The following is a list of incredible organizations. We've chosen to feature groups that are led by the same people they're serving; this means most are run by and for people of color and oppressed communities. These are mostly small groups, where a donation of $100 will go directly to ground-level work, not large administrative overheads. These groups use their funding to create necessary and often overdue changes.
New York
Critical Resistance NYC
“CR is a community people who think that we can come up with better solutions to conflict than prisons and other forms of control. As our experiences have shown us, through these many years, prisons do not work, they primarily target communities of color, and they do not help us deal with crime or violence. We are busy creating a community space where we can talk; think up community solutions that work for all of us and to decrease the power of the Prison Industrial Complex over us. Join us in our work together as communities in the South Bronx." For more information about CRNYC's projects, click the above link.
Click Here to Donate(select NYC chapter)Movement for Justice in El Barrio
Movement for Justice in El Barrio was founded by immigrants and low-income people of color fighting back against the effects of neoliberalism and discrimination in all of its forms and operates on a commitment to the ideals of self-determination, autonomy and participatory democracy. We believe we have the right and responsibility to lead our own struggle for justice by making decisions collectively and democratically and by developing our political analysis through the examination of the root causes of oppression. Movement for Justice in El Barrio is fighting against neoliberal gentrification in our neighborhood, a process that is better understood by we, the humble and simple people who are affected by it, as the displacement of families from their homes for being poor, immigrants and people of color.
Click Here to DonateMalcolm X Grassroots Movement
The Malcolm X Grassroots Movement is an organization of Afrikans in America/New Afrikans whose mission is to defend the human rights of our people and promote self-determination in our community. We understand that the collective institutions of white-supremacy, patriarchy and capitalism have been at the root of our people's oppression. We understand that without community control and without the power to determine our own lives, we will continue to fall victim to genocide. Therefore, we seek to heighten our consciousness about self-determination as a human right and a solution to our colonization. While organizing around our principles of unity, we are building a network of Black/New Afrikan activists and organizers committed to the protracted struggle for the liberation of the New Afrikan Nation - By Any Means Necessary!
Click Here to DonateSPEAC School (Sunset Park Education in Action Community School)
SPEAC School (Sunset Park Education in Action Community School) planning team
The SPEAC School planning team is working to build a new 6-12 public school for our community, in our community. This school will be founded on:
* A belief that youth succeed in an individualized, responsive, and rigorous learning environment with clear relevance to the world around them.
* An awareness that wellness is the intersection of social, economic, and environmental justice, individual health, and community strength.
* An understanding that students, families, teachers, and neighbors play an active role as community builders working towards a healthier, more just world.
* A commitment to developing sustainable wellness both within our walls and in the community beyond.
A community-based planning team, we have been working for the past two years to develop our vision. We have met with youth, parents, community organizations, elected officials, principals of local elementary schools, and have created our school model from the dreams and demands we've heard.
Audre Lorde Project
The Audre Lorde Project is a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Two Spirit, Trans and Gender Non-Conforming People of Color community organizing center, focusing on the New York City area. Through mobilization, education and capacity-building, we work for community wellness and progressive social and economic justice. Committed to struggling across differences, we seek to responsibly reflect, represent and serve our various communities.
Click Here to DonateCasa Atabex Ache
Since 1994, Casa has been "Building A Movement of Alternatives" for womyn of color in the South Bronx. Casa has a unique approach in supporting collective transformation and social change by providing holistic and alternative healing techniques for the self-empowerment of womyn of color worldwide to reclaim the power of their minds, bodies and spirits, and as a consequence their rights. We looked at women organizing models and explored organizations such as the Dominican Women's Development Center, Medgar Evers Women's Center, and the Puerto Rican Working Women's Organization in Puerto Rico. We, in Casa Atabex Aché, are proud to say we follow the legacy and are part of the history of struggle for empowerment, healing and action of our community.
Click Here to DonateRed Hook Initiative
The Red Hook Initiative works to confront and affect the consequences of intergenerational poverty through an approach that offers support in education, employment, health and community development. We believe that social change comes from within individuals. The momentum to improve the quality of life for Red Hook's residents - as well as the community at large - must come from the people living in the community. Currently over 95% of our employees live in the Red Hook Houses. We are creating a model for social change that does not exist anywhere else in the city.
Click Here to DonateCAAAV: Organizing Asian Communities
CAAAV: Organizing Asian Communities (also known as Committee Against Anti-Asian Violence) was founded by Asian women in 1986 as one of the first organizations in the United States to mobilize Asian communities to counter anti-Asian violence. CAAAV focuses on institutional violence that affects immigrant, poor and working-class communities such as worker exploitation, concentrated urban poverty, police brutality, Immigration Naturalization Service detention and deportation, and criminalization of youth and workers. By organizing across diverse, low-wage, and poor Asian communities in New York City, CAAAV exposes and struggles against violence with the goal of building community capacity to exercise self-determination. Building coalitions enables CAAAV to contribute to a unified strategy for a broader, multi-racial and multi-issue movement for social change. CAAAV is a volunteer-driven organization led by members of low-income Asian immigrant communities.
Click Here to DonateSouth
Southerners on New Ground (SONG) - Durham, NC
Southerners On New Ground (SONG) was founded in order to advance Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer multi-racial, multi-issued education and organizing capable of combating the Right’s strategies of fragmentation and division. SONG’s vision of a broad social and economic justice movement across the South, its mission to help build and strengthen that movement, and its strategy of multi-issue organizing remain as relevant, if not more relevant, today as when SONG was founded. SONG came out of conversations of Black and white southern lesbian leaders in 1993, each a long time activist on a broad range of issues, addressed deep concerns about the gains of the far right based on vicious divide and conquer tactics, particularly along fault lines of race, class and sexuality. They also expressed their hopes for helping build a broad social justice and civil rights movement where people and issues were connected and activists could bring their full selves to the organizing work.
Click Here to DonateSpirit House - Durham, NC
SpiritHouse works each day in local neighborhoods throughout the Triangle and North Carolina. We bring hope, raise consciousness, and work with low-income families and children in need. Learn more about SpiritHouse and how you can get involved with our programs while making a positive change in the community. SpiritHouse programs focus on education, the arts, health, and economic opportunities. By fighting illiteracy, racism, and poverty, we help needy families with projects that have an impact that's measurable and lasting.
Click Here to DonateFederation of Southern Cooperatives Land Assistance Fund
We strive toward the development of self-supporting communities with programs that increase income and enhance other opportunities; and we strive to assist in land retention and development, especially for African Americans, but essentially for all family farmers. We do this with an active and democratic involvement in poor areas across the South, through education and outreach strategies which support low-income people in molding their communities to become more humane and livable. We assist in the development of cooperatives and credit unions as a collective strategy to create economic self-sufficiency.
Click Here to DonateCoalition of Immokalee Workers (Immokalee, FL)
The CIW is a community-based worker organization. Our members are largely Latino, Haitian, and Mayan Indian immigrants working in low-wage jobs throughout the state of Florida. We strive to build our strength as a community on a basis of reflection and analysis, constant attention to coalition building across ethnic divisions, and an ongoing investment in leadership development to help our members continually develop their skills in community education and organization. From this basis we fight for, among other things: a fair wage for the work we do, more respect on the part of our bosses and the industries where we work, better and cheaper housing, stronger laws and stronger enforcement against those who would violate workers' rights, the right to organize on our jobs without fear of retaliation, and an end to indentured servitude in the fields.
Click Here to DonateNew Orleans, LA
Critical Resistance NOLA ... (More info here)
Critical Resistance seeks to build an international movement to end the Prison Industrial Complex by challenging the belief that caging and controlling people makes us safe. We believe that basic necessities such as food, shelter, and freedom are what really make our communities secure. As such, our work is part of global struggles against inequality and powerlessness. The success of the movement requires that it reflect communities most affected by the PIC. Because we seek to abolish the PIC, we cannot support any work that extends its life or scope.
Click Here to Donate (select NOLA chapter)Women's Health and Justice Initiative (INCITE!)
WHJI is a multi-dimensional community-based organizing project centered on improving women of color's health status and access to quality, affordable, and safe health care services integrating sexual health with reproductive and environmental justice. The Initiative's programs include a women's health clinic, a sexual health literacy and reproductive justice campaign, a community health and wellness projects, and a women's health and violence prevention project - all incorporating grassroots organizing, community-based participatory action research, and multimedia. To Donate: Please make checks out to the "Women's Health and Justice Initiative" and send your contribution to New Orleans Women's Health and Justice Initiative P.O. BOX 51325 New Orleans, LA 70151
Midwest
Young Women's Empowerment Project - Chicago, IL
Our mission as the Young Women’s Empowerment Project is to offer safe, respectful, free-of-judgment spaces for girls and young women impacted by the sex trade and street economies to recognize their goals, dreams and desires. We are run by girls and women with life experience in the sex trade and street economies. We are a youth leadership organization grounded in harm reduction and social justice organizing by and for girls and young women (ages 12-23) impacted by the sex trade and street economies.
Click Here to DonateDetroit Summer - Detriot, MI
Detroit Summer is a multi-racial, inter-generational collective in Detroit, working to transform ourselves and our communities by confronting the problems we face with creativity and critical thinking. We currently organize youth-led media arts projects and community-wide potlucks, speak-outs and parties.
Click Here to DonateEl Centro Obrero (Workers' Center) - Detriot, MI
Centro Obrero, a non profit community based organization, teaches English as a Second Language in popular education style, holds legal clinics, participates in wage recoveries, protests raids, organizes dialogues and events.
To Donate, send checks to:
Centro Obrero
4300 Michigan Ave
Detroit, MI 48210.
Phone number: (313)974-0501
West Coast
Catalyst Project - San Francisco Bay Area, CA
Catalyst project (San Francisco Bay Area, CA) Catalyst Project is a center for political education and movement building based in the San Francisco Bay Area. We are committed to anti-racist work in majority white sections of left social movements with the goal of deepening anti-racist commitment in white communities and building multiracial left movements for liberation. We are committed to creating spaces for activists and organizers to collectively develop relevant theory, vision and strategy to build our movements. Catalyst programs prioritize leadership development, supporting grassroots fighting organizations and multiracial alliance building.
Click Here to DonateGeneration 5 - San Francisco, CA
Generation FIVE’s mission is to end the sexual abuse of children within five generations. Through survivor leadership, community organizing, and public action, generation FIVE works to interrupt and mend the intergenerational impact of child sexual abuse on individuals, families, and communities. We integrate child sexual abuse prevention into social movements and community organizing targeting family violence, economic oppression, and gender, age-based and cultural discrimination, rather than continuing to perpetuate the isolation of the issue. It is our belief that meaningful community response is the key to effective prevention. Join us to help to prevent child sexual abuse in your community and make this vision a reality.
Click Here to DonateCopwatch LA - Los Angeles, CA
CWLA is a program dedicated to the struggle that will end police terrorism through collecting information on and observing police activity, by offering support to those caught in the criminal injustice system, fighting for change without a reformist consciousness, and working side-by-side with oppressed communities to create revolutionary alternatives to policing, prisons, and all systems of domination, oppression and exploitation.
Click Here to DonateNational
Iraq Veterans Against the War
Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) was founded by Iraq war veterans in July 2004 at the annual convention of Veterans for Peace (VFP) in Boston to give a voice to the large number of active duty service people and veterans who are against this war, but are under various pressures to remain silent.
From its inception, IVAW has called for:
*Immediate withdrawal of all occupying forces in Iraq;
*Reparations for the human and structural damages Iraq has suffered, and stopping the corporate pillaging of Iraq so that their people can control their own lives and future; and
*Full benefits, adequate healthcare (including mental health), and other supports for returning servicemen and women.
Our membership includes recent veterans and active duty servicemen and women from all branches of military service, National Guard members, and reservists who have served in the United States military since September 11, 2001.
IVAW’s strategy is to mobilize the military community to withdraw its support for the war and occupation in Iraq. Therefore, IVAW is leading the movement of veterans and GIs who are working to bring the troops home now.
Foundations
The Resist Foundation
RESIST is a progressive foundation that supports grassroots organizing for peace, economic, social and environmental justice, and provides political education for social change activism. For 40 years, RESIST has funded groups that challenge reactionary government policies, corporate arrogance, and right-wing fanaticism through organizing, education and action. As a non-profit organization itself, RESIST relies on contributors with a strong commitment to social, economic and environmental justice, and a firm belief in the need to build grassroots movements and capacity.
Click Here to DonateNorth Star Fund
North Star Fund is the community foundation that advances the collective good. For 28 years, we have been the first to fund the fight for equality, economic justice and peace in New York City. By organizing donors, raising money for grants, and providing technical assistance, we support activism that focuses on the root causes of poverty, racism, homophobia and gender discrimination.
Click Here to Donate