About

About RLG

Resisting, Learning, Growing (RLG) was originally short for the research project [Resisting, Learning, Growing] Investigating the Role of Social Movement Praxis in UK Agroecology Transformations. As part of this project a group of landworkers and activists came together as an action learning group to collectively reflect on how to support the UK agroecology movement to be more powerful. The website reflects both the work of the collective and the research project, both of which have now finished. The ideas from this work are being taken forward now into practical movement organising and coalition building work.

About me

I am a facilitator, community organiser, and researcher based in Cardiff, Wales. As a community organiser and scholar-activist, I root myself in traditions of critical pedagogy and participatory action research and am passionate about social movement organising and grassroots learning practices.

I have learned a lot over the last few years alongside members of the action learning group and others active in the movement. It’s exciting to see the our collective work develop and expand beyond this project, especially at a time when the agroecology movement and connected movements are giving more attention to effective and transformative organising and learning strategies.

About the Research

The RLG research project worked to support agroecological transformations in the UK through understanding, developing, and sharing key learning and organising strategies employed by the agroecology movement to scale agroecological practice and political mobilisation. It developed a collective analysis of the strengths of current movement praxis, some limitations, and ways forward to develop a more powerful and transformative agroecology movement.

RLG began in 2019 and is my PhD research based at Cardiff University.

About the Action Learning Group

The RLG Action Learning group has now ended but during the project we explored the social and political aspects of agroecology, using theoretical and conceptual frameworks to empower our work beyond the field.

By,

• calling attention to the vital work of movement organising strategies and learning practices,
• highlighting issues of power and justice,
• providing a space for collective learning and reflection,
• and sharing learning with others

we aimed to help build a transformative agroecology movement.

RLG’s Theory of Change

We believe that creating agroecological food systems will be brought about through cultivating connections and developing healthy relationships and working together in a coordinated, strategic way to leverage power. 

This involves creating strong and respectful relationships between human beings, recognising the critical place that diversity has in systems we all depend on, and seeking to hold healthy dialogue with those we don’t agree with wherever possible. 

Secondly, it refers to recognising our interdependence with non-human beings and the natural world around us: cultivating those connections and resourcing ourselves through agroecological and cultural practices. 

RLG focuses our attention on supporting prefigurative ways of organising, encouraging ambition and giving reasons to hope that we can be a movement powerful enough to realise our vision.