2024 has been a full year for us at PBP, one full of good work advancing participatory democracy, navigating transitions and changes on our team and work, and taking on new opportunities that have allowed us the chance to expand our reach and deepen our commitment to this work.
As it comes to a close, we’ve gathered some of our favorite highlights and accomplishments from this year to look back, reflect, and celebrate. Take a journey through the last 12 months with us through our 2024 PBP Highlights!
We’re also excited to share what we’ve been up to this winter and what we are looking forward to in the new year.
End of Year Giving Invitation
As the year comes to a close, will you invest in democracy with us?
Together, we’re continuing to dream big for participatory democracy into 2025 and beyond. While doing the internal work needed to ensure PBP reflects our organizational values of equity, transparency, and experimentation, we are also leveling up our library of resources, training more community leaders on participatory budgeting, and organizing an in-person learning exchange in 2025.
We are excited to bring PBP into the next phase of its evolution as a sustainable, resilient organization. And we need you to make it happen! Make a donation today to help us build this movement.
PB Seeds New Jersey First Cohort
With support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, we convened the first PB Seeds New Jersey cohort this fall. PB Seeds is our new, state-based advocacy training program that connects and equips leaders and advocates with the knowledge, tools, and support to advocate for PB in their communities.
Over five intensive learning sessions, we trained eight selected community leaders from across NJ on how to advocate for and run a PB process. They even got the chance to practice with a Mock PB cycle! By the end of the cohort, they left with an advocacy plan to take back to their community and access to coaching and support sessions from us as they start to organize for PB. Read more about the first cohort, and stay tuned in 2025 for information about our next one!
PB Seeds California Launch
We are excited to announce the launch of PB Seeds California! In 2025, the PB Seeds California will gather community leaders for a multi-week training cohort about participatory budgeting (PB) to lay the groundwork for growing PB across the state.
We will train participants in what participatory budgeting (PB) is, how to advocate for it, and best practices for successful implementation. Find out more about the program and upcoming cohort on the PB Seeds California webpage!
DBE Fall Peer Learning Session
For their Fall 2024 Peer Learning Session, Democracy Beyond Elections gathered youth leaders from across the nation to share their work and experiences with participatory democracy practices. The event was facilitated by our amazing DBE Coalition Manager, Petula Hanley and hosted in collaboration with DBE Coalition Members Center for the Future of Arizona, Participatory Budgeting Oregon, Black Nashville Assembly, Healthy Democracy and Generation Citizen.
During the learning session, panelists shared about their experience with approaches like People’s Movement Assemblies, youth voting, and participatory budgeting that are essential to building a robust, inclusive democracy. Attendees then had the opportunity to join the inspiring panlists in break out rooms for more in depth conversations on each topic. During the wrap up participants named feeling re-energized and grateful for the brilliance of young people. Tune in for the full replay!
Isabel's Tour of Global Democracy Innovations
This past October, our Director of Training and Curriculum Design Isabel Luciano headed to Europe to speak at the annual International Observatory on Participatory Democracy (IOPD) conference, and turned it into a small tour of democratic innovations happening across the world by also attending Decidim Fest nearby.
As Isabel shares, “I found a lot of energy and hope in both the number of people working on building our shared democratic resilience, and in the rich conversations these convenings facilitated – many of which have been largely absent from our mainstream news outlets.” Read both parts of her tour of democracy innovations on the IOPD conference and the Decidim conference.
George Reflects on Learnings from WSFTE Conference
As George shared, “Attending the WSFTE was a moving experience. In many ways, it was a return to the ideological home of PB, where I was reminded that transformative economies are those that ‘interchange necessities, and are based on solidarity and complementarity.’ I return to my work at PBP inspired, bringing back a rejuvenated spirit as I pick up my work on developing the curriculum for our forthcoming training program.”
The WSFTE convened practitioners who are engaging in alternatives to the capitalist world system. They came together to share their experiences in grassroots communities as we sought to collectively reimagine how we conceive of economic life beyond for-profit markets and extractivism. Read about his conference experience!
Jane Finds a Thread of Hope
Post election, our Development Manager Jane DeRonne pulled on intriguing threads of unmet needs, the MAGA movement, democracy, and how PB can begin to build the mass movement for justice and democracy.
In her reflective blog piece, she ruminates on deep reads on the cultural contradictions of neoliberalism and the the work of democracy advocates in this moment. As Jane asserts, “What we need is not only reform to government systems on the one hand and an organized base of grassroots community groups on the other hand. What we need is more connective tissue between these two efforts.”
Read on to pick up this of hope post election in the movement we are building together.
Upcoming Event: Shifting Budgets, Shifting Power
Participatory budgeting shifts budgets and builds people power. But can we also use it to redesign our relationships to capital and one another while standing in solidarity with other social justice movements?
Join us for this interactive 90 minute workshop as we sit in conversation with activist and author Jasmine Rashid to discuss “The Financial Activist Playbook: 8 Strategies for Everyday People to Reclaim Wealth and Collective Well-Being.” She will outline the eight strategies (PB is one!) and lead us through her five step method for taking actions as a financial activist. RSVP now to join us on January 23rd!
Partner Highlights
The Democracy Beyond Elections Coalition is excited to share our newest case study with you about local advocates’ inspiring efforts to win PB in Cleveland, OH.
Special thank you to DBE coalition partners Catalyst California, Partners for Dignity and Rights, and all of the organizers from PBCle for the work that went into this case study, including deep reflection on a powerful campaign and concrete lessons learned for advocates.
We invite you to read the People’s Budget Cleveland case study, bring to your next organizing meeting, and listen to organizer Molly Martin talk candidly about the campaign on Partners for Dignity and Rights’s The Next World podcast.
During their Remixing Democracy webinar, People Powered unpacked the latest methods to blend democratic practices—from citizens’ assemblies to social movements—in order to create stronger, more inclusive democratic ecosystems. Check out their recap blog and the event recording!
We collaborated with Enterprise Community Partners to build a participatory budgeting toolkit for Distressed Cities in the HUD exchange.
This toolkit, available in both English and Spanish, is designed to help smaller units of general local government (UGLGs) and their nonprofit partners learn about participatory budgeting (PB) and how to deploy it in their communities.
Will you invest in democracy with us? Make a donation today to help us build this movement.
With your help, the PBP team is ready to step into this new year re-energized and ready to re-imagine democracy. Make your gift today, and wrap up 2024 with a commitment to real community-led decison making!
