Reimagining Strategies for Immigrant Justice
Photo credit: Alianza Americas
Alianza Americas adapts to the changing landscape of immigrant advocacy through technology
Alianza Americas is a network of organizations working in the United States and transnationally to create an inclusive, equitable and sustainable way of life for migrant communities across North, Central and South America. Local member organizations include social and legal service providers, cultural groups, and community-based organizations.
At the onset of COVID-19, Alianza Americas surveyed member organizations to understand the immediate challenges they were facing in providing direct care to their communities. Results demonstrated an urgent need for technological training and resources. Support from Walder Foundation has allowed Alianza Americas to pivot in-person programming to virtual platforms, providing capacity building support to over 40 member organizations. This support will allow Alianza Americas’ network to build long-term organizational resilience and adapt to the changing political and social landscape for advocacy.
Virtual Delegations
Delegations are a signature initiative of Alianza Americas in which elected officials, decision-makers, journalists and social justice leaders in the United States are invited to Central America and Mexico to learn firsthand the situation and challenges communities in these countries face within the context of inequality, democracy, and human rights. These exchanges allow for a deeper understanding of those communities, better informing their advocacy work. In 2021, Alianza Americas launched their first series of virtual delegations after on-site delegations were put on hold in 2020 due to COVID-19. As of November 2021, Alianza Americas has held two virtual delegations, “Realities and Challenges: Tools for the Transformation of El Salvador,” and “Leadership Seedbed,” a project seeking to strengthen youth leadership.
Capacity Building
Alianza Americas’ Leadership Assembly is a bi-annual transnational event for members and partners to engage in trainings and plan advocacy strategies for the next two years. In 2020, Alianza Americas pivoted the in-person event to a virtual platform. “Asamblea 2020 = Transformation 2.0” focused on the health disparities and structural inequities exposed and increased by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Other capacity building efforts have included training member organizations on technology and digital organizing, and advocacy campaigns to connect local elected officials to the immigration issues impacting their communities, including the need to increase protections for DACA and TPS holders, and the impacts of deportation and family separation in the Chicago area.
“Shifting our programming to a digital landscape has allowed us to reach new audiences we otherwise wouldn’t have been able to reach,” says Oscar Chacon, Executive Director of Alianza Americas. “With this transition, we’ve been able to offer new trainings in the context of the rise of racial reckoning, intersectionality with migration, and COVID-19.”
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