Strategic Plan: 2008-2012

The Akonadi Foundation’s mission is to support the development of powerful social change movements to eliminate structural racism and create a racially just society.

To read the full document you can download it here. 

We achieve our mission through:

• Grantmaking:  The Akonadi Foundation provides financial and capacity-building support to organizations that advance an explicit racial justice analysis and practice. We also provide opportunities for these racial justice organizations to connect with each other through grantee-led convenings and other timely movement-building opportunities that promote collaboration in the field.
• Peer Networking
  Raising Resources:  The Akonadi Foundation increases the resources available to the field by encouraging other funders to support racial justice organizing, and by coordinating grantmaking strategies with local and national funders and donors.
  Raising the Profile:  The Akonadi Foundation documents and disseminates case studies, best practices and contemporary racial justice theories.

Moving forward, Akonadi will be guided by several beliefs:

• Because racism is structural, a social movement is needed to overcome it.  Such a movement needs to move large numbers of people to action to achieve structural and cultural transformation on a local, national and global scale. The movement must be comprised of a diverse range of communities and approaches coalescing at a moment in time, uniting people through shared strategy, principles and goals.  It must address the interconnected areas of culture, law and policy, and base building and community power that are all necessary for achieving racial justice.
  
  The Akonadi Foundation understands that the field of racial justice organizing is currently made up of groups with many different strategies, ideologies and issues that may or may not identify as part of a cohesive movement. These organizations are often seeking a clear unifying vision, yet funders often separate them into issue silos.  Given our assessment of the field, the foundation will partner with these organizations to provide funds to bring people together and begin sharing strategies, articulating a common racial justice lens across issues, and identifying common strategies across issues.

• Social movements grow over time and need investments that are long-term and developmental.   Movements are built in stages, as are the organizations involved in movement building.  The Akonadi Foundation will therefore support organizations that are developing or advancing an analysis of structural racism and that are committed to pro-active racial justice organizing.   We recognize that there will be organizations at many points along the spectrum, from those just beginning to work towards racial justice to those with a long track record of racial justice accomplishments.  The Akonadi Foundation will support the development of its grantees through establishing deep, long-term partnerships.
• Social movements are sparked by and grounded in local examples of innovation and success.  Large social movements are anchored in local stories (e.g., the Birmingham Bus Boycott, Stonewall and Soweto uprisings, etc.) that capture popular imagination and demonstrate impact.  The Akonadi Foundation believes that racial justice organizing in our “own backyard” of Oakland has the potential to become an example that inspires and informs work across the country.
• Ending structural racism requires explicit and direct focus.    Organizations and foundations need to deepen their collective understanding of structural racism and develop a more strategic collective approach to racial justice. Moreover, lack of shared and precise language to describe structural racism and a societal reluctance to talk directly about race hinders the progress of the racial justice movement. The Akonadi Foundation will promote an explicit focus on structural racism and work with both funders and practitioners to build a shared language and movement building strategy to dismantle structural racism.
• Cross-Generational Leadership Nourishes the Racial Justice Movement.  Young people are vital to the burgeoning racial justice movement and understand that an explicit race analysis is the only way to identify and resolve issues.  Supporting youth organizing and cross-generational organizing are critical components to both movement-building and racial justice organizing.

"Culture is an indispensable weapon in the freedom struggle."

- Malcolm X