Consciousness-raising (CR) as an organizing model originated in 1967 with the New York Radical Women’s organization (NYRW) and became the predominate organizing model of the women’s liberation movement of the 1960’s and 1970’s. Though it represented a unique theory for bringing about radical change, CR drew on the experiences of the earlier labor and civil rights movements. In fact, the term “consciousness-raising” came from NYRW member Anne Forer recalling that labor movements had spoken of raising the consciousness of workers who did not know they were oppressed. She asked the other women to give her examples from their lives of how they had been oppressed, because she needed to “raise her consciousness.” This model of a dozen or less women gathering to each discuss problems of collective oppression quickly spread from New York to Chicago and then across the United States. At the movement’s peak in 1973, it is estimated that 100,000 women across the U.S. belonged to CR groups. As CR gained momentum in the feminist movement, gay rights activists also adopted the model.

Researched and produced by: UMN Center for Intergrative Leadership, Spring 2012.
See following link to view all eleven community organizing models: http://www.incommons.org/node/6591