On March 18th, 2022, Platform hosted Harsha Walia for our inaugural Redefining Leadership Talk. This event celebrated Harsha’s demonstrated knowledge and activism and how it directly informs the way we work, advocate, and lead as an organization and as individuals. Marking the end of Platform’s first Redefining Leadership Fellowship cohort, Harsha’s words greatly captured the spirit of our fellowship and the leadership showcased by the Fellows we had the honour of working with throughout the past few months.

Redefining Leadership is a Fellowship that brings together a cohort of Black, Indigenous, and racialized young women and gender diverse youth leaders from across what is currently known as Canada and who have prior experience in advocacy and leadership. The fellowship aims to support fellows by amplifying their impact, expanding their leadership, and giving them tools, networks, and best practices so they can continue to support their communities in a meaningful way.

This cohort of the fellowship centered young leaders working on anti-racist initiatives. Our five fellows have spent the past six months in a community of learning and healing with each other, facilitated by a series of guest speakers to focus on their own personal development and growth. Each Fellow brought a depth of knowledge and experience to the program and their participation in the program did not only contribute to their own growth as leaders, but affirmed to us what we have always known as an organization:

Young Black, Indigenous, and racialized women are leading on multiple fronts in our community, and redefining leadership through mixing lived experience and practice with community and academic knowledge.

Culminating this period of growth, Harsha Walia joined us to share teachings based on her work as an organizer and writer addressing a multitude of issues such as migrant justice, abolitionism, anti-imperialism, feminism, anti-racism, and anti-capitalist movements for over two decades. Harsha is based in Vancouver, on unceded Coast Salish territories, and the author of Border and Rule: Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism (2021) and Undoing Border Imperialism (2013); and the co-author of Red Women Rising: Indigenous Women Survivors in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside (2019) and Never Home: Legislating Discrimination in Canadian Immigration (2015). She believes in overgrowing the logic of the state and racial capitalism.

We were so lucky to have Harsha join us in March.

Here are a few lessons we learned from Harsha: 

Go Beyond Land Acknowledgments

The first white supremacists on these lands were colonizers who massacred indigenous people. This is very much present.

Harsha highlighted that white supremacy and settler colonialism are not subjects of the past, or new frames of analysis in the present. In our actions of community organizing, advocacy, and leadership, Harsha reminds us to move from an acknowledgment to material responsibility. This urges us to think critically not only about what to say in regards to Indigenous solidarity, but how we can collaborate with Indigenous communities and organizations, provide material resources and support, and call upon other organizations we share space with to do the same.

Leadership

There is no liberation in isolation, it is not possible. We are constellations, we are not Islands we need each other in this work.

Harsha highlighted that leadership is the power of possibility. It is all of us struggling together to transform the systems around us. The work we do in our communities and with our comrades allows us to bring a sense of humanity, a sense of purpose, and a sense of hope to each other and our communities. Harsha reminds us that while the barriers we face are longstanding and persistent, so are the histories of leadership, resistance, and community we are able to draw from.

We couldn’t agree more. Our five Fellows are the embodiment of the community centred, care focused, and intersectional leadership we need to tackle systemic oppression and bring our community knowledge and solutions to the front.

Community 

We speak truth to power not because we think power is listening, but because we still have to speak truth to each other, we still have to show up for each other.

Harsha noted being intentional about who we view as leaders, who we accept leadership from, and who we struggle with. Our networks of safety are what keep us safe. Similarly, our networks are also what keep us motivated, strong, and how we find pleasure in our activism. Harsha’s commentary on community and leadership highlighted the importance of not only being in community and looking beyond oneself, but emphasized being intentional about who you are in community with.

We must ensure that the leadership we are supporting upholds anti-oppression and transformative justice. In order to fight systemic injustice, we need collective leadership that radically changes our approach to community organizing, partnerships, and education. And at the heart of that, we must put transformative justice that helps us heal and grow from the systemic oppression we have internalized, and create new possibilities for learning, accountability, and action.

To learn more about our Fellowship, click here.

We distributed 100 copies of Harsha’s book Border and Rule Global Migration, Capitalism, and the Rise of Racist Nationalism accompanied by Sarjesa tea to our guests!

This event was made possible through the generous sponsorship of VanCity Community Investment Bank, the only Canadian bank committed to working exclusively with organizations focused on driving positive change.