The Jemez Principles for Democratic Organizing were established in December 1996 during a hosting of the “Working Group Meeting on Globalization and Trade” in Jemez, New Mexico. The meeting was hosted by the Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice (SNEEJ) and brought together forty people of color and European-American representatives to forge a common understanding of how to build cross-cultural, cross-political, and cross-organizational solidarity.
The core of the Jemez Principles consists of six fundamental guidelines designed to foster democratic, bottom-up organizing:
- Be Inclusive: True inclusiveness requires more than tokenism. It demands having diverse voices at the planning table, in staffing, and in coordination, which requires patience, advance planning, and a willingness to work constructively through conflict.
- Emphasis on Bottom-Up Organizing: Organizing must actively reach and empower the base of a community. Continually building and strengthening this base provides the credibility, strategies, and leadership development necessary for sustained movement energy.
- Let People Speak for Themselves: Organizers must ensure that the direct voices of those affected are heard, and that spokespersons are accountable to their respective constituencies.
- Work Together in Solidarity and Mutuality: Organizations with compatible visions must actively support one another. This means integrating the goals and values of partner movements into one’s own work rather than just offering passive, transactional support.
- Build Just Relationships Among Ourselves: Partners must treat each other with justice and respect by being transparent about decision-making processes, strategy sharing, and the distribution of resources.
- Commitment to Self-Transformation: Shifting from individualism to community-centeredness. Organizers must “walk our talk” and embody the very values of peace, justice, and community they are fighting for.
How the Jemez Principles are Applied in Practice
Organizations apply these principles to shift power away from top-down, exclusionary structures and toward collaborative, community-led initiatives:
1. Reforming Traditional Environmental Advocacy (The Sierra Club)
Historically, large national environmental groups faced criticism for “parachuting” into local communities, calling the shots, and leaving without establishing a true partnership, which fostered resentment among local environmental justice organizations.
To repair this dynamic, the Sierra Club Board formally adopted the Jemez Principles in March 2014. They apply these principles as an organizing methodology to shift from transactional campaigns to transformational relationships. In practice, this looks like:
- Outings and Outdoors Access: Sierra Club outings are designed to reduce financial, social, and physical barriers, centering marginalized groups who have historically been excluded from mainstream conservation.
- Land Acknowledgements: Outing leaders integrate spoken territory acknowledgments at the start of trips to actively honor the ancestral land and respect Indigenous history.
- Shared Decision-Making: Developing long-term partnerships that actively share decision-making power, resources, and policy control.
2. Guiding Door-to-Door Grassroots Campaigns (Just Transition Northwest Indiana)
During their June 2023 door-to-door canvassing campaign opposing the MachH2 Hydrogen Hub, Just Transition Northwest Indiana (JTNWI) utilized the Jemez Principles as a cornerstone of their training curriculum within their Canvass Resource Center. Canvassers applied the principles to build local power in highly industrialized “sacrifice zones”:
- Centering Lived Experience: Following the principle to “let people speak for themselves,” canvassers focused on listening rather than immediate persuasion, guiding technical conversations about carbon pipelines through residents’ personal experiences with local industrial pollution, flaring, and asthma.
- Equitable Entry Points: Organizers accommodated diverse needs by utilizing bilingual (English and Spanish) materials, offering stipends for canvassers, and organizing art-based “Community Conversations” rather than strict, uninviting policy discussions.
3. Amplifying Voice in Regulatory Processes (Communities for a Better Environment)
In legal and planning arenas, advocates apply Jemez Principle #3 (“Let People Speak for Themselves”) to democratize development. Senior staff attorney Jennifer Ganata highlights that the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) serves as a vital legal mechanism for deep democracy:
- Democratic Accountability: CEQA legally empowers working-class communities of color (who carry disproportionate pollution burdens) to submit public comments that agencies are legally mandated to evaluate and respond to in writing.
- Community-Led Planning: Communities along California’s unincorporated areas and the I-710 corridor have used CEQA to directly challenge freeway expansions and industrial warehouse developments, forcing developers to implement community benefit funds, perform traffic safety changes, and extend local water services.
4. Grounding Indigenous Engagement (National Wildlife Federation)
The National Wildlife Federation (NWF) explicitly grounded its Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) implementation guidelines in the Jemez Principles. Designed to protect the self-determination of Native and Indigenous Communities (NICs) on conservation projects, this application includes:
- Addressing Power Imbalances: Explicitly acknowledging resource disparities, adjusting project timelines to fit Tribal decision-making models, and proactively compensating Indigenous partners for their time and intellectual labor.
- Accepting “No” as a Decision: Aligned with self-determination, the NWF guidelines mandate that staff must respect and document an NIC’s decision if they choose to withhold or withdraw consent.
5. Shifting Power in Philanthropy (Participatory Grantmaking)
In philanthropy, activists push funders to adopt the Jemez Principles to dismantle rigid, top-down funding constraints. For instance, during the Participatory Climate Initiative, these principles were applied to shift power directly to grassroots groups:
- Holistic Definitions: Rather than restricting funding to rigid frameworks like “climate change mitigation,” the initiative embraced more expansive, community-centered language focusing on “Mother Earth” and traditional ecological knowledge.
- Reducing Administrative Burdens: Funders aimed to absorb administrative risks themselves—such as providing flexible multi-year grants to informal collectives, tribes, and small businesses rather than requiring groups to jump through standard, complex 501(c)(3) registration hurdles.
💡 We could dive deeper into one of these specific case studies—such as how the National Wildlife Federation applies these principles to Indigenous consent, or how grassroots organizers in Indiana used them to challenge the industrial hydrogen hub. Which of those angles interests you most?