[Dialogue] Communication from ICA-USA Board on Restructuring

[David Dunn]

On 10/21/06 5:27 AM, "FacilitationFla at aol.com"  wrote:

> I would be interested in knowing which ICA offices will continue to function
> around the world.

Cynthia asks an interesting and pertinent question.

It's interesting, because in the first instance, the future of ICAs around
the world is quite independent of the fortunes of ICA USA. It's pertinent
because it involves the question of the nature of the relationship between
the ICA USA and other ICAs around the world.

It's probably no revelation to say that some ICAs are healthy and some are
not. It probably is a revelation that the ICA USA is among the less healthy.
We will all learn a lot by reviewing the underlying contradictions that led
to this state of affairs and by building a consensus about alternative
futures.

One question about which the present board of directors is not at all
certain (or so it seems to me) is the value of internationalism and
international engagement for the ICA USA.

John Patterson (Canada), Lambert Okrah (ICAI's Secretary General, now in
Toronto), Nelson Stover (ICA USA's elected representative to the ICAI board
and its current president), Dick Alton and Louise Singleton (USA), and
certainly others (e.g., Larry Philbrook) will all have data on the viability
of our sister ICAs that is certainly more immediate than mine. But here's a
perspective on the ICA USA.

Volunteer colleagues in the US like Louise Singleton--Denver-based and
globally mobile--have been strategically involved with many others in
HIV/AIDS work, including Canadian, British and African colleagues. John and
Thea Patterson's daughter Myriam, Raymond Spencer's [and Laura's] daughter
Asha, Jon Lubin and Joanna Bickel, are in Kenya for four months doing
HIV/AIDS testing with an entire Maasai village as I type.

The work of ICA volunteers and staff members has saved lives; spared
survivors the descent into destitution; mobilized hundreds, perhaps
thousands of villagers to care for their neighbors; and become a model of
community development-based HIV/AIDS intervention. The foundational insight:
the 'fight against' HIV/AIDS is waged by 'campaigns for' economic
prosperity, gender equity, communal cohesion, grassroots image change for
healthy living and social innovation for social welfare and human
development.

Here are the unanswered questions for the ICA USA. Should this kind of work
(HIV/AIDS education and prevention work; implementing HIV/AIDS action
research and demonstration projects) be one aspect of ICA USA's mission? If
so, should it be implemented by staff, but volunteers or by both? If not,
should the ICA USA encourage other ICAs around the world to undertake these
kinds of activities? Should interested individuals look for other
organizations who can tap funds from the US government and other US funders
to sponsor the engagement of ICA-trained individuals in HIV/AIDS education
and prevention initiatives overseas? Should a separate 'chapter' or 'unit'
of ICA International be incorporated in the US (and elsewhere) to develop
and manage international projects of ICA-related people?

At the moment there is no consensus on these issues. Opportunities to
develop new initiatives in concert with, for example, our African
colleagues, are being refused. The profound human need and the tangible
human talent and experience in members of our movement make such questions
of focus, scope and intent key matters for consideration and consensus
building among the network of ICA USA colleagues, our friends around the
world, and the board of directors to whom the governance of the ICA USA has
been entrusted.

David
 
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David Dunn
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720-221-4661
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