Consider what types of action might be effective

You need to identify what types of action are likely to be the most effective in reducing the inequalities you have chosen to focus on. The social, political, and legal context in your country, is likely to affect which actions are most effective.

One way to do this is to think broadly about the effectiveness of the things you might do, in terms of:

• Your skills: What resources, skills, contacts and capacities you have in your team.
• Working together: You might also think about whether there are other groups you could work with to build on your strengths.
• What works: What previous actions seem to have been effective in bringing about change in your country – and what can you learn about why they were effective?
• Good opportunities: Whether there might be specific opportunities, coming up where the issue could be brought to the public attention, or when policy makers might be most receptive to ideas. For example, in the lead up to local or national elections.
• Where the power to make changes lies: You need to think realistically about what types of action might lead to real change – which might be from influencing key politicians, from local action which, for example, targets businesses or schools, from a social media campaign, or other options.
• Any risks: You should consider whether there are any risks associated with taking any planned action.

Your skills

Your action for change, and the activities you undertake, will be more effective if you tailor your work to build on your main strengths, and the strengths of others you plan to work with. These may be things like:

• The facts you have established about multidimensional inequality through applying the MIF. You should take the opportunity to share, promote, present and repeat the important and invaluable facts and messages you have uncovered in the course of your work using the Multidimensional Inequality Framework.
• Detailed knowledge and expertise about the dimensions of inequality you are focusing on, this could include knowledge of those who are directly affected.
• Networks and good contacts with people with wider skills and expertise that you can draw on, as well as contact with people with influence and power who could help you bring about change.
• Social media skills, writing skills, data visualisation and presentation skills.
• Good fund raising skills and knowledge of opportunities – you will always need some financial resources to put an effective plan into action.

This process of looking at your strengths will give you a clear idea of the added value that you and your team can bring.

You may also find it helpful to think about your limitations. Some actions may need more resources than you have available; or require skills you and your team do not have. You may be aware that previous actions in your country have failed, and want to identify the reasons why this happened so you do not repeat the same mistakes.

Working together

Working with others can increase your chance of success. Others can bring complementary skills, you can share resources and ideas, and it can help motivation and avoid duplication.

• This might involve working with similar groups who have already started to develop an evidence base and take action. They may be keen to work with you if you make contact.
• You could make contact through social media groups, and you may find individuals who are active on social media who you could approach for support and collaborative working.

What works

Identifying ‘what works’ will allow you to take effective action to reduce inequalities.

• You may have great ideas and plenty of enthusiasm within your group for collecting or analysing certain types of data, or for taking some high profile actions. These activities may well be effective in raising public awareness of inequality.
• Bringing about a sustainable reduction in inequality can take a long time and may need targeted action in areas where the opportunities of more fundamental change are greater.
• You may already have reviewed the evidence of what works for specific candidate policies by main driver categories. Use these resources to help identify what works.
• It can be helpful to look at recent policy changes in your country, and try to identify what made them successful. You could talk to some of the people who were involved in bringing about those changes and you can also look at what has been successful in similar countries to you own.

Good opportunities

Spotting good opportunities can help increase your chance of success.

• There may already be public pressure on the inequalities you are planning to focus on and you could build on these concerns to find support for action.
• There may be evidence of changing public attitudes and you could target your action on building on that change.
• You could target local or national elections where electoral candidates could be persuaded to support and promote the reduction in inequalities you are concerned about within their campaigning platform.
• You could contribute to government or independent reviews into the inequalities you have chosen to focus on, who are seeking contributions from interested groups. You could provide the facts about inequalities you have established, the drivers of these inequalities and the policies you have identified as necessary to reduce these inequalities.

Where the power to make changes lies

To identify where the power to make change lies you can:

• Identify the key actors who are influential or shape actual policy in your country.
• Use this information to develop an understanding of who holds the levers of power to bring about long lasting change in the inequality you are focusing on.
• Use these resources to inform the decisions you make about the specific actions you take.

Any risks

When you take action around a particular aspect of inequality, you need to think through the possible risks involved. Identifying potential risks should be a key part of your planning of the activities you might undertake.

You may be in a country where there is a repressive governments or a weak rule of law, and where speaking out – even on basic rights issues – can have risks associated with it. Even in countries with more robust democracies speaking out about political and elite capture, drawing attention to wealth and income inequalities and confronting abusive corporate practices can incur legal, reputational and organisational risks. In some countries, people may be sacked from their jobs, socially ostracised or trolled and threatened online, or find themselves prosecuted through the courts on trivial or trumped up charges. You need to assess this carefully in your context before taking action.

This may involve asking questions like:

• What are the most serious risks in your context for the actions you plan on the priority issues identified? Are there physical, legal, reputational or personal risks that you might run?
• What measures can be taken to reduce risk? With whom can you work, or what strategies can you use, to reduce risk?