First Responders, Builders & Architects
3 Roles for Social Change
“There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in.”
- Archbishop Desmond Tutu
In The Four Pivots: Reimagining Justice, Reimaging Ourselves, author Dr. Shawn Ginwright talks about 3 “actors,” or roles, necessary to create social change. He calls them firefighters (which I’ll be referring to as first responders), builders, and architects. Let’s unpack each of the roles.
First Responders
First responders “do the important work that addresses harm and injustice in our institutions. [They] respond to the injustices in society that sometimes are invisible”1
Examples of first responders in the work of justice include, but are not limited to:
Therapists who support people in healing from trauma and injustice
After-school tutoring programs that support learning and filling in skill gaps
Advocates who support families through unfair housing policies
Builders
Builders “construct alternative institutions, policies, and laws that are fair and inclusive.”2
Builders include:
Entrepreneurs who start socially responsible businesses
Educators who create inclusive and just communities in their classrooms
Parents who work to raise healthy children in challenging areas
Non-profit workers aimed towards cultivating justice in the community.
Architects
Architects “generally take a birds-eye view of things and have the opportunity to learn from folks on the frontlines, gain knowledge from studying the issue, and produce a set of ideas that integrate both.“3 They take input from the other roles, work to understand the needs, and create a vision that remakes structures to be more inclusive and just.
As Ginwright argues, all three roles are needed for lasting social change to occur, and function best when interdependent upon each other. In my experience, one person can take on all three roles, but a healthier dynamic exists when multiple people are doing the work together, leveraging their unique strengths that tend to guide them towards one role over the others.
Personally, I find my strengths most naturally falling within the “builder” and “architect” roles. The ability to assess needs and cast a vision that meets those needs has served me well as a classroom teacher, intervention specialist, and equity leader. I also feel great joy at being able to implement the plan myself and make adjustments as the building is in process.
Interestingly, during my years as Equity Specialist, I found myself most often being assigned tasks for the “first responder” role. Much of the work I did involved providing various supports in responding to harmful language and actions, most often relating to identity slurs. Given my penchant for building and architecting, I worked to form these supports into more stable systems, not just one-time responses (though it often felt like so much of my job was putting out fires).
The role of “first responder” is vital in providing care for those who have experienced harm. It is also a role that is both demanding and draining. It can be very easy to feel like there is only time to be a “first responder” and lose sight of the “builder” and “architect” roles all together. Social change will not happen when this is the case,as the quote at the beginning of this essay alludes to, a broken system is often getting the results it was designed to produce - only the vulnerable communities that are experiencing injury and oppression will recognize the system as broken. Without “going upstream” to understand the systems that result in people falling in the river in the first place, justice is not possible.
Focusing exclusively on the “first responder” role can appear to be doing the work of justice and healing, while simultaneously maintaining oppressive systems. While the interpersonal aspects of injustice are important (which is often the focus of a “first responder”), it will not result in lasting structural changes. People who naturally benefit from these existing structures will likely not be motivated to find and promote the “builder” and “architect” roles that disrupt the status quo. They will instead remain content in pouring energy into addressing the aftermath instead of changing structures that cause harm in the first place. If you find yourself in the “first responder” role, keep doing this important work. And. Don’t lose sight of what can be done proactively and preventatively to create a more just community in the first place.
What role do you find yourself embodying most in equity work? What role do you want most? (Maybe they’re the same; perhaps not)
In case you missed it - related essays from Cultivating Justice:
Ginwright, S. A. (2022). The Four Pivots: Reimagining Justice, Reimagining Ourselves. North Atlantic Books pp. 211.
Ginwright, S. A. (2022). The Four Pivots: Reimagining Justice, Reimagining Ourselves. North Atlantic Books pp. 212.
Ginwright, S. A. (2022). The Four Pivots: Reimagining Justice, Reimagining Ourselves. North Atlantic Books pp. 212.