We develop, pilot and scale economic and social models for a more democratic, just and sustainable world.
What We Do
The Movement Collective helps create organizations that reshape crucial systems in our society, building collective agency and re-localizing economies for essential goods – such as food, energy and housing. Here is how we work:
The Movement Collective does not work alone. Developing new economic and social models that truly reshape systems requires deep, nuanced knowledge of how the current systems works, matched with the ability to imagine, design, and build models for new systems. The Movement Collective conducts intensive networking to identify aligned partners with deep experience in a given the field.
1. We identify partners.
The Movement Collective then facilitates a dialogue with these partners to collaboratively imagine and design a new, systems changing model for the field. These dialogues are open, generative and exploratory, creating opportunities for pathbreaking approaches to emerge.
2. We imagine and design a new model.
3. We build an organization.
The Movement Collective leads a process to build an organization to implement the model, including establishing an organizational structure, standing up administrative, financial, and management systems, forming a leadership team, raising seed funding, and creating a strategic roadmap.
The Movement Collective team and our partners run a pilot program in a local community and then scale the model, including raising long-term funding, building out a staff team, and establishing key partnerships.
4. We pilot and scale the model.
Current Projects
For years, municipalities and counties have granted permits and leased public land to renewable energy developers only to see them siphon the lion’s share of the financial returns out of their communities. The Movement Collective, in partnership with longtime solar developers, launched Municipal Solar Partners: a first-of-its-kind non-profit developer of municipally-owned solar that returns all of the financial benefits of the projects to the local communities. Check out MSP’s website here: www.municipalsolar.org.
We are launching the Movement Counselors Network to address the rise of systemic anxiety – anxiety driven by the societal crises we face. Movement Counselors are mental health professionals who are also experienced activists. They help people struggling with systemic anxiety get involved in activism, matching them with social change organizations and providing the ongoing support they need to have a sustainable, impactful, and fulfilling experience – turning systemic anxiety into action for social change.
Coming soon…
The Movement Collective will be sharing information about new projects soon. We are currently partnering with solar developers, fishermen, therapists, state and local government officials, chefs, organizers, and nonprofit leaders. If you have an idea for a project that you would like to develop with The Movement Collective, you can send us information here.
Our Leadership
Matt has spent three decades founding and leading path-breaking systems change organizations, including Global Zero, which was twice nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for its work to prevent nuclear war and eliminate all nuclear weapons through track-two diplomacy for arms control agreements, policy development and global coalition-building. Matt was the Secretary of State of Rhode Island where he removed barriers to voting, including creating a first-in-the-nation automatic voter registration system.
Matt Brown
AJ works to develop organizational and operational structures designed to meet the needs of unconventional organizations dedicated to social change. He has also helped lead campaigns that have blocked fossil fuel infrastructure, won emergency shelter space for the unhoused and passed groundbreaking municipal-level legislation. His work combating illegal and inequitable property tax assessment in Detroit led to the distribution of $4.4 million in relief and halted hundreds of property tax foreclosures.
AJ Braverman
In addition to the Movement Collective leadership and our project partners, our project teams include advisors, designers, lawyers, bookkeepers, researchers, and others. The Movement Collective leadership builds and manages these teams, ensuring they fit the needs of the projects at each stage of their development.