Reckoning with Sustainability: Black Leaders Reflect on 2020, the Funding Cliff, and Organizing Infrastructure

This installment of the Movement Infrastructure series, “Reckoning with Sustainability: Black Leaders Reflect on 2020, the Funding Cliff, and Organizing Infrastructure,” compiles insights and wisdom from over 50 Black movement leaders.

The last few years, particularly since 2020, have been marked by wide and rapid shifts in public sentiment and political opportunity related to racial justice and the concerns of Black people in the United States. This period of progress and backlash has wrought particular havoc for Black-led organizing groups. Through interviews with more than 50 Black leaders across the country, the Building Movement Project explored how leaders and their organizations understood the brief moment of “racial reckoning” in 2020, how their organizations have fared in the years since, and what they see on the horizon. By centering the foresight of Black leaders, we hope this report will bolster advocacy efforts to sustain funding and investment in the capacity of Black-led organizing groups that are building power in communities across the country and critical to the broader struggle for Black liberation.