OUR APPROACH
What Is SBS?
Story-based Strategy is a distinct organizing methodology that combines collective meaning-making, critical analysis, and radical imagination to embed storytelling and narrative into organizing. It treats narrative and organizing power as one and the same—neither can exist without the other. This approach drives individuals, organizations, coalitions, and movements toward collective action, cultural transformation, and worldbuilding.
Elements of Story
We use five Elements of Story to analyze our opposition’s stories and to craft our own.
Conflict
The backbone of narrative — conflict establishes drama, perspective, and narrative interest within a story.
Characters
The protagonists, subjects, and narrators who drive the narrative forward in any given story.
Imagery
Words to capture imagination with metaphor, anecdote, and descriptions that appeal to sensory experience and make narratives tangible.
Foreshadowing
How stories signal their potential outcomes through narrative hints and clues woven throughout.
Underlying Assumptions
The unstated parts of the story that must be accepted for audiences to find the narrative credible and believable.
The Main Stages
Understand the Narrative Landscape
Map the stories being told about your issue — who tells them, how they travel, and what assumptions they reinforce. Identify the dominant narrative and its pressure points.
Identify the Battle of the Story
Every campaign has a “battle of the story” — a contest over which narrative wins. Define the core conflict in your narrative battle and what winning looks like.
Design Your Narrative Strategy
Craft a counter-narrative that challenges the status quo story and offers a compelling alternative. Use the five elements to build stories that resonate and move people to act.
Integrate & Amplify
Weave your narrative strategy into organizing, communications, and coalition work. Build the infrastructure to tell and spread your story across channels and communities.