Signature Pedagogies: Power Mapping (Part 2)
An assignment that helps students understand complex social, economic and political systems while developing their ability to critically think in teams.
This is the second article in a three-part series that explains the why, what, and how of power mapping and how to integrate it into your teaching. This article is a great place to start if you’ve never heard of power mapping, but I encourage you to check out part 1 below, which shares a story about why I use power mapping in my teaching and what it did for one of my students in particular.
What is Power Mapping?
Power mapping—also commonly referred to as stakeholder mapping and power analysis—is a process that involves creating a visual representation of how stakeholders in a system interact with each other in pursuit of individual and/or collective goals. This process can be used in a variety of educational, professional, and communal settings.
For example, activists might use power mapping to determine which community members and politicians to collaborate with in order to get key local legislation passed. A newly appointed program director at an organization might use power mapping to comprehend and better navigate existing power dynamics at the company, including the value systems and communication channels that those relationships are built on. A housing developer might use power mapping to illustrate the ecosystem of a neighborhood, who is best served and underserved by that ecosystem, and who holds influence over key decisions made for the neighborhood.
Like mind mapping and community resource mapping, power mapping involves creating a visual that details the relationship between the items in the map. While a community resource map might feature financial and material capital, and a mind map features thoughts and concepts, power maps typically feature people as the items in the map. This can include specific people with names and formal titles (like the president of the United States), formal organizations (like universities or companies), governing bodies (like a school board or committee), or general populations of people (students, voters, investors, etc.).
This article presents ways that educators and students can use power mapping to develop students' sense of personal and professional identity, enhance their critical thinking and creative problem-solving skills, and make learning more culturally relevant, among other advantages.
A Brief History of Power Mapping
Power mapping has firm roots in social and political advocacy. According to Charles McKinney of the African American Intellectual History Society (AAIHS), power mapping—though framed more loosely at the time as getting a "lay of the land"—was a key practice used by organizers and activists in the Black Freedom Struggle and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in the 1960s and 70s, helping them understand who in those communities would support or resist their protests. This helped those movements grow through coalition building in the regions they traveled to, while also better preparing their agendas and mobilization strategies to face inevitable opposition.
Since then, power mapping has gained increased attention in academia, with centers like the Othering and Belonging Institute, the University of Illinois, and the Union of Concerned Scientists developing frameworks for the process.
Why is Power Mapping Helpful for the Classroom?
Power Mapping can be used as a tool for not only determining effective strategies for engaging legislators around specific policies, but also for critically analyzing and reimagining the system itself. You might want students to think about how they might create social or political change within an existing system, or you might want them to reimagine the system as a whole. Both may be relevant goals for your course.
Power mapping can reveal stakeholders impacted by an issue that are typically overlooked and excluded, giving rise to innovative and inclusive ways to create change in a system. It can uncover hidden agendas and illuminate key questions related to how, when, why, and for whom decisions are made
According to the National Education Association, power mapping is most effective when map creators are clear about the goals of their “campaign”, or in the case of students, the learning and advocacy goals. They also say that mappers should identify their target audience, research how related stakeholders in the system influence each other, determine which stakeholders to prioritize in their advocacy, and determine next steps based on what their map reveals.
Regardless of your learning goals, the process has the potential to do the following:
Make your instruction more culturally relevant - The problem-centered ethos of power mapping presents an opportunity for students to learn about their relationship to important events happening in the world.
Decolonizes students' perceptions of "rational" decision-making - This teaches them that justice is not an assumed value, and is something that they must intentionally strive toward in order to engender.
Teach students human-centered leadership - Power mapping teaches students leadership skills such as critical thinking, empathy, and creative problem solving; it reveals how people, emotions, and relationships drive decision making.
Increase students' sense of belonging and autonomy - When students create a power map of a community that they are all connected to (a school district, for example), students begin to understand the who, how, and why behind key decisions that impact them, which research shows can increase their sense of belonging to that community.
Promote personal and professional development - Power mapping introduces students to new career paths and gives them ideas for how they might create solutions to problems that they're passionate about, both now and as a future professional.
Encourage collaboration between your students: Power mapping requires collaboration, both with the stakeholders surrounding the issue and with your classmates or colleagues who are advocating for solutions. Students learn how to consider divergent perspectives and support others as they consider solutions
In addition to the learning outcomes above, power mapping might yield the following outcomes when applied in any context:
Reveal key stakeholders that are often excluded from decision-making processes; their relevance to the social issue at hand may be their covert influence over other key stakeholders, or the extent to which they're affected by the issue
Illuminate "policy windows" that allow you to take advantage of when supporters and opposers might be most receptive to your message
Reframe the problem by empathizing with stakeholders; people who are negatively affected by a social issue may have a different perception of that issue than those who have the power and influence to shape the public narrative
Cause the mapper to reflect on their connection to the issue by illustrating their direct and indirect influences over stakeholders
To learn about how you can use power mapping in the classroom, click the button below to read the third and final article of this series.
