Welcome to ‘Campaigning with Heroes: The Guide’. The site is published by The Syria Campaign as a resource for all human rights activists. On this site you’ll find lots of tips, tactics, and case studies that will, we hope, help you think in a new way about your campaigning.
The guide is not a “how-to” that explains exactly how to run campaigns. We don’t believe that there is one fixed approach that will always work, and we certainly don’t think that we have all the answers. We’ve organised the guide into short chapters, and the real-world examples are in the case studies section. This is where we tell the story of a particular campaign by The Syria Campaign, one of our partners, or an organisation that we admire. We believe that the best way to get inspiration is to look around and learn from the experiences of others.
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Building a campaign
When a group of people are working together towards one goal, a goal to challenge the powers that be and create change in the world, they are campaigners running a campaign.
But how do campaigners even start? How do you go from a ‘Theory of Change’ to a building the allies you need to make your vision come true?
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Campaign tactics
Once you’ve got your theory of change sorted, it’s time for action. Your tactics are the different approaches you’ll use, small and large, to achieve your campaign goals. Be as bold and ambitious as you can. Think out of the ordinary in order to get noticed.
How can you tap into current events to show how your campaign is relevant to other issues? And how do you communicate the key messages for your campaign?
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Making the media
An image can help change public opinion, investigative journalism can bring down a corrupt system, a headline repeated over many days or weeks can give politicians the spur they need to make real change.
But getting the attention of the media is a challenge when the news agenda moves so fast. How do you get the right sort of media coverage for your campaigns and issues?
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Digital campaigning
Social media is where we’re all having debates, conversations, and expressing ourselves. It’s where the buzz is and where you can gather momentum for your campaign. Nothing gets people talking or sharing more than a creative and timely piece of content – be it an image, video, or tweet. You also need to think of how you will stir the emotions of your audience.
But if everyone is putting out social media content, how can you make yours stand out from the crowd?
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Case studies
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Nominating the White Helmets for the Nobel Peace Prize
The Nobel peace prize is a fiercely competitive accolade that dozens of incredible humanitarians are nominated for every year. We believed, and still believe, that the White Helmets are deserving of the award. Once we heard that they had been […]
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The People’s Million
In 2016 we launched a campaign for the White Helmets to win the Nobel Peace Prize Although we were desperate for the White Helmets to win, the announcement did not go their way. Disappointed as we were, we wanted to […]
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Changing Italy’s mind in 26 hours
This was one of The Syria Campaign’s most successful rapid response projects. In 2014, Italy opposed a proposed EU ban on the sale of aviation fuel to Syria. In just 26 hours we managed to persuade Italy’s then-Foreign Minister Francesca […]
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Led By Donkeys
Led by Donkeys started off as a campaign against Brexit by four friends, including the former founder of The Syria Campaign, James Sadri. The group wanted to highlight the hypocrisy of politicians calling for the UK to leave the European […]
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Bellingcat
Bellingcat is an investigative journalism website set up by the British citizen journalist and blogger Eliot Higgins. It began with Higgins combing through videos of the Syrian conflict and identifying the weapons being used in them, something that saw him […]
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“Taking Sides” report on the UN
Since the Syrian conflict began, civilians have felt betrayed and abandoned by the international community, most notably the UN. In Syria, the UN has been perceived as working too closely with the regime, whether that’s by lodging its staff in […]
Activism works. So what I'm telling you to do now, is to act. Because no one is too small to make a difference.
Greta Thunberg -