Report from the Care Revolution network meeting on 20 April.

On 20 April, we had our biannual network meeting. A total of 26 people from all active regional groups, various cooperation groups and individual members and interested parties took part.

We started with a review of the conference 'Let's Socialize' on climate justice and socialisation, whose care strand Care Revolution activists helped to prepare. You can read the opening contribution to the strand here. In the Care strand, there was first a series of workshops in which groups presented their fields of work and projects, and then a phase of project and campaign planning, from which three project groups emerged: One project group is pursuing the idea of a mass lawsuit against embezzlement of health insurance contributions. The second group is looking at what a narrative around the connection between climate justice, care and socialisation can be and how this can be made better known. The third group is working on the concept of caring cities and is also referring to the Care in the Park Centre campaign, which aims to convert an empty department stores' in Berlin into a care centre. This campaign could be taken up in other cities and designed as a nationwide campaign "Shopping malls to care centres". If you are interested in joining one of these groups, please get in touch with us: koordination@care-revolution.org.

We discussed the input from the point of view of how we can use the ideas from the conference for our Care Revolution activities. Among other things, we mentioned To be more precise about what we mean by socialisation, in particular to insist that unpaid work is kept in mind here too. The individual groups should share their projects and experiences and also use the network to point out when material and support is needed.

After the lunch break, we looked ahead to the "10 Years of Care Revolution" anniversary, which we will be celebrating in Leipzig from 18 to 20 October. We are planning for at least 100 participants. A preparatory group is already working hard on the organisation; the internal network part of the event, which will take place on Sunday, is still open. We discussed how to organise this in three groups, which focussed on revising our founding text from 2014, proposals for a joint campaign and our internal working methods. If people want to participate in the preparation of this part, please also write to koordination@care-revolution.org.

Finally, we asked ourselves about interfaces with other movements, with regard to common narratives and common practices. Two people active in the network who work at the interface of the topics of care and flight and care and poverty reported on their experiences and starting points. In the discussion, it was pointed out several times that the ethnic-authoritarian right also profiles itself with care issues and presents itself as carers. The answers from the panel: Using the programmes to show that parties like the AfD, if implemented, would make the situation even worse for those people who are under the most pressure. In addition, emphasise the central point that we oppose the exclusion of people and strive for solutions for all, want to practice global solidarity.

The feedback from the participants was consistently positive and encouraging for the preparatory group. Now it's back to the daily routine of the group and caring for six months before the anniversary.