Patrick Reinsborough is a US based strategist, trainer, writer and creative provocateur with over 30 years of experience in movements for peace, racial and economic justice and ecological sanity.
His work has incorporated a range of creative strategies including narrative shift, distributed organizing, brand-busting, culture jamming, corporate campaigning and nonviolent direct action. Patrick has trained thousands of organizers and partnered with hundreds of high impact organizations to frame issues, strengthen alliances and win campaigns. He has helped organize countless creative interventions including the historic shutdown of the Seattle WTO meeting in 1999, networked protests against the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and visionary alliance building uniting North American communities impacted by fossil fuels.
Patrick’s strategic approach confronts the overlapping crises of the 21st century at the intersection of movement building, the ecological crisis, and strategies to shift cultural narratives. In 2002, he co-founded the Center for Story-based Strategy (formerly smartMeme), a national strategy center dedicated to harnessing the power of narrative to accelerate transformative movement building. In 2016 Patrick transitioned from his Executive Director role and handed the organizational reigns to the next generation of leaders. You can see Patrick doing a short presentation about the story-based strategy approach here.
From 2017-2020 Patrick was the U.S. Organizing Director for the global climate organization 350.org where he developed and led a new U.S. organizing department to strengthen the network of 160 grassroots affiliates. His team combined many different aspects of movement-building including distributed organizing, training, arts, direct action, grassroots funding and multiracial alliance-building. Patrick and his colleagues amplified numerous campaigns and supported hundreds of local actions including the September 2019 youth-led Global Climate strikes which mobilized over 6 million people across 150 countries.
Patrick is the co-author of Re:Imagining Change: How to Use Story-based Strategy to Win Campaigns, Build Movements & Change the World (2nd Edition PM Press 2017) and a contributor to Beautiful Trouble: A Toolbox for the Next Revolution (2012 O/R Books) and Globalize Liberation (2004 City Lights Press). He is a frequent commentator on issues of social movement strategy, the ecological crisis and the power of narrative. Patrick lives on the unceded territory of the Lisjan Ohlone people in Oakland, California.