Center for Third Word Organizing (CTWO)

Background

The Center for Third World Organizing was founded in the 1980s by Saul Alinsky-trained left-of-center organizer Gary Delgado. According to the left-of-center Othering and Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley, Delgado created the group to challenge “the country’s dominant grassroots power building model by asserting that (1) communities of color should be organized by young people of color; (2) organizations and campaigns should reflect the intersectional realities of communities of color, thus multi-issue, multi-racial organizations should be built; and (3) a racial justice analysis that interlinks the struggles of people of color here and across the ‘third world’ should be centered in its ‘consciousness-raising’ strategies.” According to UC Berkeley, CTWO “offered a stark departure from the traditional Alinsky model that dominated the field.” ⁴

One of its earliest initiatives was the Movement Activist Apprenticeship Program (MAAP), designed to recruit and train new activists in explicitly left-wing frameworks. Over time, CTWO expanded into offering infrastructure support for allied organizations and into running multiple national training initiatives. The group’s MAAP program has remained active since the 1980s, with UC Berkeley noting that the “MAAP program was serious about developing a disciplined cadre of community organizers ready to hit the ground running on day one of finding a placement as a community or union organizer.” ⁴

Sponsored Organizations

The Center for Third World Organizing launched a hub to host and provide back-office support to BlackOUT Collective, the Black Land and Liberation Initiative, and the Ruckus Society. ^{7 8}

BlackOUT Collective is a direct-action organization founded in 2014 in the wake of anti-police riots that started in Ferguson, Missouri, after the police shooting of Michael Brown that offers training and support to anti-police and other radical-left protesters. It is associated with the broader Black Lives Matter movement, and though it once operated as a fiscally-sponsored project of the Ruckus Society, which also trains left-wing activists in direct action, in 2017 Ruckus ended up becoming a project of BlackOUT. ⁹

The Ruckus Society is a far-left protest group formed in the 1990s that has been criticized for protests that have turned into riots, including at the 1999 World Trade Organization protests in Seattle, rioters smashed windows, set fires and overturned vehicles. John Sellers, then the director of the Ruckus Society, represented protesters when the terms of their arrests were being discussed with police, later telling USA Today, “We kicked the WTO’s butt all over the Northwest.” ¹⁰

Financials

CTWO is funded primarily through contributions and foundation grants. According to IRS filings, the group reported $12.5 million in revenue in 2023, with $9 million in expenses and $9 million in net assets. Nearly all its income came from contributions, with little revenue from program services. ¹¹

The organization’s scale has grown significantly in recent years. In 2016, it reported less than $400,000 in annual revenue, while by 2023 its budget exceeded $12 million. ¹²

Funding

The Ford Foundation awarded CTWO a $250,000 grant in September 2009 for general support to provide training and technical assistance to people-of-color organizers working on racial and social justice in the U.S. ¹

The North Star Fund supported CTWO in 2021 under its “Innovative Activism” program. CTWO was one of ten grantees receiving a portion of $100,000 in grants. ²

In 2022, the Black-Led Movement Fund, administered by Borealis Philanthropy, awarded nearly $3.9 million in grants to grassroots organizations, among which CTWO was listed as a recipient. ³