Center for People's Self Determination

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The Meaning and Work of the Center for People’s Self-Determination

Self-determination means the ability of a people to determine their own destiny. A people that is food insecure, impoverished, and in precarious living conditions cannot be self-determined. We are motivated by the historical example of individuals who made it their life’s work to develop real economic self-determination for their communities through concrete base building work. Our job is to develop community gardens, community centers, and food processing and distribution networks for free to build up a truly economically self-determined community on the North Side of Saint Louis City, an area that is historically deprived economically and in which many of the people are of African descent. Our role in the community is, ideally, one where working class and poor people can turn to receive support in regards to knowledge regarding producing one’s own food, repairing their living space for free or near-free, and escaping the deadly nature of our city’s streets through the building of a really self-determined community ideologically and materially.

Our work is many-fold. Our major task is to open and operate a series of physical community and education centers. These spaces will be open for community meetings, potlucks, food production, educational activities, trainings, and we also seek to develop and operate shelters for houseless people in the community as well. This will help alleviate the community’s housing crisis and restore vacant historical properties to their original intention, to serve as shelters and community centers. We also operate community gardens to alleviate the food desert crisis in our neighborhoods. There is a lack of fresh fruits and vegetables. This leads to health problems such as diabetes and heart disease. Our mission is to transform vacant lots into community gardens and neighborhood spaces.

We are a new organization comprised of volunteers who have a vested interest in developing our communities into safe and self-determined spaces. Donations of time, financial resources, food, and labor are welcome to help achieve our stated goals and mission and prove in practice that a better world is, indeed, possible.