In an effort to show the work that the civil society has been developing for the last years, more than ten NGOs mounted an exhibition at the Guadalajara City Museum, called “Tómala” (take it), the exhibition showed in a playful way the work of the activists in different issues, from human rights to urban mobility and political accountability.

The main idea behind the effort was to connect to more people and demonstrate that the civil society is working hard trying to develop a more human city, also the exhibit was looking forward to encourage more people to take action in different issues. During the time that it was mounted there were conferences and discussion panels that were streamed to a broader audience.

After the exhibitions finished and new connections were made between NGOs the ¡Tómala! exhibition pivoted into a new “organisation of organisations” a new network for collaborative work from NGOs and citizens. Now one of the main actions that the network is performing is called “Diálogos de frente” (Front dialogue), where they host discussion panels from a variety of issues that affect the citizens in a direct or indirect way.

Photo by ¡Tómala!

The team behind the ¡Tómala! initiative work closely with civic leaders, generating new panels and looking for new ways to generate a dialogue between politicians, NGOs and citizens, they have made different dialogues and then they generate an abstract with key points that is published in their web making it easier to any interested citizen to get informed about an specific issue.

¡Tómala! website

The ¡Tómala! initiative has been around for more than one year, I found really interesting that they keep doing the dialogues and the people is keeping going to them, I would say is a new opportunity in Guadalajara to be involved in public issues and get to know more people, at the end the network that is being build with this events could evolve into something really interesting and at least a more informed and participatory society.