Challenge for Change (French: Societé Nouvelle) was a participatory film and video project created by the National Film Board of Canada in 1967, the Canadian Centennial. Active until 1980, Challenge for Change used film and video production to illuminate the social concerns of various communities within Canada, with funding from eight different departments of the Canadian government. The impetus for the program was the belief that film and video were useful tools for initiating social change and eliminating poverty. As Druik says, "The new program, which was developed in tandem with the new social policies, was based on the argument that participation in media projects could empower disenfranchised groups and that media representation might effectively bring about improved political representation." Stewart, quoting Jones (1981) states "the Challenge for Change films would convey messages from 'the people' (particularly disadvantaged groups) to the government, directly or through the Canadian public."
In total, the program would lead to the creation of over 200 films and videos: approximately 145 works in English and more than 60 in French.
The collection, which was preceded by Tanya Ballantyne's 1967 film The Things I Cannot Change, notably included 27 films by Colin Low about life on Fogo Island, Newfoundland, produced in 1967. Known collectively as The Fogo Process, these Fogo Island films had an enormous impact on the future direction of the program, and were created thanks to the vision of Newfoundland academic Donald Snowden, who saw a need for a community media project as early as 1965.
Started by John Kemeny, Colin Low, Fernand Dansereau and Robert Forget, and later run by George C. Stoney, the Challenge for Change program was designed to give voice to the "voiceless." A key aspect of Challenge for Change was the transfer of control over the filmmaking process from professional filmmakers to community members, so that ordinary Canadians in underrepresented communities could tell their own stories on screen. Community dialogue and government responses to the issues were crucial to the program and took precedence over the "quality" of the films produced. The French-language Societé Nouvelle program was established under the direction of executive producer Léonard Forest.
As the program developed, responsibility for the film production was put increasingly into the hands of community members, who both filmed events and had a say in the editing of the films, through advance screenings open only to those who were the subjects of the films.
The program was the subject of a 1968 NFB documentary. It was also explored in an episode of the NFB Pioneers series on the Documentary Channel. It is the focus of a collection of essays and archival documents edited by Thomas Waugh, Michael Brendan Baker, and Ezra Winton, Challenge for Change: Activist Documentary at the National Film Board of Canada (McGill-Queen's University Press, 2010).
The Fogo Process
Fogo Island was a watershed moment for Challenge for Change with the "Fogo Process," as it came to be known, becoming a model for using media as a tool for participatory community development.
The idea for the Fogo Process originated in 1965, prior to the start of Challenge for Change, when Donald Snowden, then Director of the Extension Department at Memorial University of Newfoundland was dismayed by the urban focus of the Economic Council of Canada's "Report on Poverty in Canada." Snowden wanted to produce a series of films to present how the people of Newfoundland felt about poverty and other issues. In 1967, with Challenge for Change already underway, Snowden discussed his ideas with Low and introduced him to the university's Fogo Island field officer Fred Earle.
Low credited Earle with sparking his interest in the project: "I went to Fogo Island mainly because I was impressed by Fred Earle. I had an idea if nothing more happened I could make a film about a fine community development worker who would help justify our involvement." The opening voiceover narration to Introduction to Fogo Island also testifies to his key role, stating that Earle "was born and raised in Fogo Island. He knows, and is known, by all its people.... we, as outsiders, felt that we could never go into such a community without the help of such a person."