Radios Populares (RaPo) is a Chicago-based collective that collaborates with communities struggling for social justice to build low-power FM community radio stations.
Our work is grounded in a solidarity model which builds alliances between our radio collective, Radios Populares, as well as other media activists and community organizations on the front lines of the social justice movement. We are guided by the belief that community ownership and access to media and control over media content are not only essential to achieving media justice but are also invaluable to the larger social justice movement.
Thus, we view independent, non-commercial, community media as a powerful community organizing tool. Because radio is arguably the most affordable, flexible form of mass communication, we view radio as an ideal media in disenfranchised and materially poor communities where literacy rates may be low and economic resources are scarce.
Low-power FM radio equipment is easy to use and allows community residents to take control of the airwaves.