Online movements are powerful. The internet creates the ability to bring people together on an unprecedented scale. However, no matter how many thousands of supporters an online campaign amasses, it is not enough. Success must be measured by results on the ground.
This is something the Obama campaign understood, and while much has been said about their success in online fundraising, equally impressive was their ability to translate an online community of supporters into real-world phone calls and door knocks.
While the Obama campaign's internet success exemplifies the potential of online organizing, it also raises several questions.
First, can his success be replicated? The answer to that question is conclusively, yes. Some may argue that Obama's combination of leadership, charisma, an inspirational message of hope, and an activist base frustrated with the status quo, created a unique situation-an outlier that will be difficult to repeat. However, Obama is not the first candidate to have success online, and he will not be the last. Similarly, issue based online advocacy campaigns have conclusively shown their ability to affect the legislative process.
There is another question though, which is more open and in many ways more interesting. Though online organizing has been proven an effective tool for influencing high-level campaigns and national policy debates, can the same tools which helped Obama-the-Candidate be used by Obama-the-Community-Organizer? That is, can they be harnessed to create change on the local level.
I recently had the opportunity to work with the Presidential Inaugural Committee as an organizer for the National Day of Service. Though Martin Luther King, Jr. Day has long been designated as a day for community service, President-elect Obama used the day before his inauguration to emphasize the importance of community involvement, harnessing the power of his massive grassroots infrastructure to engage people in their own communities.
To facilitate this mass call to service, PIC launched USAService.org. On this site, any user can post a service event that they want to host in their community, and others can search by zip code and sign up to participate. Within a few days of launch over 8,000 events were created, and by January 19th there were more than 13,000 community service events planned nationwide. In DC, over 12,000 volunteers showed up at RFK stadium to assemble care packages to send to troops overseas.
The National Day of Service shows the potential for using online tools in a campaign with a national scope but local impact. However, I don't think this fully answers the question. The USAService.org site was a critical tool for promoting the day of service, but there was also a team of 50+ field organizers volunteering full-time who made recruitment calls to organizations and individuals, and followed up with event hosts to provide guidance for recruiting participants, contacting the media, and reporting data.
All grassroots movements, online and off, require dedicated organizers who can provide top-down structure and guidance for bottom-up efforts. But while there was lots of discussion of the Day of Service as a kick-off event for a broader initiative, that structure is no longer in place. Without an organization to push it, and lacking the massive groundswell of excitement leading up to the Inauguration, it seems likely that the National Day of Service was just that a large-scale one-time event (not that this is a bad thing).
The site is still up though, and there are still events being posted. A quick search shows 11 events in the DC area over Presidents Day Weekend. Most have no attendees, but a few do. Six people are signed up to remove invasive plants in Arlington, and an event at the Capital Area Food Bank has 26 signups. A little more searching in other parts of the country though finds fewer events and even fewer participants.
Even though the long-term sustainability of the Renew America Together Initiative kicked off on January 19th is uncertain, the potential is definitely there. The Day of Service itself was unquestionably a success and a clear example of how online tools can be used to bring together real people to make a real difference in real places.
I hope the administration continues to put resources behind this effort. This is a task that is well suited for the new Organizing for America (OFA 2.0) organization, though I'm not sure that this kind of effort will actually be their priority. If they do continue, it will be interesting to see what kind of success they have. Promoting community engagement may not have the same excitement as a campaign for President or to stop global warming, but the more mundane work of fixing our communities can have an equal if not greater impact then the work to fix our nation or our planet.
Jeff Mann was an intern at EchoDitto.
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That is true, internet brings us together for such events. and regarding Obama, the internet plays only a minor part in his success. His charisma has the vital role in becoming the President of the United States.
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Where the heck is your picture!!! I learned about your job/company from someone named Nancy yesterday...... It sounds great. Already I have a couple of ideas (internet community) One of them has to do with the enormous numbers of poor/out-of-job people who attempt to seek aid/services. Often they have many family members so just going to a local agency is hard. But when you get there you are told you also need to go to the medical aid place, then you should go to the heating assistance place, the food stamp place etc., etc. It must be true across the nation. Then they are put on long waiting lists. It is particularly tough right now as you can imagine. But I'm sure there is a better way..... The other idea has to do with hospital "rating companies". (I own a little stock in one) One of the things I read about it is that while people might appreciate the ratings they might also like to do some "rating" themselves.....
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That is true, internet brings us together for such events. and regarding Obama, the internet plays only a minor part in his success. His charisma has the vital role in becoming the President of the United States. Electronic problems abound.
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However, before that meeting and before I found out about these lists I had also set up copyfight at cs.mcgill.ca. The idea is for this to be a list for discussing our local activities for organizing protests nationally, and for local chapter representatives to subscribe to it.
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That is true, internet brings us together for such events. and regarding Obama, the internet plays only a minor part in his success.
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The idea is for this to be a list for discussing our local activities for organizing protests nationally, and for local chapter representatives to subscribe to it.
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Though online organizing has been proven an effective tool for influencing high-level campaigns and national policy debates, can the same tools which helped Obama-the-Candidate be used by Obama-the-Community-Organizer?
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This was a pleasure to read, that's just to show that the internet plays a large role in everyday life seemingly has technology gets modernized.
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A great way to grow your online activist program is to run a high-profile online advocacy campaign around a particular issue or event. Promote it like crazy using the same promotions and strategies as you would for your regular website.
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All grassroots movements, online and off, require dedicated organizers who can provide top-down structure and guidance for bottom-up efforts. But while there was lots of discussion of the Day of Service as a kick-off event for a broader initiative, that structure is no longer in place..Thanks for sharing your views..
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The National Day of Service shows the potential for using online tools in a campaign with a national scope but local impact. However, I don't think this fully answers the question. The USAService.org site was a critical tool for promoting the day of service, but there was also a team of 50+ field organizers volunteering full-time who made recruitment calls to organizations and individuals, and followed up with event hosts to provide guidance for recruiting participants, contacting the media, and reporting data.voip service providers
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But while there was lots of discussion of the Day of Service as a kick-off event for a broader initiative, that structure is no longer in place..Thanks for sharing your views..
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While the Obama campaign's internet success exemplifies the potential of online organizing, it also raises several questions.
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Obama's campaign is realy successful and i agree that organizing nationally can make a difference locally as we can see in Obama's campaign. I think they are also collecting funds through website design, am i right? i have also gone through some small business web design companies participating in this campaign and trying to make this successful. I hope they can do a good job.
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