Online organizing and voter mobilization advice (Imagine it's the 1998 campaign...)

[arcos]

Imagine a situation where you are the campaign manager or internet outreach director of a political campaign in the mid to late 90's. Mostly young people are the ones who are online, or at least they are the ones who are using the Internet to the fullest. Not that many people have access to broadband in their homes yet, but a sizable portion of the population has internet access either at their workplaces or at other public venues. WiFi is still something reserved to early adopters, but cellphone use is widespread and text messaging is as common as a phone call.

What strategies would you use to mobilize voters under this circumstances? Take into account this may be a close election, and turnout and a little convincing is all you need to make otherwise non-voters actually go to the polls and vote.


A little context:
As you may know, the discussion in Costa Rica about whether to approve or reject CAFTA has been going on for a few years now, with huge ups and downs in public support and opposition to the treaty. Costa Rica is the only country member of CAFTA who has not ratified the Agreement yet, and there's time until March 2008 before entrance expires.

Yesterday, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal ruled that a group of lawyers led by José Miguel Corrales, a former Congressman and Presidential candidate, can start gathering the required signatures of 5% of registered voters in order to call for the vote.

Realizing that if Corrales takes the 9 months he is allowed to gather the signatures would mean Costa Rica is definitely out of CAFTA, today the President will probably call the referendum himself, meaning it will probably be held by late September or early October.

Right now, Costa Rica is starting to experiment the influence of the internet in politics. A fairly active, albeit small and young blogosphere is starting to get notoriety, and all sides of the political spectrum are starting to take some shy steps into the online world. The CAFTA referendum presents a golden opportunity to use all available online tools in order to defeat the agreement, and this is the reason why I'm looking for your advice. Throughout the years I've seen, read about and studied lots of different examples in the US, ranging from McCain's $1 million online to MoveOn and to the Dean campaign, but I guess I'm looking for some first hand experience.

Given all these, what would you do?

[EFerrari]

1. I would reach out to women, who are the glue.

[arcos]

4. It worked well for the center-left party in last year's elections...

It's a strategy certainly worth considering.

[Selatius]

2. Run a populist campaign (with an online campaign as well), with an added plank to entice young folks

A good way to entice young people is to increase grant funding for public universities or raising the minimum wage or for reforms to public schools to make them better. (I don't know if tuition is paid for by the state or if it's paid out-of-pocket) If they don't have publicly financed elections, then add that into the general plank as well. Get the special interest money out of the system.

[arcos]

3. I probably didn't explain myself well...

This would be a CAFTA only ballot question. Approval of CAFTA, or rejection, it has to be focused on it.

We do have publicly financed elections, and this referendum won't be different. However, CAFTA supporters have millions of dollars that the opposition doesn't have, so we have to really make a good use of the technological aspect.

[crispini]

5. Online works best when it is combined with traditional methods.

In order to empower the grassroots, your online website requires three tools:

1) an email list, which you are able to slice and dice different ways-- by locale, by volunteer interest (voter registration, blockwalking, phonebanking etc)
2) a way for users and/or campaign insiders to generate and post their own content (blogs) in order to keep it fresh.
3) a way for users to generate and post their own events, and for people coming to the site to find their events. (This would planned as official campaign events, i.e. host a houseparty against CAFTA this week-- sign up here!)

You also need the official online content to be frequently updated and to work hand-in-hand with the campaign to get events out.

I would also make sure to have an online outreach strategy -- i.e. presences representing your website elsewhere, like a MySpace page, a Facebook page, etc. to drive traffic there.

However, I don't believe in online only. I think getting people out to knock on doors is key to any political campaign. Pay them if you have to, and if you have the money. NOTHING takes the place of old-fashioned boots on the ground. Well-designed and strategically placed advertising in the magazines and newspapers that people actually READ is also important.

Make no mistake, you can't win on the internet alone, and I think most of us recognize that now. What it DOES do for you, though, is it provides another stream, another source of energy.

[EFerrari]

6. And a place to organize much more easily. The internets

really speed up the process, imho.

[arcos]

7. Thank you...

Lots of organizations will do traditional methods. I want to focus on what's not being done and what I can do best. The opposition to CAFTA is very loosely organized, and as most progressive movements it includes different social actors with several common interests but also lots of differences. This certainly won't change in four months, although I have several contacts at different places that can help make the community grow, maybe work as a link between them.

We will definitely include some sort of forum for people to post whatever they want, and probably a wiki of why we are opposed to the agreement. Also we'll have a section where people can download and upload their own flyers, stickers and postcards so that they can print them and give out.

We certainly cannot win on the internet alone, especially in a third world country. But if it is going to be as close as a I think it will be, mobilizing otherwise unmotivated young voters can make a huge difference.