Movements, campaigns and dedication

I attended a volunteer orientation held by The Archimedes Movement (aka We Can Do Better) this afternoon; really, a dry run of future orientations. A good idea, something more organizations should do: monthly opportunities for people to learn about an organization and find out how to get plugged in effectively. It also allows the organization the opportunity to connect with new volunteers and ensure they become plugged-in and are not allowed to drift away because of organizational indifference, ineptitude, business, etc.

At one point during the orientation, AM staffer Julie Magers said “There is a difference between a social movement and a campaign”. Ding ding. Absolutely, and it’s something we discuss too little. Her example was Health Care for America Now, a powerhouse group that focused on the public option — and then found itself foundering when the option finally disappeared from sight. Progressives need to learn this lesson because what we are pursuing is not a campaign but a permanent change in how America operates.

So, by the way, is the Tea Party Movement. Just so we’re clear what the stakes are.

Campaigns are necessary, of course, and for the obvious reasons: we have to get people elected, ballot measures, tax measures, getting Congress or the Leg or City Council to take (or not take) action. Campaigns raise awareness, inform, raise money, gather volunteers and supporters, push issues forward and do other important work. Campaigns that are lost can either diminish support or galvanize the “true believers”. Campaigns come and go; one morphs into the next. They have a short-term focus, and too often are disconnected from longer-term concerns.

Campaigns are not social movements. A social movement is in it for the long-term. The civil rights movement; the women’s movement; the gay rights movement; we label these such because their goals reach far beyond any campaign that arises in support of some short-term goal. The campaigns matter, often hugely so, but in the fervor to win a campaign, and the emotional response to the outcome, remembering why the campaign was waged in the first place is difficult. But the campaign is only a means to a greater end; that end is the movement.

Both require dedication, but of different sorts. Dedicating oneself to a campaign can mean giving evening evenings and weekends to the work needed, whether a few times or relentlessly until Election Day. Movement dedication is not unlike getting religion: you have to have faith in what you’re doing, day after day, year after year, not quitting because things get tough, because campaigns are lost, because you are tired. Campaign dedication is a wonderful thing; the thousands of Oregonians who dedicated themselves to winning Measures 66/67 are heroes and deserve gratitude.

Those dedicated to movements can seem like nuts, crackpots. Freaks. They see the whole world in terms of the movement. Which is really not the best way to approach things, but it’s understandable. Dedicating yourself to a goal that is not terribly tangible — full rights for women, peace on earth, justice for all — so it’s easy to drift into a place where The Movement replaces actual goals.

We are in the middle of a Progressive Movement; it’s absolutely essential we hold on to that. In order to make that movement both something that has tangible outcomes and does not turn supporters into wandering freaks with nothing more to guide them than a vague belief in the rightness of what they are doing, we need to focus on short-term projects and goals. In other words, campaigns.

The 66/67 campaign did not achieve much in terms of the progressive movement. They kept in place some very moderate tax changes; they did not make any structural changes beyond proving that Oregonians would pass a tax increase — on other Oregonians. (Well, that’s a start.) But thousands of Oregonians busted their asses for a tangible goal they believed would be good for the state, and they kept our schools from getting worse, kept services for vulnerable Oregonians, and smacked the corporate lobbyists upside their self-satisfied heads. Not fantastic forward movement, but forward for the movement nonetheless.

Campaigns are not the movement, but movements need campaigns to serve as the stepping stones and measuring points. What we have to be careful about is not confusing the two. A movement cannot come to a halt every time a campaign ends — and those in campaigns have to remain involved in the movement even when they are exhausted by the campaign. Take a break then get on board. The reason there is a movement is because there is something that needs more than a campaign: it takes years of dedication from thousands of people who want to do more than win an election.

They want a better world.