Designing for Civil Society

BBC "drops Action Network": time for a new campaigning model?

I haven't seen this elsewhere, but the BBC's Action Network is going to close,  according to the International Centre of Excellence for Local Democracy (ICELE). This may be yet another example of how centralised initiatives to support campaigning and democracy will have to adapt to the new publishing and campaign power of individuals on the Net, and in social networks. One click politics is spreading.

In BBC backs out of changing the world  ICELE report:

A spokesperson for the BBC at the World eDemocracy Forum announced that the acclaimed campaigning site, 'Action Network' is to close its doors.
The power of the network over council-led initiatives was the faith that citizens had in the independence of the broadcaster.
The closure is expected within the next three months in favour of a more news driven service which has a greater emphasis on aggregation of bottom-up content, including issue related blogs.
BBC Action Network had a boost when it changed its name from 'iCan' but has been struggling with active content despite around 1 million hits per month.  Momentum was also lost with the departure of long-term project leader Martin Vogel.

The BBC site had been honoured as the top politics and Internet "world changer" of 2005, and in previous years.
Searching revealed a mention of the Action Network ("It seemed to disappear in the haze of BBC Online") on the blog of Martin Moore, director of the Media Standards Trust,  who reported an afternoon talking to BBC journalists a few weeks back. Reflecting on the revolution in media currently taking place, he wrote:

Central to this - and where the BBC plays a critical role - is the reconstitution of what's traditionally been known as the 'Fourth Estate'. What I mean by this is the massive explosion in the number of people doing what they consider journalism, but who don't call themselves journalists. Maybe they take the occasional photo and send it to the BBC, or write a blog about an event they go to, or do some digging about some local scandal.
The exciting bit, and the bit I hope the BBC will play a big part in, is harnessing this amazing explosion by giving people the tools and advice to help them become informal constituents of this new Fourth Estate. This occurred to me when on the way back I was reading excerpts from Demos' study about the 'Pro-Am Revolution':
"...in the last two decades" Demos writes, "a new breed of amateur has emerged: the Pro-Am, amateurs who work to professional standards. These are not the gentlemanly amateurs of old - George Orwell's blimpocracy, the men in blazers who sustained amateur cricket and athletics clubs. The Pro-Ams are knowledgeable, educated, committed and networked by new technology. The twentieth century was shaped by large hierarchical organisations with professionals at the top. Pro-Ams are creating new, distributed organisational models that will be innovative, adaptive, and low cost"
Imagine if the BBC built the tools to enable these 'Pro-Ams' to do some of the jobs journalists would like to do but just don't have time: to search through health statistics, to look at local councillors records, to look at public sector budgets. Many might use them just for their own benefit, but in doing so they could turn up things no single journalist would have time to look for. MySociety have built tools like this to enable people to scrutinize MPs (TheyWorkForYou), and more recently on to report local problems - FixMyStreet (broken drains, cracked pavements).
Isn't this something the BBC could do too? And, if it did, wouldn't it harness the power of an army of local and specialist journalists?

This is a fascinating observation at a time that the BBC Trust is carrying out a review of the online service bbc.co.uk. I'm doing some work on the consultation process, and should be able to write more about that shortly. I hope Martin submits his ideas.
Meanwhile Martin's organisation, the Media Standards Trust, has just launched an extremely interesting site - http://www.journa-list.com -that enables you to look at news articles by journalist rather than by news organisation.

You can see what articles a journalist has written, what subjects he/she writes most about, and who else has written about the same subject. More usefully still, you can build your own newsroom of favourite journalists and have their articles gathered together and automatically emailed to you every morning.
The site works by looking up the RSS feeds of the various national newspapers and BBC news online, then indexing the articles by journalist (if you want any more technical details you'll need to talk to Ben - the internet whizz whose been building the site from his cottage in the wilds of north Wales).

It's still in beta, but already fascinating ... and not just to journalists looking for their rankings. As part of my work with the Trust, I've been looking at blogs, and also for journalists writing about the BBC. Here they all are.  Hat-tip to William Davies, who is a trustee of the Media Standards Trust.

Why can't events be more like Facebook?

Before the web became live,  offline people would chastise those online for paying too little attention to friendship, sociability, introductions and the warm feelings and relationships engendered by a good get-together. I think we may be coming full circle, and our social networking places like Facebook have lessons for those organising face-to-face events. Particularly if they are about Facebook and the use of Web 2.0 social media for campaigning.

These thoughts were prompted by a meeting last night organised by Amnesty International at their London HQ, as part of a bigger launch. As the Guardian reported earlier:

The group was launching a campaign, Unsubscribe, to highlight human rights abuses in the war on terror and reach out to websites such as Bebo and Facebook, Amnesty officials said.
The campaign is the latest step into the 21st century for Amnesty, which was set up in 1961 and has traditionally engaged in letter-writing campaigns to encourage action over human rights abuses around the world.

Appropriately enough, Amnesty used a Facebook group to invite bloggers, activists, second lifers and other networkers to the event. (Warning: what follows is going to sound a bit churlish. I think Amnesty is fantastic. They do amazing work. They are in the lead with online campaigning. I have signed up to help. You can too)
Unfortunately the evening event followed the standard pattern I've found too often with think tanks and large charities.
Generous drinks on arrival, but no hosting ... so if you don't know anyone you immediately feel not part of the network. Clearly there are amazingly interesting people here, but you aren't one of them, and you probably won't meet them unless you are brash in self-introduction. Then... the meeting has a top table. On a platform. You are with the foot-soldiers in the well of the hall, waiting your turn, theatre-style, to put you hand up. There may be free wifi (as last night) ... but that usually connects you to people outside the hall, not inside.
The panel then each do five or ten minute pieces ... some well-prepared, others (by admission) off the cuff.
Fortunately the content yesterday was fascinating. We hear from Johnny Chatteron how a Support the Monks in Burma Facebook group rapidly grew to 300,000, has been used to support protect events around the world, and prompted extensive media coverage. It it providing a tremendous news feed from inside the country.
Gemma Tumelty, president of the National Union of Students, explains how a campaign on Facebook forced the banking giant HSBC to back down on graduate overdraft fees. She also used Facebook to campaign successfully for her re-election.
Kevin Anderson, head of blogging at The Guardian, gave an insider's explanation of how individual bloggers can make an impact on traditional media, exposing human rights abuses. He cited the example of camera phone images of police brutality in Egypt posted to YouTube.
A strong theme throughout was that Facebook was a terrific way to bring people together because friends introduced friends to groups - and people trusted each other. I think some Facebook functions could provide reminders on how to run engaging - rather than just interesting - events.

• First, badges with space for your interests. That's like profiles.
• Then group hosts to make introductions to new-comers.
• The space itself can be equitable - perhaps groups on tables. That's like discussion groups.
• Activity could be a mix of set pieces - postings to the wall - and the forums.

None of this is novel. For example, David Gurteen does it very well in his knowledge cafes, and provides a set of tips for participatory events.

I think that the idea behind the Amnesty event was that the bloggers among us would spread the word about Unsubscribe ... and I think we'll see more of this "blogger outreach" among campaigning organisations. I wanted to ask whether Amnesty would be borrowing techniques from social marketers who employ specialist firms to scan the blogosphere for conversations and influencers. I confess that after a bit of half-hearted hand-raising I left early, missing out on the film.
As I left, the human touch, which is what Amnesty is all about, re-emerged. One of the organisers followed me out, asked what I had wanted to say, and even recorded it. Maybe it was played back.
I left feeling Amnesty is an organisation with a compelling cause and content (of course), run by passionate people, but on this occasion anyway locked into an old-style architecture for promoting its message. A bit like Web 1.0 really.
I'll return to Amnesty's excellent online presence later - it is stunning.
Previously:
Free conference on new media and society: old-style event
Tips for participatory conferences - first, think social
Talking social media at an unsocial event
and other events posts

The power of new media, from Stop The Traffik

The project that most powerfully caught my attention at the New Statesman New Media Awards was Stop The Traffik, which won the Advocacy award against Oxjam and Intelligent Giving (who did, however, win the Information and Openness award). Here's how the award citation went:

STOP THE TRAFFIK, is a global coalition of over 800 organisations, working together to fight against people trafficking; by raising awareness on a subject that is little known or understood. It aims to expose people trafficking, lead governments to action and unlock freedom.
The coalition’s determination to succeed is clearly visible online, where pages of its website have been translated into 20 languages, from widely spoken languages like Chinese and Russian to the less widely spoken languages of Khmer, Igbo and Lithuanian. The clear design and excellent information architecture of the site enable visitors to quickly get to grips with the subject matter and how it is affecting people across the globe, as well as discover how they can make a difference.
In addition to a traditional web presence STOP THE TRAFFIK has set up a mySpace area, created viral videos, put together downloadable PowerPoint presentations for businesses and made available to download many other campaign resources.
The judges thought the site was very well thought out and an excellent example of how to use digital media as a tool for advocacy, campaigning and education.

At the ceremony I was able to talk to Strategy Director Peter Stanley, and ask him about the way the coalition started, and its scale of operation.

Click To Play also at blip.tv
As he explained, there are many organisations campaigning in the field - but they haven't always joined up their efforts very well in the past. The Internet brings at least two benefits - the ability to collaborate online, and the scope for people to create their own films on YouTube to contribute to the campaign.

Click To Play also at blip.tv
Peter went on to talk to my wife Ann about how their chocolate campaign had led children to explain to their parents why they should switch to Fair Trade chocolate - because their Easter eggs might well be made with slave labour. The next time someone asks what difference new media can make, I'll have a good story to tell.

Technorati Tags: awards, advocacy, stopthetraffik

Minister urges nonprofits to campaign for policy change

The new Minister for the Third Sector, Phil Hope, got off to a good start with his constituency of voluntary organisations tonight when he urged them to campaign more strongly - without fear that it might jeopardise their grants.
He was speaking a couple of weeks into his new job at a reception on the eve of a conference on Futures for Civil Society, organised by the National Council for Voluntary Organisations and the Carnegie UK Trust.
The Minister said that the message from the new Government, under Prime Minister Gordon Brown, was that community and voluntary organisations should not only help provide a voice for the most disadvantaged, but aim to change the policies of local and central government where necessary.

Click To Play Also at Blip.tv

"People should not be worried whether they should campaign or not if they receive some sort of grant, or have some sort of contract with the State in all its various forms. The reason why we give grants and contracts to people in the Third sector is to give that voice ... is to say those words ... is to have that campaigning zeal."

After Stuart Etherington introduced Phil Hope, I shot some video of the Minister's speech, which you can see above: warning - it is about 14 minutes long. You can find the campaigning quote about eight minutes in. However, the video is a bit dark and shaky, and fortunately Mr Hope was very happy to come out on to the the balcony and give me a short version below.

Click To Play Also at Blip.tv

Afterwards I spoke to Liz Cleverley, Performance Improvement and Information Manager at Community Matters, the national federation for community organisations.

Click To Play Also at Blip.tv
Liz had no doubt that encouragement for campaigning in the speech was welcome. Groups often felt inhibited when they were receiving a grant ... and local councils could feel challenged when groups spoke up.
Phil Hope once worked at NCVO, and has been a consultant in the voluntary sector - so people felt he knew what he was talking about. It also helped that he sounded as if he had written the speech himself ... or rather, didn't need to write it because it clearly came from the heart. I hope he can campaign successfully in central and local government to create the more open culture he is advocating.

Technorati Tags: nonprofit, campaigning

Social media for social change - time for Netsquared Europe?

In Another shout for a Netsquared Europe Steve Bridger offers a round-up of initiatives to promote and support the innovative use of social media for social change. Nonprofits in the US are better organised, particularly through Netsquared, which runs events, awards, aggregates blogs, and develops its community in many other ways too. Steve writes:

Amnesty's Dan McQuillan has made a rallying call for a Netsquared this side of the pond - which could be an "incubator for web-enabled social change in the UK & Europe"
Dan identifies some possible goals:
* To stimulate web-enabled social innovation
* To create a an online-offline community for learning skills, sharing experiences and developing expertise
* To sustain socially progressive activity through alternative business & organisational models 
I like the emphasis Dan gives to "activism", and "the organisational question" in particular ...
"Perhaps, like the second Netsquared conference, it could aim to incubate a new generation of web-enabled non-profits that use new forms of organising to deliver more directly on their missions."
There is a very real tension between where social media is taking us and how charities are responding (although there needn't be).  Web 2.0 requires Leadership 2.0.  Surely two sides of the same coin.
All this may well dovetail with the initiative soon to be unveiled by Bertie Bosrédon, the Head of New Media at Breast Cancer Care.  Bertie gave me an update earlier this week.
Yesterday, I happened to get a call from Richard Saunders, who is head of website development at NCH, the children's charity. He also hinted he would welcome a forum along these lines.  And Rob Bowker at the BTCV has flagged his interest to me via this blog.
I also know from many of the conversations I had in Brussels last week that there would be an appetite for this elsewhere in Europe, too.  Paolo Ferrara left a comment on my recent Buzz Director post to let me know that they are starting to unpick this concept in their own Italian context.

I should think that the Technology and Social Action project might be interested, as well NCVO's ICT Foresight team on the policy front. The challenge, I suspect, will be to organise in a way that mirrors the open architecture of social media. I've been a little sceptical in the past, but this sounds far more promising.

Technorati Tags: nptech, nptechuk, web2.0

Engagement 2.0: lyrics by Lennon

Ed Mitchell and Steve Bridger are working on something wonderful for Amnesty that combines human rights campaigning, John Lennon songs, an album called ‘Instant Karma‘, blogs, wikis, social networks ... and no doubt any other Web 2.0 goodness they can add to the mix.  It is part of the Amnesty Make some noise movement and may well become a model for Web 2.0-based engagement.

Ed explains in Community development across multiple networks: Amnesty:

Yoko Ono has given the rights to a bunch of John Lennon songs to Amnesty with the specific purpose to raise awareness about justice, freedom and human rights. Amnesty and Warner Brothers have organised for the songs to be covered by a bunch of artists, and sold via iTunes (for an exceptionally decent cut). As well as the songs, there is a bunch of footage of the artists saying why they think human rights are important (some of the artists would not have been able to record anything without Amnesty’s ongoing campaigning).
This all adds up to an album called ‘Instant Karma‘, which is coming out later this month; it will be promoted by the record label, but as well as this, we are going to help with promotion, in a sustainable way.
Asides to the ’selling of tunes’ model, the Amnesty team is absolutely passionate about ‘Make Some Noise’ as a vehicle for raising the issues so close to its heart; they see it as an opportunity to bring the issues closer to people’s awareness, to make them think, and, hopefully support the movement in the long term.
Thinking that way requires a new form of strategy about how to reach people who are increasingly distributed across the internet; we’re walking away from the ‘you must log in to our website‘ approach and looking to embrace the ‘we’re coming to find you on your ground‘ approach. Challenging enough I think, but we’ve also decided to do this in such a way as to enable as much learning and community development for all as possible while we do it.
We are going to help them reach out across the big name social networks which are closest to the artists’ fan bases (and youtube and flickr of course). Our plan is to do it in a co-ordinated way, by finding people within those networks who relate to the cause, and are willing to represent Amnesty responsibly (we’ll call them ambassadors for now).
Having found them, we are going to ask them to assist with the Make Some Noise presence in their social networks - the theory being that in order to make this a sustainable community development exercise (and not just another viral-styled marketing campaign thundering through the social networks), people who are already in those networks are best placed to do this themselves - they know the who and the how, we can help with the what and the when. Also, once this wave of excitement is over, Amnesty still have a clear idea of who is who in which network, and those ambassadors become increasingly closer to the organisation; hence my waffle about community.

Ed highlights an idea close to my heart:

It fits into the bigger picture of ‘engagement’, where people are increasingly looking to have some say over how they are represented; instead of being used as viral puppets, this is the beginning of looking for advice and more from supporters. We intend to develop this idea further after June’s rush to launch date; it involves considering the ‘engagement’ as a multi-domain trust building exercise, you may not be surprised to hear from me.

Congratulations to them both on winning the contract, no doubt against more conventional agencies.

Technorati Tags: engagament2.0, engagement

Ten Resolutions for Civil Change

The US Pew Partnership for Civic Change has a Smart Communities blog, written by their president Suzanne Morse, raising issues that have worldwide resonance. This week they offer Our Ten Smart Resolutions for the New Year. In summary they are:

• Keep kids in your community in school.
• Reduce the number of hungry people in your community.
• Get involved in some organization outside of your work or immediate circle.
• Find out about your affordable housing market.
• Make quality daycare accessible to all in your community.
• Be sure that every child in your community has a caring adult in his or her life.
• Revive and support rural communities.
• Let's put the civil back in civilization in the New Year.
• Let's really solve some problems.
• 2006 needs to be the year of working together. We have issues that can only be solved with a collective will and mission. Our goal for 2006 must be to create possibilities together.

Suzanne expands on each resolution and adds:

The evidence is overwhelming that when regions come together, organizations come together, or neighborhoods come together, then big things happen—not just one time but over and over. If you serve in an elected office—reach out. If you run a nonprofit organization—find a way to work with another organization. And if you are concerned about something or have an idea for change—find some people to talk with about it. Many of the challenges we face could be solved if we could work together. As Wendell Berry once said, "One's real duty to the future is to do as you should do now. Make the best choices, do the best work, fulfill your obligations in the best way you can."

I think all of that will resonate with community activists and policymakers in the UK, and the Pew Partnership commitment to blogging makes it easier to share experience on how to tackle these issues. We could do with a few leaders of UK nonprofits following suit.
Over at the NCVO ICT Foresight blog Milica Howell of the Hansard Society explains in If you've got it, flaunt it how they are working together with the National Council for Voluntary Organisations on the first strand of a project on Democracy, campaigning and activism.

The research is designed to illustrate ways in which information and communication technology (ICT) might empower charitable, community and voluntary sector organisations and their supporters and identify comparisons with citizen engagement in politics.

Maybe the research can offer busy chief executives an answer to the question "why bother to blog?". Meanwhile I'll see if Suzanne would like to provide some answers from her experience.

Campaigning with good cheer

Inspiration, challenge and good cheer are not experiences I always associate with the annual general meetings of nonprofits, however worthy - but I found them all at last night's London Citizens event. It helped that we were hosted by the American University of Notre Dame, in their fine building just off Trafalgar Square. Some of the University's law students are volunteers - or interns as the Americans say - with London Citizens projects.
It was these projects that provide the inspiration. They ranged from a campaign for a living wage that persuaded Mayor Ken Livingstone to set the London level at £6.70; an ethical framework for the Olympics; and a review of the procedures of the immigration service at Lunar House, Croydon, that engaged the attention of senior civil servants and the Minister. The fight to keep the traditional feel of Queen's market, Newham, in the face of development pressures is ongoing, with a Citizens' inquiry unpicking the planning issues.
London Citizens operates by reviving techniques of broad based organising pioneered in Chicago in the 1930s by Saul Alinsky, and building its strength through coalitions of local institutions. Last night faith groups and trade unions were strongly represented, with schools and residents groups also involved. London Citizens staff organisers, working with leaders of the local institutions, can parade a membership of thousands in their campaigning - and when necessary get them on the streets or in front of County Hall. They can claim to be "the capital's largest and most diverse alliance of active citizens and community leaders".

CampaignCreator site goes live

The CampaignCreator site and campaigning tools being developed by Bristol council with £395,000 of government funding is now live. Login accounts may be limited during the pilot phase, but meanwhile the site does offer a some excellent general advice developed with Friends of the Earth. You can download guidance on starting a campaign, developing your case, building support, raising funds and other aspects of campaigning useful whether or not you are using online tools. As I wrote earlier, e-democracy guru Steven Clift is working with the advisory group to review development. I couldn't make it to the group's meeting last week, but hope to see more about what happened on the project blog.
Once piloting starts, it will be interesting to compare the site with others spotted by advisory groups members, including Citizenspeak and Campaignwindow. Although these are far more modest, the Bristol project should be able to offer more value in the guidance and support provided for groups. I've been sceptical about how far councils will go in supporting potential critics in their communities, but piloting may well prove me wrong. The task then will be for Bristol to sell the idea to other councils, or bodies prepared to host and support more local CampaignCreators.

CampaignCreator brings Clift to advise the advisors

The Bristol project team developing the CampaignCreator tool - see Can a council host community campaigns? - has now recruited US-based e-democracy evangelist Steven Clift to help with their work. Steven will facilitate advisory group discussions, share draft guidebook content, and also invite others with community campaigning or online advocacy experience to join in the discussions. Stephen Hilton has already extended an open invitation to the group on his blog, so things should get interesting shortly.
One of the issues that I and others have raised, is whether a council can be expected to host discussions that may well be critical of politicians and officers. As Paul Hilder points out in a comment to my item:

There is a simple fix: the campaign portal should be owned not by the council, but by local civil society. In some areas there are community coalitions or CENs which could lead on this, and LSPs or councils could endorse or "dual key" this use of the technology without needing to sit atop it and control it in a way which will inevitably quell civic action.

I'm looking forward to discussion on whether Bristol council is prepared to give up control of the platform. Meanwhile you can keep up with Steven's other international assignments on his blog. I think he should bring a useful perspective to CampaignCreator.

Technorati Tags: e-democracy, Engagement 2.0

Can a council host community campaigns?

Bristol City Council has been given £395,000 of UK government funding to test whether councillors and officials, often under attack from activists in their local communities, can learn not only to react positively but actually provide support to their critics.

The project is funded under the Government's e-innovations programme:

The focus of e-innovations is to encourage practical examples of new and innovative approaches to joined-up working, effective service delivery and community engagement which are sustainable in the long term.

The Campaign Pack funding is being spent on software that will provide an online home for any campaign, and ways to develop pamphlets and other materials; a guide to campaigning; a forum for campaigners to share experience; piloting; and development work to make the tool available to other local authorities. The project description says:

Falling election turnout is citied by many as evidence of the growing crisis in democracy. The Community Campaign Project starts with a different premise and an open-mind as to what might be achieved.
The Community Campaign Project’s starting point is that it is not lack of opinions or ideas which leads to this sense of disengagement. Rather it is the lack of ability that individuals and communities have to make their voices heard and a lack of trust that anyone will listen when they are.
Campaigns start with people with ideas. This project sets out to prove that by providing the right support, encouragement and access to tools, councils can help “people with ideas” to become effective community campaigners and in so doing, can show themselves to be effective community leaders.

I'm on an advisory group for the project that was recruited when most of the development work had been done, and I'm still not really sure why we are there, or whether I will stay. I'm developing a suspicion that we may be a tick box, as in "you must have an advisory group if you are getting Government funds". I hope I'm wrong.
However, I think I can say without breaking any confidences that there is some lively questioning from a few of us about how far it is realistic for councils to provide platforms for campaigners ... and whether any campaigner really trying to make a difference would use a council-hosted platform.
For me the problem is the use of the term 'campaign'. If the project aimed to create a set of tools and processes by which councils, community groups and many other interests in an area could work out when to agree and when to disagree - and then get on with it - that would make sense.
But campaigning is something different - it is about challenging, and councils don't usually like that. I've heard of quite a few situations in which councils have restricted or closed down online forums just because contributors disagreed with them. Are they really going to host and support active campaigns?
On the advisory group we are being urged to be positive, and wait until we can actually have a go with the online platform. On that basis I thought "don't get cross, get creative", and came up with a couple of ideas.
The first is that the campaign tool could provide a great learning experience to help councillors, officials and activists understand each other better. How about a mixed group gets together for a few hours to invent a possible campaign issue - not a real one, so tempers are not frayed from the outset. They work out who might be involved on council and community sides. Then they exchange roles, and start campaigning with all the support that is planned as part of the project. At the end they get together to talk about what they have learned from each other, and how the campaign tool might be improved. (I'll declare an interest here ... I would love to be hired to help on that one).
The second idea is that the project staff and advisory group reflect on the experience we are currently having in trying to share ideas. As the project proposal says " ... it is the lack of ability that individuals and communities have to make their voices heard and a lack of trust that anyone will listen when they are" (which leads to this sense of disengagement). If the advisory group starts to feel that it isn't being taken seriously, I think we have the perfect reason for raising this lack of attention strongly with the council. If they won't take seriously people who are meant to be advisers, what hope will there be for community activists?
Either way, it is an experiment, and I certainly wouldn't want to criticise Government for trying something different. I just wish they would also be prepared to provide at least some recognition to the thousands of campaign activists and community volunteers who have struggled over the past decade or so to understand online tools and make their benefits available to people in their neighbourhoods and communities of interest.
Ah, that gives me the third idea. Look more widely at what else is happening in the field, and invite others to contribute ideas through the project's online forum or blog. These days advisory groups don't have to be closed.

Technorati Tags: e-democracy, Engagement 2.0