Progressive Movement Sectors and Functions

Advocacy, Organizing & Persuasion
• Educate public officials, candidates, and decision-makers regarding issues
• Influence major institutions to respond favorably to the movement’s ideas and proposals
• Exert an appropriate influence on the legal and judicial systems
• Organize and operate grassroots campaigns (other than legislative, such as those that pressure corporations and office holders)
• Train grassroots advocates and grassroots campaign managers
• Train individual persuaders and idea promoters
• Carry out online education, motivation, and fundraising for issue campaigns (e.g., by non-profits)

Electoral & Civic Engagement
• Run political campaigns (done by political parties & campaign operations)
• Identify and train candidates and political campaign operatives
• Carry out ballot initiative campaigns
• Submit legislative proposals and work to get them passed
• Carry out opposition research related to electoral, legislative, and initiative campaigns
• Conduct campaign research and polling
• Educate and motivate people for civic engagement, including voter registration and GOTV
• Monitor election processes and pursue election integrity objectives

Idea Generation & Marketing
• Articulate the movement’s underlying ideology
• Monitor and research social, economic, political, military/terrorism, scientific, and technological trends and developments, national and global
• Research political opposition resources, strategies, and tactics
• Develop strategies and tactics that can be used by organizations within and allied to the infrastructure
• Create a body of intellectual work (including research) that supports critical issue areas, and prepare policy papers and other “idea products” that explain and advocate the movement’s positions on specific issues
• Conduct policy research and development that reflects the movement’s priorities
• Develop model legislation for adoption by Congress and by state and local legislatures
• Develop model ballot initiatives
• Develop a coherent progressive “brand”, market test it, and provide training and brand-supportive messaging and collateral materials to progressive organizations, activists, and political figures
• Develop, disseminate, and apply conceptual frames, language, and narratives that can be used to advance positions consistent with the movement’s ideology
• Provide training in marketing and communication techniques (including framing, language, metaphors, and narrative) for office holders, media spokespeople, authors, and activists
• Conduct market research on attitudes, knowledge, framing, language, and media usage
• Create and disseminate content for all types of media and for office holders and advocates, tailored for the specific target media and audiences
• Track developments, trends, and opportunities in media and information channels, including broadcast, print, digital, etc.
• Develop and maintain  media resource databases for use by the movement
• Carry out investigative research in areas of interest to progressives, such as government, corporate, and public sector corruption; campaign financing; and media bias; and communicate findings
• Garner favorable media coverage for the movement’s philosophy and positions
• Provide input into advertising and public relations campaigns relevant to progressive goals
• Establish speakers bureaus, provide training for speakers, and secure media placements

Coordination & Capacity Infrastructure
• Foster coordination between the organizations and individuals within the infrastructure, and between infrastructure entities and others political players, such as activists, fundraisers, and officeholders, for purposes of strategy implementation;
• Coordinate the various components of the infrastructure on an ongoing basis
• Track the behavior of opponents and develop appropriate counter-measures
• Plan measures to neutralize or marginalize opposition
• In conjunction with idea generators, perform ongoing SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis and communicate results within the movement, as appropriate
• Cultivate and coordinate with both regular and ad hoc funding sources;
• Inform funders regarding movement operations, priorities, and funding needs, on an ongoing basis
• Create and maintain databases for overlapping use by political and issue campaigns
• Augment the intellectual, technical, and functional capacity of progressive organizations

Leadership & Human Resources
• Recruit and train members for the movement, including youth
• Develop and operate programs for mid-career development, and retention and promotion of talented progressives within the movement
• Provide skills training for operating progressive organizations
• Provide leadership development resources: training, networking, and placement opportunities
• Operate a job placement service for the progressive movement
• Recruit and train for progressive media career positions
• Recruit and train for Director positions in progressive nonprofits
• Arrange for coverage of human services needs (e.g., health & disability insurance, retirement plans, etc.) for progressives working in short-term, temporary, transitional, etc., positions

Media & Idea Dissemination
• Broadcast – radio, television, cable TV
• Print - including newspapers, magazines, book publishers, comic books
• Digital and non-traditional - internet (blogs, e-zines, video-posting sites, etc.), e-mail, mobile phone, online social network groups, podcasts, Second Life, etc.
• Film, audio, and video
• Music
• Performance arts – theater, comedy, mime, etc.
• Graphic arts
• Other (e.g., billboards, posters, newsletters, sermons, cue-cards for politicians and speakers, games, banners, messages on clothing and items of daily use)
• News services
• Watchdogs that pressure media to increase accuracy and progressive coverage
• Monitor media coverage of the progressive movement, its opposition, and relevant issues

Funding
• Provide funding for progressive movement organizations, as well as candidates and campaigns
• Promote “movement thinking” -- educate funders regarding the benefits of funding progressive movement organizations, not just candidates and campaigns; infrastructure, not just specific-issue organizations and campaigns; and the synergistic benefits of movement and campaign support
• Educate funders regarding the need for ongoing operational support, not restricted to specific projects, and not time-limited, and how taking a director position in a nonprofit can permit the donor to monitor the application of their investment in order to lessen the perceived risks of unrestricted funding
• Develop and promote a universal grant-application form and process
• Provide potential funders with services to make it easier to give support with confidence, such as identifying and profiling potential recipients, and tracking results of gifts
• Provide forums in which funders can meet and work together
• Work with coordination infrastructure entities to ensure funders can be informed regarding movement operations, priorities, and funding needs, on an ongoing basis
• Identify potential new supporters for progressive infrastructure, e.g., by approaching people who have been significant donors to candidates and campaigns, but have not supported other components of the progressive movement
• Provide educational and promotional material for financial advisors to use when working with progressive clients who would like to express their values through giving as well as investing
• Provide fundraising services, such as direct mail, online donation tools, donor relations management
• Donation aggregators (online & other)
• Fundraising consultants & advisors

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