by Rich Cowan

In February and March of 1995, I was involved in organizing a national day of campus protest using the Internet. This coordinated effort was conceived in a national meeting in Washington, DC on January 27, 1995 and first pitched to student e-mail discussion lists on February 3. A face-to-face meeting involving representatives from about a dozen campuses was held at the Fellowship of Reconciliation in Nyack, NY on February 18. The organization holding these meetings, the University Conversion Project, had spent over 18 months compiling materials related to the topic of the protests, proposed student aid cuts and the Republican Contract With America.

On the day of action, March 29, the New York Times ran a feature article "Students turn to Internet for Nationwide Protest Planning" (excerpted on-line for free at the SF Chronicle website). A few followup articles in other national media followed, but in terms of online and academic coverage, the article that got the most play was a 1995 research paper by Harvard graduate student Mark S. Bonchek of the now-defunct Political Participation Project at MIT. The paper was entitled "Grassroots in Cyberspace: Using the Internet to Facilitate Political Participation." It was published as a book by Political Science Press (Chicago) in 1996; and widely referenced on the web. It is now preserved at archive.org and here.

What was unfortunate about this coverage is that Bonchek never really examined the methods used in this online campaign, the publication of which might enable others to wage similar efforts. The author never contacted the organization responsible for the protests (which was conveniently located between Harvard and MIT). Had he done so, he could have asked us what lessons we had learned about what works and what doesn't for mobilizing people on the Internet.

Although we had saved archives of e-mail messages, neither Bonchek nor any other researcher has explored the myriad of organizing techniques that were applied to the new online medium. How did we build listserves from 20 people to 1000 people in 3 weeks? How did we keep track of endorsers? How did we balance electronic means of communication with phone, fax, and face-to-face? The impression created is that one person, using a computer, created demonstrations out of thin air, without staff (Nicole Newton and Jeremy Smith) and without the support of other national organizations, with whom we had been building relationships for four years.

Fortunately, we will be able to use this website (www.organizenow.net) and its associated listservs (octech@democracygroups.org) to reveal some of the methods that heretofore have not been published to an audience of activists. Just for starters, we present three items:

1) Here is the email promotional announcement that was used to build participation in one of the two organizing listservs that were used to discuss and debate protest plans.

2) Here is the e-mail "call to action" dated March 3, 1995.

3) Here is a relatively light piece, drafted at the request of George Magazine, but never published.

[Note: the University Conversion Project changed its name to Center for Campus Organizing; however, CCO is no longer in business..]

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