Activists and practitioners were already preparing for a tumultuous election year before the COVID-19 pandemic hit our shores. Now, the months ahead present immense challenges – and opportunities – for redefining how civic engagement is practiced for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) communities.
Join us on September 10 for a timely discussion with leading practitioners who are effectively integrating digital strategies with authentic power-building while navigating a never-before-seen civic environment. All share a mission of giving real agency to vulnerable...
We will begin our series, "Voting Matters: Gender, Citizenship, and the Long 19th Amendment," with a keynote address by the historian Martha S. Jones, who will root the generations-long movement for women’s suffrage in the activism of African American women from the 1830s. Jones will explore the tangled intersections of gender and race in the battle for the ballot while considering the evolution of birthright citizenship, more broadly, as itself a gendered origins story about constituting the American people.
COVID-19 laid bare the cracks in national leadership and international institutions charged with providing a timely, coordinated response to the pandemic. At the same time, Large non-profits found themselves constrained when delivering aid and assistance on the ground. Yet, self-governed membership associations operating at the grassroots level were uniquely efficient and impactful across the globe.
To what extent have these organizations proven better equipped to deal with the pandemic response, and what are the challenges that these associations face when...
Two of our country's top political communications strategists — Mark McKinnon and Jennifer Palmieri — will discuss messaging in Democratic and Republican political campaigns. What is a message? Why is messaging important? How do you mobilize voters through messaging? What are the current messages of the presidential campaigns?
Health care is the single most important issue for most Americans, yet 51 million people forego a considerable amount of influence in shaping our nation’s health policy by not registering to vote. COVID-19 has made these issues painfully salient, with voter registration down by 70% in many states.
With an election coming up this fall, Harvard Votes Challenge (HVC) is undertaking an ambitious campaign to get every member of the Kennedy School community registered and ready to vote. We invite all interested HKS students, staff, and faculty to a volunteer orientation session this Wednesday, August 5, where we will introduce HVC, provide resources on registering to vote, and explain how you can become part of the team and organize every member of HKS in time for election day on November 3.
Join Professor of Education Meira Levinson and CEO Sean A. Floyd for a conversation on the the civic engagement gap in part two of GSE's "Get Out the Vote: Voter Mobilization and Civic Education" series.
What is the civic empowerment gap, why does it matter, and how can it be eliminated? In this session, Meira and Sean will discuss insider politics and outsider activism, and why and how youth, people of color, first generation college students, and new Americans can upend traditional power disparities in U.S. politics.
Art has the power to provoke, inspire, inform, and force new ways of thinking - particularly in times of crisis. Over the last few years, artists have been engaged in resistance movements, encouraging political participation through their art, and calling attention to issues and tragic events that confront us in novel and affecting ways.
Join us for a discussion on how artists, particularly artists of color, are responding to the current fight for racial justice in the midst of a global pandemic. We will explore how they are expressing what is happening in creative...
Imagine an American democracy where the election system was designed to allow citizens to perform their most basic civic duty with ease and without obstruction. Imagine every citizen treating voting as a civic duty, a society where nearly everyone voted.
Our current crisis of governance has focused unprecedented public...
We are in an unprecedented moment of protest and mobilization against the biting impact of racism and inequality. This reckoning is coming just a few months before an election of enormous consequence, with challenges to participation as a result of COVID-19. What can philanthropy do to be most effective? Can it pivot as fast as is needed? What needs to change? Join a conversation with leading practitioners in philanthropy who will talk about all of these issues and the urgency the times demand.