LaCour appeared to be breaking new ground, showing that one brief but memorable interaction could reduce prejudice. Fleischer is especially interested in learning whether deep canvassing can affect peoples thinking on two issues racial prejudice and abortion rights. The Leadership Lab has honed the deep canvassing method through years of intensive, in-house analysis of their work ( Denizet-Lewis, 2016 ). As part of the LA LGBT Center's groundbreaking Leadership LAB team, he helped create the original deep canvass approach. Broockman says this research can at least lend ordinary people a new script when dealing with people in their lives who hold prejudicial opinions. Though the abortion debate is less obviously rooted in prejudice than transgender discrimination, Fleischer and his canvassers noticed that many voters reacted negatively to a short video of a middle-aged woman recounting having an abortion when she was 22. "It was a really ingenious test of the change. Through the power of a year-long, cohort experience, your leaders connect with and discover alongside others. Its a real heart-to-heart between strangers. Thats what the Mormons use, he said on this sunny, bird-chirping Saturday in February. Canvassers often had to politely extricate themselves after 20 minutes voters were sad to see them go. Instead of a script that lasts 60 seconds, volunteers spend 10 or 20 minutes talking with each voter. Staying grounded in our real lived experiences instead of opinions. KnockEveryDoors canvassing methodology is based on the groundbreaking work of the Leadership LAB at the Los Angeles LGBT Center. How much does a deep canvass program typically cost? There, Executive Director David Fleischer, collaborating with political scientists David Broockman and Josh Kalla and a host of staff and volunteers, have been working for years to iterate a model called deep canvassing.. She didnt. A partner organization that isnt doing electoral work may ask its members to canvass via #KnockEveryDoor. The Los Angeles LGBT Center's Leadership LAB (Learn Act Build) specializes in deep canvassing and organizing through volunteer leadership development. Whats the best way to convince a voter at the door? Treat it like the most normal thing in the world. So why dont more campaigns for candidates and issues canvass? Give me a five., Nancy wasnt the only person to significantly decrease her support after watching the video. And while the effects may be small, only moving opinion a handful of percentage points among those canvassed may be worth it, too. This doesnt mean that you all confront that person at once. Theres no difference regarding who you can speak with in a deep canvass. In the runup, conservative news outlets were blaring headlines about a scary immigrant caravan marching north through Mexico to the US southern border. The numbers get a bit bigger when you just focus on people who actually entered into the conversation, he says. LaCour, joined late in the process by Green as a co-author, published the results in the December 2014 issue of Science. We hope to provide both new and seasoned grassroots activists with a quality canvassing training that will allow them to enhance their local power building around whichever issue or candidate of their choice. Deep canvassing is a technique created and used by a group of people at the Leadership LAB, an organization that is part of the Los Angeles LGBT Center in California. Green connected Fleischer with Michael LaCour, then a U.C.L.A. A typical state or national campaign, even one with a ground-game focus, doesnt want its volunteers spending 10 or 15 minutes at a door. In one, a social worker (a social worker! Barrett marveled) announced that being transgender is a mental illness; in another, a man matter-of-factly said he hoped to develop a straight pill to change gay people. If you would like to see first-hand what these one-on-one conversations are like, we encourage you to sign up to canvass with us. Topping and dozens of other canvassers were a part of that 2016 effort. Broockman and Kalla (2016) assessed the impact of the . In the video above, notice how the voter starts to come around on the issue when the canvasser asks if shes ever been on the receiving end of discrimination. In 2020, Susmik moved to New Hampshire to work as a field organizer for Bernie Sanders presidential campaign. Jeffrey Fountain/Courtesy of Los Angeles LGBT Center After the dust. Something went wrong. Oh, yes, Nancy said. We have a national reputation for our success developing practical, positive, non-partisan, non-judgmental ways to connect with voters. The canvasser shares vulnerably about their own life and asks curious questions to create mutual understanding grounded in lived experience. Possibly. All Muslims are often blamed for single acts of terror. The key to changing peoples minds is to be curious about what other people think. Have a Conversation. If I would have only talked to people who agreed with me, I would have only talked to my mom and dad, he told me. That's why we keep our work free. You can also go more in-depth on the science behind deep canvassing by reading the academic study referenced by the New York Times' that was published by political scientists David Broockman and Josh . I have to teach my hamster to speak Finnish today., Gardiner turned to the volunteers. In the face of this defeat, the Leadership LAB was established at the LA LGBT Center to embark on a radical project - knocking on voters' doors to learn why and make a case for love. Then they should try to change the voters minds. In New Hampshire, Susmik reached out to immigrant and refugee communities in the state, which has a particularly high number of Bhutanese refugees from Nepal. Jackson grew up as a girl, but he knew even when he was 5 or 6 that he was really a boy. Leadership Lab-trained volunteers were found to be successful at reducing transgender prejudice in front-door conversations, the effects persisting months later in follow-up surveys. That means not making assumptions based on the voters age, race or their religion. Volunteers working a 2-hour shift, on an average, can complete 5 conversations. It costs money. Topping, whos nonbinary, and others, went door to door. Does this give us any guidance on how to talk to folks we dont agree with? He and his colleagues started the effort in 2009, shortly after the Prop 8 constitutional amendment and struck down same-sex marriage in California. Its about sharing and listening, all the while nudging people to be analytical and think about their shared humanity with marginalized groups. Broockman and Kalla point to Leadership Lab canvassers ability to engage voters in two prejudice-reduction behaviors at the door: perspective taking (the ability to empathize with anothers experience) and active processing (deep or effortful thinking). Deep canvassing, a relatively new technique, is showing promise and is backed by rigorous testing from researchers and activists in the field. There are very few tests of prejudice reduction methods, and Paluck says this suggests the Los Angeles LGBT Center's approach is actually far more effective than previous efforts, like TV ads. For many voters, they reflect on it and they realize that's a terrible feeling they don't want anyone to have," Broockman says. Not every campaign can afford to run canvasses. That doesnt tell you about the person inside., On this particular day, volunteers would be canvassing in a predominantly black neighborhood, so Gardiner reminded them to be sensitive to experiences of race-based discrimination. You can also go more in-depth on the science behind deep canvassing by reading the academic study referenced by the New York Times that was published by political scientists David Broockman and Josh Kalla in the peer-reviewed journal Science. After a long day of canvassing on that Saturday, tired but exuberant volunteers returned for a debriefing. Its a reminder that our political opponents arent always as rigid or ideologically severe as they appear in our minds. Still, the Leadership Lab is unusual in its focus on quality over quantity. He also hopes it will usher in a new era of political persuasion. In 2020, these seem like radical propositions. He ran a phone program in the 2020 general election that canvassed over 15,000 people in battleground states, and also led the deep-canvassing phones program in support of the Minneapolis public safety charter amendment in 2021. Right, because otherwise you have the biggest secret in the world, and everyone thinks something about you thats not true, Fleischer said, before pivoting to a story about Jacksons being demeaned by a waiter in a restaurant. As a result, our elected officials are reflecting the communities they represent less and less. Cost: $50 for both sessions This article covers the basic components of a deep canvassing script. Armed with a no men in womens bathrooms message, anti-L.G.B.T. People are what makes Advancement advance. In his work, Bruneau finds that political partisans have a skewed view of how they think their opponents think of them. But things fell apart when David Broockman and Joshua Kalla, then graduate students at the University of California, Berkeley, tried to use LaCour's methods to study prejudice against transgender people. Fleischer then returned to his scale, asking Nancy what number felt right for her now. The idea is that people learn lessons more durably when they come to the conclusions on their own. ", The Leadership LAB of the Los Angeles LGBT Center trains people in canvassing techniques aimed at reducing prejudice. Dont try to change someones mind alone. That failed miserably, he said. Specifically, the canvasser asks the voter to recall a time when he or she was discriminated against. The year before, a survey of more than 6,000 transgender and gender-nonconforming people revealed that an astonishing 41 percent had tried to commit suicide. There wasn't, however, any indication that those who started out with very negative feelings about transgender people were particularly resistant to the conversation. The modern form of deep canvassing was developed by the Leadership LAB of the Los Angeles LGBT Center. That means you need to create 100,000 conversations to change 10,000 minds and win the vote. The day before one canvass, representatives from an animal rights group told me they hoped to better understand how to help people connect emotionally to animal welfare. Green, who was unaware of the deception, quickly requested a retraction. In 2008, he was in Ohio mobilizing African-American and Latino voters for Barack Obama when California residents passed Proposition 8, banning same-sex marriage in the state. They sent out surveys to thousands of homes in Miami, asking people to answer questions that included how they felt about transgender people and if they would support legal protection against discrimination for transgender people. See below for examples around particular issues including climate change and marriage equality. People would often be very judgmental of the woman on the video or any woman who had had an abortion, Fleischer said. A gray-haired Hispanic woman named Nancy cracked open the front door, though not enough to let her little dog eat our ankles. I dont like seeing people mistreat Jackson. Its up to volunteers to add specific candidates, districts, elections, or geographically-specific voting information to our templated #KnockEveryDoor scripts. They, along with Yale statistician Peter Aronow, discovered that LaCour's work was almost a complete fabrication. Mike LaCour had not assembled [it]. That is, it will be a platform that individuals, groups, and campaigns alike can plug into to receive training and support for progressive volunteers who wish to canvass in their communities. We accept credit card, Apple Pay, and Deep Canvassing in Action - The Leadership LAB Deep Canvassing in Action The Leadership LAB works to reduce prejudice and change voters' hearts and minds. Massachusetts voters chose to protect trans rights, and Topping believes deep canvassing helped. What a roller coaster of emotions," he says. Deep Canvassing to Shift Hearts, Mind and Votes. (Also worth noting: Deep canvassing has only been tested with progressive causes. Fleischers team videotapes many of its conversations with voters, then analyzes the tape like a football team might so we can figure out whats working and whats not, explained a field organizer, Steve Deline. Their Project Director, Dave Fleisher, describes it saying, "In a conventional canvass, campaigns try to control the message by sending volunteers out with a script to recite exactly as written. Were just beginning to learn how to do this well, but its important. The experiment divided voters into a treatment group engaged in a conversation intended to reduce transgender prejudice and a placebo group targeted with a conversation about recycling. The group goes out canvassing in pairs, with one person assigned the role of trying to change people's minds and the other responsible for recording it on camera. You've probably noticed this if you've ever tried to change someone's political opinion at a dinner party. And 75 percent of the people who start the conversations with the canvassers share a story about their own lives. The effort helped defeat the anti-L.G.B.T. Going door to door, a Los Angeles-based activist group tries to reduce prejudice against transgender people. She told voters about her own transgender child, Jie, now an adult. Have more questions about long form or deep canvassing? Like, of course were on your doorstep on a Saturday talking about transgender issues!, Moments later, Williams reminded the volunteers to be open and nonjudgmental. What we can now say experimentally, the key to the success of these conversations is doing the exact opposite of that.. Deep canvassing research shows it is effective in getting infrequent voters to become regular voters as well as enthusiastic advocates for voting, sharing their new practical knowledge with close contacts and family members. In 2014, Science published a study claiming to show that an approximately 20-minute conversation with a gay or lesbian canvasser trained by Fleischers team could turn a gay-marriage opponent into a supporter. When I asked how her day went, she shook her head and recounted a series of disheartening conversations with voters she couldnt persuade. Or for issues like the acceptance of genetically modified foods? Steve: So my name is Steve Deline, and I am a field organizer at The Leadership LAB at the Los Angeles LGBT Center. That lack of control scares campaigns. And I also wanted to point out to people we were not going to give up. If only I could have 10 minutes with Ted Cruz, Fleischer said once. What does it take to divert someone away from prejudice and toward greater acceptance of others in order to build support for progressive causes? The design of this tool was inspired by the Business Model Canvas. If they dont, and even if they do, theyre asked a question like, When was a time someone showed you compassion when you really needed it? to get them to reflect on their experience when they might have felt something similar to the people in the marginalized community. He is deeply passionate about the superpowers of vulnerability and non-judgmental curiosity that we all carry within us, and the political and personal transformations that occur when we use those powers to bridge fear and difference. "Out of that outrage and despair, people wanted to do something very constructive." In 2014, Fleischer and his team modified their canvassing work to persuade and mobilize voters by phone. Fleischer began getting the sense that just talking and listening to people was making them more accepting of same-sex marriage. Volunteers went to the other half and started the conversations that Fleischer thinks can help change minds. Deep canvassing is an approach to conversations which is non-judgemental and invites people to open up about their real conflicted feelings on an issue. Even as Trump was talking about the caravan, we see that Republicans in our study are moving.. While #KnockEveryDoor will focus on the mechanics of canvassing, not the campaign objective of the canvasser, there will be minimal restrictions on what volunteers may canvass for. In terms of the length of the canvass program, you have to look at the outcome you are trying to achieve. Across the street, a man in his late 30s who said he was liberal and pro-L.G.B.T.-rights moved to a five from an eight, explaining that he was deeply worried about the bathroom issue. The mans concern seemed informed by his experience in a New York City nightclub; he hinted at his discomfort standing at a urinal next to a drag queen. Williams says the man said he hadn't considered what that might be like. At the Leadership Lab's two-hour pre-canvass training that morning, volunteers were warned about "fake 10s," people who think of themselves as against discrimination many of them Democrats . We studied everything, from the kinds of conversations we should be having to the characteristics that made a voter persuadable, he says. LGBT Center volunteers went out to canvass hundreds of people. Becky Bond, a Bernie Sanders campaign adviser and an admirer of the Leadership Labs work, says that the Sanders campaign has focused on marshaling the enthusiasm of volunteers to persuade people. Some folks may have a crucifix on the door. Deep canvassing is an approach to conversations which is non-judgemental and invites people to open up about their real conflicted feelings on an issue. The curse of the orange hats, read a headline in Salon. But through deep canvassing, the activist is able to turn her around. And he can grow a better beard than I can!. Without that theoretical understanding, its difficult to generalize and use the approach in other settings, Bruneau says. I think people dont talk enough about the focus on persuasion we had, because the story line became, Oh, they won because turnout was so high.. Its also quite a departure from standard political canvassing. Volunteer's go door-to-door, talking to strangers, and often change their attitudes about things like same-sex marriage and transgender rights. Help put resources in the hands of change makers, Listening Partnerships and Deep Canvassing, Resistance School Video Course, Deep Canvassing whilst social distancing, Indivisible, 2021 (Video), Unpacking Deep Canvassing, Indivisible, 2022 (Video 54:08), Kimberly Serrano on lessons learned from deep canvassing, The Immigrant Learning Center, 2019 (Video 6:50 mins), Everything you need to know about Deep Canvassing, CallHub, Changing the Conversation Videos and Articles, For Your Reconsideration Podcast, This American Life, NPR, April 8, 2016. Everyone basically ignored the canvassing aspect, and that the message and the quality of the conversation at the door is what seems to matter.. We are still in the process of figuring this out. Most people have been judged because of gender, race or some other issue. We will retain the data and also send the digitized data back to the volunteer. Thats not known.). And thats exciting, because it offers the possibility that we could get past the current paralysis on a wide variety of controversial issues.. His deep canvassing career and vision took off in rural North Carolina, where hehelped change hearts and minds in our groundbreaking immigration deep canvass with Down Home North Carolina. New distinctions Nancy laughed. 1. Is First Republic Banks failure sign of a slow-motion banking crisis? An IE may ask its volunteers to canvass via #KnockEveryDoor. Keep in mind the media environment the canvassers were working in. Taken advantage of us. Broockman and Kalla arent completely sure. ), Emile Bruneau, a neuroscientist who studies intergroup conflict at the University of Pennsylvania and was not involved in the canvassing experiments, tells me in an email it is so promising to see an intervention, any intervention, that has a lasting effect on big social issues.. Deep canvassing is a long-term investment, but the impact is cumulative. But even if that happens, he says, it at least will encourage people to think deeply about the issues they're going to vote on. This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged. Why is deep canvassing relevant to the world we live in today? Eager to know if his abortion canvassing was persuasive, Fleischer asked Broockman and Kalla to measure it. Peer-to-peer texting is another vehicle (though virtually untested for turn out effect) for personal back and forth conversations. As the team's National Mentoring Coordinator he partnered with organizations and campaigns across the country to develop and apply deep conversation approaches - around marriage equality, trans-inclusive nondiscrimination laws, criminal justice reform, and . Neighbours United, formerly known as West Kootenay EcoSociety, developed their script over 1.5 years of script iterations, building off the learnings of many other deep canvasses and organizations, notably Montana Engagement Partnership, and in collaboration with the New Conversation Initiative, with support from Yale Program on Climate Change Communications. Fanned out across the neighborhood were more than three dozen Leadership Lab volunteers, many of them local college students, as well as progressive activists from around the country hoping to learn about changing voters minds. We have a national reputation for our success developing practical, positive, non-partisan, non-judgmental ways to connect with voters. The groups feared a backlash against a recent ordinance that prohibited discrimination based on gender identity. On the issue of transgender rights, the woman seemed mostly supportive but stopped at a nine. One of the challenges at #KnockEveryDoor is to take a traditional organizing practice that assumes volunteers can be extensively trained and managed by staff and translate it into a distributed organizing model. Maybe, as The Wall Street Journal suggested, Fleischers efforts merely flattered the ideological sensibilities of liberals. But this week, a new study published in Science by David Broockman, an assistant professor of political economy at Stanford, and Joshua Kalla, a graduate student in political science at Berkeley, appears to serve as vindication of Fleischers work. Oh, okay, that makes a lot of sense, she says. But many times this approach underestimates whos persuadable. The new research also tries to identify the secret ingredient that makes deep canvassing work, and whether versions of it that occur over the phone or through video prompts can be useful as well. #KnockEveryDoor isnt currently supporting or opposing any particular federal, state, or local candidate, but instead we are providing materials for volunteers to support or oppose candidates of their choosing. Whats the coolest thing about this method of canvassing? Theres also the question: Is it worth the effort? Fleischer headed west to work with the Los Angeles L.G.B.T. #KnockEveryDoor will support volunteers in several ways: First, we will train volunteers. Though there is scant research on transgender prejudice, what is known suggests transgender people face widespread prejudice and discrimination, Aaron Norton and Gregory Herek wrote in their 2012 study of heterosexual attitudes toward transgender Americans. "We had a certain sense of responsibility.". Have A Conversation. Volunteers also encouraged people to talk about anyone they were close to who had an abortion. Nancy had mostly dismissed Fleischers how did that make you feel? questions, but his personal story prompted a shift. Because abortion is such a politically polarized issue, he said, it could just be that we have to get better at making voters trust us and open up. But it could also be that the Leadership Labs transgender canvassing success is an anomaly. He said I blew his mind, and that he would never forget the conversation we had! Meg Riley, a 60-year-old Unitarian Universalist minister from Minnesota who volunteers with a racial-justice group, recounted her eventful day. 2. Who can you reach with a deep canvass? Second, we will provide volunteers with materials, including template scripts, data entry sheets, sign-in sheets, field training and debrief agendas, etc. Prejudices are often deep, obstinate beliefs. In a distributed organizing model, a sprawling crew of part time, sometimes, and one-time volunteers work across space and time and use consumer software platforms like Google apps, Maestro Conference Calling, Slack and Facebook to manage everything from canvassing logistics to training to research to tech development. This model encourages a freeform and reciprocal conversation between the volunteer canvasser and the voter.
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