Activism, Inc.

How the Outsourcing of Grassroots Campaigns Is Strangling
Progressive Politics in America

Dana R. Fisher

Activism, Inc. introduces America to an increasingly familiar political actor: the canvasser. She'’ sthe twenty-something with the clipboard, stopping you on the street or knocking on your door, the foot soldier of political campaigns.

Granted unprecedented access to the “People’s Project,” an unknown yet influential organization driving left-leaning grassroots politics, Dana Fisher tells the true story of outsourcing politics in America. Like the major corporations that have outsourced their customer service to companies abroad, the grassroots campaigns of national progressive movements have been outsourced at different times to this single organization.

Fisher examines the history and rationale behind political outsourcing on the Left, weaving together frank interviews of canvassers, high-ranking political officials across the political spectrum, and People’s Project management. She compares this process of outsourcing to the grassroots efforts on the Right, which remain firmly grounded in communities and local politics.

This book offers a chilling review about the consequences of political outsourcing. Combining the stories of local people on the streets throughout America to the national organizations and political campaigns that make up progressive politics, it shows what happens to the passionate young activists outsourced to the clients of Activism, Inc.

department of sociology ▪ columbia university ▪ drf2004@columbia.edu