Complexity and Social Networks Blog

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20 October 2008

The party after the campaign

What happens to the Obama "network" after the election? It's an intriguing question. The capacity that has been built to mobilize people's time and money greatly exceeds that of the parties. Think about it: Obama's campaign has mobilized on the order of two million or more individuals in one fashion or another. It has raised unprecedented amounts of money from unprecedented numbers of people. This is not a typical case of a campaign as an ad hoc organization that goes into mothballs for four years. The lights are not going off on this operation. If Obama loses, the network provides him an instant infrastructure to run again. The more intriguing question to me, as a student of politics, is what happens if, as seems likely right now, he wins. There are inter-related political and strategic questions. On the political side, the question is how Obama might use the apparatus to help him govern. Does he directly appeal to his e-mail list to support his policy objectives? There are, on average, about four thousand politically active Obama supporters in each Congressional district--that could be a lot of letters to Members. Does he appeal to his network to support particular candidates? A single e-mail on a candidate's behalf to Obama's e-mail list might provide a large fraction of the war chest of someone running for office.

On the strategic side, the question is to what extent does the apparatus continue to evolve to allow grassroots involvement, and to what extent does stuff flow up as well as down? In the long run, the only way that there will be some stickiness to the structure is if the people who have been involved can mobilize for local action, can connect to each other, and feel that their voices matter. At this current time, there is some limited functionality built into the system to allow for these things, but the architecture is built to optimize for the short run coordination of efforts and extraction of resources. Grassroots functionality, as I have discussed before, is a double-edged sword, because sometimes those roots turn against you. But it is a necessary next step, if the network is to be institutionalized (excuse the apparent oxymoron).

The potential impact on our democracy is both thrilling and troubling. On the thrilling side is the potential for a long standing increase in the engagement of people in politics-- most notably, among the youngest voters, who have always been the least engaged. On the troubling side is the potential disintermediation of our (small r) republican institutions.

This may be a realigning election - not (necessarily) in the usual terms that political scientists mean, but in terms of the re-organizing of American politics. Whatever choices are made are sure to be studied by allies and opponents of Obama alike, and serve as a starting point for emulation. This will be a tall order--win or lose-- the success of the Obama campaign has been the product of a unlikely marriage of man, message, medium, and moment. And while the campaign has been historic, the decisions that are made after the campaign, I think, may fundamentally restructure American politics for the 21st century.

Posted by David Lazer at October 20, 2008 9:45 PM

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