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At Organizing to Win, we partner with social justice organizations, unions, political campaigns and nonprofits to design strategic campaigns that bring people together to build power – using the opportunity of the campaign or issue to do it. Not the other way around.
We believe that we win elections when we have power; we don’t have power just because we win an election (although . . . let’s win all the elections).
We center relationship-building, leadership development, and alignment around issues that are widely and deeply felt.
We plan campaigns to answer the question “How will this campaign build our power even if we lose?” (Credit for this question goes to Prentiss Haney.)
Even in a election campaign with fundraising deadlines and voter contact goals, we infuse the plan with opportunities to build relationships.
If you ask enough people to vote for you, you will probably win. If you build relationships with voters, volunteers and donors, you can win on the issues that inspired you to run in the first place.
Organizing to Win specializes in campaigns with candidates from historically excluded communities. Past clients include Stephanie Wade, a trans woman in Orange County (CA); Zekiah Wright, the first nonbinary person to run in West Hollywood; Dan Kalmick, a Jewish man in a city known for anti-mask rallies and white supremacist supporters; and Sasha Ritzie-Hernandez, an Afro-Indigenous-Latinx who became a US citizen three months before declaring a run for the Oakland (CA) school board.
Below are a few examples of campaigns where the Organizing to Win model led to more than victory.
The president of Brady United Against Gun Violence told us that she wanted to “recharge the grassroots.”
And win the midterm elections. Yeah, that part.
So, we designed a campaign to bring people together to build power for gun violence prevention. We created intentional spaces for gun violence prevention leaders and activists to share their experiences with gun violence and what they wanted to do about it.
It turns out that no matter what they wanted to do to prevent gun violence, we needed a better Congress to do it.
Soon, members who had never knocked on a door were recruiting others. Members who were afraid to talk to strangers phonebanked up a storm.
By election night, we’d blown past all the goals we’d set to measure our progress. Members loved the campaign. Local chapters found new leaders.
Eighty-nine percent of our highlighted candidates won and a new comprehensive background check bill was the third bill passed by the new Congress the following January.
“Mira’s organizing plan for our midterms campaign not only helped us win in 89% of our targeted districts, but more members engaged in campaigns than ever before. Her focus on building relationships, then moving together to action, not only meant victory on election night – but also more inspired, engaged and fired up activists for everything that comes after.“
— Kris Brown, President, Brady United Against Gun Violence
What does a state employees association do when it:
It doubles down on organizing.
In two years, we doubled membership, helped to elect a worker-friendly governor, won raises for the lowest paid employees and improvements in health care and identified dozens of new leaders.
Our campaign transformed the organization from its focus on representing workers one-by-one to collective action to solve big problems.
We formed a coalition with former rivals and won an executive order from the new governor. That EO established an innovative system by which state employees could negotiate over workplace conditions – and the quality of the services that they provide to taxpayers.
All that in a state where most public employees did not have the right to organize or negotiate.
Update: the current executive director started her career when Mira hired her as an entry-level organizer. Also, Mira was invited to the virtual signing ceremony where the governor signed legislation making the executive order permanent!
