Citizen Engagement Laboratory (CEL) uses digital media and technology to amplify the voices of underrepresented and underserved constituencies, particularly people of color and youth. Our mission is to empower these constituencies to act consistently and collectively on the issues that concern them, promoting a world of greater equality and justice in the process.

Permanent function: Advocacy, Media/Communications, Organizing

Strategy: CEL seeks to incubate and support projects that engage everyday people in the process of making change. While the projects we work with vary in scope and focus, they share a common engagement model that starts by providing people with information connected to simple, lightweight actions. Once people act, they become members of ongoing communities and campaigns through which we seek to deepen their engagement over time. In this way, we knit together discrete organizing moments into movements for social change. This model is rooted in the concept of member service: we serve our constituents by helping them take action on issues that matter to them and facilitating their involvement in all aspects of civic and political life, including voting. In the process our campaigns and communities become trusted sources for information and opportunities for action.

Our work is divided into three main areas: community incubation; campaign design and execution; and model innovation.

• Community Incubation: CEL incubates issue- and identity-based organizing efforts that specifically target underserved communities. We provide the support (campaign strategy, media production, strategic public relations, fundraising) and infrastructure (technology, legal and back office services) that enable social entrepreneurs to quickly start and grow effective organizing initiatives.

• Campaign Design and Execution: CEL designs and executes high impact, base building campaigns in conjunction with CEL incubated communities and partner organizations. Our campaigns center around critical issues facing progressives at large, focus on clear targets and deliver concrete victories while promoting core progressive narratives and values.

• Model Innovation: We continually look to innovate aspects of the model of technology-fueled organizing, identifying new strategies for engaging our target audiences with an emphasis on new technology tools.

Accomplishments:  In 2009 CEL incubated and launched Presente.org in conjunction with a group of progressive Latino organizers who served as co-founders. Presente.org began with a simple pledge signed by 100 Latinos and allies. Less than two years later the community has more than 250,000 members and is the largest online organization serving Latinos – helping to fill a critical gap in the progressive infrastructure. In that time, Presente.org has run numerous successful campaigns, including the BastaDobbs initiative that successfully pushed for the removal of anti-immigrant anchor Lou Dobbs from CNN.

Conservative Counterpart: Not really, though FreedomWorks is similar in its efforts to build communities using online tools.

How would you like to see the country change? We would like to see millions more Americans regularly mobilized around the issues they care about, both within and outside of the electoral process. We would like to see a cohesive progressive movement of which our communities and campaigns are an integral part, as evidenced by the ability to run high-profile, cross-community initiatives that regularly impact the media, culture, and public policy. And we would like to see a society that reflects progressive values at every level of government and in culture, including a fair immigration policy, a fair criminal justice system, and an equitable and sustainable economy.

Who we work with:New Organizing Institute, MoveOn.org, CREDO Action

Donor Advice: Look for opportunities to make leveraged investments and be willing to take risks. The progressive infrastructure is just like our economy as a whole: a huge portion of the impact and innovation comes from entrepreneurs who are developing cutting edge strategies for making social change. Relatively small amounts of financial backing for those change-makers can ultimately reap huge benefits for our movement.

Ian Inaba

Co-Executive Director, Citizen Engagement Labratory

Ian is an award-winning director and producer with a wide range of experience in media, technology, and business strategy. His directorial credits include the 2006 Sundance Award-winning documentary American Blackout and the MTV Video Music Awards-nominated music video for Eminem’s “Mosh.” He is a co-founder of Video the Vote and co-author of the book True Lies. A former investment banker and Silicon Valley executive, Ian is a graduate of the Wharton School of Business and the School of Engineering and Applied Science at the University of Pennsylvania.

Board of Directors: Ted Trimpa, Judith Freeman, James Rucker, Ian Inaba

Type of Organization: 501(c)3

Contact Citizen Engagement Laboratory

http://www.engagementlab.org

info@engagementlab.org

Phone: (510) 875-2135