Q&A with Citizen Connect

This week, Community Manager Megan Goldstein interviewed Morris Effron, co-founder of Citizen Connect. Read on to learn more about the organization and how you can get involved!

Q: What is Citizen Connect?

A: Citizen Connect is a front door to over 600 pro-democracy organizations, along with their events and best content, all in one place. You can quickly see what’s happening this week, and easily search for the topics that interest you.  The idea is to use Citizen Connect as a starting point to find what kinds of civic engagement resonate for you. In addition, it enables you to become more aware of and better informed about all the efforts already underway to improve our democracy.

Q: Tell me about the steps that our audience can take to get involved with Citizen Connect

A: The first thing to do is go to citizenconnect.us. Start by watching the 90-second mission video to learn about Citizen Connect and get inspired. Next, you can search for organizations or events that interest you. There are also featured events on the main page and a bi-weekly newsletter that summarizes events coming up in the next two weeks.

Q: How would you say Citizen Connect helps to strengthen democracy?

A: The underlying philosophy behind Citizen Connect is that democracy is a team sport and we all need to participate in some way, shape, or form. Helping citizens partake in making a positive difference in our country helps strengthen our democracy, and frankly, that’s the only way good change happens.

Q: What might be the time commitment for events I find on Citizen Connect?

A: For most of the events you can expect it to be no more than an hour, which is not a major time demand to get started. As you find an area or areas that interest you, you can decide if you want to go deeper and devote more time.  There are lots of different levels of commitment. It is not an all-or-nothing type of deal.

Q: Since 2020 when Citizen Connect began what has been the impact of the organization?

A: People are finding Citizen Connect and are using it! There is clear evidence that Citizen Connect is reaching more people, and a wider variety of people, and connecting those people with the organizations and activities in the pro-democracy space. Visitors and click-throughs to our member organizations and their offerings are continuing to go up.

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NEW & NOTEWORTHY

This is Megan Goldstein, The Democracy Group's Community Manager. This week I listened to a lot of podcast episodes and wanted to share my favorites with you!

Democracy Works: Gen Z's fight for democracy

‍As a Gen Z, I knew I wanted to listen to this episode. It took a deep dive into how Gen z impacts and will continue to impact politics. For a generation that usually gets a “bad rep," it was nice to hear how director of polling at the Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics & guest expert, John Della Volpe believes in my generation. If you are a Gen Z or want to learn more about them give this a listen.

Democracy in Danger: Black and Blue

I learned a lot from New York Times Columnist and guest Jamelle Bouie during this episode. He discusses topics like police brutality, the culture of violence in America, and most interestingly to me —  the way that people perceive the government differently based on how they look. Will and Siva ask important questions and Bouie replies with insightful answers. It was a quick and great listen!

FEATURED EXPERTS

Politics is Everything: Katie Harbath on election integrity and combating misinformation

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Katie Harbath is the CEO of Anchor Change, a fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center, and the director of technology and democracy for the International Republican Institute. Prior to her work at anchor change she worked as a public policy director at Meta for 10 years, where she led teams to help government figures use the platform. Her expertise lies within the crossover between tech and democracy.

Democracy Paradox: Daron Acemoglu on the Struggle for Shared Prosperity

‍Daron Acemoglu is a professor of economics at MIT who focuses on topics such as macroeconomics and political economics. In addition, he is the co-author of books such as, The Narrow Corridor, Why Nations Fail, Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle over Technology and Prosperity, and more. In this episode, he discusses the intersection between technology, economics, and politics.