Shift the Country
Growing Something Like A Phenomenon
Tools + Strategy to Help People Through Crises, Get Voters Engaged, Hold This Country Together, & Make Change Along The Way
Shift the Country is a new nonprofit founded in this moment of great disruption to help people help each other through several crises happening at once, to get voters engaged, to hold civil society together in this country while we get through, and to make structural transformation along the way.
^^ That’s the mission.
We can help Shift the Country toward a more equitable, just, resilient, and sustainable society using the five principles of connection, community, inclusiveness, resilience, and problem-solving.
Our five-part strategy:
- Provide Key Civic Engagement Tools: We recommend a core set of 15 all-purpose civic engagement tools designed for exactly this moment and mission that any individual or group can use for action at any level – with ideas, context, and examples for use;
- Help Engage the Majority of Voters: We help get voters engaged to counter the natural tendency of humans to disengage due to collective trauma from the worsening coronavirus catastrophe, and from emerging tyranny and nationalistic oligarchy (an engaged, active majority of voters can push back tyranny and oligarchy);
- Drive The Narrative + Public Agenda: We help drive the narrative, and help people advocate for solid opposition agendas/priorities at every level to build consensus for revitalized institutions and a social contract that serve all Americans better than ever before;
- Leverage Social Networks To Reach Further: We leverage social networks plus marketing for greater permeation and reach in both the real world and online – to foster the “viral spread” of action, engagement, activities, problem-solving, stories, messages, and ideas.
- Help Build Power Through Greater Alliances: We build power by helping people build bigger and more coalitions of coalitions, groups, teams, businesses, organizations, nonprofits, institutions, and individuals in greater alliances than ever to help us have more engagement than ever.
The US is in a massive disruption.
Americans are fighting for our lives, the lives of the people we love, our safety, and a fair shot at getting through. At every level, elected officials, governments, and institutions are often not helping us survive, stay alive, and thrive as best they could. This country is in a giant pivot.
“We believe that COVID-19 will be one of the biggest economic, political, and cultural turning points of our lifetime, and how we respond will shape our future.” – New Media Ventures website
This civic engagement approach can help people help each other through all of this, help people save lives, help get more voters engaged and voting, help hold this country together… and create something like a phenomenon. A shift to a different future. Shift. We make shift happen.
The US needs action, coalitions, ideas, and empowerment now. The Shift the Country framework can help catalyze organic, structural, systemic action and transformation in US communities as we find our way through, together.
Change is coming, whether we drive it or not. We – all of us – can help that change be transformation.
How We Get Shift To Happen
The Shift the Country framework is spelled out in an 11-page white paper (in PDF). The same information that's in the white paper is on this page right here for mobile reading, and in this set of links:
- Framework for a Phenomenon
- Why Civic Engagement Is Critical
- 15 Tools for Civic Engagement
- 10 Structural Areas - For Action & Change
- A Structural Framework Built For the Risks We Face
- More To The Story: Urgency & Risk
- More To The Story: Fostering Tipping Points / Viral Spread
Where We're Making Shift Happen - To Start
As funding allows, we will be ramping up our social media activity, broadcasts, webinars, workshops, storytelling, and community-building. We go outward from here:
- Community: Discord (server setup coming soon)
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShiftTheCountry/. FB Lives + webinars + other events happen here, too.
- Broadcasts: https://counterfear.com/shift-the-country/broadcasts/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShiftTheCountry
- Website: www.shiftthecountry.com (that's this website)
- Email: team at shiftthecountry dot com -- or contact us
- Main: (202) 556-0317
What's Next?
Good question!
Now that we've got this here website information up about what we're doing, and we did our first-ever introductory video (skip the first 3 minutes), we need to start getting more information out about the tools and how to use them.
To get that shift going, we're kicking off fundraising on GoFundMe and Patreon any minute to get us launched for the first six months - and ready to ramp up like NOW. Six months gets us through the election and the Biden Administration's initial transition. That's some positive thinking right there.
Then we get started on how to use each one of the 15 Tools for Civic Engagement...
- We're imagining that there will be different kinds of information for each of the 15 tools - like a basic quick "how to" page, and then videos, podcastss, examples, and stories of people actually using the tools.
- Plus, you can combine the tools and use them in different ways for action in any of the 10 Structural Areas - For Action & Change, or for any action. So we'll plan to put out videos, examples, and stories of people doing that, too.
- And we'll do videos, workshops, webinars, podcasts, blog posts, and other stuff to help people make shift happen in general - for the mission. For helping people through, for getting voters engaged, for holding society together, and for making change along the way.
- Holler when you've got stories to tell and examples of stuff we can share. That's all part of the strategy here - spiraling up, and fostering tipping points. Amplifying. Getting the word out. Sharing each other's progress. Then we spread it further, and keep right on going.
More Money Makes More Shift Happen
We're super-brand-new as of July 2020. We're at the very very beginning of fundraising. Every bit of help helps us make more shift happen.
We have an interim fundraiser to help with set-up as we await paperwork, on Facebook. As soon as possible, we will launch major crowdfund initiatives on GoFundMe Charity and Patreon.
Money is an amplifier. It's not the only one. You can use the tools, tell your stories, help support the shift, talk to people about what we're doing, share it, & sign up for team work.
Shift the Country is a newly formed left-leaning 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization created to promote social welfare. Contributions are not deductible for federal income tax purposes as charitable contributions.
Making Shift Happen
We – Americans – can help build coalitions. We can help each other survive a deadly pandemic. We can help the US hold a successful and fair election. We can help hold this country together during the pandemic and a potentially tumultuous presidential administration transition. We can help institutions help us survive, while we also work on transforming them to serve all Americans in more equitable, just, and sustainable ways. We can help shift this country so that we can partner with other countries for a global transformation to address the urgency that is climate change.
People are already fighting for each other; fighting for this country; fighting for public health action to save lives. They are working to help keep other people alive in hospitals and nursing homes; to keep grocery stores and other critical services operating; to help feed people; to help reform police departments and spending in communities everywhere.
We – together – can do even more. It’s going to take millions of us doing all the things. Shift the Country is bringing more of the things, as are so many others. Together we can help organize, catalyze, and amplify action and transformation at a scale never before seen in this country.
Shift the Country can help you and anyone else take it to the next level. We’re here to make serious shift happen. We’re here to help us all survive, stay alive, and thrive. There are ways. We find them together.
"There are some people who live in a dream world, and there are some who face reality; and then there are those who turn one into the other." - Douglas Everett
Thank you for your interest and support. We will absolutely find ways through. We help each other forward. That's how we get it done.
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I'm In! Sign Me Up
How Can I Support All This Shift?
15 Tools to Make Shift Happen
Events to Shift the Country
The Shift the Country White Paper
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Services
The Blog
The Focus Areas - for Navigating Disruption
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Shift the Country as it is now organized grew out of the Proposal to Shift the Country, completed April 24, 2019 and pitched to various organizations and campaigns. The initiative has evolved and iterated since that time into its current organization as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit.