A year of Democracy 2076!
Dear friends,
A little over one year after Democracy 2076’s official launch, I can’t help but think of the work that got us here. Quick story about our founding:
In 2022, the Democracy Funders Network and Better Futures released their report, Imagining Better Futures for American Democracy. Among many findings and recommendations, this report highlighted the importance of positive futures visions to “help us to imagine better alternatives, motivate us, and guide us to achieving positive societal outcomes” and “reinforce the idea that we have agency to shape our individual and collective futures and those of our descendants.”
I was so inspired by the report that I sent an email to the report’s author, commissioner, and a futurist I know with the subject line: “Can I make up a job as a democracy futurist?” The report encouraged funders and partners in the democracy ecosystem to 1) invest in collaborations and connections between those engaged in future visioning work and those in the democracy movement; 2) model and fund new and innovative strategies that embrace long-term orientations; and 3) to develop and promote positive, future-oriented narratives. And it encouraged us to launch Democracy 2076 to tackle all of these things.
In the first year since Democracy 2076 launched, we have generated impact on those three essential recommendations:
We’ve held two convenings (December 2023 and June 2024) that together have built a diverse group of 92 unique participants to envision what a future Constitution requires to ensure an effective, responsive, and representative democracy and to begin strategizing to bring those changes to fruition. You can join us on Wednesday, September 11th at 12pm ET / 3pm PT to learn more about the success of our latest convening and next steps for our constitutional reform strategies (RSVP here).
We have anchored our programs in strategic foresight, which uses a systematic and future-oriented analysis of driving forces and trends to inform how we develop long-term strategies. While typically embraced by the national security, intelligence, science, and business communities, we have found that utilizing this methodology in our work––and empowering our partners to do the same––allows us to understand what is necessary to bring about the future we desire and strategize to make it possible, rather than being limited by what appears possible in the present.
And finally, we have launched research and development to investigate the role of media in promoting positive portrayals of American democracy to ultimately persuade the entertainment sector to prioritize protopian visions of a democratic future. Already, this research is demonstrating the power––and unintended consequences––of political violence in films.
More on all of this below, but first and most importantly and from the bottom of my heart: thank you. This year has been more than I could have imagined (no pun intended!) when we launched and that is in large part due to all of you. Whether you participated in one of our gatherings, offered thought partnership, contributed financial resources, made connections, gave me an opportunity to write or speak about this work, or offered encouraging words: this would not be possible without all of you.
I’ll be honest, after years of being focused on short-term election protection work, it has been a shift for me not to be working directly on the immediate threats to our democracy. However, in devoting time and resources to developing long-term goals for our democracy, Democracy 2076 and our partners can better support each other in understanding how the tactics and strategies that are prominent now in our electoral politics will have long-term, interrelated consequences for our democracy. As Kristen Vermetten from the New Georgia Project wrote at the end of our time together in June: “It’s the time…to think beyond this year, this quarter, this electoral cycle. To not only dream about what democracy can look like but to commit amongst these movement co-conspirators that this vision for democracy WILL happen if we work together.” This is a crucial goal of Democracy 2076: to hold consistent, intentional space in the democracy ecosystem for future-oriented work to ensure our movement does not lose sight of our ultimate priorities.
I am looking forward to meeting this moment with all of you. Let’s make year two even more impactful.
Onwards,
Aditi
Making A Constitution for 2076 a Reality
This June we gathered in Philadelphia for our second convening of organizers, scholars, issue-based experts and futurists to envision and bring about a Constitution for 2076. Building upon the success of our time together in December, we focused on developing strategies to bring the categories of amendments we had aligned on (universal basic income/guaranteed rights, re-structuring elections, and structural changes to Congress) from the drawing board to the governing chamber. Our time together in June centered around three primary goals:
Develop a 50-year plan to achieve impact in the three categories of amendments co-created by participants at our December 2023 convening (universal basic income/Guaranteed Rights, re-structuring elections, and structural changes to Congress).
Understand the mechanisms of a Constitutional Convention and strategically plan for the risks and opportunities if one were to be called without our explicit efforts.
Achieve collective clarity on existing resources that currently support this long-term strategic work and identify where more support is needed.
Based on feedback, survey data, and work product from our time together, we believe we achieved these goals. You can see a more extensive summary of the convening workshops and assessment of impact in the report we put together (online version and PDF version), including:
22 distinct 38-state ratification pathways to enact the identified amendments;
An analysis of the existing landscape of efforts trying to advance the three buckets of amendments from the December convening;
Various strategies to amend the Constitution on 15, 30 and 45-year timelines;
A summary and analysis of opportunities and risks presented by Constitutional Conventions; and
Data and analysis from participants on the impact of future-oriented efforts on their work at their home organizations and the democracy field more broadly
For just a sampling of the magnitude and impact of this convening on participants:
Participants left with greater belief that amendments are possible and viable as a path to change within our lifetimes. In answer to “How likely do you think we will have amendments passed in order to deal with our challenges over the next 50 years?” respondents increased their confidence by 25% over the course of the convening.
As a result of our efforts, participants reported feeling 35% better prepared individually and organizationally to respond to a state or federal Constitutional Convention and more aware of the potential strategic opportunity that a Constitutional Convention could present to advance their organization’s mission.
93% of surveyed attendees that the space we created at our convening provided something unique that they don’t get in other spaces. As participant remarked, “The people in the room were more diverse in every way than most spaces.” This reflected a common theme amongst almost half of all participants who explicitly praised the ideological, professional, and experiential diversity of the convening.
To hear about participants’ experiences in their own words, see this video for another look at the impact of our time together.
And of course, we’d love for you to join us at our briefing on Wednesday, September 11th at 12pm ET / 3pm PT to go deeper into both the report and the facilitation guide (password: Amend2076), which we developed so that partners and organizers can easily incorporate our strategic foresight processes into their work. We will also share more about our strategies and next steps, and answer any questions you might have. You can RSVP for the briefing here.
Combined, our convenings in December and June have allowed us to co-create categories of necessary amendments and strategies to bring them about in partnership with the very individuals and organizations with the power to make that happen. Our task now––beyond ensuring that our diverse group of partners believe that constitutional reform is possible––is to equip them with the tools, resources, and strategies to enact that reform. We have begun conducting replications of the strategic foresight processes we introduced at our convenings for partners who want to bring future-oriented work and the possibility of constitutional reform to their organizations, coalitions, and communities. Some examples of this include:
In May, we partnered with the POPVOX Foundation to convene experts and advocates in Congressional reform and folks working on the Hill to share their visions for a more effective, responsive, and representative legislative body. 25 participants––with expertise ranging from technology to space exploration to the modernization of Congress––gathered together at the US Capitol to propose innovations and insights for the future of the US Congress. You can learn more about what we accomplished together here.
In July, we partnered with the Bertelsmann Foundation to run this process with their democracy fellows, thinking about changes needed within both the EU and the United States. We have also launched a year-long partnership with the Appleseed Network (which has centers across 18 U.S. states and Mexico working together to reduce poverty, combat discrimination, and advance the rule of law) using the strategic foresight process we developed to support them in identifying priorities and projects to strengthen the binational relationship to weather anticipated challenges over the next 50 years.
And finally, we have several other planned replications throughout this fall to support our partners in their strategic planning conversations, including during a staff retreat as well as helping a coalition of organizations in Louisiana navigate calls for a state-wide Constitutional convention. Please reach out if you are interested in bringing this type of process to your coalition or organization! You can find the facilitation guides here.
Imagining 2076
In May, we launched Imagining 2076 to meet the need for greater investment in the narrative environment that could drive buy-in for constitutional change. Democracy 2076, along with our partner, Harmony Labs, is conducting content analysis of effective democracy in popular media to measure the results against trends in declining public trust and optimism about the future over the last 25 years. By examining the impact of these portrayals of present and future on audience attitudes towards our political system and civic engagement, we can ensure we have the socio-cultural momentum and participation needed to bring about a better, more democratic future. We held a recent stakeholder briefing (password: XtE&6*=R) on the results of the first phase of our research and our next steps, which we are developing with input from Hollywood industry leaders in partnership with Bridge Entertainment Labs to ensure our research is as impactful and persuasive as possible.
Orienting the Ecosystem Towards the Future
A core finding in the Imagining Better Futures report is the fact that the “future-oriented community seldom connects with the democracy community;” as a result, “America lags in experimenting with new forms of future-oriented governance models and thinking.” Democracy 2076 endeavors to straddle both the democracy and strategic futures ecosystems, forging pathways and building bridges to bring both communities into partnership with each other.
We have spent much of our first year socializing the importance of long-term planning and future visioning work within the democracy movement and bringing pro-democracy ideas and models into future-looking programs to ensure that partners and funders understand the value of the other for their respective missions, and for our broader movements. In the past six months alone, this has ranged from presenting to academics and practitioners at the Harvard Kennedy Schol’s Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, civil society leaders, UN staff and member states preparing for the United Nations’s Summit of the Future, futurist practitioners at the School of International Futures, media and tech entrepreneurs at New Media Ventures, and various communities of pro-democracy funders and practitioners––including providing a future-oriented perspective in a conversation on civil rights with the Federalist Society. Just as our convenings and replications are bringing strategic foresight processes into the democracy space, so we hope that bringing democracy issues into futures-thinking spaces will support greater collaboration and innovation across the ideological and professional spectrum towards our shared goals.
What’s Next: Pro-Democracy Political Coalitions in 2076
And finally, with two of our strategic programs up and running, we are laying the groundwork for our initiatives to ensure future pro-democracy political parties. Historically, American political coalitions realign approximately every 30 years. We are currently living through a realignment that is almost complete, likely leading to a party with weak commitments for democracy for the next 30 years. We have an opportunity––with substantial and coordinated cross-sector interventions––to shape the next political realignment to ensure pro-democracy tenets are at the core of the next political realignment.
In early 2025, in partnership with Horizon 2045, Democracy 2076 is planning to run a participatory strategic foresight process on the future of U.S. political parties to assess what issues may divide the parties, which voters are in each party, and whether the parties are pro-democracy or not. We will use this process to create an early warning system to identify where interventions could be useful to ensure that when opportunities to guide our next political realignment emerge, that we have the tools and resources needed to ensure pro-democracy future political coalitions. We are actively working to resource these efforts, so if you want to know more or have ideas of possible participants, please email me!
As I said at the opening of our June convening: we are living in someone else’s 50 year timeline––it’s time to create our own. There is already a non-democratic, authoritarian 50-year vision of how to transform our Constitution that is being resourced and rolled out. We have a chance to build something different for our future, and to begin creating that today. Previous constitutional changes have come at pivotal periods in American history, when tensions have impelled the need for structural change, such as during Reconstruction, the Great Depression, and the Progressive Era. Constitutional change, cultural change, political party shifts––these forces are not hypotheticals. And the future we are barreling towards is not inevitable. The opportunity to make our positive visions a reality is there, provided we rise to meet it. Thank you for rising with us.
In gratitude,
Aditi