2007 Bay Area Progressive Roundtable Information
On December 3 the Commonweal Institute convened over 100 local progressives at the First Unitarian Universalist Center in San Francisco for the 2007 Bay Area Progressive Roundtable. In attendance were members of local political groups, think tanks and other non-profits as well as bloggers and individual activists. Google chef Mirit Cohen provided an attractive and tasty display of food and refreshments.
Featured speaker Rob Stein of Democracy Alliance showed a PowerPoint presentation entitled "Movements, Politics and Power" about the conservative movement's funding and structure. Mr. Stein's presentation described with outstanding clarity and detail how the conservative movement has come to dominate our public discourse and politics. It was an updated version of his famous presentation described in this article: http://www.alternet.org/media
One of the more interesting details was Mr. Stein's description of "integrators," organizations whose primary function is to bring together other groups that have disparate specialties to coordinate and focus their efforts on common goals. Through programs like the Progressive Roundtable and the Promoting Progressive Values project, the Commonweal Institute performs this function at both local and national levels.
During a question and answer period following the presentation, Mr. Stein made another important point: his data show that there is a great deal of money being contributed to liberal and progressive organizations and interest groups, but the funds are not being spent strategically and therefore have a much smaller effect than they could. By developing shared strategy and coordinated plans, the progressive movement can accelerate our ability to impact political discourse and policy debates.
After Mr. Stein's presentation, attendees participated in Roundtable discussions about concrete ways to improve progressive infrastructure and counter the conservatives'. Each table's "reporter" then presented the results of their discussion to the larger group. Executive Director Barry Kendall scheduled a follow-up conference call with the table reporters and other interested attendees. An online survey was also sent to all participants.
