<div dir="ltr">Thank you for the article. I've had some time now to think about the membership-model, and have some additional information from this reading, and so I have some more comments on the topic.<div><br></div><div>First, a general belief: things change. Things don't change very fast most of the time. Most "the world has changed" claims end up being wrong, but some are vast understatements. The hard part, of course, is figuring out which is which.</div><div><br>Now a specific suggestion: Basing too much on stereotypes about the skinny-jeans and skinny-tie wearing, clunky glasses, expensive sliders and craft cocktails in mason jars generation (that was purposefully ironic, by the way) is, in my opinion, a mistake. Why? Because people grow up. It is easy to mistakenly think the world has changed based on what is trendy among young people.</div><div><br></div><div>What I think will be permanent is the sharing/homebrew economy and the disruption is it bringing, not only economically but also socially - disruption in a good sense, that is, for everyone except entrenched interests. The change won't, in my opinion, be as huge as one might think - I don't think it's quite accurate to say "the sharing economy will win over entrenched interests" and to expect that a time will come when TLCs will stop fighting Uber, restaurants will stop fighting food trucks, etc. I also don't think the sharing economy will lose. There will be a detante, probably - homebrewing will go further than it did in the past, but not as far as I think it should. Such is life.</div><div><br></div><div>Membership models are tied into this fight. The article doesn't mention it, but what is flourishing far more than any synagogue model is the chavura model - something closer to a co-op than a retail religious experience. I attend a synagogue that does not charge dues, by the way. It is not flourishing. The difference, I think, between this article and a chavura is that the chavura has truly moved away from the membership model, while this synagogue has just moved away from dues but still has the same notion of membership. </div><div><br></div><div>Now, to the LP: If we were a religious organization, membership and attendance would be the entirety of our goals. Our goal, though, is to elect candidates to public office in order to move public policy in a libertarian direction. We want to have members as a means to that goal. I agree that a model of get lots of members, have them pay dues, have a fixed income stream before fundraising is likely not optimal. People are bowling alone. If they weren't, they probably wouldn't want to go bowling with a bunch of libertarians anyway - and if they did, they'd find them on Facebook or Meetup. I don't think a chavura model would work for us either - precisely because of what we are. We're supposed to provide a service, but to the public at large - that service is freedom. We can only provide it by convincing the public that they should want it, but we can't charge for it. Our constituency is that portion of the public we've convinced to want that service. Our membership is a subset of that. But you don't need to be a member to campaign, run for office (except President, or as established by an affiliate), volunteer, vote, register L - that is, almost all of our political activities, which are the core of what a party does. </div><div><br></div><div>So what do I want to maintain a membership model for? Internal purposes - serving in leadership roles and so on. We want our members to be the pool from which that is drawn. For the real politics, though, we cannot have a model that says "oh, you like our ideas? Come to our boring business meeting, pay us $25, and then...stuff." We cannot charge for agreeing with us. </div><div><br></div><div>How, then, does one fund our activity? How does one get a fever down? By taking Tylenol (that is, making phone calls), and by curing the infection (that is, by inspiring people to love this party and what it does so much that they can't help but take out their checkbooks.) I made some suggestions today regarding that, including increasing contact with the DC press corps and Congressional staffers. We are a clearinghouse for connecting in a horizontal way, and we are the national presence for our affiliates and candidates. The LPCT is in an odd position trying to take a stand on foreign policy - reporters don't want to talk to us about it, because, well, we're a state party. One of the topics taught at LPEX was the importance of the perception of bigness, and the reassurance given when a person doesn't feel like joining us is jumping off a cliff, but joining a large group. "Please speak to our national office about that" is bigness. Not having to clarify our views on larger issues because national is messaging them effectively, and instead focusing my campaign on my key issues, is bigness, and it works. Being perceived as an important part of the political process gives reassurance. I am happy to work with staff to figure out if what I suggested will work, and to travel to the District to make it happen as often as I can. </div><div><br></div><div>I'm not married to that particular way of creating value (well, I think it's a really good idea, but I'm biased.) I am married to the idea that our focus should be creating value for affiliates in the ways unique to a national organization. Doing fundraising is like saying that my type is a woman who will have me - yes, that's necessary, but it's not really all that descriptive. We have to ask, but our bigger problem is being valuable. "We ran out of money, let's go ask for more" is not a long-term strategy - it's how governments operate. </div><div><br></div><div>I'd add that we also need to demonstrate to our donors that we are good stewards of their resources. It is a fact about human beings that it is easier to spend other people's money than one's own, and there's no reason to think this wouldn't impact us. I was going to say "like it impacts politicians" except, hey, we are politicians. </div><div><br></div><div>Those are, of course, just my opinions. I am not claiming they're definitive - I am hoping to spark discussion. We all bring different life experiences - I'm relying here on my experience reinventing a math department in a school with declining enrollment and revenue, and on my very different experience building an EMS organization from small to adequate. I've seen that it grew faster after I left, though, so that's a worthy disclaimer. </div><div><br></div><div>I'd also compare the opinion I'm laying out here to what campaigning is like. Trying to get our supporters to join and pay dues is like expecting everyone who supports you to volunteer on your campaign. If the number of volunteers equals the number of votes, you're in trouble. You also get votes (most of them) from non-libertarians who never will be libertarians, but who think you're the best in the race. We often give off the impression of only wanting supporters who identify as libertarians (which we then treat as a binary.) In any case, the basis of a campaign, in my opinion, is turning ideology and philosophy into an actual program of governance. Most of that program - the part you don't talk about as much, but show in the way you carry yourself and act - has nothing to do with your ideas. A lot of the art of governance is ideology-independent. On that, you need to convince voters you're competent - just like we need to show we are good stewards. Then there's the ideology-driven part, which is what you actually campaign on. It only works, though, if you can turn it into actionable items. I'm not willing to squeeze that into as small a box as others might be, but the idea here, in my mind, is having simple, concrete actions, which make the community better off in some way, and which, taken together, move your ideology forward. Our equivalent is electing officials - the art of governance is determining in what ways we can do so - just like, as a candidate, I want to advance freedom, but need to also figure out how I'd do that as an X by looking at the powers that X has, and what X can actually do in practice. So what specific tools do we have to use towards the goal of electing officials, that are unique to us and not available to affiliates, and what ability do we have to use them in practice - considering money costs, the fundraising impact of using them successfully, and all other constraints and opportunities? I think that's the starting point if we want a model other than finding people to give us $25.</div><div><br></div><div>I apologize for the length, and, again, that's all just my opinion. If I knew for sure, I'd be making a heck of a lot more money as a consultant than I do as a teacher.</div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br clear="all"><div><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr">Joshua A. Katz<div>Westbrook CT Planning Commission (L in R seat)</div></div></div></div>
<br><div class="gmail_quote">On Sun, Jul 19, 2015 at 4:37 PM, Nicholas Sarwark <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:chair@lp.org" target="_blank">chair@lp.org</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="ltr"><div>Thank you for sharing that very insightful article. There are some very good ideas there that we may want to try.<br><br></div>-Nick<br></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div><div class="h5">On Sun, Jul 19, 2015 at 7:28 AM, Brett Bittner <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:brett@brettbittner.com" target="_blank">brett@brettbittner.com</a>></span> wrote:<br></div></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><div class="h5"><p dir="ltr">To follow up on my comments regarding the membership model today, please take a look at this case study regarding a "radical" idea to change how we view membership in the Party: </p>
<p dir="ltr"><a href="http://ejewishphilanthropy.com/scrapping-synagogue-dues-a-case-study/" target="_blank">http://ejewishphilanthropy.com/scrapping-synagogue-dues-a-case-study/</a></p>
<p dir="ltr">**This message sent from my phone. Please excuse any typos.</p>
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