Trading Democracy for Justice: Criminal Convictions and the Decline of Neighborhood Political Participation by Traci Burch

Author:Traci Burch [Burch, Traci]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Political Science, General, Law Enforcement, American Government, Local, Social Science, Criminology, Law, Criminal Law
ISBN: 9780226065090
Google: ybMQAAAAQBAJ
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 2013-08-21T02:53:03+00:00

Note: The table includes organizations that were observed, shadowed, or interviewed during the study period.

Meanwhile, all the remaining nonpartisan organizations must officially be nonpartisan for tax purposes. Whether these organizations advance a “liberal” agenda, however, is in the eye of the beholder. For the majority of nonpartisan organizations on this list, the primary role is that of service provision. Only the National Action Network/Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Georgia Women’s Action for New Directions, Democracy North Carolina, People’s Agenda, and Charlotte H.E.L.P. are explicitly political organizations that do not provide services as a primary function, representing five of the nineteen nonpartisan groups on the list. However, even within these organizations, Democracy North Carolina’s primary focus is on documenting state-level lobbying dollars, and Charlotte H.E.L.P. is a nondenominational, congregation-based group that encourages activism in local churches. Every attempt to find complementary conservative organizations working to mobilize people in disadvantaged Charlotte, Chicago, and Atlanta communities turned up nothing, including asking the county Republican parties for help in locating such organizations.

INTERVIEWS

Interviews with the outreach directors of local campaigns, parties, and nonpartisan organizations are used to get a sense of the activities organizations undertake to reach voters, as well as the rationale behind these choices. These semistructured interviews were conducted in all three cities by graduate students attending local institutions. The instrument is composed of both multiple-choice and open-ended questions. The interviews cover past and future mobilization drives or canvassing events in an effort to discern the logic behind the locations of these efforts. The outreach directors were asked for schedules of various events and contacts in order to link changes in registration over time to specific activities by mobilizing organizations. The interviews also provide an opportunity to gather information about the organization, such as its relationship to state and national entities, its attempts to collaborate with other organizations, and the structure and resources available to the organization. Apart from the semistructured interviews, the research assistants also noted and recorded several unstructured, informal conversations with staff and volunteers. Most interviewers took between thirty minutes and an hour to get through the questionnaire and finish the interview.

OBSERVATIONAL DATA

As mentioned, the interviews with voter outreach directors also serve as a source of information on the voter outreach activities planned by each organization. From early September through election day, graduate students in each city attended and observed various outreach activities conducted by each organization. The students shadowed staff and volunteers as they conducted voter registration drives, door-to-door canvassing, phone banking, rallies, and other operations. The primary purpose of the shadowing and observations is to document the coverage, preparedness, strategies, and tactics of each organization. These observations give a sense of the kinds of opportunities to participate in campaigns and organizations offered to citizens.

“Coverage” refers to the types of citizens reached by the organizations’ outreach activities. Coverage involves the location of activities, such as the addresses of events and the areas in which door-to-door canvasses take place. However, “coverage” might also refer to specific attempts by an organization to

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