Phoning In Democracy
Some argue against phonebanking on privacy grounds, but it’s essential to democracy.
By Dylan Matthews
July 28, 2009
(istockphoto)Shaun Dakin does not like political phone calls, and that’s putting it mildly. In fact, as founder and chief executive of Citizens for Civil Discourse, which defines “civil discourse” as “politicians not calling voters,” he works full time to stop campaign workers from calling voters, compiling a National Political Do Not Contact Registry and advocating a Voter Privacy Bill of Rights.
I have encountered people like Dakin before. When I worked for the Obama primary campaign from Mar. 15, 2007 to Jan. 8, 2008, I phonebanked almost every night. I made calls from about 4 or 5 p.m. to 8 or 9 p.m. I talked to a lot of Dakin types or, as the campaign called them, “refuses.” The reason campaigns phonebank is to code people. In the most common system, “2”s are supporters, “3”s are undecided, “4”s are supporters of another candidate, “discos” are disconnected phone numbers, and “refuses” are people who hang up or tell you not to call again. This way they know who to focus time, energy, and resources on. People like Dakin don’t qualify for such targeting.
Generally, the campaign did not call refuses like Dakin back. Why would they? The campaign wanted their votes, not to upset them. So Dakin’s call for government intervention seems unwarranted. It is already in the self-interest of campaigns not to call refuses back, so it seems strange to try to propose federal legislation banning calls.
Once you scratch the surface, what Dakin considers to be a privacy violation from phonebanking by campaigns isn’t a new argument. He calls Organizing for America’s “Neighbor to Neighbor” online tool, which lets voters lobby their neighbors to support progressive legislation, “tech cool but privacy scary.” The tool gives volunteers their neighbors’ phone numbers and addresses—the same information phone books have provided for decades. Indeed, websites like whitepages.com now let people across the world find out phone numbers and with limited information about that person. “Neighbor to Neighbor” just harnesses readily available public information for the benefit of community organizers. It seems odd that Dakin would call public information “scary.”
More broadly, Dakin’s singling-out of phonebanking seems mostly arbitrary. It is hard to see how phonebanking violates voter privacy more than a television ad or a mass mailing. Dakin’s “privacy violation” logic applies just as well to those two cases. The voter did not ask to for 30-second commercial on her television screen or a glossy mailer dropped into her mailbox any more than she asked for a phone call. And while a voter can toss a mailing in the trash or flip the channel when a political ad comes on, she can just as easily hang up on a political caller, or ask to not be called again. Indeed, if anything, phonebanking violates voter privacy less than mailings or television ads, as it provides voters with an opportunity to ask the campaign to stop.
As Dakin would surely counter, these same arguments could apply to commercial telemarketing. If J.C. Penny’s can send its latest catalogue in the mail or advertise its latest sale on television networks, why can’t it call customers directly? Herein lies the rub. While telemarketing is just a nuisance, phonebanking is a vital part of modern campaigning, and thus a vital part of modern democracy. What’s more, the alternatives to phonebanking only take our political system further away from the grassroots and closer to the whims of the highest bidder.
Think of what campaigning would look like in a world without phonebanking. It would be heavily reliant on two things: direct mail and television advertising. What those two methods have in common is that they are expensive. Sending millions of color flyers printed on glossy paper to voters is not cheap. Neither is blanketing the airwaves with 30-second spots. The campaigns that can afford to campaign like that are, thus, those of well-funded candidates. These are the self-funders, the well-connected, or the friends of special interests. The Steve Forbeses, Max Baucuses and Terry McAuliffes of the world already have a big leg up. Do they really need another?
By contrast, phonebanking is relatively cheap. Especially when volunteers use their own cell phones, the only real expenses are the development and printing of the voter database. Phonebanking, thus, levels the playing field. It lets campaigns of the Russ Feingolds and Paul Wellstones survive. They might be badly funded but full of grassroots and volunteer energy. Phonebanking lets candidates like these—real progressive candidates—have a fighting chance against wealthier ones. In the (unfortunate) absence of a real public financing system, phonebanking is one of the best field-levelers there is.
This, I suppose, is the most important lesson to learn from foolhardy crusades such as Dakin’s. Even when cloaked in a veneer of neutrality, all reforms benefit one side or another. To pretend otherwise-or to not take that bias into account-is not just lazy, it’s dangerous to democracy.
Dylan Matthews is an intern for The New Republic, a staff writer for Campus Progress, and a sophomore at Harvard University.
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Comments
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First, every candidate is not as polite as the Obama campaign you describe. I receive TONS of political calls, from the same candidate, even after asking them to remove my name. My requests are ignored and I do not have the same recourse as the Do Not Call list.
And of course, your same arguments were made by the telemarketing industry when the Do Not Call list was first proposed, including the loss of business and the end of the world as we know it, but neither have happened. Change, yes, but not the dire circumstances that some predicted.
I agree with Dakin that something needs to be done.
— Allen - Jul 29, 11:50 AM - #Thanks for the mention.
I actually do NOT call out phone banking specifically. Phone banking is just one communications tool that politicians use to invade the privacy of voters without their permission.
Commercial orgs can’t do it. Why should politicians be able to do it.
Why?
Because they write the law.
That is why.
More data on why robocalls don’t work can be found here:
www.stoppoliticalcal…
Shaun Dakin
— Shaun Dakin - Jul 29, 04:04 PM - #CEO and Founder
StopPoliticalCalls.org