What are organizing and "base building"? Why fund this work?

What is organizing?

Marshall Ganz, lifelong organizer and Harvard Senior Lecturer, defines it like this:

"Organizing is leadership that enables people to turn the resources they have into the power they need to make the change they want.”

Organizers:

• Identify, recruit, and develop leadership.
• Build community around that leadership.
• Turn the resources of that community into the power to achieve change.

What is "base building"?

In their seminal publication, Power Metrics: Measuring What Matters to Build a Multiracial Democracy, our allies at Democracy & Power Innovation (DPI) Fund describe it this way:

“[Building] a base of constituents who can wield long-term independent political power that creates local, state, and national impact.”

Why fund this work?

As DPI puts it:

“Simply mobilizing individuals is insufficient to meet the challenges of our time. We must strengthen the practice of growing strong organizational containers that turn individual leadership and resources into the collective capacities necessary to shift power arenas and win change. This is what power looks like in a multiracial democracy.”

Base building is the heartbeat of MVP grantee partners’ work — they just need sustained, multi-year funding to scale it up.

By investing in year-round base building instead of just short-term, transactional mobilizing, we can shift the political center of gravity and enact an agenda that benefits all — not just the wealthy few.

Case Study: Minnesota

In the face of daunting political challenges, Minnesota defied the odds and achieved a "miracle" – passing the most ambitious legislative agenda since the New Deal in just a few months in 2023.

This progress didn’t come out of nowhere – it was the result of over a decade of strategic base building and organizing, led by MVP grantee partners and other local organizations, and supported by MVP and other funders.

Watch our video and learn more in our Minnesota Case Study.