My friend Allison Fine is a senior fellow at Demos, editor at TechPresident, and author of the award-winning book Momentum: Igniting Social Change in the Connected Age. She writes frequently about the Internet and its impact on society and the promises it holds for democratic renewal. Allison has recently written Social Citizens, a discussion paper about how Millennials will use their Internet skills in civic engagement. The paper makes the case that this generation has unique potential to make impacts on the civic landscape.

The Case Foundation had asked Allison to write the paper, and as she wrote on the Social Citizens Blog, they decided to go deeper than just listing a litany of different ways these young people are using the tools of Web 2.0 to share information about their favorite causes. They wanted to know what the impact will be of Millennials having "…the ability to become an advocate for their cause instantly, broadly, inexpensively, and what does their ability to do so mean for the rest of us?" Fascinating questions.

Allison and the foundation invite everyone interested in social change and how technology can be used to foster it to join the conversation in an effort to define what it means to be a "social citizen." Do it.

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So, this is neat.

Momentum: Igniting Social Change in the Connected Age by Allison Fine (which Sunlight distributed widely as a "must read" to philanthropists when it was published)" has won the 2007 Terry McAdam Book Award from the Alliance for Nonprofit Management. The Alliance is a D.C based professional association of individuals and organizations focused on improving the management and governance capacity of nonprofits nationwide. The selection was heralded for its "energetic and entrepreneurial approach to building ownership and influence for activities that create social benefit caught the both the minds and hearts of this year's jury in an engaging and provocative way."

We agree.

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Well, we certainly feel some momentum from our experiment in collaborative research over the weekend, and we’re bracing for the huge burst of interest that’s been expressed in the databases that are being released tomorrow by our grantees OMB Watch and Center for Responsive Politics. More than 225 attendees have signed up to join the press conference either in person or on the web. (Here’s the sign up information, join us if you can. (Go to www.ConnectLive.com/events/sunlightfoundation at 9:30 am tomorrow morning.) 

And speaking of momentum, I want to mention that Allison Fine’s really terrific book: Momentum: Igniting Social Change in the Connected Age, is now available. I think it’s a must read for all activists, not to mention the foundations who fund activism at the state, local or national level. (In fact, Sunlight has purchased a couple hundred copies of the book and sent them widely to heads of as many foundations located throughout the country.). Allison also published a really terrific op ed today in the San Jose Mercury News in which she concludes:

The Connected Age moves the power that institutions used to have, for informing, organizing, mobilizing and fundraising millions of people into the hands of individuals. Institutions don’t change systems, particularly those that elected officials are very invested in keeping as is. We, the people, do that. We have the power to do so today like never before. All we need now is the political will.

 

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