Netroots

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Netroots is a term coined in 2002 by Jerome Armstrong [1] to describe political activism organized through blogs and other online media, including wikis and social network services. The word is a portmanteau of Internet and grassroots, reflecting the technological innovations that set netroots techniques apart from other forms of political participation. In the United States, the term is used mainly in left-leaning circles. [2]

Contents

The term necessarily overlaps with the related ideas of e-democracy, open politics, and participatory democracy—all of which are somewhat more specific, better defined, and more widely accepted. Netroots outreach is a campaign-oriented activity that uses the web for complementing more traditional campaign activities, such as collaborating with grassroots activism that involves get out the vote and organizing through interconnecting local and regional efforts, such as Meetup, and the netroots-grassroots coalition that propelled the election of Howard Dean to the DNC Chair in January, 2005.

At times, the term netroots is used interchangeably with the term blogosphere, though the blogosphere is considered a subset of netroots in that blogosphere describes just the online community of blogs, where netroots includes that plus a number of larger (mainly liberal) on-line outposts such as MoveOn, Media Matters for America and Think Progress. [1]

Advocates claim that the essential quality of the netroots is its flatness and inter-linked web connectiveness—that it constitutes communication points that reach out to influence traditional media, but is not directed outward from any one point. Through events like a blogswarm, [3] the netroots displays non-hierarchical and decentralized features.

American origins of term

The first popular use of the term in its modern definition is Netroots for Howard Dean, [4] by Jerome Armstrong in December 2002 on MyDD. Democratic political consultant Joe Trippi credits the short lived success of his then-client Howard Dean to their listening and taking the lead from netroots activity.

The netroots also played a key role in drafting General Wesley Clark into the 2004 Presidential campaign. The growing power of the netroots was seen most recently during the 2006 midterm elections. In one such instance, a volunteer for the senate campaign of Democrat James Webb of Virginia filmed remarks by then-Senator George Allen. The remarks in question, in which Senator Allen referred to the volunteer as a "macaca" (the volunteer was of South Asian ethnicity), were viewed by many as being racially insensitive. The video was posted on the popular video-sharing website YouTube. The resulting netroots attention to the video triggered a series of events that resulted in the defeat of the incumbent senator. [ citation needed ] James Webb had, in fact, been the subject of a successful netroots draft, which resulted in his entry into the Virginia senate race. Netroots activists also supported Ned Lamont in his 2006 primary victory over Democratic Senator Joe Lieberman, wrote Ari Melber in The Nation magazine. [5]

Blog writers have contributed to more than a few controversies and early netroots attention. Amongst these were the remarks made by then-Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott at a birthday celebration for then-Senator Strom Thurmond, the Dubai Ports controversy, the Mark Foley congressional page controversy, and the recent US Attorney controversy. [6] In addition, the recent controversy regarding a Democratic presidential debate sponsored by Fox News, which the left-leaning netroots attempted to stop, ended with the debate being canceled. [7]

In a December 2005 interview with Newsweek magazine, [8] Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, founder of Daily Kos, described the netroots as "the crazy political junkies that hang out in blogs." He is also the co-author (with Jerome Armstrong) of the book Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots and the Rise of People-Powered Politics ( ISBN   1-931498-99-7).

William Safire explained the term's origin in The New York Times Magazine on November 19, 2006:

...  The Nation 's Web site cited the unabashedly liberal Jerome Armstrong's praise of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee "for reading blogs and being ready to work with the netroots." [5] From these citations and a few of the million and a half others in a Google search, the word netroots has a left-of-center connotation. The earliest use I can find is in a Jan. 15, 1993, message on an e-mail list of the Electronic Frontier Foundation from an "rmcdon[ell]" at the University of California at San Diego, apparently complaining about an internal shake-up: "Too bad there's no netroots organization that can demand more than keyboard accountability from those who claim to be acting on behalf of the 'greater good.'" ... Popularizer of the term—unaware of the obscure, earlier citation when he used it—was the aforementioned (great old word) Armstrong on his blog, MyDD, on Dec. 18, 2002, as he went to work on the presidential campaign of Gov. Howard Dean of Vermont.... headlined his entry "Netroots for Dean in 2004" and told Internet readers where to get the first inkling of a groundswell: "O.K., so Dean is still polling 1 to 4 percent nationally, so what. Look at the netroots." [2]

Similar activities elsewhere

So-called netroots activity also takes place in Iran, which has a disproportionately high number of bloggers, and in the United Kingdom, where there is strong support for e-democracy in the form of local issues forums have become an approved form of feedback on government performance. Netroots UK is a project started in 2011 in partnership with the US Netroots Nation organisers to strengthen the UK's netroots through training and networking. In Australia, the netroots "progressive" lobbying group GetUp has more members than all Australian political parties combined.

Netroots activity has also begun to spring up in student politics where online social networking programs such as Facebook have been used in student elections.

In Sweden Social Democratic Party have initiated a network open to all "progressive" bloggers in Sweden. The network meets on a regular basis and holds a yearly gathering, Nätrot (Netroot in Swedish)Netroots.se. The first Nätrot gathering was held in the Swedish parliament 2006 with Joe Trippi as guest speaker. The second one, 2008 also in the Swedish parliament, and the third, Nätrot '09 was in Visby, Almedalen featuring John Aravosis from Americablog and Jane Hamsher from Firedoglake.

In 2010, the book "Netroots - a progressive blog movement that set the agenda" (Netroots - En progressiv bloggrörelse som sätter agendan) was published in Sweden (author Johan Ulvenlöv). The book explains various bloggers about how media content changed after blog entry and how they are partially set the agenda. [9]

In 2012, the largest gathering of progressive bloggers in Scandinavia took place in Stockholm.

See also

Related Research Articles

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joe Trippi</span> American political strategist (born 1956)

Joseph Paul Trippi is an American political strategist. A member of the Democratic Party, Trippi most notably served as campaign manager of Howard Dean's 2004 presidential bid, and has served as a political commentator for CNN since 2018. He has worked on a number of prominent gubernatorial and United States Senate campaigns, including the successful bids of Jerry Brown for Governor of California and Doug Jones for U.S. Senate in Alabama.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Democracy for America</span> Vermont-based political action committee

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Daily Kos</span> Blog focused on left-wing American politics

Daily Kos is a group blog and internet forum focused on the U.S. Democratic Party and progressive liberal American politics. The site publishes blog posts, polls, election and campaign fundraising data, and is considered an example of "netroots" activism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Markos Moulitsas</span> American blogger


Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, often known by his username and former military nickname "Kos", is an American blogger who is the founder and publisher of Daily Kos, a blog focusing on liberal and Democratic Party politics in the United States. He co-founded SB Nation, a collection of sports blogs, which is now a part of Vox Media.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Simon Rosenberg</span> New Democrat Network founder, president

Simon Rosenberg is the founder of New Democrat Network and the New Policy Institute, a liberal think tank and advocacy group based in Washington, D.C.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MyDD</span>

MyDD was the first large collaborative politically progressive American politics blog. It was established by Jerome Armstrong in 2001. Its name was originally short for "My Due Diligence." In 2005, MyDD was profiled in Campaigns and Elections magazine, crediting the site with being "the first major liberal blog." In January 2006, the name was changed to "My Direct Democracy" as part of a site redesign, with the new tagline "Direct Democracy for People-Powered Politics."

Chris Bowers is a blogger for DailyKos and a manager of their email list. He was a blogger and co-founder of OpenLeft, and was until July 2007 a front-page blogger for MyDD. His focus is on polling and data-driven analysis of US politics, as well as of the blogosphere.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jerome Armstrong</span> American political strategist (born 1964)

Jerome Armstrong is an American political strategist. In 2001, he founded MyDD, a blog which covered politics, making him one of the first political bloggers. Armstrong coined the term netroots, and was referred to as "The Blogfather" for having mentored many other famous bloggers such as Markos Moulitsas in their early years. He is credited as one of the architects of Howard Dean's 2004 grassroots presidential campaign, and bringing those tactics to campaigns globally. In 2005, Armstrong co-founded Vox Media with Markos Moulitsas and Tyler Bleszinski.

<i>Crashing the Gate</i>

Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People Powered Politics is a book (ISBN 1-931498-99-7) authored by American political bloggers Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos and Jerome Armstrong of MyDD, published in 2006 by Chelsea Green.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Howard Dean</span> American politician (born 1948)

Howard Brush Dean III is an American physician, author, consultant, and retired politician who served as the 79th governor of Vermont from 1991 to 2003 and chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) from 2005 to 2009. Dean was an unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic nomination in the 2004 presidential election. Later, his implementation of the fifty-state strategy as head of the DNC is credited with the Democratic victories in the 2006 and 2008 elections. Afterward, he became a political commentator and consultant to McKenna Long & Aldridge, a law and lobbying firm.

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Netroots Nation is a political convention for American progressive political activists. Originally organized by readers and writers of Daily Kos, a liberal political blog, it was previously called YearlyKos and rebranded as Netroots Nation in 2007. The new name to reflects participation of a broader audience of grassroots activists, campaign workers and volunteers, thought leaders, messaging technology innovators and local, state, and national elected officials. The convention offers three days of programming: panel discussions on emerging issues in politics and society; training sessions to support more effective activism; keynote addresses from speakers of national stature; an exhibit hall; networking and social events. The event draws roughly 3000 attendees.

OpenLeft was a political blog founded July 9, 2007 by Matt Stoller, Chris Bowers, originally of MyDD, and Mike Lux, a former official in the White House under President Bill Clinton. Covering political and social issues from a progressive standpoint, it spearheaded a number of causes, including focusing attention and criticism on the Blue Dog Democrats and supporting net neutrality. The website's campaign garnered criticism from a number of Democrats, including Brian Baird.

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Open-source political campaigns,open-source politics, or Politics 2.0, is the idea that social networking and e-participation technologies will revolutionize our ability to follow, support, and influence political campaigns. Netroots evangelists and web consultants predict a wave of popular democracy as fundraisers meet on MySpace or Facebook, YouTubers crank out attack ads and bloggers do opposition research.

Arshad Hasan was the executive director of ProgressNow. He was previously executive director for Democracy for America.

Blogging is increasingly used in many countries around the globe, including those with oppressive and authoritarian regimes. In many Arab countries with oppressive and authoritarian regimes, where the government conventionally has controlled print and broadcast media, blogs and other forms of new media provide a new public sphere where citizens can obtain information they are interested in and exchange their personal opinion concerning several topics, including politics, economics, culture, love, life and religion.

BlogPAC was a political action committee founded in 2004 by Markos Moulitsas and Jerome Armstrong focused on progressive bloggers and politics online. In 2006, Chris Bowers and Matt Stoller took over BlogPAC from Moulitsas and Armstrong. Instead of channeling money to electoral campaigns, the mission was refocused "to defend the netroots and improve the quality of online activism". In 2007 BlogPAC organized progressive bloggers in several states, and offered microgrants to progressive bloggers through the 50 State Blog Project run by Laura Packard. Later that year, BlogPAC ran a contest to fund progressive entrepreneurs for infrastructure building. In 2009, BlogPAC funded the website software platform SoapBlox. BlogPAC was active until 2012.

References

  1. 1 2 Boehlert, Eric (2009). Bloggers on the Bus: How the Internet Changed Politics and the Press. New York: Free Press. ISBN   978-1-4165-6010-4.
  2. 1 2 Safire, William (November 19, 2006). "Netroots". On Language (column). The New York Times Magazine . Retrieved 2006-11-19.
  3. ↑ Gratsch, Bill (22 February 2005). "Blogswarm". Blawg's Blog. Archived from the original on 10 December 2008. Retrieved 14 July 2019.
  4. ↑ "My Daily Dose". Archived from the original on 2003-02-23.
  5. 1 2 "Ned Lamont's Digital Constituency". Archived from the original on 2006-08-13.
  6. ↑ "You Did It".
  7. ↑ "How Netroots Killed the Fox Debate". Politico .
  8. ↑ NBC News
  9. ↑ Burstrom, Evelina (July 5, 2010). "Boken om rödgröna bloggar". VK bloggen. Archived from the original on September 6, 2010. Retrieved 2010-07-06.
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