The Fulcrum presents The Path Forward: Defining the Democracy Reform Movement. Scott Warren's interview series engages diverse thought leaders to elevate the conversation about building a thriving and healthy democratic republic that fulfills its potential as a national social and political game-changer. This initiative is the start of focused collaborations and dialogue led by The Bridge Alliance and The Fulcrum teams to help the movement find a path forward.
The latest interview in this series took place with Connie Razza, the Executive Director of Future Currents. This organization creates spaces for movement organizations to build resilient relationships, tackle pressing challenges, and prepare for possible conditions. Connie is an organizer at heart and by training, having worked on economic justice issues for most of her career.
Most of the interviews in this series to date have featured practitioners in the more traditional democracy ecosystem: election administrators, bridge-builders, structural reformists, and local practitioners. I appreciated the opportunity to speak with Connie to gain a perspective from someone embedded in the movement-building space —those on the front line. Often, there appears to be a perceived— and at times real —divide between organizers and pro-democracy advocates. It was refreshing to explore that dynamic with Connie.
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One of the key topics we discussed, which has gained traction and importance in the wake of the 2024 election, was whether the pro-democracy movement should more explicitly connect with economic justice. Many Americans, understandably, are primarily concerned with day-to-day survival, including the cost of living, economic opportunities, and basic needs. Preserving democratic norms, such as the rule of law and self-governance, can justifiably feel like a secondary concern.
Connie addressed the challenge and opportunity of bringing the pro-democracy and economic justice movements into closer alignment. She also explored how the pro-democracy tent can expand its reach, perhaps by rethinking its language and metaphors, as well as its behavior.
Her main reflections included:
- Democracy and economic justice must be linked: Too often, nonprofits and advocates separate democracy from economic issues, perhaps a natural byproduct of a fragmented and siloed nonprofit and policy landscape. The division is counterproductive. It is also not new. Having the right to participate in a free society and having the economic means to live freely and securely are deeply interconnected.
As Connie shared, “In my career in nonprofits. I feel like they've been really bifurcated. There's..folks who work on the economy and folks who work on democracy.
But when you think about it, the 1964 march on Washington was about economic justice. It was also about democracy and civil rights. And when you go back even further- abolition was economic democracy. It was all of the things. And so, I think that really this is like an approach that is very much repairing an artificial sort of separation that has happened before.”
- The movement needs to be more fun and more imaginative: Pro-democracy work can feel like a grind right now, with new daily threats and increasingly high stakes. But perhaps ironically, there are lessons to learn from the far-right. Despite a sometimes-destructive vision, it offers its followers a sense of belonging, imagination, possibility, and purpose. Those fighting for democracy can and should tap into joy, creativity, and hope to build a movement equally compelling.
As Connie notes, “I think we struggle because I think that we really do deeply believe in each other. I think that we are seeing (from the other side) what a radical imagination of exclusion, of consolidation, of power, of destruction. That imagination is inconceivable in our minds- because I think that we believe in our democratic norms and practices….
But I do think that it means that there is an opportunity in front of us, to imagine, not rebuilding what existed, but rebuilding what we need for the future.” - Maybe it’s not a pro-democracy tent. It’s a democracy music festival: We often talk about the “big tent” of the pro-democracy movement- a metaphor for a broad, inclusive coalition. We need as many people as possible in the tent to be successful, and so the argument becomes how to build a broad-based coalition.
But in practice, litmus tests emerge. If someone believes in core democratic principles but holds other contested policy views, can they still be part of the tent?
In response, Connie offers the idea of a music festival:
“I know that we always talk about the big tent, and it suggests that we literally all have to be in there together. (But) I don't want to be actually in a tent with certain people. I mean, I know that we're not supposed to say this, but like there are people that we don't want to be in the tent with, and they really don't want to be in the tent with us.
I've really been thinking about a music festival rather than a tent. It's like we all came to the same event. We can all be enjoying (different music), and we'll run into each other in the beer line, and we'll run into each other in the bathroom line, and it'll be fine. We'll navigate that, and maybe we'll even be like, hey? Oh, my God! I love that shirt that you got.
We can share a core belief that we can make decisions together, and we can get to a place, and I think that this is where the headwinds are, where we believe that we share an interest in our families thriving.”
I’m grateful to Connie for offering such thoughtful reflections on how we can build a more joyful, purpose-driven, and expansive pro-democracy movement—one that connects economic justice and democratic values, and that welcomes many into a shared future.
Scott Warren is a fellow at the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University. He is co-leading a trans-partisan effort to protect the basic parameters, rules, and institutions of the American republic. He is the co-founder of Generation Citizen, a national civics education organization.
