Ian Storrar, (202) 736-5755

National civic engagement organization Common Cause announced its partnership with Mobilize.org on the first Democracy 2.0 Entrepreneur Grant Summit for 2008 today. Common Cause joined Mobilize in its commitment to Millennial-generated ideas and projects to tackle critical national issues and has adopted a unique strategy to getting Millennial plans into action: give them the financial support to make ideas a reality.

The first summit will take place July 18-21, 2008, in Denver, Colorado. The topic, “Money in Politics,” will focus upon the impact of special interest-funded campaigns on citizen-centered democracy. Emphasizing the problem at the national level, Common Cause and Mobilize.org will challenge Millennials, those under 30, from across the nation to compete for grant monies to support projects working to promote clean elections practices.

The call for projects will address campaign finance reform, focusing particular on clean election practices like the public financing of elections, targeting the eighteen states where Common Cause is currently working on public financing.

These summits exemplify Democracy 2.0 which Common Cause has supported from the start. The theory of change starts with the individual citizen identifying problems at the local, state, and national levels. Once problems are identified, citizens must engage in conversations searching for innovative solutions to the problems they have identified. The Common Cause and Mobilize.org partnership seeks to take the individual actor past the deliberation stage, enabling members of the Millennial Generation to implement their solutions. Through the success of citizen-generated initiatives, our end goal is to institutionalize citizen-generated solutions as a staple of American governance at all levels.

Ian Storrar, Director of Youth and Volunteer Programs for Common Cause, explains the importance of Democracy 2.0: “The Democracy 2.0 movement is all about empowering every voice, every citizen to be politically effective. Common Cause has worked for years to make sure that citizens have the tools and the opportunities to be active citizens. This summit is an amazing collaboration to support young social entrepreneurs who want to redress the imbalance of special interests in the political process by putting citizens back at the center.”

Money in politics is an issue that affects all other issues. We need to look for inter-generational solutions and Common Cause noted that the Democracy 2.0 Declaration recognized this and leads the way to reclaim the role of the citizen in democratic government.

Maya Enista, Chief Executive Officer of Mobilize.org, commented on the partnership: “Mobilize.org is looking forward to working with Common Cause on our first grant summit and on bringing attention to the important issue of money in politics. The energy of our network will bring renewed energy to the fight to end the stranglehold that money has on our electoral process. Mobilize.org feels that it is up to this generation, and the Democracy 2.0 movement, to finally level the playing field.”

For further information on this project or Common Cause, please visit Common Cause’s website at http://www.commoncause.org or contact Common Cause’s Director of Youth and Volunteer Programs, Ian Storrar, at 202 736 5755 or istorrar@commoncause.org.