DARE, MADD, and YIMBY Action

Two different theories of action that make big differences.

You know something is worth paying attention to when not one but several people email it to you, each of them saying some variation on “this story is totally about you.”

In What MAGA Can Teach Democrats About Organizing—and Infighting, journalist Charles Duhigg compared two activist organizations that both started in the 1980s: DARE and Mothers Against Drunk Driving. His question is why did MADD become one of the most successful advocacy groups in the country, while DARE is little remembered except for its t-shirts?

Duhigg’s answer is that the groups had two different working styles, with DARE focused on what scholars of social movements call “mobilizing,” while MADD focused on “organizing.” Here’s how he explains it:

DARE was overseen from a central headquarters, in L.A., where staff guided nearly every aspect of operations [...] MADD, by contrast, wasn’t particularly focussed on mobilizing. Each of its chapters was independent and largely ungoverned by headquarters; volunteers concentrated on local advocacy instead of on national activism. As a result, local MADD leaders often supported sets of policy recommendations that diverged—or even conflicted—with the agendas of other chapters.

Organizations that focus on mobilizing have to be more staff-driven, with tightly defined messaging and limited, clear, and well-branded ways for folks to take action. An effective mobilizing strategy makes activism easy. It’s professional, strategic, and always on-brand.

On the other hand, organizing is frequently a hot mess. Organizing enables people to connect with one another and set their own priorities. Organizing is visibly and deliberately unprofessional, since it relies on networks of people following their own strategies. It’s organic, vibrant, and chaotic.

Duhigg makes the case for organizing. In anxiety-inducing detail, Duhigg showed how “the chaos at [MADD] headquarters led to the empowerment of local chapter heads and allowed the social bonding that a movement needs to survive.” As a result, MADD has not only gotten thousands of laws passed but caused a cultural shift in the United States around drinking and driving. By comparison, DARE never really got kids off drugs.

Organizing and Mobilizing: Two Great Strategies That Go Great Together

So what can YIMBYs learn from this article? Friends who emailed me this story assumed I would be 100% on Team Organizing, but my full answer is that YIMBYs need a bit of both, even if we do lean more to one side.

As Amanda Tattersall and Nina Hall wrote in the well-titled “Why Organizers Need Mobilizers and Mobilizers Need Organizers” in the Stanford Social Innovation Review in 2024: “Choosing organizing means investing time and resources in developing new capacities in smaller groups of individuals, while those who mobilize focus on the tools and techniques that can reach large masses of people, seeking greater engagement from people that already support the goal.”

Case in point: On Friday, the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act hit the fan. The bill is currently on the ropes, and organizations that previously were in support may be flipping to opposition. Apparently, Senator Elizabeth Warren has been pushing for a functional ban on Built-to-Rent single-family housing projects, and wants a new provision that requires them to be sold within seven years. But that would all but shut down BTR production, which could make the bill a net-negative for housing production as a whole. That’s complicated and wonky, requiring professional staff to understand WTF is going on. But if we want to influence Senator Warren, we also need to organize our local chapter to put pressure on her office.

Organizations can end up too far on either end. There are organizations that become 100% organizing, who “uplift” the voices of their community without a coherent goal. It’s also true that when good things do happen in an organizing-focused group, the credit goes to the visible activists, and the background work of building that network is underfunded and unseen.

On the other hand, organizations that are too mobilizing-focused have constant “capacity” issues. If you’re too mobilizing-focused, your base becomes passive, simply waiting for the next action alert. You’ve got staff and an email list, and nothing but endless irritating text messages about how you should donate another $5 and sign a petition.

Most organizations are somewhere in between. Frequently, the most powerful coalitions are built by groups working in tandem. For example, when it comes to passing legislation, it’s often most effective for organizing-focused groups to rally their base while mobilizing groups work as lobbyists. Respecting one another’s strengths is key to making these coalitions work.

No matter where your organization lands on this spectrum, there are costs. Too much organizing, and the chaos can consume you. Too much mobilizing, and nothing gets done that isn’t directly done by paid staffers.

Why We Lean Toward Organizing

YIMBY Action’s core strategy is to foster local chapters and leaders to build their local power (without just doing the work for them). Once they are up and running, we want them to work with a great deal of autonomy, even while we coordinate state legislative actions or enforcement. A growing chapter with capable leads might see an opportunity locally to pass single stair reform or legalize ADUs, and we want them to take it. An organizing strategy means building up localized activists to have their own local political power, building up their ability to digest a complicated action alert and come up with ideas like “I was at a conference last week with a state senator from Arizona and can call their senator.” To which I can reply, “omg, yes please do that.”

But at the same time, chapters sometimes make poor choices on local endorsements or get drawn into side projects we wish they wouldn’t. When you empower people and give them tools, you’re not their boss. If anything, you’re teaching them how to ultimately overthrow you. (But like… please don’t?)

Balancing these strategies requires the right infrastructure. For example, we have YIMBY Slack, where all of our members can talk to one another, strategize, and get excited. We also have private channels for our leads to chew on more complicated calls to action and debate our positions. Maintaining online spaces is a resource investment, because it’s also a space where members can piss one another off, and therefore requires ongoing enforcement of a code of conduct and more.

The feature and the bug of a more organizing-based strategy is that it requires the organization to get buy-in from people. You have to make clear, compelling arguments to your base and demonstrate the value of being part of the coalition all the time. It means that members can point out when there is a flaw in the strategy or nitpick a policy platform. Which, ultimately, makes for better policymaking; a smarter, stronger base of power; and more sticky victories.