Research that Changes How America Thinks About Elections: Understanding that solutions only come after successfully defining problems, FairVote pursues innovative research into local, state, federal, and international elections to demonstrate and explain flaws in America’s electoral rules.  Spotlight: Our signature Monopoly Politics series started in 1997 forever changed how our nation’s leading political observers gauge congressional races and understand the roots of non-competitive elections.

Outreach to Infuse Our Big-Picture Vision into Reform Coalitions and Legislation: To communicate our unique insight into America’s electoral flaws and their solutions to broader communities, we help build local, state and national reform coalitions and provide technical assistance to policymakers who embrace our reforms.  Spotlight: In 2003 and 2007, our Claim Democracy conference brought hundreds of leading advocates and organizations together to discuss reform strategies and support a broad-based pro-democracy vision that we advance to this day.

Implementing Reform by Targeting Advocacy for Victories and Maximum Impact: Communities considering our innovative reforms want evidence of success in other cities. FairVote nurtures and supports winnable and high-profile reform campaigns to demonstrate the viability and value of our solutions. Spotlight: We worked on every step of the instant runoff voting (IRV) success story in San Francisco, California – from advocacy to implementation and evaluation. Its model has contributed to consideration of IRV spreading rapidly to localities around the nation, including thirteen of fourteen ballot measures in 2002-2007.

Generating high profile and strategic media coverage: We make sure the story of our reform victories reach high and wide in the American press and to the changemakers most likely to back our reforms. Spotlight: From the Washington Post to USA Today and the New York Times, commentaries and news articles about our work reach millions of readers every year FairVote’s staff members have been quoted in dozens of publications and have appeared on outlets like NPR, NBC, CSPAN, CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, while also regularly writing pieces targeted to constituency publications. Our postal and email newsletters regularly reach more than 30,000 readers.