Hip-Hop Activism: Will They Come to Vote?

The political doomsday possibility of a second Bush term has awakened many who may have been asleep at the wheel, or just disconnected from politics. This is especially true of hundreds of thousands of alienated or apolitical young people who are now open to being organized. Major efforts are underway to reach out to these young voters -- both at the grand scale of huge arena Hip Hop concerts and at the grassroots where the method is more hands on.

Dire political circumstances have inspired many groups who have been traditionally content to remain outside the political arena. These groups are taking any number of non-traditional approaches to engaging potential new voters. Voting information tables and registration efforts are showing up in the most unlikely places -- from malls to beauty salons, where, for example, one organization is attempting to reach unmarried women by distributing "Beauty Kits" that include voter registration material to nail and beauty salons.

Nowhere is this new and innovative electoral energy more apparent than in the hip hop community. Here the emergence of an election-oriented, politically sophisticated effort to register and mobilize thousands of younger voters and build a political power base is one of the most promising developments of the election season.

An early centerpiece of this grassroots organizing is the ambitious National Hip-Hop Political Convention in Newark, New Jersey slated for June 16-19. The convention, which is likely to attract thousands of activists as well as top-draw musical talent, might also be an early indication of how successful the hip hop effort will be at the local level.

James Bernard, one of the convention's organizers, a founder of the hip hop magazine The Source and founding editor of XXL, says, "Newark is a coming-out party for a whole new generation of activists. We're about organizing a progressive movement for our generation of black, Latino, Asian and white hip hoppers. We need muscle at the polling booth and a presence in the street." He calls the convention "the kickoff of an intense campaign to register and mobilize tens of thousands of young people between now and election day."

Reaching for the Youth Vote

In addition to the Hip-Hop Convention and its registration campaign, there are dozens of other efforts aimed at young people, designed to reverse a trend of increasingly high drop-out numbers among young voters in the 25 years since 18-year-olds won the right to vote. The League of Pissed off Voters have been barnstorming the country promoting their book How to Vote Stupid White Men Out of Office, and a new organization called the Young Voter Alliance promises to seek out young people where they actually are most reachable -- in the summer basketball leagues, in barbershops and hair salons and hip-hop clubs where advocates hope that partying will mix with politics.

In addition, this year is seeing several huge national non-partisan voter registration efforts. America Coming Together (ACT) has a strong youth component, while the US PIRGS have launched the New Voters Project, thanks to a multi-million-dollar grant from the Pew Foundation. These groups are also using what have been found to be the most effective tactics, making face-to-face contact with youth in a number of states.

Meanwhile much of the grassroots work has been overshadowed by the glitzy, mainstream Hip Hop Summit Action Network (HSAN), a high-powered effort led by music and clothing impresario Russell Simmons and a gaggle of record industry heavies like Damon Dash and the "king of excess" P. Diddy Combs. The project is being run by the controversial Ben Chavis, a member of the Nation of Islam and organizer of the so-called "Million Man March." HSAN, which doesn't appear to have many actual members of the hip-hop generation in their leadership mix, has used huge concerts with A-list talent for high-volume registration of young people. With large events in Chicago, Los Angeles and Houston under their belt, HSAN has turned for support to corporate sponsors such as Anheuser Busch, PlayStation2 and the corporate media behemoth Clear Channel.