Dave Fleischer runs the team at the Los Angeles LGBT Center's Leadership Lab that created deep canvassing - a groundbreaking approach to political campaigning that uses doorstep conversations to change people's minds about potentially polarising issues and which helped to win the US equal marriage campaign.
Deep canvassing avoids pelting voters with arguments or facts; instead "we find surprising common ground by sharing our real, lived experience — vulnerable stories about ourselves and people we love— and invite voters to share in return."
We spoke with Dave about how deep canvassing works, the psychology of what makes it so effective, and how it potentially points the way towards new approaches to campaigning where success is about bridging divides rather than deepening them.
*Show notes*
Dave's TED talk, which includes the video of the deep canvassing conversation that we discuss in the episode: https://youtu.be/xN6O5LTaGyg
NY Times profile of Dave and his work: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/10/magazine/how-do-you-change-voters-minds-have-a-conversation.html