Big Tent Nation Vision

Big Tent Nation is committed to transforming the way individual citizens, business and government communicate and collaborate on issues critical to broad-based national prosperity. The online platform we’re building will give mainstream citizens the information and organizational tools they need to effect meaningful change. Check out the short video below to learn more!

Why the Time is Right

There is finally consensus across the political spectrum that broad based American prosperity has been eroding for decades.  What we’re struggling with as a nation is how to come together and turn things around.  This is a complex issue that’s beyond silver bullet solutions, but scaling up citizen engagement is a critical piece of the puzzle. To facilitate this, Big Tent Nation is building a platform that radically simplifies the civic engagement process for mainstream citizens.  Our online environment leverages civic technology best practices to make it substantially easier and more rewarding for citizens to learn about economic issues, define common ground and form coalitions to pursue shared prosperity.

How We Intend to Pull This Off

When our platform is complete, it will allow every American to build a personalized civic homepage in just two minutes. This customized environment will reflect your highest priority economic concerns and serve as a nonpartisan portal through which you can connect and partner with fellow citizens, thought leaders and elected officials.  Big Tent Nation will provide a rich and empowering environment that integrates learning, dialogue, collaboration and advocacy.  This will result in a unique context within which all political stakeholders passionate about shared prosperity can work together to forge pragmatic solutions. Check out our prototype at the Big Tent Democracy Lab to learn more. 

Where You Fit In

Whether you are a Republican, Democrat or Independent you’re welcome at Big Tent Nation.  The only thing we need to agree on is that American prosperity is at risk and worth fighting for.  Different perspectives on how to move forward are inevitable – and a powerful resource if paired with mutual respect.  The fact is, getting better at working together despite our differences is essential to this nation’s long term growth and stability.  It’s also important to understand that participating on Big Tent doesn’t require lots of time and heavy lifting.  A great place to start is at our Prosperity Learning Center  – it’s where you can review, discuss and challenge ideas about prosperity from across the political spectrum. That’s just one way to join in - click here to see all the easy and impactful ways you can get involved right now!

Why We’re Confident It Will Work

Despite partisanship and polarization, the majority of Americans from across the political spectrum agree on many economic issues vital to national prosperity (see table below). The challenge is ensuring these areas of general consensus are better represented in U.S. economic policy. We've done extensive research into how political decision making really works - and what mainstream citizens can do to get a seat at the table.  We’ve also analyzed the American electorate and identified literally millions of engaged citizens like you for whom the Big Tent platform will be extremely compelling.  Integrate these insights into an online environment that leverages the most powerful lessons from user experience design, collective action and gamification and you have the ground-breaking civic empowerment platform America needs to get beyond gridlock and seize the future. It won't be easy by any means, but with enough citizens on board change becomes inevitable.

Source: 2019 Public Policy Priorities for the President and Congress (Pew Research Center)

Where We Are Right Now

This movement is really building momentum.  The first Big Tent Nation product release is under construction and scheduled for launch in 2021 – and it looks great so far.  We have a world class technical team chomping at the bit to build out the full, game changing Big Tent platform.  We’re also getting support and guidance from many of the smartest people in the world – thought leaders from top universities, technology firms, think tanks and even political insiders who’ve had it with the current system.  Our biggest gap?  More people like you.  We need citizens who are fed up with gridlock and finger pointing to come off the sidelines and be heard.  We’re going to harness cutting edge technology to make getting involved as easy and rewarding as possible, but if we’re going to restore broad-based prosperity and the American Dream you’ll have to make the first move! Click here to see all the ways you can make a difference today!

Who We'd Like to Thank

Wonderful people at the following institutions are providing us with advice, guidance and support.  We’d love to add your organization to the list!