An action alert is a message that an organization sends to mobilize people - often members of their group and supports of a specific point of view - calling on them to take action to influence public policy. Typically, action alerts are in reference to a timely issue, where prompt action is needed in order to affect upcoming decisions. Action alerts are considered a cost-effective and efficient grassroots organizing tool and are employed widely by many advocacy organizations. A well-designed action alert can be a "powerful way to invite people to participate in the processes of a democracy."
Action alerts may, for instance, ask supporters to:
- Contact their member of Congress in support of proposed legislation; or
- Write a letter to the editor about a specific item in the news.
Action alerts commonly begin by explaining the public policy issue to the recipients, and then tell the reader how they can impact the decision. Action alerts go by many other names; Amnesty International, for instance, refers to them as "Urgent actions"
Read more about Action Alert: Organisations That Use Action Alerts
Famous quotes containing the words action and/or alert:
“The United States must be neutral in fact as well as in name.... We must be impartial in thought as well as in action ... a nation that neither sits in judgment upon others nor is disturbed in her own counsels and which keeps herself fit and free to do what is honest and disinterested and truly serviceable for the peace of the world.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“One’s prime is elusive. You little girls, when you grow up, must be on the alert to recognize your prime at whatever time of your life it may occur. You must then live it to the full.”
—Muriel Spark (b. 1918)