Background
Color of Change was co-founded in 2005 by James Rucker and Van Jones. Rucker had previously been Director of Grassroots Mobilization for MoveOn.org Political Action and MoveOn.org Civic Action (2003–2005). Van Jones is the founder of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and was executive director at the time. Van Jones left the organization several years later to move on to other pursuits, such as Green For All. Rashad Robinson is the Executive Director of Color of Change, having joined the organization in May 2011.
Color of Change emerged in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, creating campaigns to help the hurricane's survivors. Color of Change was a leading advocate of the Jena Six, helping that cause gain increased media, national, and international attention.
Color of Change utilizes the Internet, and specifically e-mail, as its main conduit for communicating with its members. Web 2.0 developments such as social networking sites also contributed to the organization's scope and public impact, particularly in the case of the Jena Six. Rucker attributes the viral-nature of e-communications with helping promote the case of the Jena Six, and sees the Internet as a powerful resource for activists looking to garner attention for causes. The Democratic Strategist also noted that major blogs and supposedly liberal media outlets were largely silent on the case of the Jena Six, while The Cornell Daily Sun wrote that web-savvy organizations like Color of Change have been able to adopt new Internet technologies for causes of civic protest, but indicated that these new technologies should not be thought of as a total replacement for concrete grassroots work. They also use aggressive boycotts to achieve their goals. They recently (April, 2012) forced several companies, e.g. Wendy's, CocaCola, Pepsi, to withdraw funding of ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council, a political action group that supports voter ID laws), while other companies, e.g., Walmart, Johnson & Johnson refuse to bow to such tactics and continue their support of ALEC.
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