Proxies for People: A Vehicle for Involvement

Abstract

Question: What prompted you to start your new organization, Proxies for People, and how will it work? Alinsky: I started thinking about corporate responsibility as an arena for action during my proxy fight with Kodak some years ago. I began to see the political power of proxies when a convention of Unitarians voted to send their Kodak proxies to us-I knew that the instant it hit the newswires, every Senator and Congressman in Washington would turn to his research director and ask, 'How many Unitarians have I got in my district?' and then call Unitarian leaders to ask, 'What can I do for you?'