Workin’ Together: The Case for Inclusive Civic Infrastructure

This blog is part of a series written by FSG leaders on inclusive democracy and civic engagement. Read the full series here. 

With just under eight weeks until the U.S. presidential election, we are witnessing an exciting surge of civic energy and engagement. Get-out-the-vote efforts are in full swing, with grassroots organizations, civic leaders, philanthropists, and local institutions all working together to drive change. There is renewed energy to participate in the political process. But as we count down to the final days of this election cycle, I ask you to consider what comes next after the polls close in November. How do we help ensure this short-term burst of energy leads to lasting change?

FSG is committed to building a truly inclusive, multiracial democracy as a cornerstone to advancing equitable systems change, and we recognize this long-term work must be sustained far beyond November. Over the coming weeks, you’ll hear reflections from FSG leaders about how our clients and partners are advancing this new vision of democracy through innovative strategies, working across diverse issue areas (and political party lines), and in service of equitable systems change.

At FSG, we view inclusive civic infrastructure as essential to advancing this vision of an inclusive, multiracial democracy well beyond November. We define inclusive civic infrastructure as the institutions, networks, and spaces that allow diverse groups to engage in meaningful dialogue, collaboration, and problem-solving in a particular place. Many individuals and groups have already written about the importance of civic infrastructure, and many examples of this infrastructure already exist in communities and regions—from regional chambers of commerce, neighborhood planning councils, collective impact initiatives, and other place-based, cross-sectoral tables and partnerships.

This is a reminder that these collaborative tables and spaces—when led with intention—are central to advancing lasting systems change. They provide durable connections that can be leveraged across issue areas, and they help build the broader “we” in-place that reflects the inclusive, multiracial democracy we envision at scale.

A central role in systems change

In cities across the country, we often see resident leaders and organizers coming together to strategize, protest, and mobilize, while business and civic leaders gather to network, collaborate, and plan a region’s future. However, these two groups rarely come together to align their visions or co-create solutions. Often, community-based organizations struggle to maintain the resources and capacity necessary for sustained engagement, while civic and business leaders lack the incentive, will, or skill to facilitate meaningful collaboration and power-sharing.

As my colleagues highlighted in the Water of Systems Change, this gap in relationships and connections across system actors is often one of the greatest barriers holding seemingly intractable problems in place. Where do the after-school tutor, in-school reading specialist, and a student’s parents come together to align on a young person’s reading priorities? Similarly, where do regional workforce boards align with training providers and employers to ensure that folks are prepared for the jobs of today and the future? In the absence of inclusive civic infrastructure, literacy gaps are likely to persist, and high-demand jobs will likely remain out of reach for local communities.

While one might target a ballot measure or public narrative as your systems change strategy, any wins are unlikely to be sustained if there is not also a diverse coalition advising and engaging in how that policy is implemented or championing that new narrative. Inclusive civic infrastructure is where a region’s leaders—across sectors, industries and various other lines of difference—do the relational work of equitable systems change.

Leveraging civic infrastructure across issues

Inclusive civic infrastructure not only fosters effective collaboration across various sectors, but also provides a durable framework that can be leveraged to address a range of issues and needs.

For instance, the Health and Wellness Alliance for Children in Dallas exemplifies this approach. This coalition of Children’s Health (a major local pediatric hospital system) and over 100 community organizations have made a remarkable impact by focusing initially on reducing child asthma hospitalizations. Through a collective impact strategy and internal changes at the hospital, the coalition achieved a 49% decrease in asthma-related admissions. Their initial success has led to an expanded focus on broader health issues, such as healthy eating and physical activity, demonstrating how civic infrastructure can be leveraged to meet evolving community needs.

Similarly, recent historic federal investments in clean energy, infrastructure, and chip manufacturing utilize existing collaborative infrastructure to engage stakeholders and achieve greater impact. For example, the Black United Fund of Texas originated from a community-led effort to address the unique needs of Black communities. However, the city of Houston was able to partner with the Black United Fund of Texas and leverage its existing civic infrastructure to secure $20 million in environmental and climate justice community change grants for Texas organizations through the Community Change Grants Program which utilizes funding from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

These examples illustrate how existing civic infrastructure can be leveraged to attract further investment and achieve greater impact. While addressing specific community needs, such as reducing childhood asthma, might be the initial challenge that brings a coalition together, the civic infrastructure and relationships developed can be applied to broader goals and to secure greater resources—both public and private—to ensure sustainability.

As federal competitive grant programs and other state/local public investment mechanisms continue to flow through these groups, the role of this infrastructure as a cornerstone of our inclusive multiracial democracy is also likely to increase.

Building a bigger “we” in place

Inclusive civic infrastructure fosters a shared vision and purpose among otherwise disparate groups, helping to create the “bigger we” that is crucial in today’s polarized world. Having collaborative tables where these groups and leaders can come together to align on shared vision is crucial for an inclusive democracy.

Research highlights the critical role of diverse epistemic communities, where professional political leadership collaborates with community, civic, and grassroots leaders. Notably, research by Manuel Pastor and Chris Brenner examined over 192 metropolitan areas and found that regions with strong, diverse epistemic communities consistently outperformed the average in both economic growth and equity. This demonstrates that such collaborative networks are not only vital for social cohesion, but also for driving inclusive economic success.

A concrete example of this is the Mid-America Regional Council (MARC) in Kansas City, where civic leaders, policymakers, and grassroots organizations have come together to address regional challenges. By fostering collaboration across sectors, MARC has been instrumental in creating a unified approach to economic development and public health initiatives. Similarly, in San Antonio, UP Partnership, the anchor organization of the Future Ready Bexar County Plan, has brought together nearly 90 partner organizations in a “cradle-to-college” initiative to increase the percentage of Bexar County high school graduates enrolling in a postsecondary degree or credential program to 70% by 2030.

Building and maintaining these spaces is difficult, time-consuming work, fraught with challenges like ego, power dynamics, and competition for scarce resources. When considering how to build inclusive civic infrastructure, leaders in the St. Louis region recently aligned on the need to prioritize four key elements, or the “4Rs,” for cross-sectoral collaboration: 

• Reason: Why are we pursuing this work? Can we articulate both a moral/justice case and a business case that will keep a broad swath of cross-sector stakeholders engaged?
• Readiness: Are different stakeholder groups ready to engage with each other? How do we design activities (e.g., meeting times and format, pre-meeting prep, compensation for resident/volunteer leaders, language) to ensure diverse groups can actually engage? What capacities and incentives must be in place for productive conversations?
• Relationships: How do we foster lasting and transformative relationships vs. short-term and transactional engagement between leaders? What stakeholders need to be engaged in this work?
• Results: Are we producing and communicating tangible wins?  What explicit goals are we targeting and what measures of progress are we using to hold ourselves accountable?

While the St. Louis leaders considered this framework at the beginning of their work, our experience shows that the same principles for cross-sectoral collaboration would remain relevant 5, 10, or even 15 years into the process. While these components may appear linear, they are both cyclical and emergent. Systems change leaders engaged in the relational work of collaboration understand that continuously nurturing these elements is vital for both impact and sustainability. 

If diverse stakeholders can unite around a shared vision in regions and cities, we can also hope that our vision of an inclusive, multi-racial democracy might be possible at a national scale. As we approach the immediate urgency of the upcoming U.S. elections, it is vital to recognize that the work of building an inclusive, multiracial democracy extends far beyond November. We have an opportunity to invest in the long-term work of building and sustaining inclusive civic infrastructure.

I uplift these examples as an invitation to consider: Where does this infrastructure exist in your local community and what are you doing to foster it? How can building, sustaining and engaging these tables be part of our civic duty? Where are there opportunities to make our existing collaborative efforts more inclusive?