Stacey Abrams' bid for Georgia governor highlights the link between community organisation and public leadership

It is unusual that an announcement of this type generates such attention, but in the case of Stacey Abrams there is particular intrigue regarding her decision to run for Georgia state governor in 2022. The first thing to note is that the news does not come as too much of a surprise. Having lost one of the state's tightest elections in decades, many analysts had expected her to re-enter contention at some point - this is all the more true after an election cycle which has seen her stock rise considerably.

Most people will recognise Abrams as a political strategist and activist. Many on the ground in Georgia have credited her for playing an important role in the record turnout seen in the state during the 2020 US election.

Joe Biden was a major benefactor of this effort, becoming the first Democratic nominee to take Georgia in three decades. He narrowly defeated Donald Trump by .5 percentage points in a contest that witnessed nearly 5 million Georgians take to the polls.

Beyond the result, Abrams' work was seen as a victory for democratic participation, and her announcement draws a link between public leadership and the virtues of community organisation. It is one which is still often overlooked but has set the path for prospective future leaders to take positions in public office.

At the very least it should in theory allow for leadership that is more (although never truly) authentic to the communities public servants represent. This is especially the case for Georgia, the nations eighth biggest state. It is difficult to imagine that Abrams much like any public servant, will be able to entirely represent the views of every one of the state's residents in all its complexity, but she has continually found support for her willingness to find solutions to the states biggest issues and expand the number of voices involved around these conversations. 

“What she was doing was, she was changing the shape of the electorate by adding new voices to the table,”

Andra Gillespie, a political scientist at Emory University, speaking with NBC news, 2020

In 2020, she was not alone in her efforts, but the influence of her opposition to voter suppression bore fruit on election day. Reviewing the role of Black women in deciding the election, OBV's Sandra Stewart noted: "The New Georgia Project Abrams started in 2013 to foster voter registration, expanded in 2018 after the loss of the Governor race. The emphasis was now to include schooling on voter participation and education regarding elections and voter rights." 

She added: "As a direct result of Fair Fight’s efforts 800,000 more voter registrations have been recorded since 2018, significant numbers of young people and people of colour making up that total."

Abrams' candidacy will likely pit her against the Republican Brian Kemp, the current state governor, whom she suffered a narrow defeat to in the 2018 gubernatorial elections. 

In the years since her defeat, she has spoken candidly about the wrongs she believes were done during the election and the state of a system she believes to have not been fair. 

Clearly, this remains a matter in which she hopes to address in public office. When announcing her candidacy for next year’s election, she said: "I'm running for Governor because opportunity in our state shouldn't be determined by zip code, background or access to power." 

Victory would make Abrams the nation’s first Black woman governor.

Image credit: Callie Giovanna via TED, 2018

Mayowa Ayodele