By Dr. Mark A. Rafter, Editorial Director
With contributions from Wolfgang Kovacek
Editor’s Note: This is the first in a new Modern-Day Marco Polo series examining emerging technologies, the problems they seek to solve, and their potential impact on business, government, and everyday life. Through this series, readers will explore innovations that are shaping the future—often long before they become part of the mainstream.
Why political campaigns still knock on doors like it’s 1996—and what a DoorDash-style platform could change about that
It’s a Saturday morning in late October. A campaign field office somewhere in Southern California is buzzing—or at least it’s supposed to be. The volunteer coordinator has printed walk lists, assigned turf, scheduled shifts, and sent three rounds of reminder texts. By 10 a.m., half the volunteers who signed up haven’t shown. By the following weekend, several of the ones who did show won’t be coming back.
Anyone who has worked on a political campaign knows this story. It repeats itself every election cycle, in races large and small, across the political spectrum. Campaigns build their entire ground game around one critical resource: volunteers. Yet many campaigns manage that resource using a system that can unintentionally drive people away.
A system built for a different era
For decades, the playbook has remained largely unchanged. Recruit as many volunteers as possible. Hand them a clipboard and a map. Tell them which doors to knock on, which script to follow, and which shift to work. Report back to the coordinator. Repeat until Election Day.
The problem is that the volunteers campaigns most need today—people with energy, digital fluency, flexible schedules, and a desire to make a difference—often have little patience for that traditional model. The data on American volunteerism paints a sobering picture of just how limited the volunteer pool has become.
According to joint research by the U.S. Census Bureau and AmeriCorps, formal volunteering in the United States fell to 23.2% in 2021, the lowest rate recorded since tracking began in 2002. While participation rebounded to 28.3% by 2023, it remained below pre-pandemic levels, and the number of hours served per volunteer continued to decline.
Research from Stanford University also found that the pandemic significantly disrupted in-person volunteering, with many organizations continuing to struggle with rebuilding participation even after restrictions ended.
But the deeper challenge is not simply recruitment—it is retention and how volunteers are managed once they arrive.
The Urban Institute’s national study of volunteer management found that organizations retain volunteers when they recognize contributions, invest in development, and match people with work that fits their interests and abilities. Heavy-handed supervision, by contrast, was not enough to sustain long-term participation.
Combine a shrinking volunteer pool with management practices that fail to adapt, and campaigns face a familiar problem: large numbers of volunteers disappear before Election Day.
Think about what that means. A campaign spends weeks recruiting one hundred volunteers to knock on doors, only to discover that during the final stretch—when voter contact matters most—only a fraction remain active.
What DoorDash figured out that campaigns haven’t
Here’s the strange part: much of the economy solved a similar problem years ago.
When companies such as DoorDash, Uber, Instacart, and other digital platforms emerged, they changed the relationship between organizations and participants. Instead of assigning fixed schedules and tightly controlling every task, these platforms created marketplaces where individuals could choose when, where, and how they participated.
The insight was not simply about food delivery or transportation. It was about people.
Researchers saw this generational shift coming long before the gig economy became mainstream. The Pew Research Center’s landmark 2010 portrait of Millennials described a generation that was digitally connected, self-directed, and comfortable using technology to manage daily life. Many increasingly expected flexibility and autonomy in how they worked and contributed.
A shopper picks up groceries when it fits their schedule. A driver accepts deliveries in areas that work for them. The platform coordinates the process behind the scenes.
Now ask: why would political volunteering necessarily be different?
Enter WIN PC App
That is the idea behind WIN PC App, a mobile platform developed by Burbank-based PAAR Capital Apps LLC that applies a gig-economy approach to political field operations.
Instead of a coordinator assigning every volunteer a neighborhood and shift, volunteers open the app, view available opportunities, and choose when and where they want to canvass. GPS verification confirms that assigned areas were actually covered, reducing reliance on paper tracking and manual reporting.
Real-time targeting tools are designed to help volunteers focus on voters most likely to be persuadable rather than simply covering every household equally.
The platform also incorporates features familiar to users of modern digital applications: gamification elements, leaderboards, and privacy protections, including anonymous login credentials for volunteers who may prefer not to publicly associate their political activity with their personal identity.
The goal is to create a volunteer experience that feels less like a traditional assignment and more like the flexible, technology-driven platforms people already use every day.
“Young people like to have the freedom and flexibility to volunteer when and where they want. The value that they bring to the campaign remains untapped with old-fashioned door-knocking platforms,” says Wolfgang Kovacek, founder and CEO of PAAR Capital Apps. “WIN PC App is the first and only platform to date to completely unlock this massive potential and to energize passionate contributors, which creates a viral movement benefiting commonsense candidates.”
Whether that approach ultimately reshapes campaign field operations will depend on adoption by campaigns and on whether it measurably improves volunteer retention and voter contact. But it reflects a broader trend toward technology that gives participants greater flexibility, autonomy, and real-time coordination—an approach that has already transformed industries from transportation to retail delivery.
So why aren’t campaigns switching?
Of course, no technology by itself guarantees success. Campaigns still need compelling candidates, effective messaging, and dedicated volunteers. But if organizing people is one of the largest operational challenges in politics, then improving the way campaigns recruit, coordinate, and retain volunteers may represent one of the greatest opportunities for innovation.
If the technology exists and the traditional model is struggling, why hasn’t the industry moved more quickly?
The answer appears to be a combination of habit, culture, and risk.
Political campaigns are short-lived, high-pressure organizations often run by people who learned their craft from previous generations. When everything is on the line and the clock is ticking, campaign managers naturally rely on familiar methods—even when those methods may no longer produce the best results.
Adopting a new platform can feel risky. Continuing with the old approach can feel safe, even when volunteer participation declines.
It is a familiar pattern across industries. Taxi companies understood dispatch systems. Video stores understood rental models. Traditional approaches often remain dominant until a new technology demonstrates that a different way is possible.
With tens of thousands of races on the ballot during the 2026 election cycle—from congressional contests to local school board races—the campaigns that learn how to recruit, engage, and empower volunteers may gain a significant advantage.
The tools are already emerging. The question is which campaigns will be willing to use them.
The Modern-Day Marco Polo perspective
This article begins a continuing series exploring emerging technologies that are quietly reshaping industries, organizations, and everyday life. Through my work as the “Modern-Day Marco Polo,” I’ve had the opportunity to meet entrepreneurs, developers, researchers, and innovators working on ideas that often reach the public long before they become household names.
Some of these technologies will succeed; others may not. Yet each reflects the creativity, experimentation, and problem-solving that continue to redefine how we live, work, communicate, and participate in our communities.
My goal is to introduce readers to these innovations, explain the problems they seek to solve, and explore the broader impact they may have on business, government, and society.
Sources; This article draws upon research from: the U.S. Census Bureau and AmeriCorps, Volunteering and Civic Life in America, Current Population Survey Civic Engagement and Volunteering Supplement (2021 and 2023 waves); and Stanford University research on pandemic-era disruptions to in-person volunteering (2021); and Urban Institute, Volunteer Management Practices and Retention of Volunteers, Volunteer Management Capacity Study (2004); and Pew Research Center, Millennials: A Portrait of Generation Next (2010).
