Hazem Hassan 's Quick takes

By Hazem🔸 @ 2026-05-19T03:42 (+2)

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Hazem Hassan 🔶 @ 2026-05-19T03:42 (+54)

More EA undergrads should do political volunteering. It's impactful AND fun.

Choose an election that's impactful (e.g. AI safety candidate) and neglected (e.g. primaries in always-blue/red places), couch-crash the weekend there, and volunteer with the campaign.

I say this after doing 15 hours of street canvassing myself. I was surprised by how anecdotally impactful and fun it was. If you like people-watching, talking to strangers, and/or joining passionate projects for a weekend, I think you'll also love this.

I wish I thought of this earlier.

Literature on the impact (Claude-generated): Kalla & Broockman's meta-analysis of 49 field experiments finds zero average persuasive effect in general elections, but effects do show up when voters lack a partisan cue (i.e. primaries and ballot measures). Mann & Haenschen (2024) find mobilization effects (e.g. canvassing) are 33-76% larger in low-attention races than in high-attention ones. Your marginal volunteer hour goes much further in a primary.

Kiara 🔸 @ 2026-05-19T12:41 (+11)

As someone who did this, and ended up actually working as a political staffer for years, strongly agree. Not just for the reasons you mentioned, but volunteering on a campaign for a weekend is a pretty easy/cheap test to see if you have aptitude and/or enjoyment in the realm of politics as a whole. If you do, even a short stint is a great way to learn some pretty handy transferable skills, and to meet people that might be handy to know if you’re trying to influence policy down the line. Campaigns love thoughtful, passionate people, and they can be convinced to give you more to take on if you show that you’re willing and trustworthy. And as long as you’re not too loud about it or take on any permanent paid roles, it’s fairly concealable, if you are worried about being visibly partisan negatively impacting you in the future. 

Hazem Hassan 🔶 @ 2026-05-19T03:47 (+2)

I specified undergrads because I assume they're similar to me. This can of course apply to non-undergrads.

Also, I recommend checking prediction markets and prioritizing elections that are close calls (e.g. don't volunteer for a 90%-likely-to-win candidate, or a 10% one that is dwarfed by two other 40% candidates). Aim for 35-50% (judgement call)

Hazem🔸 @ 2026-07-08T08:27 (+16)

I think EAG/EAGx conferences should try (if possible) to avoid venues under active corporate campaign targeting for animal welfare failures.

I recently went to a protest against Marriott over their unfulfilled cage-free egg commitment and couldn't help but think back to EAGxDC which was held at one of their hotels in May.

I don't think the EAGxDC organizers intentionally ignored this; they probably didn't know, or the venue was just very logistically convenient (which I think outweighs this concern).

But I wonder whether organizers generally consider this when choosing venues. I feel like they should, assuming there are other options not under campaign targeting.

Redmerlin @ 2026-07-08T17:15 (+10)

My understanding is appropriate venues are hard to come by, expensive, and have to be booked nearly a year in advance, so they may not have had a choice. 

Hazem🔸 @ 2026-07-08T20:45 (+4)

Thanks, I didn't know that, esp. the booking timeline. The campaign over Marriott's noncompliance apparently started in late 2025, so it makes sense.

Marcus Abramovitch 🔸 @ 2026-07-09T02:28 (+1)

I think this is a great point. Thanks for raising it.