The Clicktivists - a new breed of protesters

What's the next move?
A nationwide day of mass action is planned for January 30, with smaller nationwide occupations and demonstrations taking place throughout this month.

38 Degrees
Who?
A Left-of-centre campaigning organisation with a team of three staff and a network of volunteers. It launched in May 2009 and is unique because its direction is driven almost entirely by its membership, who use social media and the internet to help decide on every aspect of running a campaign. "We have a staff team who are very focused on listening to what our members want, and exercising some judgment as well," explains
29-year-old executive director David Babbs, who lives in Bethnal Green.

What do we want?
It has co-ordinated campaigns on a range of issues, from saving BBC 6 Music to protecting the NHS. At the moment their energies are focused on a newspaper campaign that portrays George Osborne as a pouting "Artful Dodger", stating that he is not only skirting the issue of tax avoidance but dodging £1.6 million of tax himself.

Greatest success?
38 Degrees delivered a petition signed by 11,000 people to party leaders to call on them to urgently pass a Recall Law for MPs that would let voters oust them between elections. The Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, has since indicated that this will become a reality.

Where's the money from?
Half of 38 Degrees' funding is raised from membership donations. The other half is provided by benefactors and trusts.

How many followers?
38 Degrees claims to have a membership of about 300,000, whose levels of advocacy vary. Its campaigns tend to be based around online activism that requires supporters to sign petitions or email their MP rather than take direct action.

"We make change happen through people power," says Babbs. "So in terms of what the staff can do without members our options are genuinely limited."

What's the next move?
£20,000 has been raised by members to display a round of Artful Dodger adverts on bus stops and billboards around the UK. The organisation is also currently engaged in several other campaigns.

False Economy
Who?
Conceived by a group of activists, campaigners and trade unionists, False Economy isn't a campaigning organisation in itself but rather a platform for people to find out about how Coalition cuts are affecting the populace and what they can do about it.

"We're very interested in what people do offline," says campaign director Clifford Singer, 42, who lives in Hackney, "but False Economy itself is an online hub. It's a way for people to get information about what's going on, about local cuts in their area and the arguments against the Government's economics, and to spread that using social media."

Its success at uniting online activists has been assisted by the involvement of Liberal Conspiracy blogger and prolific tweeter Sunny Hundal, who has proven adept at connecting activists online and offline through events such as this month's grassroots conference Netroots.

What do we want?
The site has three aims: to map the cuts and their effect on people, to provide a resource for campaigns and protesters from different organisations and to make a case against the Government's view of how it would reduce the deficit.

Greatest success?
It is not due to launch until the first week of February and is still in the process of establishing the site.

Where's the money from?
False Economy was set up with financial support from the TUC, Unison, the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy and the Fire Brigades Union, and has a staff of two working part-time. "We have very limited funds at the moment," says Singer, who is a part-time web developer, and hopes to maintain the site through donations.

How many followers?
It's currently reported to attract about 2,000 unique users a day.

What's the next move?
The group's energies are focused on their launch in the first week of February. It has also used Freedom of Information requests to conduct research into the impact of public sector cuts, which it plans to release at the same time.

National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts
Who?
A network of student and education worker activists not affiliated with the National Union of Students (NUS), the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (NCAFC) was founded at a conference of more than 150 campaigners at University College London in February last year. It was originally conceived in response to the NUS's failure to represent students who wanted to campaign for free education, and organises protests and occupations opposing tuition fees and cuts in education funding.

Founder Michael Chessum, a 21-year-old student officer at University College London, explains: "We thought there were lots of little local campaigns which weren't being catered for or supported by their students' union or the NUS. We wanted to give them a national face and a national direction."

What do we want?
The NCAFC ultimately wants to secure free education for students, and this is where its views differ from the NUS. Considered more radical than the NUS, the group has a record of supporting forms of (non-violent) direct action, such as university occupations, that the NUS is less willing to undertake.

Greatest success?
A march the NCAFC organised on December 9 last year saw tens of thousands of students descend on London to protest, causing disruption that included the painting of a giant "NO" on the grass in Parliament Square.

Where's the money from?
By donation through its website.

How many followers?
The campaign against a rise in tuition fees was believed to have the support of hundreds of thousands across the UK, most of them students. Marches have seen tens of thousands of students take to the streets. "What's important about the campaign is it's still overwhelmingly a physical thing," says Chessum, who lives in Haringey.

What's the next move?
A mass demonstration is planned for January 29, where protesters will take to the streets of London and Manchester.