Tag Archives: advocacy

In search of adaptive capacity

Posted on March 12, 2012 by | Leave a comment

Advocacy evaluation has been both an academic and an applied pursuit of mine for the past three years or so now.

I’ve learned a lot about how to build accountability and shared learning into advocacy campaigns, how to measure the comparative impact of different approaches, and, most importantly, what to address in order to improve the effectiveness of a given advocacy organization.

I’ve learned a lot about what doesn’t predict advocacy success, too: sheer organizational size or budget, ‘inside’ connections to decision-makers, expertise in a given issue area, even the number of grassroots activists.

All those things matter, certainly.

But what seems to matter more than anything, and what captures, in a way, the effect of knowing how to bring those elements and others together into a cohesive and potent whole, is adaptive capacity.

It’s an idea borrowed from systems theory, and I’m certainly not the first one to connect it to the task of advocacy evaluation.

It’s one of those beautiful theories that makes intuitive, as well as empirical, sense.

Wouldn’t we expect that, in the advocacy realm, those organizations that can adapt to a continually changing environment would see the greatest success, especially over time?

The challenge, then, for nonprofits engaging in advocacy (and, we assume, wanting to win!) is to figure out what adaptive capacity looks like, for them, and how to build it. Otherwise, you get organizations that build the same kind of campaign, or deploy the same kinds of messages, or use the very same tactics, no matter the context, which yields victories (not surprisingly) only when the actions are well-suited to the demands of the situation. When they’re not, well…that “successful” advocacy organization can find itself losing, a lot.

It means understanding how to really diagnose the political context–not just who’s in power, but who has influence over them, and where there are openings and how to leverage your assets to push through them. It means fully reflecting on the victories and failures of each advocacy effort, so that you can learn from one experience to figure out what it means for the next. It means compensating for the areas where your capacity is less than you would hope, by optimally wielding the capacity you do possess. It means building your skills, and knowledge, and relationships–not so that you can “master” advocacy, as though it was a one-time achievement–but so that you can increase your versatility and pivot to different strategies as the situation demands.

This understanding, as fairly evident as it appears at this point in the development of the field, presents a different nuance to the pursuit of advocacy capacity. Now, we know that what we should be working towards isn’t just a bigger organization or better connections or a stronger base…it’s the elements that are particularly essential in this specific environment, and maybe the one that we think is headed for us next. That might require going after any one of those assets, or all of them, or something else entirely. And it will definitely demand that we know when to pull out which tools, and in what combination, and that we never stop scanning around ourselves to see how what we’re doing might not fit with what is needed.

Adaptive capacity:

A fancy way of saying “able to win again and again and again and again.”

Doesn’t that sound good?

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Spend your “extra” day fighting a losing battle

Posted on February 28, 2012 by | 2 Comments

The way I see it, folks, tomorrow is a freebie.

It’s a totally bonus day that we only get once every four years.

You won’t have a February 29th next year, and you got by without one last year. Since we don’t plan on it, then, it’s essentially a total bonus, right?

So here’s my thought:

Let’s “waste” this extra day fighting some battles we’ll almost certainly lose. You know the ones–they need to be fought, to right a wrong or just stir up some trouble for those who need to be troubled. But we avoid them, because it seems more prudent to focus our energies on more attainable victories.

But not tomorrow.

Those 24 hours are a calendar’s gift, so we might as well throw them away on some of these hopeless causes.

My list, to get the day started:

  • Public assistance eligibility for immigrant families–can you think of a less popular cause? But economic hardship sentences some citizen children of immigrant parents to a lifetime of reduced life chances, and financial desperation traps some immigrant women in violent homes. Our public assistance systems are designed to reduce hardship and provide a safety net, and these families–part of our communities–deserve that, too.
  • Tax fairness–okay, so I fight this one on some of the other days, too, but I figure I can spare a few extra hours today. We need a revenue system equal to the challenges that face us, as a state and a country, and maybe this Leap Day can put us over the top.
  • Electing truly progressive candidates to my state legislature–most of the year I’ll do some campaigning for some allies whose relatively moderate views make them important stopgaps in our current political environment, but I have dreams of seeing some folks with big plans and huge hearts elected, and maybe some fundraising calls on this extra afternoon can help.
  • Peace on earth–yeah, I know. But, then, I ask myself: what have I done lately to try to stop war and promote peace? The answer, sadly, is not much, even though I very much want my kids to grow up in a safer world. I’ll spend some time today checking out the activities of peace groups local and international, and find a way to contribute some of my time (or, most likely, my money) as an investment in the future I want for them, and for us all.

The way I see it, we spend too much energy talking ourselves out of some of the fights we really should embrace.

Pragmatism is overrated, and the greatest movements for social justice certainly never conducted a feasibility analysis first.

We have to be strategic, but we also have to be bold. And stubborn. And, sometimes, a bit foolhardy.

So, what’s on your list of losing battles for our bonus day?

Happy February 29th.

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Posted in Events and Calls to Action, My New Favorite Thing

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When the “enemy” is a structure

Posted on February 21, 2012 by | 2 Comments

My oldest son is really, really cognizant of bad guys.

Everyone in his world, really, is either a “good guy” or “bad guy”–even though he can recognize gradations in his own moods and behaviors, he seems perplexed, at times, by the idea that someone can be simultaneously good and bad, in that very flawed, very human kind of way we all live, and see, every day.

And, you know, I think we see advocacy, and our quest for social justice, in much the same way sometimes.

People, and institutions, are either “with us” or “against us”, as much as we might like to pretend that we don’t categorize that way.

Yes, as social workers, we have an ethical obligation to respect the dignity and worth of every individual, but, really…how often do you hear social workers talk that way about politicians? Or bureaucrats?

I see it in my students, and I feel it in myself: somehow, everyone who isn’t as committed as we are to seeking justice for those we serve (as we define it), is our enemy–an obstacle to be surmounted and a target for our advocacy.

I know. It comes as a shock that I can be sanctimonious. I know.

And, so, part of what was, for me, so morally and intellectually challenging about dr. john powell’s presentation, and the work of his with which I have familiarized myself since, is his insistence that we need to move beyond calling each other racists.

And I have kind of a problem with that, because, well, some people are racist. It’s not just the legacy of racism–it’s still alive and flourishing, and it can’t live except in people’s hearts.

But, after a lot of reflection, I think I understand more about what he means.

Pinpointing the root of racial inequity in this country–or any other–in the structures that perpetuate racially unjust outcomes isn’t about letting racists off the hook. If anything, it heightens the tension, because when we think about racism as only existing in marginalized pockets of “fringe” outcasts, it is trivialized, in some ways, as compared to locating it properly among those who set up the rules of the game and rig it in their favor.

And identifying the racialized nature of the system brings more of us–those who would never consider ourselves racist but nonetheless benefit in very tangible ways from the injustice of the status quo–into the ranks of the “guilty” too. Because even good intentions can’t excuse racialized outcomes.

And that means that even the “good guys” share responsibility for transforming our systems–economic, political, social–so that they work for everyone.

And that means that even the “bad guys” aren’t really, in the final analysis, all that much worse than the rest of us, just as that pesky “dignity and worth of every individual” clause would have us remember.

Analyzing structures this way isn’t always easy; it can be harder to walk a client through the process of dissecting the systems that impact his/her life to identify the root causes that perpetuate problems than it is to nod when someone talks about caseworkers who have it in for her, or those bums in Washington who only look out for themselves.

And it’s more fun to throw darts at a face than a structure, for sure.

But it’s far more accurate, and ultimately more powerful.

Because we can’t hope to win if we’re not fighting the right fight.

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Seeking transformational solutions in a transactional world

Posted on February 20, 2012 by | 2 Comments

I had the opportunity to hear dr. john powell (sic) of the Kirwan Institute speak at a Communities Creating Opportunity event in Kansas City a few months ago.

There’s something so life-affirming about sitting in a multiracial crowd, struggling together with the reality of “structural racialization” (his term, and my new favorite) in our society, in our organizations, and in our individual lives.

It was a really challenging and tremendously invigorating afternoon, and those ideas have continued to swirl in my mind. This week, I’ve written 3 posts related to aspects of what he spoke about, and how I’ve tried to apply it to my life and to my social work in the weeks since.

One of the parts of the afternoon that struck me the most was the story he related about a mother sentenced to jail for lying about her residence in order to get her kids into a better school. There was a great deal of sympathy, in the room, for her plight, but what dr. powell pushed us to think about was how frequently we take such actions, in our own efforts to cope with systems which are inherently unjust.

And how, in so doing, we’re seeking to change the terms of those unjust transactions, rather than transforming the system.

And that got me thinking about advocacy, and about how often our advocacy revolves around trying to improve a client’s (or clients’) outcomes in a given transaction–advocacy to get someone in a decent apartment, or to make sure that a school district meets a child’s IEP parameters, or to get an employer to give a second chance to an ex-offender.

That advocacy is important. Securing more favorable transactions for those marginalized within oppressive systems can change people’s individual lives, opening doors that were closed and allowing them to access an entirely new plane of opportunities.

And it’s often how we engage with the systems that impact us personally, too; just as the mom highlighted in the story did, we look for ways over, around, and through the obstacles we confront, because, quite honestly, it’s often just too much to try to figure out how to dismantle those barriers entirely.

But, as dr. powell reminded us, only such transformational approaches–those that ask not how can we find a way out of this trap, but who keeps setting traps in the first place?–can reshape the landscape for ourselves and for those who will follow.

It’s a harder lift, obviously.

And, in a world of such structural racialization, with so many injustices woven right into the fabric of the systems, it’s heaping oppression onto oppression to say that this mom, or any individual, is to be blamed for seeking a better transaction rather than a radical transformation.

Because, like the fault in the first place, that’s a responsibility we all share.

Transforming our society by rethinking the systems that govern our lives–asking why and why and why and why–falls to all of us. It’s not enough for me as a mother to want the best for my kid, when I know that I can do something to make “best” within the reach of other kids, too. It’s not enough for me as a social worker to be skilled at getting more for my clients, when I know that more is owed to many.

The best deal isn’t nearly enough.

We need a whole new game.

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Finding our Voices

Posted on February 13, 2012 by | Leave a comment

I was talking with a group of nonprofit CEOs the other day, about advocacy (of course) and our collective responsibility to stand up and speak out on the issues that affect those we serve. I pointed out that there are some systemic issues that affect nonprofits as a sector and that, sometimes, starting to come together around those issues–foremost in my mind, of course, is the revenue foundation–can help to overcome our silos and bridge the divisions that often keep us quiet.

And then one of the executives said, with more dismay than disdain, “that sounds like nonprofits would become just another special interest.”

That reminded me of some of my conversation with Robert Egger last fall, when he talked about the kinds of advocacy, and the kinds of sector organizing, that it will take for nonprofits to find their voices without (seriously in quotes) “becoming just another special interest.”

Does he think of everything, or what?

At the time, that statement mostly rolled right off me, in part because I don’t see anything that wrong with special interests, per se–I’m only concerned when the interests that are being represented are not aligned with my values of social work justice.

But hearing the worry echoed by this executive made me think about how, from a strategic perspective, bringing something qualitatively different to the table, beyond what an industry or trade group might do, is really essential.

Those of us working to exhort nonprofits to make a bolder play for political power have a responsibility not to screw this up big-time.

Because our greatest assets in the advocacy arena–the stories of those we serve, our reputations and public trust, and the perception that we are, in fact, somewhat above the fray–can easily be sullied the moment we enter the struggle.

That’s often used as an excuse, and it shouldn’t be. What good, after all, is having some really good ammunition if we never fire our collective weapon? Why do we care how much latent political power we potentially hold, if we never even test it?

What good is it doing anyone on the shelf?

But it is right for us to be sure, as we consider the kinds of coalitions we build and the types of battles we choose, that we’re spending our capital wisely.

We should be clear about what we want to say, as we begin to find our voices.

On the one hand, that’s pretty easy; if we’re fixated on our vision of the world as it should be and solidly rooted in our values, we should not be tempted to go for the low-hanging fruit or to seize what we can on our way out the door.

The goods for which we aim can only be secured with long and principled and careful engagement.

But it’s obviously not always so clear, what’s right and what’s best. The recent debate over tax reforms makes that clear, with most nonprofits alarmed by proposals to somewhat limit charitable deductions, as part of an overall effort to ensure that higher earners pay a greater share of a growing revenue “pie”. (It’s clear where I come out on this.) The nonprofits rushing to decry this change in the structure as a direct assault on their existence aren’t bad. Or even necessarily wrong.

They’re just operating in much the same way that other special interests do, by looking out for their own.

And, so, as we seek to have a greater impact on policymaking, and to raise our voices on the greatest issues of our day, we must do so with a constant humility, an awareness that, in many ways, we are not so different from the other contenders, and that our difference can only be preserved by a distinguishing vigilance.

Because our interests really are special, and they deserve allies equal to their task.

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The Power of One

Posted on January 30, 2012 by | Leave a comment

One fairly influential individual

There are a lot of sort of pop psychology, bumper sticker motivationals out there about the difference that one individual can make…they all sort of run together for me, but you know what I mean, right?

Probably the best known is attributed to Helen Keller, “I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.”

Beautiful, right? And capable of making me feel guilty when I’m, say, on my way to the fabric store instead of a rally.

The belief in the power of the individual is very much rooted in our culture, but much less frequently seen in how we build capacity for advocacy and social change.

Bet you never thought about that while stopped behind someone at a red light, hunh?

See, when it comes to how we invest in building power to make a difference, we tend to focus almost exclusively on networks of people, on the connections that bind us together, and on how we create structures that leverage those relationships for power.

Sure, it’s obvious that no social movements are the sole work of any individual, even those that are commonly associated with one. But isn’t it also just as true that single individuals do, perhaps not as often as we would wish, change the course of history in amazing ways?

So why is the organization, or the community, most often our focal unit, when we think about what we need to develop in order to reach our goals? Why do we sometimes sort of gloss over the individuals who populate those entities, as though they are somehow replaceable, even when history so clearly teaches us otherwise?

I’ve been particularly thinking about this over the past couple of weeks because of the work that I do with The Sunflower Foundation and its Advocacy Fellows initiative. The initiative is somewhat distinct, particularly in the philanthropic world, because it revolves around advocacy, specifically, rather than a more diffuse sense of nonprofit leadership, and yet, unlike many other advocacy capacity-building efforts, individual advocates are clearly the emphasis.

The theory of change animating the Advocacy Fellowship is this: “the Sunflower Foundation believes that increasing the number of nonprofit health leaders who advocate on behalf of their constituents informs public policy and leads to real solutions for those in need. By becoming involved in advocacy, nonprofit leaders are advancing their causes, building public trust, and helping the people they serve.”

Notably missing, then, is discussion about the organizations in which these individuals work (indeed, they fairly frequently move organizations during the Fellowship or quickly following it) or about the sector as a whole. Instead, the idea is to find promising people, who happen to be working in nonprofit health organizations, and to work intensively with them to develop the knowledge, skills, and, yes, relationships they need to be effective advocates themselves. They are the ones held accountable for moving their work forward, and they are seen as the keys to advancing a vision of a healthy Kansas.

We’re still very much in the early stages of evaluation, but the indications at this point are, really, that the model works–that, no, their organizations do not necessarily greatly increase their advocacy capacity, but they as individuals do, and that that makes a difference. They are quoted more frequently in media accounts of related policy debates, they engage in those debates more often and with more influence, they are more respected by a larger circle of potential targets and allies, and they are increasingly sophisticated and outspoken in their advocacy.

It’s a bit of a gamble, this business of investing in individuals. We feel safer, sometimes, with organizations, because of the law of averages, but those same “averaging” tendencies can dilute and stall the radical message we want to convey: that, in the end, justice hinges on you (and me).

Here’s to sparking movements, one soul at a time.

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Why do big tents so often fall down?

Posted on January 24, 2012 by | Leave a comment

Over the past several months, I’ve had the opportunity to work with some really committed advocates–super smart and dedicated people who are working extremely hard to protect their clients and the programs that serve them, in a climate of drastic budget cuts and an eroding social contract.

It’s soul-sucking work, and we’re losing many, many more battles than we win.

Lately, though, some of us have felt like we’re really fighting the wrong battle. Or, more accurately, battles.

It’s not just the old “divide and conquer” problem–the fact that social service advocates are vulnerable to intra-skirmishes that distract us from the real enemies and make it easier for those same opponents to play us against each other.

It’s also that we deliberately avoid taking on the real struggles, and even sometimes miss noticing them altogether, because we’re trying to contain debates that we can really only hope to dominate if we act collectively.

Here’s how it looks in real life:

In Kansas, advocates spent all last year fighting against budget cuts in different program areas–mental health, public education, child welfare, senior services. And all year, the Governor and some legislative leaders hinted that their sights were really set on a policy battle far larger and more fundamental to our state’s well-being: the revenue foundation that shores up (or doesn’t) all of those programs and far more. For the most part, they have not encountered much effectively organized opposition. From my conversations with at least some advocates, it seems that many hoped that not antagonizing the Administration on that issue would, somehow, preserve some access and influence that they could use to defend their work and serve their clients.

So, in essence, we’re sitting on the sidelines while our fates–for the next several years–are decided.

Because, of course, if the Governor and his allies are successful in eliminating the state income tax, they won’t need to legitimate their budget-slashing goals at all: there quite literally won’t be enough money to fund any of these programs, and so advocates will be fighting over crumbs.

If the failure to build a sustained, strategic, progressive coalition to take on these more global, structural issues was just a logistical one (getting people together across distance), or just jurisdictional (getting people to set aside their competition with each other), or even just a problem of capacity (people not having enough resources to take on a fight this big), then I feel like we’d know better how to start addressing it.

After all, those are the kinds of challenges that we overcome in our organizing every day.

But the real reason that building this kind of “big tent” is so hard, I think, is that too many awesome advocates think it’s a bad idea–that taking on these common concerns dilutes their influence and compromises their positions. And so we have to overcome not just inertia but entrenched resistance, and we’ve got to do it without being able to offer any guarantees that their concerns aren’t, in fact, totally well-founded: this Administration absolutely does box out those who oppose them.

But advocacy isn’t about tallying the numbers of wins v. losses.

It’s about how we can build movements that shape how people see themselves, and their worlds, and about how we can change even the debates about the policy challenges we confront. It’s about being in the arena, even if we emerge somewhat bloodied.

And so we can’t afford to sit out the really, really big fights, and we can’t presume that going it alone is ever safer.

There are some battlefields on which we just have to be willing to make a stand.

And there is solace in solidarity.

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When we fall into the same old traps…

Posted on January 10, 2012 by | Leave a comment

In this second post for Organizational Transformation week, here at Classroom to Capitol, I’m tackling an ugly reality of nonprofit social service work and, in the interest of full disclosure, my parenting, sometimes, too.

Because the truth is, sometimes the ways in which we interact with those we serve (or parent) serve to replicate the same power imbalances against which we rail, when we view them on the “outside”.

You’ve seen it, no doubt:

  • Eligibility rules that are ambiguous and seemingly arbitrary, the sort of institutional equivalent of “because I said so”
  • Organizational cultures that afford greater prestige to men, and to those higher in the hierarchy (like when we refer to the Executive Director as Mr. SoandSo but the receptionist as “Maria”)
  • Programmatic requirements that force everyone to attend the same classes, fill out the same paperwork, not because those activities actually contribute to the amelioration of the social problems that prompted a particular individual to seek services, but because that’s how people prove that they “deserve” help

    We fall into these patterns of power and oppression not because we’re bad people, of course, but because we’re people, and people tend to seek comfort in regularity and predictability and status, and those pursuits are not necessarily compatible with the promotion of maximum empowerment for those who have historically been marginalized and oppressed.

    But I promised you that this wasn’t just a post about how you should change what you do in your organizations, right? I understand that changing the way we view those with whom we work, in every way from using language like “constituents” instead of “patients” to authentically making room on decision-making bodies for the full participation of those we serve, isn’t easy.

    I understand not just because I’ve been there, as a nonprofit leader and as a consultant to the same.

    I understand because I fight the same internal battles at home, too, where parenting offers opportunities every day to choose to live power imbalances that put me purportedly on top, versus a challenge to figure out how to make our family a sort of laboratory for empowered living.
    On a daily basis, that means that I can’t change the rules without accountability, even though I’m the mom. It means that the kids’ preferences on little things matter just as much as mine, and that, even on the big stuff, I can’t disregard their views without an honest discussion and a full examination of my own rationale.

    It’s not a democracy, exactly, any more than a nonprofit organization is. That’s what people often fear when we talk about transparency and participatory governance in nonprofit organizations, but it’s more like an excuse to duck our obligations to social justice than a valid concern.

    We’re not a 1-person-1-vote family.

    We’re something more, and better, just like our organizations need to be, too.

    Because avoiding the temptation to fall into the same old bad patterns means starting from the premise that power is only as valid as the way in which we wield it, that we can’t decry the abuse of authority in others without being willing to own it in ourselves, and that our relationships will be stronger when they are based on a presumption of equity than when reinforced through hierarchy alone.

    Ultimately, turning our organizations inside out like this should make us stronger advocates externally, too, because we’ll gain an empathy for those targets against whom we’re arrayed when we understand the universality of the temptation to oppress, at least in subtle ways. It also restores some of our moral authority and reduces our vulnerability to charges that “you do it, too.”

    But, more immediately and much more importantly, it will turn our organizations into places where people learn how to relate fully and equally, as agents in their own rights.

    And that’s what I remind myself every time I so want to say, “because I’m the Mom.”

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    Root Causes: Keep Asking “Why?”

    Posted on January 9, 2012 by | Leave a comment

    It’s organizational transformation week on Classroom to Capitol! I can’t think of a better way to start the new year than sharing some of my thinking about how to help nonprofit social service organizations fully integrate social change activities into their work with the community of readers here.

    I’ve been working with several nonprofit organizations and individual leaders to assess their organizations’ capacities for transformative social change, in pursuit of their visions of social justice, relying heavily on the work of the rock stars at Building Movement Project (if you haven’t already downloaded their free Process Guide, please make that a 2012 resolution!). The Guide approaches social change work from a foundation of quality social services and helps nonprofit organizations engage in cycles of learning and strategy development and action and reflection, as they walk a continuum from status quo-reinforcing to truly revolutionary power-building.

    This process begins (and ends–it’s a cycle!) with exploration of the root causes implicated in the social problems that our social programs are designed to address. Too often, our organizations’ activities are aimed at the symptoms of those problems, rather than the structural realities that perpetuate them, despite all of our best intentions. It’s not that we don’t care about the root causes, or even always that those examinations are too controversial for us to contemplate (although that can be a factor).

    Instead, I think that one of our greatest obstacles to uncovering the root causes that demand our attention is that we…

    don’t think enough like 3-year-olds.

    Because, really, have you ever met an adult with the same “why, why, why?” stamina as a preschooler?

    I didn’t think so.

    The connection was made clear when I was reading The Little Engine That Could to my 3-year-old son.

    Twenty-seven times in one day.

    Every single time, he asked me (on the same exact page), “Why the black engines no help?”

    And it occurred to me, maybe on time 18 (slow, I know), that what he really wants to know is WHY someone (or, in this case, something) would ignore the pleas of another in need. He can’t understand that, and, of course, none of us should be able to. And he wasn’t satisfied with any answer I gave, because they all fell short of really explaining “why”.

    And that commitment to “why?” needs to underscore our organizational evolutions towards social justice orientations, too.

    WHY do racial health disparities persist? WHY are people of color more likely to be uninsured? WHY are unemployment and underemployment rates higher for some demographics? WHY are educational attainment levels different for different populations? WHY are health outcomes tied to income and other social determinants? WHY? WHY? WHY?

    It often takes peeling away many layers to see the linkages between social problems and to uncover the root social inequities that, tragically, are relatively few and achingly predictable.

    How many “whys” do you have in you?

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