In this blog Brian Harvey introduces some of the key questions being addressed in research he is conducting for The Advocacy Initiative on the link between public funding and advocacy.
He will present the first phase of this work on 11 th February, click here to register for this lunchtime seminar.
Something very important happened to voluntary and community sector organisations in Ireland between the early 1990s and now. Before then we raised most of our money ourselves, from raffles to table quizzes. Now between half and two thirds of funding comes from government - national, regional or local. The state recognises the valuable contribution of the sector to Irish society through this financial relationship, but is there a danger that the state will use this as a lever to control what we say, or don’t say?
Officially, of course, that could never be the case. The white paper ‘Supporting Voluntary Activity’ (2000) ( http://www.welfare.ie/en/downloads/supporting_minister.pdf ) affirmed the independence and freedom of action of the community and voluntary sector. It specified that ‘the state and sector each recognise their mutual right to constructively critique one another’s actions and policies’ and acknowledged ‘the role of the sector in inputting to policy making’. However the reality has not always lived up to this ideal, and since the adoption of the white paper the standard Service Level Agreement (SLA) of the Health Service Executive (HSE) has come to specify that:
§2.8 The [funded] organization must not use the grant for:
b. campaigns whose primary purpose is to obtain changes in the law or related government policies, or campaigns who primary purpose is to persuade people to adopt a particular view on a question of law or public policy.
So what is the reality? The Advocacy Initiative recently commissioned preliminary desk research to investigate what is the exact relationship between the state and how it funds voluntary and community organisations that advocate. It is a complicated picture. There are instances in which the state may have used its power inappropriately, but there are also examples of the state supporting advocacy work and many examples where the state is neutral. Some politicians welcome advocacy, but others make it clear that the sector should be seen, but not heard.
This initial research, to be presented on 11 th February, explores the funding/advocacy link. There are two important learning points.
- First, there is a broadly accepted narrative within public administration, more so in Europe than in Ireland, that advocacy work plays an important role in improving the quality of public administration. Voluntary and community organisations bring expertise to government and reflect ground truth, they generate long-term perspectives and improve decisions, enable minority and excluded views to be heard and can support government by increasing the buy-in to the implementation of policy. It is in the state’s and public’s interest to have a competent, advocating voluntary and community sector.
- Second, when we look at the funding/advocacy link, we need to see it as several points of a continuum. It may be tested at any one of these points: when funding is invited, when approvals are made (or not), when contracts are sent out (like the SLA), when projects are running and after they are delivered.
These learning points should provide us with a context to go on to a second stage of this research in which the concrete experiences of voluntary and community organisations will be sought; good, bad, or indifferent . We are looking for your help in taking this analysis to the next stage, in building a more comprehensive picture of the link between funding and advocacy and we want to work with organisations who have had particular experiences of this link which they think should be included. If you would like to get involved in this part of the research please contact Brian Harvey at brharvey@eircom.net .
If you would like to attend the first part of the funding research on February 11th please book your place at http://goo.gl/W3Cwb or contact Clodagh O’Brien, Communications Officer at clodagh@advocacyinitative.ie .
Brian Harvey is an independent social researcher working in the fields of poverty, social exclusion, equality, community development, human rights, the world of non-governmental organisations and European integration