When your work is blocked – adding advocacy to service delivery

When your work is blocked – adding advocacy to service delivery Richard Holloway CRS East Timor

The Spectrum of NGO Activities CARE AND WELFARE….. service delivery mobilising resources research and new/innovative methods human resource development public information, education, and advocacy …..CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT Commonwealth Foundation – Good Policy and practice Training Kit 1997

NGOs are often defined in the public eye by those carrying out public information, education and advocacy But numerically most NGOs work in care and welfare – principally to provide alternatives to ineffective, absent or mis-targetted programs of Government

Care and Welfare NGOs doing service delivery think Change and Development NGOs: are involved in politics are likely to bring difficulties to the NGO world do not make much impact on poverty are ideologically different from them

These views will continue until ….. Service delivery NGOs in Care and Welfare experience obstructive laws, policies, practices and behaviour which stop them from doing effective service delivery

When health NGOs find that government supplied drugs have been stolen and sold on the blackmarket They can try and set up an alternative supply system or They can try and do something about the corruption

When education NGOs find that government text books are badly produced: They can set up their own text book production or They can lobby for a better product

When AIDS NGOs find that the government refuses to issue retrovirals They can make their own negotiations with the drug companies or They can advocate for a change in the government’s position

When an NGO working with battered women finds that violent men are not prosecuted They can set up shelters for battered women or They can try to get the law changed

Service delivery NGOs, once awakened to the obstructive nature of some laws, policies, practices, or behaviour, may decide to use the Advocacy tool - as well as continuing with their existing services. It is usually not: “either / or” – more likely “both / and”:

Such NGOs need training in Advocacy How to challenge bad laws, or introduce new laws How to question bad policies and introduce new policies How to expose bad practices, and get something done about it How to question harmful behaviour, and build organised opposition to it. and to believe this a legitimate use of their time

And training in how to move from a one-off response to solve a specific problem ….to a demand for an institution-alised and recognized right of consultation on issues that the NGO has experience of.

This may well involve many changes in the NGO learning new skills hiring different kinds of staff working the corridors of power negotiating and lobbying alliances with strange bed-fellows different donors

And the new strategy needs to be monitored…. Does advocacy to change obstructive practices work? Does changing obstructive practices actually improve the lives of more people than service delivery? Does adding the advocacy strategy strengthen your NGO or not?

Many Service Delivery NGOs, once aware of advocacy possibilities: are interested in building their capacity in advocacy are interested in keeping up their competence and experience in care and welfare Need to retrain their staff and re-orient their supporters

When your work is blocked – adding advocacy to service delivery