Advocacy Activities of Nonprofit Human Service Organizations: A Critical Review

Abstract Policy advocacy is widely regarded as an eminent feature of nonprofit organizations’ activities, allowing them to represent their constituencies. The article presents a literature review of research on nonprofit policy advocacy that has been published over the last decade, focusing on advocacy by nonprofit human service organizations (NPHSOs) and its unique characteristics and contributions. The review focuses on several key topics, including: the definitions and origins of the term advocacy and its current uses in studies related to NPHSOs; the current situation and prevalence of NPHSO advocacy activities; organizational and structural variables as they relate to policy advocacy; dependence on external funding sources and policy advocacy; strategies, tactics, modes of operation, and the effectiveness of NPHSO policy advocacy. The article presents and discusses the implications of this research and suggests directions for future research.

Keywords advocacy, policy-making, human service organizations.

1Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, 91905, Israel 2Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare, The Center for the Study of Philanthropy in Israel, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, 91905, Israel.

Corresponding Author: Michal Almog-Bar, Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare, The Center for the Study of Philanthropy in Israel, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, 91905, Israel. Email: msmi@mscc.huji.ac.il

483212 NVS43110.1177/0899764013483212Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector QuarterlyAlmog-Bar and Schmid research-article2013

12 Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 43(1)

Introduction

Policy advocacy is widely regarded as an eminent feature of nonprofit organizations’ activities, allowing them to engage and represent their constituencies; give voice to diverse views and demands, promote economic, and social justice; contribute to a more vital, active civil society, and strengthen democracy and equality of opportunity. However, the abundant literature on nonprofits published through the years has paid limited attention to the ways in which nonprofits represent their constituencies in political and policy-making processes and arenas (Berry & Arons, 2003).

This article presents a literature review of research on nonprofit policy advocacy published over the last decade, focusing on nonprofit human service organizations (NPHSOs). While interest in nonprofit advocacy has grown in recent years, many studies have focused on “advocacy organizations,” defined as organizations whose main goal and core activity is advocacy. However, these amount to only a small per- centage of the nonprofit organizations active in many countries. Most nonprofit activ- ity is undertaken by organizations that combine advocacy with the provision of services, usually their primary goal.

The political and social environments in which NPHSOs operate have changed dramatically in the last two decades in many countries. These changes relate mainly to processes of welfare state retrenchment following the introduction of a neoliberal ideology that has led to privatization, devolution, and the contracting- out of social services. Consequently, the number and scope of activities of NPHSOs—the main providers of social services—have grown significantly. Although previously they tended to control the field of social services, they are now competing with for-profit organizations in the same field (Schmid, 2004). As a result, NPHSOs providing services largely funded by government are more attuned to political fluctuations and policy changes. Their dependence on govern- mental resources enables the government to impose on them policies, regulations, and work procedures as a condition for ensuring a steady stream of resources that they need for their activities and survival. However, these organizations have addi- tional roles in enhancing human and social rights, to protect and advance the well- being of the clients they represent: advocacy, an essential component of their mission as civil society organizations.

This article presents an extensive review of the literature discussing the current situation of advocacy activities employed by NPHSOs, and discusses the dilemmas associated with these activities and their effectiveness. We focus mainly on studies conducted in NPHSOs and do not review the extensive literature that addresses inter- est groups and social movements. While one can learn extensively from this rich body of research and the similarities that are evident between these types of organizations and NPHSOs, many differences remain. Those relate to the fact that interest groups and social movements are in many cases not considered to be formal organizations as NPHSOs, most of them do not receive funding from the government and they do not provide services to populations in need. In addition, they are usually less bureaucratic in their nature and their organizational culture tends to be more organistic than

Almog-Bar and Schmid 13

mechanistic (Christiansen et al., 2010). These make advocacy activities in NPHSOs unique and they deserve careful examination. Our goal is to present a critical examina- tion of the literature on advocacy by NPHSOs from an international, comparative per- spective, and to shed light on topics still to be covered or discussed and requiring further development in both theory and research.

A review and analysis of the literature has led us to focus on several key topics, providing a basis for a comprehensive examination of the unique characteristics and contributions of NPHSO policy advocacy. The article begins with a presentation of the origins and definitions of the term advocacy and its current uses in studies related to NPHSO advocacy. The following sections deal with different aspects of advocacy that are crucial for these organizations: the current situation and prevalence of advocacy activities of NPHSOs; organizational and structural variables, and their relation to policy advocacy; dependence on external funding sources and policy advocacy; strate- gies, tactics, and modes of operation, and the effectiveness of NPHSO policy advo- cacy. There are certainly other important topics related to NPHSO advocacy, such as the involvement of their constituencies in advocacy (Smith & Pekkanen, 2012) or regulatory policies for advocacy by nonprofits (Reid, 2006), which is more relevant to the understanding of nonprofit advocacy in the United States. These and other topics are excluded from our review, due to space limitations. Finally, we present and discuss the implications of the research on NPHSO advocacy and suggest directions for future research.

Definitions and Origins of the Term “Advocacy”

In recent years, interest has been growing in the role of nonprofit human service orga- nizations in policy advocacy. These organizations engage in advocacy in addition to their core activity as providers of social services. They represent disadvantaged, disen- franchised, excluded, and vulnerable populations, mediating between these groups of citizens and governmental agencies (Berry, 2001; Dalrymple, 2004; Ezell, 2001; Hoefer, 2002; Hudson, 2002; LeRoux, 2009; LeRoux & Goerdel, 2009; Reid, 2006; Salamon & Geller, 2008; Schmid, 2004; Strolovitch, 2006). An attempt to understand the origins of the term “advocacy” brings us back to the root “advocare,” meaning “coming to someone’s aid.” According to the Free Online Dictionary (2000), advo- cacy is defined as “the act of pleading or arguing in favor of something, such as a cause, idea, or policy; active support.” Synonyms proposed for advocacy include active espousal, aid, approbation, approval, auspices, championship, countenance, encouragement, and endorsement. All express the desire to provide help and support and to encourage individuals who need support. Late Middle English forms that appear in the World English Dictionary are “advocacye” and “advocatia.” The Merriam Webster Dictionary (1982) offers a different definition: “the act or process of advocat- ing or supporting a cause or proposal.” This broad definition of advocacy activity, reaching beyond assistance to individuals, focuses on supporting, promoting, or defin- ing a certain cause or proposal in an attempt to change laws, policies, practices, and attitudes. This kind of activity, which began with the Citizen’s Advocacy Movement in

14 Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 43(1)

the United States and Canada in the mid-1970s, derived from the principle of normal- ization developed by Bengt Nirje (Nirje, 1969).

Organizations such as Scope in the United States are associated with advocacy activities initiated in 1954, which demanded that every child in the country be entitled to education. In 1946 Judy Fryd began a campaign to provide support and promote the rights of children with special needs and learning difficulties. Ms Fryd, whose own son had a learning disability, established the National Association for Parents of Backward Children which later changed its name to Mencap. Over the years, other organizations— primarily for mental health services—joined the effort to protect the rights and well- being of disabled patients, whose needs were being ignored by the government. According to Reid (2000), the term “advocacy” describes a wide range of individual and collective expression or action for a cause, idea, or policy; it may also refer to specific activities or organizations. Thus, Reid also modified the definition of advo- cacy to include the venue of a political action.

Accordingly, the literature presents additional definitions that expand the meaning of the word advocacy beyond that of providing assistance, protection, and support to individuals. These new definitions include activities in the political arena; they focus on attempts to change policies or influence the decisions of elite government and state institutions through enhancement of civic participation, in order to promote a collec- tive goal or interest (Berry, 1999, 2001; Boris & Mosher-Williams, 1998; Jenkins, 1987, 2006; Warren, 2001). Similarly, it has been argued that advocacy and political activity aim to effect changes in existing or future practices for a group of citizens with a common interest (Ezell, 2001), as well as to protect basic civil rights (Boris & Krehely, 2003; Frumkin, 2002; McCarthy & Castelli, 2002; Mosley, 2010; Rektor, 2002; Schoff & Stevenson, 1998). According to Boris and Mosher-Williams (1998), building social capital, facilitating civic participation, and providing a public voice are activities central to an analysis of the interaction between nonprofits and public policy in a democratic civil society. Andrews and Edwards (2004) emphasize the act of advo- cacy in “promoting or resisting social change that, if implemented, would conflict with the social, cultural, political, or economic interests or values of other constituencies and groups” (p. 481).

Other definitions relate to advocacy as a tactic for managing the external environ- ment in an attempt to mobilize support and change power-dependence relations (Mosley, 2010); others emphasize social justice (Mickelson, 1995), advocacy toward corporations and the business world, a topic which has not been developed intensively so far (Nelson,2007; Ottinger, 2009), and global advocacy (Bryer & Magrath,1999; Edwards,1993). In addition, the literature deals extensively with different types of advocacy. Important distinctions relate to direct versus indirect advocacy (Andrews & Edwards, 2004; Casey, 2011), pragmatic versus legislative advocacy (Kimberlin, 2010; Laws, 1997), and case advocacy versus policy advocacy (Mosley, 2010). Direct advocacy refers to lobbying and other appearances before key decision-makers by organizational representatives on behalf of others; indirect advocacy describes the par- ticipatory aspects of advocacy in nonprofits, particularly the capacity of groups to stimulate individual citizens to take action on their behalf. Legislative advocacy means

Almog-Bar and Schmid 15

reliance on the state and the federal legislative process as part of a strategy for creating change. “Case advocacy is when the interests of a particular individual, family or organization are being represented. It is different from policy advocacy, because it generally does not include changing policy” (Kimberlin, 2010, p. 508).

There is also a distinction between self-interested organizational advocacy (e.g., advocacy to protect agency funding contracts) and progressive advocacy, which “seeks to advance the interests of nonprofit constituents rather than the organization’s inter- ests, and fully engage constituents in the advocacy process” (Donaldson, 2008, p. 26).

It is important to note the distinction between two closely related terms: advocacy and lobbying (Mosley, 2010; Salamon & Geller, 2008). “Lobbying” has a legal and IRS definition for nonprofit organizations and refers to advocacy efforts that aim to influence specific legislation through appeals to policy-makers or individuals. This is a specific form of advocacy, which involves promoting a position on specific pieces of legislation to legislators or legislative staff, either directly or indirectly (Salamon & Geller, 2008).

It is also important to note the distinction between an “advocacy organization” and advocacy as performed by nonprofit organizations. Some studies concentrate on a nar- row set of organizations defined as “advocacy organizations,” whose core function is advocacy (Kimberlin, 2010). However, as McCarthy & Castelli (2002) remind us, advocacy is widespread across the entire spectrum of nonprofit organizations. Participation in advocacy is not limited to organizations that define themselves as “advocacy organizations” and thus should be studied as an activity, and not as an orga- nizational classification.

In sum, advocacy as a component of the mission and activities of NPHSOs has shifted over the years from an emphasis on assisting and representing individuals, to the representation and protection of disadvantaged, disenfranchised, marginalized groups (Hyman, 1983). Advocacy activities initiated by nonprofit human service orga- nizations are channeled toward the political arena in which policies are formulated and decisions are made about allocation of resources for different purposes and popula- tions (Berry, 1999; Verba, Scholzman, & Brody, 1995).

The Current State of Advocacy in Nonprofit Human Service Organizations

Research findings indicate that the scope of advocacy activities is limited, and that advocacy does not play a major role in NPHSOs, which concentrate more on the pro- vision of social services. Findings suggest that most nonprofits are ambivalent about advocacy. In a study on advocacy by UK-based development NGOs Hudson (2002) reports on the unease and suspicions directors of services had about advocacy unit that was in charge of promoting advocacy activity, saying “they’re working on issues which are nothing to do with us”(p.408). Some do not engage in it at all, and many participate in some form of advocacy, even though it is not part of the organization’s mission-related activities or primary goals. Only a small proportion of nonprofits

16 Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 43(1)

devote considerable resources to advocacy and limited positions, but this pattern dif- fers significantly among different types of organizations (Berry & Arons, 2003; Boris & Krehely, 2003; Child & Gronbjerg, 2007; DeChesnay & Robinson-Dooley, 2011; Nicholson-Crotty, 2007).

Findings reported by the National Center for Charitable Statistics (2010) indicate that less than 1% of all registered nonprofits in the United States identified advocacy as their primary purpose. Of 1.5 million registered nonprofits there, only 11,463 iden- tified their primary purpose as civil rights, social action, and advocacy; furthermore, only 159 indicated that the Public Interest Law—also connected with advocacy—is relevant to them.

Salamon (2002) examined 3,400 public benefit organizations in 16 regions through- out the United States in the early 1980s. His findings indicate that only 16% of them had spent any funds on advocacy activities, and that half of the agencies reporting advocacy expenses spent less than 10% of their operating funds on advocacy. Boris and Krehely (2002) reveal that, between 1989 and 1998, only 1.2% to 1.5% of 501c(3) organizations reported advocacy and lobbying expenses. Salamon and Geller (2008) report that 85% of the organizations examined in their study reported expenses for advocacy amounting to less than 2% of their budget for such activities.

Similar findings are presented by Schmid, Bar, and Nirel (2008), indicating that the scope and intensity of political activity in Israeli NPHSOs is moderate and limited. The organizations allocated a limited number of staff positions and most of the work- ers were engaged in provision of services. Lack of appropriate resources restrained the organizations’ ability to initiate political activity.

Onyx et al. (2010) found that in Australia many organizations that grew out of ear- lier social movements have lost their strong activist orientation and collectivist work practices, and instead adopted more bureaucratic and professional structures, while seeking out stable and secure funding sources primarily from the government. They concluded that in Australia overt political advocacy is repressed and in decline (see also, Casey& Dalton, 2006).Other findings have revealed more comprehensive advo- cacy activity in these organizations. In a study conducted jointly by the Center for Lobbying in the Public Interest and OMB Watch, Berry & Arons (2003) find that 75% of the participating organizations have engaged in certain forms of policy activity. Bass, Arons, Guinane, and Carter (2007) find that most of the organizations examined in their survey (75%) have engaged in some type of advocacy, and nonprofit executive directors feel strongly that advocacy is a critical component in achieving mission- based goals. Salamon & Geller (2008) find that 73% of 311 nonprofit organizations in four key fields—children and family services; elderly housing and services, commu- nity, and economic development and the arts—reported engaging in some type of policy advocacy during the previous year. Engagement in policy advocacy is found to be somewhat frequent, as 61% of the organizations engaging in advocacy efforts reported doing so at least once a month. Mosley (2010) finds that 57% of 641 NPHSOs in California reported participating in advocacy in 2002.

The discrepancies between the different studies of advocacy participation can be explained partly by the different ways in which advocacy is defined and measured.

Almog-Bar and Schmid 17

Generally, studies that define advocacy more broadly, based on a more detailed set of policy activities, report higher rates of nonprofit participation in advocacy activities (Bass et al., 2007; Mosley, 2010; Salamon & Geller, 2008).

However, most studies reveal low levels of advocacy, indicating that political advo- cacy is marginal and limited in scope. Resources are not allocated and very few staff positions are assigned for this purpose (Bass et al., 2007; Donaldson, 2007; Salamon & Geller, 2008). NPHSOs have not assimilated advocacy activity into their organiza- tional culture; nor have they integrated it appropriately into their work programs (Balassiano & Chandler, 2010; Kimberlin, 2010; Saidel, 2002; Schmid, 2012).

What are the reasons for the limited scope and intensity of advocacy in these orga- nizations? Various explanations have been provided, supported by organizational the- ories analyzing the relations between NPHSOs and their funding sources (governmental or private). According to resource dependence and neoinstitutional theories, NPHSOs are highly dependent on external resources and do not bite the hand that feeds them (Bass et al., 2007; Donaldson, 2008; Gormley & Cymrot, 2006; Leech, 2006; Schmid et al., 2008). They conform to government policies to ensure funding streams, and are reluctant to engage in advocacy because it can endanger their survival (D’Aunno, Sutton, & Price, 1991; DiMaggio & Powell, 1983; Meyer & Rowan, 1977; Tolbert & Zucker, 1996). Philanthropic funding sources are also hesitant to support advocacy activity because it could be perceived as a protest against the government. Instead, they are interested in supplementing or complementing the government’s role, and seek to share responsibility for initiating and promoting social service programs (Atlantic Philanthropies, 2008; Guo, 2007).

Other explanations for the limited scope of NPHSO advocacy activity relate to laws that provide nonprofit organizations with benefits and tax deductions. NPHSOs are concerned with ensuring the continued receipt of government grants, benefits, and subsidies that they are entitled to under these laws, and are therefore reluctant to engage in advocacy activities. Furthermore, some organizations lack knowledge about their options for engaging in political advocacy activities (Berry & Arons, 2003; Raffa, 2000).

The low level of advocacy activities in nonprofit organizations has also been asso- ciated with their executive directors’ lack of organizational skills. Findings indicate that these office-holders lack the professional knowledge and appropriate education, skills, and competence to enter the political arena, which is inherently different from the provision of services (Ezell, 2001; Gronbjerg & Smith, 1999; Minkoff, 1994; Mosley, 2010; Pawlak & Flynn, 1990; Schmid et al., 2008). Advocacy activity is also time consuming. Furthermore, in order to meet with politicians, government officials, policy-makers, and others who influence public opinion, it is necessary to work beyond regular work hours and outside the premises of the organization. This requires a con- siderable personal investment that not all directors are willing to make (Chaskin, Brown, Venkatesh, & Vidal, 2001; Sosin, 1986). Finally, the lack of adequate resources limits the scope of the advocacy activity because executives are primarily committed to the provision of services to their clients.