Advocacy, politicians: a disconnect

Advocacy, that cornerstone of college liberalism, is a strange beast. To some, it is the shining… Advocacy, that cornerstone of college liberalism, is a strange beast. To some, it is the shining monolith of politics before people stop caring and have to start winning elections. To others, it is a sly devil that seduces students into gathering in crafty enclaves to pat each other on the back. Of course, it is not fully either of these, and I have no interest in determining exactly where it falls between them. Neither the naivete of unqualified support nor the self-inflating cynicism of fierce critics deserves terribly much attention. What concern me are the cultural and ideological problems of advocacy on a much more general level. Advocacy can be divided into two general categories: awareness-raising and policy reform. The former is, unquestionably, the more innocuous of the two and the closest that advocacy gets to its unproblematic ideal. There is not some awareness quotient that advocacy could upset by caring too much about too many things, and the public can never be too informed. Awareness-raising is thoroughly a positive endeavor. It might get annoying, but the benefits of an informed public outweigh the drawbacks of a few irritated individuals so much that to complain about these efforts is crass. It is on the side of policy reform that advocacy stands on questionable ground. The narrative behind policy reform is that politicians are so caught up in their agendas that they either neglect humanitarian concerns or actually violate them. Politicians act in discord to the positions of advocacy groups because they don’t care or don’t know about the issue. Through attention, petitioning and demonstration toward these politicians, advocacy groups can pressure change. Here is the problem: Most politicians are aware of the issues that concern advocacy groups long before the first sandwich-board is even donned. Furthermore, most politicians do care about humanitarian concerns. While this does not apply to every lawmaker ‘mdash; some really are that dumb and greedy ‘mdash; politicians are not the heartless, political automatons of popular belief. So, why then do these leaders not act in accordance with advocacy group wishes? The reason for this disconnect is that the ends desired by advocacy groups do not necessarily entail the means they propose to achieve these ends. This doesn’t mean that advocacy groups don’t know the best ways to reach their goals; often, advocacy groups are the best informed about their issues, retaining experts and other knowledgeable people. However, what this does mean is that judging political progress toward a certain end by the actions politicians are taking is tenuous in cases of advocacy. The meter stick by which political progress is measured as satisfactory is often one of how much the political actions line up with the actions proposed by advocacy. Herein lies the problem. Advocacy tends to erase the difference between ends and means and, in their stead, it trumpets a message that mixes the two together. ‘If you support our cause, you will support the policies we support.’ The process whereby the advocacy group arrived at the policy it promotes becomes obscured, and the public is presented with the idea that the advocacy group’s policies are naturally married to the ends that it wishes to achieve. This is a false and dangerous mix up. Imagine that there is an awful civil war in a country we will call Sweetland. An advocacy group wants to end this war. Therefore, it asks politicians to send money to the government of Sweetland to squelch the barbaric rebels. In its drumming up of public support, wanting to stop the war in Sweetland becomes equated with wanting the government to send money to Sweetland’s government. Politicians who don’t support sending money are, then, against the advocacy group and, by transitivity, against stopping the war. Cue public outrage. Now, I know that the situation isn’t as simple as all of this. Advocacy groups do understand that there is more than one way to skin a war. However, this does not prevent the confusion of ends and means. So, is the solution that the policy group should just raise awareness? The answer is no, because then these groups would be little more than flaccid cheerleaders ‘mdash; please excuse the sexually controversial imagery. Advocacy groups need to back up their awareness with action if anyone is going to be motivated to act on their initiative. What, then, is the solution? First of all, there should be more public dialogue than public exhibition. Demonstrating is wonderful, and I fully support it, but without extensive public forum, the public loses sight of the agenda creation and the ends and means become confused. Secondly, advocacy groups should focus more energy on idea reform. Philosophy trickles down to politics ‘mdash; I promise. Advocate Erik at ech15@pitt.edu.