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Advocacy & lobbying for human rights issues

A social media model for efficiency

Prof. Olivier Arifon, Universit libre de Bruxelles

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This paper presents a comprehensive analysis for efficient advocacy and lobbying cam-paign and use of Information and communication technologies (ICT). Then, case studies are presented. The purpose is to understand how a combination of influence and lobby-ing with ICT could contribute to some success or failure specialty with NGOs on human rights issues with less powerful protagonists than usual procedures of corporate lobbying. Our fieldwork is Brussels and European Institutions. The lobbying activities deploys in the capital of Belgium could be observed and provide interesting results.

Context Advocacy and lobbying refer influence on decision-making process or to types of protag-onists such as grassroots movements, private companies, professional bodies or consult-ing agencies.

It's an evidence that ICT tools and applications have deeply modifies the conditions and the communications strategies of protagonists involved in advocacy and lobbying. To understand the efficiency of ICT on advocacy and lobbyings a several dimensions analy-sis is useful. On one side, we considered actions repertoire, on the other, mediating condi-tions to understand strengths and weakness of the particular sector of lobbying done by NGO on human rights. Several tools or registers of communication could be considered. The key point remains to gain in credibility and accountability.

Moreover, the disengagement or some failure of the state, especially in social and envi-ronmental domains, leaves empty spaces, often occupied by NGO's using for that the web 2.0 functions in order to influence decision making process.

A - Advocacy and lobbying The content and the borders of the two concepts "advocacy" and "lobbying" (Coen, 2008) remain unclear. They may refer to legal aspect when devoted to change the law elaboration process according to groups interests. They may also refer to social aspects when protagonists, especially in the social sector, try to advocate one cause.

To advocate is to support or recommend publicly, to plead for or speak in favour of one cause. Advocacy is public support for or recommendation of a particular cause or poli-

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cy1. Logically, it is a political process by an individual or group, which aims to influence public policy and resource allocation decisions within political, economic, and social sys-tems and institutions.

Lobbying is an official activity focused, at least in Europe, on influencing decision-making process, including different types of stakeholders such as grassroots movements or pri-vate companies (Guegen, 2010). Lobbying is often defined as A group of persons who work or conduct a campaign to influence members of parliament to vote according to a group's special interest2. At the European level, in the European agreement of 2011 on the transparency register, a definition of interest representatives can be found: all activities (...) carried out with the objective of directly or indirectly influencing the formu-lation or implementation of policy and the decision-making processes of the EU institu-tions, irrespective of the channel or medium of communication used (...)3.

A law in Quebec, the French speaking state of Canada, proposes an interesting definition of the activity, because it tries to focus more on the intention of the actor and less on the result: Activities of lobbyism in the sense of the present law constitute all communica-tions oral or written with a holder of a public load with a view to influencing or being able to reasonably be considered, by the person who initiates them, as being likely to influence the catch of decisions comparatively:

1 in elaboration, in presentation, in modification or in rejection of a legislative or regu-lation proposal, a resolution, an orientation, a program or a plan of action;

2 in the attribution of a license, a license, a certificate or another approval;

3 in the attribution of a contract, otherwise than as part of a public invitation to tender, as a subvention or as another financial advantage, or in the attribution of another form of performance determined by regulations of the government4.

Nevertheless, we consider that both terms can designate the same type of activity, influ-encing policy reforms and decision-making processes. The main ideas behind the concept of lobbying are:

The recognition of communication channels and medium as significant; The omnipresence of the concept interest and influence ; The interdisciplinary discipline, referring to law, sociology, political science and com-

munication. 1 http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english 2 source : http://oxforddictionaries.com 3 Texts Adopted Wednesday, 11 May 2011- Interinstitutional Agreement, EUROPARL (official website of the European Parliament), URL: www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=- //EP//TEXT+TA+P7-TA-2011-0222+0+DOC+XML+V0//EN, consulted 6 June 2013. 4 www2.publicationsduquebec.gouv.qc.ca, retrieved 6 May 2013.

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To complete the general frame for a comprehensive understanding of lobbying activities, an important dimension should be presented: State rescaling facing globalization and NGOs actions filling the empties spaces lefts by this rescaling process allows many protagonists to proceed to lobbying.

B - Rescaling State; news spaces of lobbying procedures The second element to consider is the evolution of the conception and of the perimeter of the State influenced by new responsibilities and new types of borders. Debates on role, shape, limits or the capacities of a State are nowadays intense because central state is un-der the pressure of globalization. This pressure has modified the links and the relations between geography (landscape), governance (State), and territorial community. New pro-tagonists can express themselves on topics such as gender, race, religions and ethnics identity, elements no more connected to State level. At a political level, several schools debate on more or less social and economical participations of the State, according to social democrat or liberal theories. At a geographical and structural level, regions and ter-ritories are now dealing with finances, local development, employment, high education, social care or culture (Gollain, 2010).

Moreover, the forms of governance should deal with urbanization, decreasing borders systems, movements of capital. As consequences, the disengagement of the state, especial-ly in social issues, leaves empty spaces, often occupied by NGO's. Helped by the Web 2.0 functions helpful for their organizational and communications aspects, NGO's try to oc-cupy those empties spaces, first to gain and provide support to the audiences, second to support policy reform. This point is central for advocacy and lobbying strategy. In three domains, private life, professional life and geopolitics, networks borders could serve to get round and to cross obstacles by superposition of a new hybrid space border which overflow institutional limits and blockages of physical borders5. New spaces of negotia-tion arise where all types of protagonist could engage lobbying procedures. Those features of lobbying cover and justify the communicational angle of attack chosen for this re-search.

Information and communication technologies and action repertoires It's an evidence that ICT tools and applications, such as social media, have deeply modi-fies the conditions and the communications strategies of agents involved in advocacy and lobbying. Emiliano Grossman & Sabine Sauruggers notion of resource is worth high-lighting before going further. According to these authors, resources are defined as means that give actors the ability to act and secure them a power . Action repertoires could be define as ways to bring out resources with the aim of influencing a decision-making process and can be classified in five ideal types:

5 Perriault, J., Hermes n63, p. 158, our translation.

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Negotiation and consultation: actors are invited to participate in the decision-making process;

Use of experts: scientific data are used to support the represented interests; Protests: raising awareness in the public space; Juridification: creation of a legal framework to defend interests; Politicization: transformation of an interest group into a political party6.

A French scholar proposes a very detailed typology7:

Institutional actions which includes trail, lobbying, and platforms of actors, Non-cooperation actions: non-participation, objection, civil disregard, and boycott, Public legitimation actions: petition, protestations, fast, experts contribution, stars

contribution, Direct actions such as sabotage, interposition, occupation, demonstration, reprisal, Actions of awareness such as festive actions, feast or picnic, symbolic action, such as a

die in

Neveu explains that NGO have a less restricted repertoire at the European level, due to the particularity of the Institutions. NGOs focus on actions such as trail, decision making process lobbying, institutional platforms of protagonists, and more specific, parliamentary intergroup (members of parliament form different political parties concerned by a same topic).

In 2013, our press survey and our observations done in Brussels on actions repertoire shows that many protagonists, specially in the NGO sector, are using many types of ac-tions, because efficiency ask now to use communication as a cocktail at the same time and in direction of several audiences. The goal is to raise awareness with a unique mes-sage. In that sense, under the pressure of digital medias, the frontiers between corporate, advertisement and political communication have merged.

To analyse the efficiency of ICT on advocacy and lobbyings actions a model with two dimensions is useful8. On one side, he considered collective actions, on the other, mediat-ing conditions.

A - Structural dimension of collective actions Such dimension can be divided into several items:

Campaign goal: is it weak or strong (target, adversary, or issue) 6 Grossman Emiliano & Saurugger, Sabine (2006), Les groupes d'intrt, p. 16

7 Neveu, Eric, (2000), Vaincre lindiffrence, p. 40 8 Liu, (2012), Chineses Journal of communication, Vol. 4 n2, June 2011, p. 146

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Number of organization involved: 1, 2, 10, 50, 100 It will influence the capacity of relays, mobilization and perception by media and other protagonist.

Level of activity: high or low. Is the action simple and humble or would it use images or demonstrations able to reach attention of politicians and media?

Types of activities and campaign: urban, rural, water, animal, nature, education, and energy. Some topics maybe more sensitive than others. For example, health and youth questions remains important for any type of population and audiences.

Audience reached, types and levels: one community, one town, residents, all citizens in a State, and world level.

The combination and the intensity of these factors help to understand, or at least to quali-fy, the efficiency of a collective action. To make it short, a weak campaign goal with few organizations involved at a local level would only produce local changes. Nevertheless, many types of protagonist are now aware that several mediating actions are necessary to fulfil an advocacy campaign.

B - Mediating conditions & ICT disposals We consider that any type of action that would support an advocacy or lobbying cam-paign should maximize the use of media and digital tools. Internet use in the campaign and activity may be designated as mediating conditions:

Consciousness level of Internet use: high, low Type of use:

o Dissemination of information o Recruitment o Education o Organize mobilization at different levels o Promote discussion and debate.

With a different angle, Cardon, Granjon (2010) propose three aspects for the use of ICT by NGOs.

First is attentiveness and counter expertise. Protagonists are able to share and to verify officials statements and media reports and develop their own argumentation that could be shared on a platform with documents under pdf format.

Second is subjectivity and diversion on media, images and symbols, for example, a web site parody. After the oil pollution due to the BP platform incident in the Mexico Gulf, a parody has emerged, reflecting the position of BP during the several month crises: BP Spills Coffee on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AAa0gd7ClM ; (12 548 813 views on the 15 January 2013).

The third is grassroots mobilization: citizens commit themselves with the idea of rein-forcing collective procedures and increasing attentiveness.

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Van Laer and Van Aelst conceptualized a typology of a new digitalized action reper-toire9. They based their thesis on two oppositions: Internet-supported versus Internet-based actions and low versus high thresholds actions. To briefly summarize, they distin-guished real actions that are supported and facilitated by the Internet and virtual ac-tions that are Internet-based. The second dimension evaluates the degree of risk and commitment required to act. The authors also supported the case that the Internet will not replace offline actions but instead the offline and online worlds will help each other.

Human rights issues and NGOs efficient lobbying Human rights are real challenges for NGOs for several reasons. One of them is the diffi-culty to select measurable and reliable datas because human rights issues rely on values, themselves related to cultures. Another point is to confront those datas with actors and States, which don't always agree with such approach, arguing that reports and arguments of NGOs are based on norms that could be not universally accepted. For example, the Russian and Chineses position on human rights issues are based on that approach. More-over, efficiency is a key point that we examine here. The word has two meanings:

1 - (of a system or machine) achieving maximum productivity with minimum wasted effort or expense:

2 - (of a person) working in a well-organized and competent way: an efficient administrator10.

A - Two cases studies In order to understand the logic and practices of lobbying on human rights issues, two NGOs campaign are analysed. Despite our effort since July 2013, it was not possible to proceed to several interviews as expected.

A.1 - The International Campaign for Tibet The International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) works to promote human rights and demo-cratic freedoms for the people of Tibet. ICT does the following:

Monitors and reports on human rights, environmental and socio economic conditions in Tibet;

Advocates for Tibetans imprisoned for their political or religious beliefs; Works with governments to develop policies and programs to help Tibetans; Secures humanitarian and development assistance for Tibetans; Works with Chinese institutions and individuals to build understanding and trust, and

explores relationships between Tibetans and Chinese,

9 Van Laer, J. and Van Aelst, P., Internet and social movment action repertoires: opportu-nites and limitations, information, communication & society, pp. 1146-1171, 2011. 10 Souce : http://oxforddictionaries.com

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Mobilizes individuals and the international community to take action on behalf of Ti-betans; and

Promotes self-determination for the Tibetan people through negotiations between the Chinese government and the Dalai Lama11.

We conducted a semi directive interview with Vincent Metten EU Policy officer at the ICT office in Brussels. He defines his activity as a work of political influence and informa-tional activity and makes no difference between advocacy and lobbying. He considers the following elements as best practices.

- A good quality of information is effective through a good network and regular contacts. - ICT has also a subscription to a specialised company in charge to provide intelligence and information. This allows being more proactive than reactive face to events and to actuality. To be proactive means providing good information to people whom needs it at the right time. For example, on the 22nd of October 2013, the second universal exam of The Peoples Republic of China (PRC) takes place at the UNO office in Geneva. A month before, ICT have provided to selected members, a twenty pages reports in order to balance the official arguments that are provided by the PRC. A dedicated visit can also be done to the participants before their travel to Geneva in order to raise their awareness to the meeting.

- A third point is to provide precise and detailed information, material and recommenda-tions to the stakeholders, ICTs communication activity.

- The last point, that could also be the first, because we consider it as the starting point, is the quality of research and quality of information issued from this research Precisions provide credibility and enhance the reception of the message. The recruitment and the training of the staff is a key point to reach such a level.

As pointed out in the introduction, lobbying on human rights issues done by NGOs and public organisations could be different form the one by corporate and private sector. Vin-cent Metten argues that lobbying on human rights issues is based on values, ethics and on morals. Moreover, resources are lower that the ones of the corporate sector. He then ad-vances than the human dimension and the transparency procedures are more important. He also argues that the communication and lobbying techniques are the same. In other words, emotion and human dimensions could be the real difference between the two cat-egories of lobbyists, NGOs and corporate organisations.

Some obstacles should be pointed out. On the question of Tibet, bias and ignorance are important. The debate is political and the PRC has strong strategies to counter this lobby-ing and some actors consider that the Dala Lama has a hidden agenda. More broadly, on human issues, manipulation and actions of secret services is also possible.

11 Source : www.savetibet.org, consulted 2nd octobrer 2013

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Considering the action repertoires, V. Metten does not really believe in petitions, online or not. He considers that Op Ed is efficient to present an opinion. Protestations are also an important element for three reasons. First, for the Tibetans themselves, to nourish their motivation, second to gain attention to the media and to the general public, third to show to the PRC that his opponents are active.

The capacity to provide information to the Member of European parliament (MEP) is a key point. They appreciate to receive position paper, arguments and reports. Sometimes, a successful action is to provide an amendment that will be included in officials European texts. For V. Metten, a successful campaign of lobbying is the result of the combination between medias, communication and direct statement to MEP and diplomats, in order to touch at the same time several types of protagonists from different circles.

A.2 - The Control Arms campaign Our second case, the Control Arms campaign by Amnesty international, represents a model because it includes all structural and mediating conditions developed above. An informal discussion was conducted during a workshop in Brussels; unfortunately, it was not possible, due to time constraint, to ask the same questions to the Amnesty interna-tional officer in charge of this topic in Brussels.

Since 13 years, Amnesty international and its headquarters in London rule the Control Arms campaign: Control Arms is a global civil society alliance campaigning for a bul-letproof Arms Trade Treaty that will protect lives and livelihoods. A bulletproofs Arms Trade Treaty means an international, legally binding agreement that will stop trans-fers of arms and ammunitions that fuel conflict, poverty and serious violations of human rights and international humanitarian law.

The idea of an arms trade treaty first came from Nobel Peace Laureates, supported by civil society organizations worldwide.

In 2003, the Control Arms Campaign was launched and has since gathered support for the Arms Trade Treaty from over a million people worldwide.

In 2006, Control Arms handed over a global petition called the Million Faces to the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan.

In December 2006, 153 governments finally voted at the United Nations to start work on developing a global Arms Trade Treaty. Momentum for the treaty has been building ever since.

In 2009 the UN General Assembly launched a time frame for the negotiation of the Arms Trade Treaty. This included one preparatory meeting in 2010 and two in 2011, before the final negotiating conference scheduled for July 201212.

12 www.controlarms.org

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Besides political aspects, the situation is quite complex. First, to develop precise argu-ments, the NGO must investigate arms trade, illegal air flights or non-respected embargos by arms manufacturers. The members of the NGO do research at exhibitions (Milipol in Paris), on some battlefields (Congo, Togo), or online by checking databases and the Web in order to collect data, flight plans, arms manufacturers, photos.) To see some of theses elements, see Andrew Niccols movie Lord of war.)

Amnesty International produce fact-checked reports. These well-documented reports be-came arguments, synthetized by a lobbying and communication team. In order to con-vince politicians and public opinion, a two-branch strategy is used: a lobbyists and a grass-roots approach. Throughout the year, lobbyists working for Amnesty send press releases, reports and arguments to the UN delegates in New York. Control Arms campaigners lobbied states to make positive ATT statements, in particular to get support for the cur-rent version of the Chairs non-papers to be used as the starting point for the negotiation conference. In addition, Control Arms members made a presentation to states and orga-nized a number of well-attended side events. Then, once a year, during the general assem-bly, they tried to convince the delegate at the ambassadors level to vote for the ATT pro-ject.

But this strategy is not enough for an NGO, nor, more generally, for agents who need to receive the support of the public sphere. A complete set of communication tools is used to influence the public: press conferences, demonstrations in the streets that are able to catch the attention of media, Web sites, including online petitions, Twitter, Facebook pages, expert testimony or reports, support of stars (for example, in France, Lillian Thu-ram, a famous French football player). Some parody videos are also on YouTube (for a teleshopping parody, see www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3OprnmlJmM).

The communication strategy fulfils the there conditions of Cardon Grajon (2010): Coun-ter expertise, i.e. fact checked reports, parody, and grassroots mobilization.

According to the conditions presented above, that case is a multi dimensional one.

A strong goal, at UN level, with law implantation and vote procedures 155 affiliated NGOs in 132 countries in a network coordinated by Amnesty interna-

tional A high activity, during the entire year, by collecting datas, by communication cam-

paign, with a peak during each UN general assembly A sensitive subject: arms regulation would have positive impacts on children, civilians

and women

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A multilevel audience such as medical Professionals, global Investors, survivors of armed violence, women, religious leaders and organizations, and parliamentarians, as well as general public13.

The purpose of control Arms campaign is to mobilize media, to gain positive acceptance in opinion, and to convince the public sphere, in order to put pressure on politicians, civil servants and heads of governments engaged in the issue.

B - Discussion and conclusion Two points could be discussed: legitimacy and indicators, but we are aware that the lines between the two need to be clarified.

The legitimacy of NGO, moreover of civil society is largely debated since 1999, after the Seattle events. A contribution by Jan Aart Scholte inspires the following paragraph. He develops the questions of legitimacy identifying four components14:

Moral legitimacy. Because actions concern human rights, development, noble objec-tives and social consciousness, activities of NGO are considered as legitimate. Their actions can often gain attention of the general public and media. A limit, already evo-cate, is linked with cultural relativism, norms and values that differ according to differ-ent conceptions existing between countries and civilisations.

Efficiency. According to Jan Aart Scholte, civil society and NGOs have significant results: intense work to inform policy makers in order to impulse positives reforms on juridical systems; concretes actions to develop and support humanitarian and reduc-tion of poverty operations; surveys, reports and others field work which are useful to inform media, public opinion and policy makers. This criterion to difficult to discus; we think that facts, proven results and datas extracted from examples should be pre-sented in order to precise such arguments.

Democracy. NGOs actions are a democratic factor because it can reinforce popular participation in numerous occasions. For example, marginal groups can express them-selves. Moreover, civil society actions tend to be transparent with availability of doc-uments and transparency of accounts proposed on Pdf format on web sites. J. A. Scholte consider that this dimension put pressure on officials bodies to be more transparent and more open to the public for their modalities of exercise or decisions.

Social cohesion. J. Aart Scholte argue that civil society and NGOs actions contributes to enhance social cohesion, face to the pressure of globalization.

13 Source ControlArms.org, consulted, 17 April 2013. 14 Socit civile et gouvernance mondiale , Jan Aart Scholte, Centre for the Study of Glo-balisation and Regionalisation, Universit de Warwick in Gouvernance mondiale, Rapport de synthse, Pierre Jacquet, Jean Pisani-Ferry et Laurence Tubiana, pp. 221-228 www.ladocumentationfrancaise.fr/var/storage/rapports-publics/024000230/0000.pdf, con-sulted 2nd octobre 2013.

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Nevertheless, critics can be made. Civil society and NGOs should prove by their acts and actions their willingness to fulfil those four criteria instead of relying on it or simply to take it as granted.

The question of indicators for lobbying will leads us to the conclusion of this work. Our literature review was unsuccessful to find papers discussing indicators able to evaluate from a quantitative and qualitative perspective lobbying activities. We try here to estab-lished a list that can be debated

For mass media, it is possible to count the articles, reportages, and others elements done by the media. This count is the most ancient one and is related to evaluation of an audience

For social media, it is possible to count the numbers of followers, the numbers of tweets, of Like on Facebook. This count is made possible because of digital tech-nologies. The most ancient one is the evaluation of visitors on the web site of the or-ganisation.

Face to decision policy makers, criteria is the level of contact. In other words, when an organisation can have access to high-level decision makers, to an ambassador, to an influent MEP, or to an advisor at a ministry cabinet level, it reveals that the organisa-tion is recognised and credible. It's a proof of the professionalism and its capacity to provide credible and useful information and reports. In other words, doors are open.

During a press conference or a protest, criteria could be the quality of the audience or the quality of the participants (the presence of people involved in the process). Of course, we are aware that this criterion is difficult to define and to make clear.

And finally, inside the lobbying process itself, an important element is the inclusion of the arguments directly provided by the NGOS. In Brussels, scholars, journalists and NGOs concerned by the lobbying have identified that protagonists of lobbying are able to provide to the civil servant in the Commission and to MEP, arguments and amendments. A copy and paste procedure allows the argument to be present on the final text of the European institutions15.

V. Metten form ICT confirms it. An indicator of success is the capacity to be invited to participate to important events. For example, during the UE Spanish presidency in 2009, ICT was invited to a seminar on Human rights between UE and China. The credibility is the heart of the process: if an NGO is credible, the lobbying done by the organisation will also be credible.

Four elements of conclusion could be presented:

15 For more on that question see two NGOs Alter EU and Corporate observatory Europe. A web site launch on 2013 try to identifies which arguments are coming from which actors http://lobbyplag.eu/lp

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Advocacy and lobbying are deeply linked with information management, At the point of the research, we think that tools and methodologies are similar be-

tween Ngos and corporate organisations, Communication is a key component. Form an appointment with a diplomat to a

demonstration covered by TVs, the cocktail, i.e. the communication strategy, devel-oped at the same time is important,

The descriptions and definitions of indicators is a difficult task. For digital media, its easy to quantify. A qualitative evaluation should also be done. For meeting, internal or inside lobbying with decision policy makers, it related to interpersonal communica-tion, persuasion and credibility.

As The art of war16 or The art of negotiation17, we would like to consider lobbying as an art, engaging personal communication, information management, influence, communi-cation tools in a multidimensional cocktail.

References Cardon, D. Fabien Granjon, (2010), Mdiactivistes, presses de Sciences Po, Paris

Coen, David. (2008), EU Lobbying: Empirical and Theoretical Studies. London: Routledge

Gollain, Vincent, Guide du marketing territorial, Editions territoriales, 2010

Grossman Emiliano & Saurugger, Sabine (2006), Les groupes d'intrt, Armand Colin, Paris

Guegen, Daniel, 2007, Lobbying europen, Bruxelles, Europolitique

Liu, Chineses Journal of communication, Vol. 4 n2, June 2011, 137-166

Neveu, Eric, Vaincre lindiffrence, CNRS editions, Paris, 2000

Orr, A. (2007). Political Participation and the Web 2.0. Paper presented at the Australasian Political Studies Association (APSA) Annual Conference 24th-26th September 2007, Monash University, Melbourne.

16 McNeilly, Mark R. (2001), Sun Tzu and the Art of Modern Warfare, Oxford University Press 17 Arifon, O. (2010), Langue diplomatique et langage formel : un code double entente, Herms n 58 Les langues de bois . CNRS Editions, pp. 71-78.