EXPANDING THE LOBBYING CONCEPT TO PUBLIC POLICY ADVOCACY

The speech below was prepared for the Public Affairs Community in Europe's (P.A.C.E.) meeting to be held this year in on 23-24 May in Paris, France and organized by the A.F.C.L. (Association Française des Conseils en Lobbying). 

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Today in the literature, in the mass media and everyday communication different terms are used to denote lobbying and its separate elements. In English there are at least two commonly used terms that are sometimes used as partial synonyms to lobbying- public affairs and government relations. These terms are used to provide better characteristics of the respective field of activity or to avoid the negative image of lobbying. Another term widely used is interest representation. The European Commission talks about 'interest representatives' and 'representing interests' in preference to 'lobbyist' and 'lobbying' which for some people carry negative connotations. Interest representatives is a catch-all term covering interest groups, pressure groups, lobby groups, advocacy groups etc.

It is sometimes argued that lobbying is an inadequate designation of the work done by the majority of people in this field, if lobbying is basically understood as the direct advocacy of a point of view about a matter of public policy. The lobbyists, or to be more precise, the policy consultants do not engage in direct advocacy themselves, but help their clients to perform their own advocacy. In such cases, the term 'government relations' is used, it covers both lobbying in the narrowest understanding of the term, as well as a wide range of services e.g. advising clients on the relationships with Government officials and/or Parliamentarians; identifying opportunities to raise the awareness of the client and their profile; helping clients to draft materials for when to speak to Government and/or Parliament; identifying who they should go and talk to; setting up meetings. In other words, the lobbyist or consultant does not always perform the advocacy of the client's opinion, but assists his clients in various ways with the relations with government and/or parliament. The term 'government relations' emphasizes therefore those aspects of lobbying that are related to different types of interaction with public authorities.

By comparison the term 'public affairs' puts the stress upon relations with the general public and encompasses all corporate functions related to the management of an organization's reputation, with external audiences- usually including lobbying or government relations, media relations, issue management, and community relations.In the context of lobbying public affairs are sometimes treated as government relations with communications garnish- especially communications with external audiences (outside the narrow relations of the lobbyist, client and the targeted officials).

The problem we face is that no clear-cut border line exists between these various terms and for practitioners lobbying or government relations are something very similar or identitical with communication, corporate communication or strateggic communication.

For the European Commission the term 'interest representation' is defined as 'activities carried out with the objective of influencing the policy formulation and decision-making processes of the European institutions'. The definition relates to the activity- influencing policy formulation and decision-making. That is what counts when deciding whether a particular entity falls within the definition- not who or what the entity is or what cause it is defending.

To be clear the European Commission wanted the definition to be broad enough to cover any kind of entity- European and international associations linked to any line of business or branch of society, private companies, firms of solicitors, public affairs consultants, non-governmental organisations, charities and think tanks. The European Commission recognises that the mission of most organisations engaged in interest representation is wider than the activity for which registration is expected. They engage in activities such as the provision of studies, statistics and other information and documentation as well as the provision of training and capacity building for members or clients which fall outside the scope of this definition, if not related to activities of interest represented.

Back in 1992, the deputy of the European Parliament Marc Galle offered the following definition of a lobbyist: 'Anybody who acts on the instructions of a third party and sets out to defend the interests of that third party to the European Parliament and other Community institutions. This definition in fact covered only hired lobbyists and excluded interest groups and companies that are themselves engaged in lobbying or in the representation of their interests. At the same time this definition was rather broad, since at least formally, it included not only political but also all administrative issues.

From AALEP's perspective rather than talking about interest representation or lobbying we favour the term public policy advocacy which we define as 'the interaction of private persons with the state or local authorities' institutions with the aim of achieving that certain decisions are or are not taken or certain activities are or are not peformed in the interests of these persons or third persons'. Public policy advocacy does not include the activities of private persons as part of administrative or judicial procedure as well as activities which take place exclusively in the open public space. Under this definition a private person covers both a natural person and a private legal person. Third person may also be public persons, for example a country that hires a professional public policy advocate to influence the political decisions taken by other countries.

It is AALEP's view that referring to Public Policy Advocacy offers distinct advantages:

• We can demonstrate that public policy advocacy is the best value added contribution to policy development;
• It serves to dispel the myths surrounding lobbying and its negative connotations worldwide;
• It recognizes that advocacy is a broader concept than lobbying and that while lobbying can be part of an advocacy strategy, advocacy does not necessarily include lobbying;
• It includes a broad range of activities including advocacy, lobbying, campaigning i.e. the whole is more important than the sum of its parts;
• It is an ecompassing term that brings under one single umbrella all related terms (government relations with the emphasis on general consultations about government relations; public affairs with the emphasis on communication including with external audiences; interest representation with the emphasis on interests);
• It eliminates the contradictory attitude towards the word lobbying;
• It has the potential to considerably reduce the negative media coverage of our profession;
• It recognizes that the influencing of political decisions (influencing politics) can be achieved through various forms of advocacy directed at policymakers on behalf of another person, organization or group;
• It does not directly refer to influence or attempt to influence but rather considers the interaction to achieve certain actions;
• It elevates our profession by providing painting a more positive image.

Here below are sample tasks Public Policy Advocates accomplish

• Securing public funding or contracts, changing laws or regulations, resolving disputes with government bodies or obtaining approvals;
• Identifying how changes in legislation, policies, programmes and personnel impact clients' industry or organization;
• Positioning requests to goovernments so they are relevant to decision-makers and supportable on the merits;
• Knowing who to talk to, when and how. And what to say;
• Working with client to develop targeted messages that are easily understood by decision-makers and those who influence them;
• Creating supporting documentation and materials that capture the attention of government and policy makers;
• Preparing client to advocate directly or advocating on his behalf;
• Tracking public policy and programme developments;
• Helping client understand political considerations that drive those developments;
• Organizing political activities, including managing election campaigns, raising funds and planning party political events;
• Providing strategy and campaign advice;
• Identifying political audience;
• Structured contact programmes with political audiences;
• Legislative support on regulations, proposals, directives and statutory instruments;
• Assistance with issue audits;
• Production of responses to formal EU government and government agency consultation papers;
• Public policy advocacy training and advice on establishing in-house public policy advocacy systems;
• Developing public consultation strategies;
• Conducting stakeholder relations and coalition-building activities;
• Planning, mannaging and interpreting public opinion and awareness research using leading survey firms on a competitive basis;
• Understanding client communications objectives, needs, audiences and resources;
• Developing effective communications strategies;
• Planning, integratting and implementing an optimal mix of marketing, PR, media relations, advertising, web, public speaking and other communications tools to support client's governmentvrelations objectives;
• Preparing strategic and tactical communications programmes which are directed to all target audiences and support clients' overall business plan;
• Research, writing and editing services adaptable to any medium;
• Strategic communications planning;
• Issues management;
• Planning and implementing media strategies;
• Writing and editing media advisories, news releases and backgrounders;
• Organizing new conferences and media interviews.

As you can see the term Public Policy Advocacy offers a wide range of possibilities in comparison with more restrictive or narrow terms.

Thank you for providing me your comments.