Note from an online meeting: Removing the barriers between services and campaigning
Note of a Better Way roundtable on ‘Removing the barriers between services and campaigning’, held on-line on 21 April 2020
Fifteen people, from across the country, participated in this discussion, which was introduced by Steve Wyler, co-convenor of the Better Way. He explained that at the launch event of the Call to Action for a Better Way, in November last year, several people spoke of their desire for those working in the social sector to be bolder, and to break down the barriers between services and campaigning.
Sue Tibballs, from the Sheila McKechnie Foundation, made the opening presentation.
She pointed out that it is often thought that there are two traditions in the social sector: on the one hand charity (the provision of immediate relief) and on the other social reform (working for long term change). Typically, the one is transactional, the other transformational. This Sue said, is a false dichotomy, and she described it as a weed that needs to be pulled up.
In recent years, Sue explained, the social sector has moved towards the charity model, believing it can secure more money by positioning itself to deliver commissioned services, employing professional fundraisers, and telling the story of its work in ways which drive fundraising income, rather than bringing about more radical social change.
At the same time there has been a narrowing of what people think campaigning is, an assumption it is confined to public affairs and lobbying. The social sector’s models of leadership have narrowed as well, so that it looks for those who have managerial strengths, and not necessarily those who will be bold and brave.
In the last decade or so we have seen the emergence of a ‘sock-puppet narrative’, which asserts that those in receipt of public funds should not use those funds for campaigning, and it has become even more difficult to be seen to be ‘biting the hand that feeds you’. The social sector was told to ‘stick to the knitting’ and largely obeyed, and kept its head down.
This means that the sector has lost much of its power to deliver on its mission and drive transformational change.
Yet, as a sector, it is not just here to pick up the pieces, it is here to build a better world.
Most change proceeds from personal experience. Campaigning takes many forms and is not just about public affairs and policy. By believing that it is, the social sector has become a supplicant to government, and petitions rather than makes demands. Yet history tells us that civil society drives many changes and that governments do respond to pressure from civil society.
The language of ‘campaigning’ is difficult, and Sue has found that the term ‘social change’ allows more people to engage.
There are organisations which are rethinking their approach, many of whom are service providers, using their experience and evidence to drive systemic change. Some are able to work in mature partnership with the state, respectful of each other’s strengths and weaknesses, and working to shared outcomes. Others are holding the state to account, by bringing challenge. And the best manage to do both.
Some use the term social influencing. Others describe themselves as social activists, and see themselves not as providers but enablers. And for some campaigning has become a service, providing encouragement and resources for people to be agents of their own change.
If we don’t sort this out, Sue said, the writing is on the wall. Much significant change is coming from outside the formal social sector. When private companies are using purpose to sell product, and activism is adopted by the private sector, just when it becomes illicit in charity, we must know that something is wrong, and it is time, said Sue, to ‘take our purpose back.’
Steve thanked Sue, and he noted that in response to the coronavirus emergency we have seen a great number of formal and informal organisations step forward and provide immediate services, but also, woven into that, many are also trying to make change. For example, the scandal of what is happening in care homes was exposed by charities speaking out, sometimes at risk to their own funding, and the organisation Charities So White has drawn national attention to the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on BAME communities.
The meeting then divided into three breakout groups, to allow everyone to contribute. The following points emerged from the breakout sessions, and the subsequent plenary discussions, facilitated by Caroline Slocock, Better Way co-convenor:
Rediscovering purpose as social change organisations
The social sector would benefit from an organisational framework where social change becomes the overriding objective, and services are seen as a means to achieve that objective, in authentic ways.
Organisations which give a prominent role to lived experience in their service design and delivery may be less likely to act in a paternalistic way and more likely to be contributing to transformational change, it was felt.
Service delivery organisations not only have responsibility to help the individuals they currently work with, they also have responsibility to help the next generation.
Some charities have adopted right-based models of working. Sometimes this has always been implicit, but at other times it has been made explicit. Mention was made of the cross-sectarian work of Bernadette McAliskey in the South Tyrone Empowerment Programme, an organisation which regards the UN Conventions on Human Rights as its constitution.
Understanding systems change
If we fail to make change happen we fail the people we work with, by keeping them stuck in a detrimental system, where inequality persists. Our role, it was proposed, must be to become systems change leaders.
We noted that ‘systems thinking’ has become fashionable, as a means to bring about social progress when faced with complexity. While this may be welcome, its practical application is not always clear. Does it imply a different way of working with individuals, or does it require a wider change in how organisations and institutions operate? Or both?
Being more outspoken, and also influencing behind the scenes
The voices of the social sector are too often those of professional people and as a result are too often sanitised. We need to allow more authentic voices to be heard, loud and clear.
On the other hand, there are times when charities can influence change in quiet ‘covert’ ways, or change the conversation, and this should be recognised too.
The implications of funding practice
The funding community has a big responsibility, it was argued. Many organisations are funded only to deliver services, or only to pursue innovation in service delivery. They are rarely funded to act as campaigners or influencers.
On the other hand, some suggested that charities are too much inclined to blame their shortcoming on funders. This betrays, it was felt, a lack of their own bravery.
Inevitably some organisations will have embedded relationships with funders and will find it harder to ‘bite the hand that feeds them’, while others are relatively free from funder dependency, and can be more easily outspoken. It was suggested that these types of organisations could be encouraged to work together more, so that the respective strengths can be combined.
What prevents organisations acting as agents of social change?
There are vested organisational interests in maintaining the status quo, i.e. only addressing the manifestations of social problems, and never addressing the underlying causes, or failing to create opportunities for people to make change happen themselves. After all, it was suggested, social sector jobs depend on the problems persisting.
Services that support people, public or social sector, continue to stigmatise people, when we should be helping them claim their rights. We fail to employ people we serve, or appoint them to our Boards, and maintain a ‘them and us’ way of working. We label people as ‘vulnerable’, but inherently they are not, we make them so.
We also noted, that in the current crisis, statutory bodies appear to be referring fewer people to independent advocacy services, thereby stifling challenge and reinforcing inequality and unfairness.
It was suggested that the Better Way, with others, could help to build up examples of organisations which are moving from a narrow service delivery model to one which where services become a contribution to transformational social change objectives. It was felt that this could be an important contribution to shaping the post COVID-19 world.
Final reflections from Sue Tibballs
This is a rich and important conversation, Sue noted. We do need to keep challenging ourselves. But also the crisis has revealed what others think about the social sector, she felt. The Chancellor invoked Victorian language when he spoke about ‘the gentleness of charity’, and, even though governments had pushed social market models so much in recent years, social enterprises have been hung out to dry.
We should say as a sector that we are about change and delivering social value and social good, and everything in our organisations must integrate in pursuit of that. Campaigning is one method, when there is something identifiable that can be changed in a fixed period of time, and where the campaign is winnable. If we understand that our organisations exist for change, than everything we do can be seen as contributing to that, not only when we run a campaign.
Sue also suggested that the social sector should change the way it describes itself, and not be known as the charity sector, or the voluntary sector, or the third sector, but as the social sector. And explain that the social sector works within civil society, and that it is about social good and social value. Yes, she acknowledged, it is ambitious to encourage shared language, but it would serve the sector well to do so.