scholarly journals Nonprofit Advocacy Coalitions in Times of COVID-19: Brokerage, Crowdfunding, and Advocacy Roles

2021 ◽  
pp. 089976402199167
Author(s):  
Peter Raeymaeckers ◽  
Stijn Van Puyvelde
Keyword(s):  
Nonprofit Organizations ◽  
Social Workers ◽  
Physical Distance ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Distance Measures ◽  
Advocacy Coalitions ◽  
Target Groups ◽  
Advocacy Coalition ◽  
Advocacy Role ◽  
Nonprofit Advocacy

This article analyzes the roles an advocacy coalition undertakes to support nonprofit organizations to cope with the challenges caused by lockdown and physical distance measures to stop COVID-19. We find that social workers and nonprofit members of the coalition created different kinds of solutions and innovative practices to support vulnerable target groups when confronted with the COVID-19 crisis and the resulting lockdown regulations. In particular, we show that the coalition was pushed to diversify its activities, leading to the development of three roles: a direct and indirect advocacy role, a brokerage role to provide information on new practices, and a crowdfunding role to provide finances for material aid. We conclude by emphasizing the implications of our analysis for both theory and practice.

How Social Media are Changing Nonprofit Advocacy: Evidence from the Crowdfunding Platform in Taiwan

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 349-370
Author(s):  
Shulin Zhou ◽  
Chienliang Kuo
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Nonprofit Organizations ◽  
Digital Economy ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Data Source ◽  
Nonprofit Advocacy

AbstractHow nonprofit organizations (NPO) utilize social media to engage in advocacy work is regarded as one of the most important challenges in the digital economy era. However, although current studies pay their attention to how NPO react to the prevalence of social media, less focus is paid on how social media help to shape NPO’s practices on advocacy work. To help close the gap between theory and practice, this research explores whether the alignment between NPO’s advocacy practices and features of social media determine the NPO’s usage on social media. In particular, how the crowdfunding platform, an emerging and powerful form of social media, is used by NPO is investigated. Those crowdfunding projects initiated by NPO in FlyingV, the most well-known crowdfunding platform in Taiwan, are taken as the data source for analysis in this paper. The findings reveal that crowdfunding platforms are beneficial to NPO in turns of gaining resources and attracting participants, which then fostering the realization of advocacy activities. As well, the efficiency of crowdfunded projects (or advocacy proposals) is mainly determined by the number of participants (or sponsors). However, based on the findings, it is argued that NPO so far have not realized the power of crowdfunding platforms, thus not yet regarding crowdfunding platforms as key social media or strategic weapons in strengthening their impact or contribution on advocacy work relevant to their missions.

Imputing missings in official statistics for general tasks – our vote for distributional accuracy

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Maria Thurow ◽  
Florian Dumpert ◽  
Burim Ramosaj ◽  
Markus Pauly
Keyword(s):  
Missing Values ◽  
Mean Squared Error ◽  
Imputation Accuracy ◽  
Potential Effect ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Distance Measures ◽  
Parameter Estimates ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Survey Analysis ◽  
Gross Income

In statistical survey analysis, (partial) non-responders are integral elements during data acquisition. Treating missing values during data preparation and data analysis is therefore a non-trivial underpinning. Focusing on the German Structure of Earnings data from the Federal Statistical Office of Germany (DESTATIS), we investigate various imputation methods regarding their imputation accuracy and its impact on parameter estimates in the analysis phase after imputation. Since imputation accuracy measures are not uniquely determined in theory and practice, we study different measures for assessing imputation accuracy: Beyond the most common measures, the normalized-root mean squared error (NRMSE) and the proportion of false classification (PFC), we put a special focus on (distribution) distance measures for assessing imputation accuracy. The aim is to deliver guidelines for correctly assessing distributional accuracy after imputation and the potential effect on parameter estimates such as the mean gross income. Our empirical findings indicate a discrepancy between the NRMSE resp. PFC and distance measures. While the latter measure distributional similarities, NRMSE and PFC focus on data reproducibility. We realize that a low NRMSE or PFC is in general not accompanied by lower distributional discrepancies. However, distributional based measures correspond with more accurate parameter estimates such as mean gross income under the (multiple) imputation scheme.

Social Media as a Tool for Nonprofit Advocacy and Civic Engagement

2015 ◽  
pp. 1077-1097
Author(s):  
David Chapman ◽  
Katrina Miller-Stevens ◽  
John C. Morris ◽  
Brendan O'Hallarn
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Civic Engagement ◽  
Nonprofit Organizations ◽  
Military Families ◽  
Virtual Community ◽  
Blue Star ◽  
Small Organizations ◽  
Private Citizens ◽  
Advocacy Role ◽  
Community Space

Blue Star Families is a small nonprofit organization whose goal is to create a virtual community for military families, spouses, children, relatives, and the general public. Founded in 2009 by a group of military spouses, Blue Star Families combines community building and civic engagement with an advocacy role on behalf of military families. Blue Star Families aims to create a cross-sectoral community space that includes other nonprofit organizations, government agencies, private businesses, and private citizens. The organization employs several forms of social media to accomplish its goals. While Blue Star Families has been largely successful in its efforts, the study finds that social media creates challenges for small organizations, particularly in terms of monitoring for appropriate use of the common space by members of the community, acquiring adequate staff resources to analyze usage data, and finding resources to purchase access to more powerful analytics.

Social Media and Social Change

2014 ◽  
pp. 56-72 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauri Goldkind ◽  
John G. McNutt
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Nonprofit Organizations ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Comprehensive System ◽  
Technological Advances ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Words And Images ◽  
Media And Technology ◽  
Nonprofit Advocacy

Technological advances in communications tools, the Internet, and the advent of social media have changed the ways in which nonprofit organizations engage with their various constituents. Nonprofits now have a constellation of tools including: interactive social media sites, mobile applications (apps), Websites, and mash-ups that allow them to create a comprehensive system for mobilizing supports to advocate for changing public policies. From Facebook to Twitter and from YouTube to Pinterest, communicating to many via words and images has never been easier. The authors explore the history of nonprofit advocacy and organizing, describe the social media and technology tools available for moving advocacy goals forward, and conclude with some possible challenges that organizations considering these tools could face.

scholarly journals Social workers’ conceptions of the relationship between theory and practice in an organizational context

2004 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 543-557 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ko Ling Chan ◽  
Cecilia L.W. Chan
Keyword(s):  
Social Workers ◽  
Organizational Context ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
The Self ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Research Studies

The research studies the relationship between theory and practice in the context of an agency. Eight social workers from an agency were recruited for in-depth interviews. Results showed that the conception of theory and practice was influenced by the self, the client and the agency.

Service-Providing Nonprofits Working in Coalition to Advocate for Policy Change

2017 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
John J. Chin
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Nonprofit Organizations ◽  
Policy Change ◽  
Coalition Structure ◽  
Policy Advocacy ◽  
Organizational Survival ◽  
Advocacy Coalition ◽  
Implementation Level ◽  
Immigrant Health Policy

Nonprofit organizations that primarily provide social or health services can play an important role in policy advocacy, as indicated by recent research. Less is known about how and why they participate in policy advocacy, and concerns remain that their advocacy is overly self-interested. This case study of an urban immigrant health policy advocacy coalition made up primarily of service-providing nonprofits in New York City suggests that (a) service-providing nonprofits’ insights as daily case-level advocates for their clients generate unique contributions to policy change agendas, particularly at the policy implementation level rather than at the legislative level; (b) these organizations do not necessarily see a conflict between their organizational survival imperatives and social change objectives, nor between case-level and higher level advocacy; and (c) a coalition structure, leadership by an experienced advocacy organization, and dedicated foundation funding can elevate case advocacy concerns into a higher level and more sustained advocacy agenda.

Advocacy Coalitions in Foreign Policy

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Pierce ◽  
Katherine Hicks
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Policy Analysis ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Final Analysis ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Foreign Policy Analysis ◽  
Advocacy Coalitions ◽  
Advocacy Coalition

The advocacy coalition framework (ACF) was developed to explain policy processes where contentious coalitions of actors seek to translate competing belief systems into public policy. Advocacy coalitions may include interest groups, members of the media, scientists and academics, and government officials that share beliefs about a public issue and coordinate their behavior. These advocacy coalitions engage in various strategies using resources to influence policy change or stasis. As part of this process, advocacy coalition members may learn within and/or across coalitions. This framework is one of the most prominent and widely applied approaches to explain public policy. While it has been applied hundreds of times, in over 50 different countries, the vast majority of ACF applications have sought to explain domestic policy processes. A reason for the paucity of applications to foreign policy is that some ACF assumptions may not seem congruent to foreign policy issues. For example, the ACF uses a policy subsystem as the unit of analysis that may include a territorial dimension. Yet, the purpose of the territorial dimension is to limit the scope of the study. Therefore, this dimension can be substituted for a government body that has the authority or potential authority to make and implement foreign policy. In addition, the ACF assumes a central role for technical and scientific information in the policy process. Such information makes learning across coalitions more conducive, but the ACF can and should also be applied to normative issues, such as those more common among foreign policy research. This article introduces the ACF; provides an overview of the framework, including assumptions, key concepts and theories, and transferability of the ACF to foreign policy analysis; and discusses four exemplary applications. In addition, it proposes future research that scholars should explore as part of the nexus of the ACF and foreign policy analysis. In the final analysis, the authors suggest the ACF can and should be applied to foreign policy analysis to better understand the development of advocacy coalitions and how they influence changes and stasis in foreign policy.

The Advocacy Coalition Framework

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paúl Cisneros
Keyword(s):  
Policy Change ◽  
Policy Process ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
The United States ◽  
Advocacy Coalition Framework ◽  
Advocacy Coalitions ◽  
Forthcoming Article ◽  
Advocacy Coalition ◽  
Policy Subsystems ◽  
Theoretical Foundations

This is an advance summary of a forthcoming article in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. Please check back later for the full article. Paul Sabatier and Hank Jenkins Smith introduced the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) in the late 1980s, to refine the theoretical and methodological tools available for the study of the policy process. In the past two decades, the framework has grown in use outside the United States, and it is now applied to study a broad range of policy arenas in all continents. ACF scholars have created a core community that regularly synthetizes findings from applications of the framework, giving the ACF the form of a true research program. The ACF has three principal theoretical domains: advocacy coalitions, policy subsystems, and policy change. Expectations about the interactions between and within these domains are contained in 15 main hypotheses. The ACF posits that advocacy coalitions and policy subsystems are the most efficient way to organize actors interested in the policy process for empirical research. The policy subsystem is the main unit of analysis in the ACF, and there are four paths leading to policy change. The aspect that has received more attention in existing applications is the effect that external events have on policy change, and some areas in need of refinement include: policy-oriented learning, interactions across subsystems, the theoretical foundations to identification of belief systems, and how the interactions between beliefs and interests affect coalition behavior.

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