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THE ACTIVISTS AND ADVOCACY--PART.1.



/* Written Thu 11 Jun 11:00am 1998 by drunoo@xxxxxxxxxxxx(Dr U Ne Oo) in igc:reg.burma */
/* -------------" The Activists and Advocacy Pt.1 "--------------- */

COMMENTS ON ACTIVISTS AND ADVOCACY
**********************************
Recently, there have been some postings on the Net which attributed
to the activism and advocacy in general. In the World of Internet
mailing-list, the power to communicate is equal among all subscribers,
regardless of their political leaning or background resources.
Surely, we all have the right to speak our own mind on the Internet.
However, a serious distinction has to be made between advocacy and
non-advocacy; of true-activists and cynics.

On the surface, these postings do look like a rather objectionable
form of usual "squabbling" within a movement. At a deeper level,
however, there exists the underlying misconceptions about the true
nature of (political) activism. It should be noted that this kind of
political-illiteracy is not an isolated incident but rather
prevalent among the Burmese population.

ADVOCACY AND NON-ADVOCACY
*************************
Contrary to some people's beliefs, the meaning of advocacy is not
about preaching to the masses who, supposedly, are un-informed or
un-sophisticated. The advocacy is not of an avenue to make
oneself known to the public or to the powerful people within the
community. The advocacy, certainly, is not about airing one's
own personal grievances in a public arena -- no matter how this may
justified from one's own perspective. Nor activism means to let
loose one's frustration about its own life and therefore sought a
revenge on the Establishments: i.e. society, governments and
political system etc. What, then, are the meaning and purpose of
advocacy and activism?

The advocacy, to my understanding, is about communicating to the
general public or to the like-minded people on the matters of
special concerns. The activist may put forward his/her own
assessment of the situation, or personal view: rights and wrongs,
justs and un-justs. He/she may further suggests how things ought to
be done in particular circumstances. This is certainly different
from preaching moral messages to the public. Sure, there has to be
some element with ethical and moral leaning included in the
communication because the activist needs to explain about what is
right and what is wrong. But on the whole, the activists are simply
seeking cooperation from the public on particular matters.

WHY DO WE ADVOCATE ?
********************
There can be as many different motivations as the number of
activists participating a campaign or a movement. Some may try to
gain social status or to receive recognition from the public by doing
advocacy and joining the movement. Others may just try to be involved
in "activities" with colleagues and friends. Significant proportion
of them may be genuinely unhappy with the socio-political situations
or established systems -- in our Burma case, the military's holding
onto power -- and therefore seeking changes by doing advocacy.
(In our Burma advocacy cases, we can forget about the possibility of
activists joining the movement to gain financial incentives -- it
just simply impossible!)

People may join the advocacy, initially, for different reasons.
However, in the long run, those who genuinely care about the cause
and seeking genuine changes to the system are likely to be staying
in the movement. The other types of participants may just come and
go regarding the movement.

My personal reason to join refugee advocacy in few years back and
becoming an activist was to seek improvement to the situation and to
find a solution to the Burma's refugee problem. In these years, not
only had I been -- and since then continue to have been -- a refugee in
Australia, I have had much concerns about the Rohingya refugees
especially. Among many of displaced people from Burma, the Rohingyas
are somewhat under-represented, politically, because of their low
political status in Burmese community. On the other hand, we had
received various reports, through JRS and other refugee agencies,
the egregious living conditions for Rohingyas in Bangladesh and a
possible forced repatriation to Burma. My empathy about refugee has
also been a driving factor. When having concerns about such
vulnerable people and practically cannot do anything else, then
there is only one thing left to do: urge the people who are in
authority to "do something". That became my first engagement in the
work for advocacy.

Looking a glimpse at the activists around the world, we can see
differing causes they are striving to achieve: East-timorese
activists for an independence of their homeland; Chinese and
Indonesian activists for the transition to democracy;
Australian-aboriginal right activists for a better social justice
situation for the Indigenous Australians, etc. On their own, the
objectives set out by those activists are clearly beyond their own
personal capacity to achieve. Therefore, they must try to win the
public support for their cause by doing advocacy.

FAITH IN HUMANITY IS ESSENTIAL
******************************
At this point, we can visualize an "activist", a "cynic" and a
"situation" that is beyond their capacity to solve. A cynic will
certainly be complaining about situation but will not try to correct
the problems. An activist, on the otherhand, will reach out to the
people and seeking improvements, no matter how small and being
insignificant. The activism, therefore, is being built-upon the
faith in humanity. A person may never become an activist, no matter
how articulate or having the power to communicate to the people, if
he/she does not have concern for the others and is lacking the faith
in humanity.

Engaging in advocacy is about becoming a service to the community
with the purpose of furthering the cause and in helping to those
vulnerable others. An activist must be open-minded and selfless in
seeking cooperation from the community and providing solidarity to
other activists. Without such spirit of cooperation, one would never
become a successful campaigner for the cause.

The faith in humanity, of course, does not mean to take a refuge in
the thought that everything in this world will turn out to be good
in the end. It means that the trust in fellow human-being's
willingness and ability to strive for the just and right causes.
Activism, therefore, is built upon the positive nature of human
society.

It may be true that the Burmese generally are not politically
open-minded -- i.e. not quite receptive to the well-meaning
activists and their advocacy. Even then, it is heartening that there
are no shortage of people, particularly among Burmese expatriate
community, who are being cooperative. Some people sought to complain
about the Burmese expatriate community as "A 3 Burmese has to have 2
political parties". Nevertheless, things are being done and many
more are going to get done in this way.

POLITICAL SOPHISTICATION IS NEEDED
**********************************
As explained above, the principal requirement for activism is the
good-heartedness towards others and the faith in humanity. However,
in politics things will not be done simply by having a goodwill. For
a successful advocacy, some level of political sophistication is
required. The activists, at least, must have the working knowledge
about the policy of various political actors, such as governments,
United Nations and other entities. For example, when you advocate
for the refugees to the United Nations, you must have the knowledge
about various U.N.Refugee Conventions and government policies etc.
Without such knowledge, your action will probably get to no-where.
In other words, the activist who advocate to the public must know
on what issue is he/she been talking about. It may be found that, in
politics, it is not always easy to identify the important issue.

In studying the policies of governments and other political actors,
to my experience, simply reading the policy statements is generally
not enough. One may have a grasp of the "working policy" for a
political entity only by observing it a fairly long time. Therefore,
no activist can simply "swing into action" in advocacy work: the only
path to political advocacy is via a process of gradual learning.

THE RIGHT TO ADVOCATE: MANDATE OF ACTIVISTS
*******************************************
There have been attacks on activists such as "self-appointed" judges
by cynics and-- sometime by professional politicians. There has
been a question of whether an activist has the right to advocate
on behalf of the people who are in a dire situation -- such as
people of Burma. The answer rest with the whole concept of
(political or human rights) advocacy and political leadership.

As far as human rights advocacy is concerned, the activists
certainly have the right to campaign on behalf of the oppressed.
This is simply because campaigning for human rights means
campaigning for the truth and justice. In other words, we need
nobody's permission to tell the truth and we require nobody's
blessing, including the oppressed, to serve justice. Therefore, it
is quite wrong to accuse human rights activists as the
self-appointed gurus.

The right to political advocacy (re: political leadership) is a
little more complex. However, our Burma history has given us some
good examples to look at on this question. It is as a matter of
understanding the political actions of activists and leaders
within the context of current socio-politics.

TWO DISCIPLINES OF POLITICAL ANALYSIS
*************************************

/* Discussions to be continued on Part-2 */