Capacity building to overcome discrimination and awareness-raising on their rights.

RIGHTS AIPP AIPP Regional Capacity Building Program - Training Manual on the UNDRIP 197 General Guide to Practical Advocacy Skills Advocacy is active espousal. It is aimed at gaining support for a cause or goal and at drawing participation in a general movement or in particular activities. It is the generation of awareness, interest and concern around an issue, then the mobilization of people for a desired action on the issue. Advocacy of legislative or policy, judicial, executive or administrative action on an issue usu- ally entails a rather long, sustained and multi-faceted campaign. For it to be effective, it should be well planned.

I. CONSIDERATIONS IN PLANNING A CAMPAIGN

A. Determine whether you have complete informaion on the issue. If you have in- formaion gaps, ill them. B. The irst target of your advocacy work should be the communiies afected by the issue. You therefore need to: 1. Identify exactly who these communities are. 2. Find out whether they are even aware of the issue. 3. If they are aware, find out whether they have sufficient and accurate information and un- derstanding of the issue. 4. Find out what they think, how they feel about it, and whether they can be mobilized to act on it.

C. Gauge the Poliical Situaion:

1. Government is not monolithic. Even if the issue is a judicial decision, a law, a policy or its implementation, or a government program or project, it is possible that members of the judi- ciary, legislature, administration or bureaucracy, or perhaps local government units, are against it. You therefore need to find out how different people in government stand on the issue. Deter- mine which government offices your campaign should address and which government officials would likely be your allies, which of them your adversaries. 2. Also determine how much political space is open to you, in your prospective conduct of a campaign. Gauge whether you should prepare for repressive action on the part of the state. D. Assess media coverage and gauge public awareness of the issue. Also gauge what kind of informaion and educaion materials will be most efecive in atracing and sustaining the atenion of the public. RIGHTS AIPP AIPP Regional Capacity Building Program - Training Manual on the UNDRIP 198

E. Assess the condiion of your campaign machinery:

1. Determine who exactly among the members of your organization can devote time to the campaign. Determine what their skills and capacities are, and define what roles they should play in the campaign. 2. Gauge who else, outside your organization, you can draw into the campaign. Note their skills and capacities, and gauge what roles they can play in the campaign. F. Based on an assessment of campaign needs and campaigners’ capacity, determine the scope or targeted coverage of your campaign – whether it will be local munici- pal, provincial, district etc., naional, regional or internaional. G. Assess the condiion of the material resources available to you for engaging in the campaign and gauge the possibility of raising more resources.

II. BASIC COMPONENTS OF A CAMPAIGN

A. Informaion and Educaion

Information-dissemination and education work may simply mean speaking with people, whether individually or in groups, in small meetings, forums or seminars, or in big public rallies. On the other hand, it may entail the production of such materials as the following: • fact sheets; • news reports or press releases; • statements of position, position papers, manifestos, petitions, resolutions; • essays, feature stories, exposés; • magazines, pamphlets, primers, comics; • info-posters, posters, photographs, photo essays, art exhibits; • theatrical, musical or dance performances on a stage, in a village square, on the streets etc., which may or may not be interactive or participatory; • slide shows or power point presentations; • video documentaries, short films; • audio productions such as recordings of songs, dramas or commentaries; • radio or television talks; • press conferences; • etc. Be as creative as possible, using traditional as well as modern forms. The important thing is to consider what forms will be most effective with your audience, given their character, needs and tastes. Some tips for information and education work: 1. Be clear in communicating your message. First, make sure that what you want to say is clear in your own minds. If it is, then you can say it clearly to others.