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Advocacy is a powerful tool for social change: Expert

American budget advocacy expert, who is pursuing his fellowship in Pune, is pleased to know that India is a vibrant and loud country, with no shortage of voices.

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American budget advocacy expert, who is pursuing his fellowship in the city, is pleased to know that India is a vibrant and loud country, with no shortage of voices.

“Advocacy in democracy is about getting what you want out of the government. In a democracy, which is a collection of voices, it is everyone’s job to use their voice to remind the government about what people want,” said Matthew Kaplan, a former Congressional staffer who has worked with US Congress on budgets for the last six years. He is currently in Pune completing his fellowship with National Centre for Advocacy Studies (NCAS) in Pashan.

Spending most of his time on projects related to budget advocacy and tribal sub-plan (TSP), an earmarked programme organised for the adivasi (tribal) community, Kaplan enlightened students on how the government budget writers think.

He took lectures at city-based MIT School of Government (MITSOG) and Karve Institute of Social Service.

“Strategies for advocacies are similar in the US and India, but the structures are different,” said Kaplan. He said that budget advocacy is an information sharing process between budget advocates and policy makers. “The work of an advocate involves developing years of work and a clear understanding on the scope of budgets, but the policy maker or legislator has to scrutinise this work often in 30 minutes or less,” said Kaplan.

On the role of advocacy, Kaplan said, “Our role is to help the government and policy makers to think about the process. We make them understand why things are not working and provide tools so as to make the budget work. If budgets do not work, there is a total breakdown in the democratic process.”

About tools used by budget advocates, Kaplan said that it involves asking questions to bureaucrats, sitting with them, meeting officials at local-level and dissecting where funds are going and how they are being used. He said that bureaucracy is the most conservative institution of government.

On January 5 and 7, Kaplan attended two workshops organised by National Centre for Advocacy Studies (NCAS), along with over 50 activists working on issues of adivasis in Koraput (Odisha) and Raipur (Chhattisgarh).

These workshops were conducted under the Adivasi Resource Centre programme of NCAS. The discussion was on the tribal sub-plan (TSP), a government budgeting programme meant for tribal communities.

Talking about his observation based on the discussions, Kaplan said, “The tribal communities have no stake or say in the promised funds. On paper, a fund is set aside for the tribal communities in all government budgets equivalent to the percentage of tribal population, but in practice, the allocation of this fund is riddled with problems.”

Meeting students of social work, activism and advocacy, Kaplan said most of them still don’t know in what direction they want to steer their careers. He added that being a professional in advocacy does not pay much, but it attracts those who have a passion for bringing changes.

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