Lobbying Workshops: A Morning with Mitch, Hudson & Felix Dodds
Hi Singapore!
As promised a while back, some updates on the lobbying training we had. During one of our morning youth caucus meetings, we had an informal lobbying workshop held by other members of the MGCY, Mitch & Hudson! As they have had some recent successes with lobbying, they were asked to conduct an internal workshop, which included interactive dialogues and role play. After a brief demonstration and theory session, we engaged in lobbying practice. The workshop addressed many concerns we had about lobbying, and was very useful overall.
We also attended a lobbying workshop later in the week held by Felix Dodds, the executive director of Stakeholder Forum (SHF). There, he shared many tips on lobbying, most of which I hadn’t considered before. I’ll just share a few of them here now.
1) Be well prepared: This may seem obvious, but often, people do not have all the necessary materials when they are engaging in lobbying. It is important to ensure that you have your namecard, a laptop, thumbdrive and preferably a hardcopy of your lobbying points before approaching a delegate.
2) Spend no more than 20% of your time on lobbying to other NGOs: The bulk of your time should be focused on talking to country delegates; they’re the ones who will ultimately make the decisions, not to mention its far easier to set up appointments with other NGOs.
3) Know what countries to lobby to: All countries are equal, but some are more equal than the others. Single vote countries (those that don’t vote in a bloc) should be focused on to get your amendments into the text. Examples include Norway, Switzerland, Japan et cetera. Blocs like G77+China must also be engaged to get amendmends passed though, and thus it’s good to know the “stronger” countries in a bloc.
4) Study the faces of the delegates religiously: It pays to know them by name, addressing them by their position is far more impersonal and may not be as effective. A “Face List” done by SHF gets sent around before the start of CSD to help us identify these government delegates.
5) Understand the reasons behind objections: Countries may not neccesarily be against the points proposed when they object to it. They may be unsure of the meaning, attempting to use it as a bargaining chip or simply wanting to change the wording and not the meaning. If you know the rationale behind their objections, it becomes easier to lobby them.
6) Take them out of their comfort zone: Don’t meet the delegates in their offices, bring them for a coffee or talk over lunch! Meeting them outside of familiar places ensures that they will be less confident of making assertive stances, and thus may be more receptive to your ideas.
That’s all for lobbying, more updates about successes as they come!
- Jonathan
