This question came from Charles N. via our latest website survey.

Too often when we talk about “advocacy,” we are talking about the kind that’s done by other people on behalf of people experiencing homelessness. While this is an important activity, it is crucial that we also value and pay attention to the ways that people experiencing homelessness participate in self-advocacy.

Considering advocacy undertaken by people with lived experience is important because they have the most at stake. I also think that their advocacy is much more valuable than other forms because they are the people most directly impacted by homelessness, poverty, and other issues – therefore they have the most control and motivation within their own movements.

While social service organizations provide many vital services and programs, the advocacy that many social service agencies can do is extremely limited – especially if they are funded by government initiatives. Mosley’s 2012 study confirmed that even though managers at agencies funded by government tend to be highly motivated to participate in advocacy, their goals and tactics are centered around securing funding for and promoting the agency.

As a result, substantial policy change and service user inclusion tend to not be included in such efforts even though they should be our primary focus. Projects, campaigns and coalitions led by people with lived experience are key in pushing for these direct changes.

Towards a New Bill of RightsEvaluation methods

As for how we should evaluate advocacy efforts, this all depends on what the goals of specific efforts are. Some advocacy is aimed at increasing awareness, while other forms target specific policy or program changes. In many ways, advocacy can be evaluated the same way we evaluate programs: by knowing the plan, goal and tactics used; and assessing whether or not those goals and outcomes were achieved.

In 2011, a group of youth experiencing homelessness in the U.S. worked with the Reciprocity Foundation to produce a documentary about their lives. It was nominated for an Emmy, and they went on to launch a “Homeless Not Hopeless” campaign during which they organized documentary viewings and discussion groups to raise awareness about potential solutions to youth homelessness and poverty. Though there aren’t any concrete numbers associated with their efforts, what we can be sure of is that their advocacy put youth homelessness in a spotlight that it otherwise wouldn’t have had. In this example, awareness was the goal and it was certainly achieved – over 700,000 people saw a single screening.

Simply sharing their stories and being heard remains a very powerful advocacy tool for people experiencing homelessness, whose voices are missing from so many policies and narratives about them. Homelessness is Only One Piece of My Puzzle: Implications for Policies and Practice collects a number of stories from people with lived experience and applies them to recommended changes in policy and practice.

Other advocacy groups go beyond raising awareness and target specific policies, actions and even people in their efforts. In Toronto, The Dream Team began as a group of consumer-survivors and family members advocating for more supportive, affordable housing in the city. The group’s members have a long list of achievements, including:

  • filing a "Human Rights complaint on Jan. 31st, 2008 against a politician. This politician had written a letter to the Committee of Adjustment indicating his opposition to a supportive housing agency’s attempt to acquire housing in his riding, and in his letter he made numerous derogatory comments about people with mental illness. The case was heard June 12, 2008 with results in the Dream Team members’ favour."
  • …acquiring "intervener status to help St. Jude Community Homes win its case at the Ontario Municipal Board hearing. At this hearing, neighbours were appealing the City of Toronto’s permission to renovate a former dairy into supportive housing for 29 homeless people."

This group also regularly participates in research and report-writing (including the report pictured right), and operates within a sponsoring organization (Houselink).

On the social service organization side, supporting groups led by people with lived experience is one way to indirectly participate in service user advocacy. It is also important to meaningfully engage people with lived experience in program evaluation that goes beyond simply including their narratives. This can be participatory, meaning people experiencing homelessness are included in the evaluation from beginning to end and have something to gain from the participation; or empowerment-oriented, meaning the goal of evaluation is to promote self-determination. In both methods, people actually using the services or attending the programs are given a change to give feedback and shape the future of the agency. People with lived experience must be authentically involved and represented if we want these services and programs to be successful, and ultimately, if we want to truly see social and political transformation.

This post is part of our Friday "Ask the Hub" blog series. Have a homeless-related question you want answered? E-mail us at thehub@edu.yorku.ca and we will provide a research-based answer.