The best things in life are free: community‐powered advocacy

Abstract

PurposeThis is an opinion piece about exploring fresh approaches to advocacy for older and disabled people. The purpose of the paper is to suggest a new role for professional advocates. Professional advocacy help can be an important first step to a stronger life or it can be a revolving door. It makes all the difference when we've got people around us who can help us to get over problems, and not feel we're stuck on our own. But most users of services have no one whom they can turn to when things get tough for them. What if we designed advocacy services so they acted on the causes of demand for advocacy, rather than delivered a number of advocacy transactions?Design/methodology/approachThis article uses the experiences of Grapevine in Coventry and draws on the findings of a project conducted with advocacy organisations in the Midlands and South East, many of whom felt that professional advocacy was not getting to the root of the problem.FindingsAdvocacy practice is about being a corrective to failures in other services and an intermediary between service users and providers. It can be very vulnerable at times to being seen as an “add‐on” of unproven value.Practical implicationsThe article asks practitioners to consider the new role advocates might play in developing and connecting networks of local people for mutual help and support. This “community‐powered” advocacy could provide effective root cause help and protect the sector's legitimacy during unprecedented financial austerity.Originality/valueThe paper is of value to practitioners and commissioners of advocacy services.