IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/ororsc/v34y2023i1p456-483.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Triadic Advocacy Work

Author

Listed:
  • Summer Rachel Jackson

    (Harvard Business School, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02163)

  • Katherine Cissel Kellogg

    (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142)

Abstract

Scholars of street-level bureaucracy and institutional research focus primarily on the relationships between advocates and their larger bureaucratic and social systems, assuming that advocates have little need to satisfy their beneficiaries. We find otherwise in our two-year ethnographic study of public defenders advocating for disadvantaged clients in interactions with district attorneys. In our analysis of 82 advocacy opportunities, we demonstrate that, when existing bureaucratic and social systems put beneficiaries at a disadvantage, advocates may be concerned about managing fraught relationships with their beneficiaries in addition to navigating barriers within the bureaucratic and social systems. We further show a tension between the two; ironically, engaging in advocacy work on behalf of beneficiaries can lead to beneficiary mistrust. As a result, advocates engage in triadic advocacy work —managing impressions with their beneficiaries while also influencing powerful actors within the system on behalf of these same beneficiaries. Understanding the process by which advocates navigate this tension is critical to understanding beneficiary outcomes. By reconceptualizing advocacy work as a triadic process among advocate, bureaucratic system, and beneficiary rather than as a dyadic process between advocate and bureaucratic system, this paper develops new theory about how advocates can attempt to garner benefits that advance the rights and opportunities of the disadvantaged.

Suggested Citation

  • Summer Rachel Jackson & Katherine Cissel Kellogg, 2023. "Triadic Advocacy Work," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 34(1), pages 456-483, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:ororsc:v:34:y:2023:i:1:p:456-483
    DOI: 10.1287/orsc.2022.1588
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2022.1588
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/orsc.2022.1588?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:ororsc:v:34:y:2023:i:1:p:456-483. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.