Administrative Advocacy and Black Urban Administrators

Black administrators are part of the new thrust for greater black participation in urban governance. This essay examines the extent to which they can and do advocate the interests of black communities through civic, community and professional organizations. The concept of advocacy is discussed and distinguished from concepts of representation, in order to focus more on the advocacy behavior of black urban administrators. Advocacy behaviors are also identified and organized into a civic/community advocacy index and a professional advocacy index. These indices generate scores which suggest the presence and the intensity of advocacy behavior among administrators in the study. A control group of white administrators was selected with which to compare the advocacy inclinations of black urban administrators. Administrators from Washington, St. Louis, New Orleans, and San Francisco participated in the study. Survey research was used not only to examine the advocacy behavior of administrators but also to generate social and occupational data which could be related to advocacy scores. The major finding of this study is that, although black urban administrators appeared more inclined to advocate civic, community, and professional interests than white administrators, the majority of both black and white administrators are generally not advocacy prone.