Best Practices - Advocacy

Strengthening Democracy, Increasing Opportunities: Impacts of Advocacy, Organizing and Civic Engagement in Los Angeles
National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy
This research documents how 15 nonprofit organizations in Los Angeles County and their allies leveraged foundation grants to secure nearly $91 of benefit for every dollar spent for Los Angeles citizens.

Agenda for Action: Building a Movement for Elder Women's Advocacy
The Women's Foundation of California
Agenda for Action: Building a Movement for Elder Women's Advocacy presents the findings from the Elder Women's Initiative research and Speak-Outs organized through the combined efforts of The Women's Foundation of California, The California Endowment, UCSF Institute for Health & Aging, and the Insight Center for Community Economic Development.

Advocacy Funding: The Philanthropy of Changing Minds
GrantCraft
Advocacy includes many opportunities to improve public policy through work that is well within the limits of the law. Whether your organization is advancing an idea, arguing a position, or enriching the policy debate, the guide offers resources and strategies for planning your work, reaching your audience, assessing impact, and more.

Funding Community Organizing: Social Change through Civic Participation
GrantCraft
This guide highlights how funders and organizers make community organizing unique and uniquely effective, how to manage grantee relationships over time, understanding the value of process, and the grantmaker’s special role in fostering change.  This guide dispels grantmakers’ fears of not knowing how to measure the impact and effectiveness of community organizing work.

Words to Give By: Leading Voices in Advocacy Funding
Alliance for Justice
While making the case for foundation support of advocacy, the Alliance for Justice compiled lessons learned from 23 philanthropic leaders around making social change happen, identifying advocacy activities to support, and ensuring these efforts result in long-term community benefits.  Together, their stories offer a powerful and very personal look at the importance of investing in social change.

Tips for Evaluating Advocacy: A Checklist for Grantmaking Organizations
Alliance for Justice

The Challenge of Assessing Policy and Advocacy Activities: Strategies for a Prospective Evaluation Approach
Blueprint R&D
Blueprint R&D provides a variety of resources for foundations to measure the impact of policy advocacy work. A follow-up to this report, The Challenge of Assessing Policy and Advocacy Activities: Part II - Moving From Theory to Practice, is also available.