Public Affairs in Practice: A Practical Guide to Lobbying

Citation

de Lange, R. (2007), "Public Affairs in Practice: A Practical Guide to Lobbying", Corporate Communications: An International Journal, Vol. 12 No. 3, pp. 311-312. https://doi.org/10.1108/13563280710776897

In the part of Europe where I live, the Netherlands, public affairs is seen as a relatively new field of practice and study. It is said to be more developed, though, than in some parts of the south of Europe, but less than in the USA, where the concept was born. In this respect, the UK holds a position between the Netherlands and the USA. This is one of the reasons why we sometimes look for books on this subject coming from the UK, and thus why we read the book that is on review here.

As the subtitle already clearly indicates, it is a practical guide. The authors claim that there is a clear need for that. “For those entering the industry” Thomson and John write in their preface, “there is not currently a book that helps them to learn about the “do's and don'ts” or what is expected of them” (p. XV). In the light of my opening sentences above, that comes a bit as a surprise. Although, as a foreigner to the UK, I could not claim to be an expert on British literature in this field, I remember having read British books and articles on this subject already over a decade ago. Maybe the crux is in the word “currently” which leads them to go into current developments that look surprisingly similar to those in other countries. These developments imply that lobbying is increasingly seen as a sub‐field of the wider and socially more integrated field of public affairs. Another one is the awareness that the still existing negative connotations of lobbying seem to be more and more countered by logical argumentation and friendly comments by politicians and other targets of lobbying, who admit that in their work they rely partly on the effort of good PA practitioners. But perhaps most prominent of all is the structural growth of PA as a strategic discipline.

So, is this a useful book? I suppose it is. As more new people – and by the same token, recently graduated junior staff – are entering the field, and the number of university curricula on this topic seem to lag behind, it is always useful to have a practical “how‐to” hands‐on book on the shelf in the office. For, practical it is. The book contains practical tips on how to get into public affairs, what skills and academic subjects are necessary, how the aspiring PA practitioner can acquire valuable working experience that may enhance his or her chances of entering the field, and what the typical working day of the junior PA practitioner will look like. It describes the possible reasons for PA, how to monitor, the outlines of how policy is made in the UK, how to lobby, the tools and techniques and, indeed, all the do's and the don'ts that one might think of. The global environment and, not the least important for the social responsible corporation, the ethical codes of conduct are not forgotten. The authors dedicate a special section to corporate social responsibility (CSR).

At times they go (too?) far in this practical book for instance, in the chapter about building support, the authors give advice about how to successfully organise so‐called fringe meetings at party conferences. Book an appropriate room, they write, make reservations on time, consider which title sounds best for the topic under consideration, order appropriate refreshments (“A good selection can help attract an audience and keep them in the room”), order appropriate projectors and microphones and double check EVERYTHING (pp. 96‐7).

Sections like these may make the reader smile, at times, but do not make the most exciting reading, not to say that they are boring. At the same time, however, as an experienced teacher (and I assume senior PA consultants would agree with me) I can imagine giving this practical handbook to my students (or my interns or trainees for that matter), saying: read it from cover to cover and keep it at hand while you work. If the book had been written for the Dutch situation, I can also imagine that I would use it in my PA seminars at the university.

This brings me, finally, to a few points of critique. There are two important subjects that occupy the academic agenda for public affairs, that I miss. One is the lack of theories that might guide practical work as well as research in this field. This point is completely neglected in this work. Now the authors might claim that the title promises the readers a practical guide and that is what they are going to get. But that does not completely satisfy me. More so, because both authors are PhD's and act as consultant and lecturer. They certainly know Kurt Lewin's almost cliché phrase: nothing so practical as a good theory. In my view, both consultants and lecturers are what I often call “practical intellectuals” for whom the final quest is to infer generalised theory on the basis of researched practice and to guide practice on the basis of validated theory.

The other point is the widely felt need among practitioners and scholars alike for tools to measure the effects and to evaluate public affairs. In a survey among 200 practitioners that we did a few years ago, this last point came out as the most wanted topic for further research and theorising. If not for their own professional satisfaction, practitioners always feel the need to justify their expenses and ultimately their existence. When I read the section “What Difference does Public Affairs make?” (pp. 7‐8), I thought for a moment that this practical book was going to give us some insight into this crucial matter. But, it contains only sentences with “can” and “may” (e.g. “PA can protect an organisation from the perceived threat of a new policy initiative … ” “… may help to avoid a damaging incident … ” (my italics)), but not a word on how actually to asses these effects.

Relevant for the international readership of this journal is that the book focuses for a large part on political bodies, institutions and circumstances in the UK. But, apart from the mentioned omissions, the book contains a lot of interesting knowledge and insights, also the for the non‐British readers.