Activism and the Policy Process by Anna Yeatman

Author:Anna Yeatman [Yeatman, Anna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Political Science, Political Process, Political Parties
ISBN: 9781864487046
Google: kx98QgAACAAJ
Goodreads: 3486252
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Published: 1998-01-15T06:12:18+00:00

The Consumer Research Development Programme

In 1985 The Swinging Door report recommended that the Commonwealth Department of Health allocate research funds to community organisations to research the information needs of their constituency and to carry out 'participatory and social action research'. Then, in the following year, the report of the Better Health Commission recommended '. . . that a national community development fund should be established to assist in, and educate local communities about participation and advocacy projects' (Better Health Commission 1986, vol. 1, p. 75). In 1987 when the Consumers' Health Forum of Australia was established, it had as part of its foundation budget, a small fund ($60 000) earmarked for grants to consumer and community groups for research and development projects.

This grants programme had an important ana unique role in research funding in Australia, as the funds enabled consumer and community groups to initiate and conduct their own projects—not to have research done about them by an 'expert', but for the groups to undertake the activities themselves, defined in their terms and by their assessment of the perceived needs and information gaps. 'This tiny fund . . . represented almost the entire monies available for consumer and community controlled research projects' (CHF to Department of Health, 24 May, 1989). Thus, the Consumers' Health Forum enabled consumer representatives to network, and to be resourced with the research and information that enabled them to be properly briefed and knowledgeable in their roles as consumer advocates.

Between 1987 and 1989, the Committee administering the CHF grants programme was chaired by a sociologist, Yoland Wadsworth, a well-known social policy activist and advocate of participatory or action research (Wadsworth 1984, 1989). In 1990, when Wadsworth resigned from the Committee, I accepted an invitation to join the Grants Committee, renamed the Consumer Research Development Funding Committee, and I remained a member until its demise just two years later.

The Consumers' Health Forum research funding programme aimed to fund only those applications which especially demonstrated and furthered a consumer perspective. Grant applicants were asked to specify how consumers would be involved in the management of the proposed project, and groups representing professional, government or commercial interests were not eligible to apply. It was, however, acceptable for consumer groups to seek assistance from another organisation in carrying out its project; the group remained eligible if it was managed and initiated by consumers and genuinely oriented to consumers. The centrality of research to the work of the Forum is illustrated in the following excerpt in correspondence from the Forum to the Department of Health (24 May, 1989):

The CHF was established to strengthen the 'voice' of the consumer and community sector in health policy-decision making. We believe that a strong consumer voice is one which grounds its arguments in research. For this to be possible, consumers must have access to the resources and education necessary to undertake research work which is of a high quality, as well as community controlled and community based.

Between 1987 and 1992 seventy-five consumer research projects were

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.