Clout Observations from Roberto Bedoya

So advocacy for me is not about arts advocacy, it advocating for and defending the very meaning of public—of the public good embedded in civil society. I believe strongly that my charge is to build and defend civil society through the tools at my disposal—the creative community that the arts council serves and our collective passionate belief in democracy. It also has to deal with how complicity is constructed through laws and policy that says you belong, you don’t belong. How the cultural sector plays into the politics of belong/dis-belonging is a charged topic that we must engage in with more rigor and vigor, if we want our advocacy efforts to have weight and soul.

Yet, in spite of the attacks against cultural differences and the very notion of the public good, I feel that the cultural community is steadfast as it faces these challenges through the work of creating shared visions of our relationships to each other—be it in a concert hall, in a barrio, in a gallery or in a book.

Your words triggered much thought and if my musing a bit much and off target because of its local references, let’s continue the conversation. As my advocacy work has moved from the national that took me to the Supreme Court as a co-plaintiff in the Finley vs. NEA lawsuit to now my local efforts in a mid-size American city, what I’ve learned is how the sovereignty of context is essential to advocacy arguments: that what works in Tucson, may or may not work in San Francisco; what works with the white gloves may or may not work with the anarchists; what works in communities of color may or may not work among the Anglo community—that understanding context with all its complicities is essential to successful advocacy work.