Strategies of "Activists"

Some general thoughts on the subject of Activism and what makes them tick. Activists of various hues such as Animal Rights (PETA), Environment (Greenpeace), Human Rights (PUCL, ACLU) etc. are a major non-state force in the global polity today, just like perhaps insurgents. They draw a lot of water, wield tremendous influence and needless to say are usually flush with cash. Of course they are not viable under certain circumstances, such as Human Rights Activism in Saddam era Iraq, China etc.

Does "activism" help? Obviously it helps in localized situations, but the total effect is at best unclear. We are more interested in finding out why activism works, how does it sustain etc.

Activists work against broadly two types of entities: Government/political entities and Corporate/Business entities. The effect of activism on businesses and corporations is so great that the phenomenon is regularly studied in business schools, to equip future managers with tools to deal with them. For instance, this course syllabus for "Ethics in Action" from the Tuck School of Business openly shows a significant portion devoted to strategies of activists (scroll to: STRATEGY AND ETHICAL DILEMMAS POSED BY ACTIVISTS).

Needless to say in this day and age of political correctness, the fact that business schools look upon activists as a major pain in the ***, shows something. Corporations like WalMart know. A whole cottage industry of leachers have grown around the venerated US retailer at local, state, national and global levels. WalMart deals with them in various ways, including PR campaigns, dedicated bloggers to fight misinformation etc. WalMart also supports every whims of these groups, it has become a major crusader in the "Green" movement. Funny thing is, the company is so super efficient, it is actually visibly impacting emissions standards and yet keeping costs low.

Quite obviously business schools can not openly teach effective techniques as they are essentially controversial in nature. Instead, they introduce students to some basic ideas and drop enough hints that dealing with activists may need underhanded techniques. A sample concept is as follows:

N * (individual economic loss) < Economic loss to the organization

N represents the number of activists embarking on a protest. In this simplistic and laughter inducing model, a number of do gooders are protesting against an errant corporation by picketing at a factory. The activists will win if the above inequality holds true. In that case the corporation will strike a deal. Actually, corporations do strike a deal in many cases, when the legal costs are insignificant. Some corporations have a no negotiation policy for obvious reasons. They fight each case in court to the bitter end.

Value creation or financing:

The first question is of course, how do these activists create value? Without tangibles, the movement will not survive. Donations are a major factor, but even a significant part of donations are obtained by plain blackmailing. These organizations employ a very large number of people, who in turn become dedicated fighters for the cause. So, when you see that banner waving crowd protesting against something or the other, they are not quite what you think. Most of them are being paid for the job, you are the one footing the bill, indirectly.

In India, we have the Government subsidize and directly finance these organizations. The last UPA Government unleashed an unprecedented NGO culture. No public records or accounting is available, nor is it obvious how such funds were disbursed. The potential for abuse is phenomenal. In any case, NGOs are a special case, generally speaking the money does not make it to the activists.

A special case is Human Rights Activism. Government money is directly available to them since they also double up as NGOs involved in rehabilitation efforts.

Activists also enlist students and genuine citizens concerned for the cause. Often these unsuspecting folks do not know that the sweet talking dude who is leading them to a protest is in on the money. They also get free endorsement from Film stars and public personalities. It is a much better option to appear in a 30 second ad than stir up the hornets nest.

Activism greatly benefits from network externalities, the more the merrier. You support the cause, you get assignments. You write about the cause. The cause becomes even bigger.

Political involvement:

Just like some people argue that caste should not be a factor in politics since every party can put up caste candidates, activism should not really impact the political process. It should be easy to neutralize environmental and animal cruelty activism.

Unfortunately activism has become a significant part of the political process, each reinforcing the other. Apart from the financing factor, activists often use propaganda to enlist people. They inform a significant number of people, so political parties recruit them to send out political messages.

Activists generally end up supporting one side of the political spectrum. This is a riskless strategy. It works regardless of whether their party is in power. Arguably they might lose out on Government financing when their party is not in power, but this is compensated by the fact that the party will have to enlist them for political campaigns anyway.

Contrast this with the strategy of going after every political party. This does not fly since then the political parties might collude to put the activists out of business.

When their party is in power, activists become subdued, introspective. They can still go after the opposition.

To Summarize:

• Activism adds little societal value.
  
• Activism flourishes in open societies such as the US, Europe, India etc. while paradoxically they bat for the principles of China, Iraq etc.
  
• They are very closely involved in the political process
  
• They are most definitely not gentle, concerned citizens. 
  
• They are wily bastards who often have the gall and resources to go after big corporations.
  
• Activists have strong financing available to them.
  
• Activist strategies are drawn from economics: go after big targets, offer a reasonable compromise etc.
  
• Corporations often bribe activists to make them go away.
  
• Activism thus is an indirect tax on the society paid for by unsuspecting people.
  
• Activists often end up distorting the political process and causing irreparable harm to society.