Finding the Advocates: Practical Network Mapping Tools
Advocacy evaluators have embraced network mapping as a useful tool for understanding and evaluating advocacy networks, and with good reason. Mapping the connections in an advocacy field or network can provide great insights to advocates, evaluators – and to funders who seek to develop a field. Often, though, network maps are generated, and then a long “So what?” moment follows. There aren’t many publicly-available examples of network mapping usefully applied in the advocacy evaluation space. We’re delighted to add one!
Innovation Network (InnoNet) mapped advocacy capacity across Kansas, developing a series of network maps and an advocate database for use by the Kansas Health Foundation as it tries to understand the landscape of grassroots health policy advocacy capacity across Kansas and make funding decisions. The Foundation found the maps and database practical and useful. Kat Athanasiades, Senior Associate at Innovation Network, will speak about the rationale for using these tools to map advocacy capacity in Kansas, and Elina Alterman, Program Officer at the Kansas Health Foundation, will speak to how and why these tools were useful.