| Summary: | A special issue on advocacy and agency is presented. Topics discussed include: definitions and ethical dimensions of advocacy; the role played by advocacy in expanding aging policy in the U.S.; the ability of organizations to use advocacy in order to change social and cultural systems; the variety of roles that attorneys can play as advocates; the role played by bureaucrats as “insider” advocates; key elements of administrative and legislative lawmaking systems that advocates must be familiar with; ways in which organizations involved in advocacy for elderly people have responded to the challenges of neoconservatism; the reasons why advocates for the elderly have achieved only moderate success in building stronger programs for this portion of the population; the future of advocacy in the interest of older people; the decline in advocacy for aging programs and policies; advocacy for individuals, and the role of case managers, hospital discharge planners, and nursing home social workers as advocates; advocating for Indian elders; two examples from Ohio of the power of local advocacy to secure funding for senior services; and lessons from the Southwestern Pennsylvania Partnership for Aging on how to create an advocacy coalition of varied interest groups with different agendas.
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