by Anya Ogórkiewicz
Three years after graduating, I gained employment managing the marketing and business development of a lobby firm in Warsaw. Although not a lobbyist myself, this rich experience provided me with a bird’s eye view of the profession, its practitioners and the backdrop to my coming of age as a “re-immigrant” in the country of my forefathers.
Ever since picking up my first copy of The Economist, its fast-paced kaleidoscope of economics and politics was just the stuff my teenage dreams and ambitions were made of. Yet I never imagined that I would work one day in the lobbying industry and, as a second-generation Polish-American, especially not back in my forefathers’ country. In high school after all, being a “Lobbyist” was a slur on par with being a “Nazi” or, for that matter, a “Capitalist”. Even today in the industry, most prefer the neutral “public affairs professional” or “government relations specialist” designation. Given that I’m on a crusade to reclaim the name, I make a point of introducing myself as a lobbyist at social events often to the surprise of my audience. However in truth, I am not a lobbyist; I simply happen to work for some of the best and brightest in Poland.
To better understand this profession and its practitioners, let’s first consider the lobbyist’s employer and the environment in which the lobby practice is embedded.
Either one is employed as an industry or in-house lobbyist for a particular company; or else one works in an agency and is assigned to key clients a.k.a. accounts. In the first case, the lobbyist will gradually become an expert in the main focus of the industry association or company that employs him. Here lie, for instance, lobbyists for the nuclear industry alongside anti-nuclear lobbyists (or “activists” for the layman), both sides experts in the nuclear field. When a lobbyist is employed by an agency however, she may find herself working on wind energy, breweries and a satellite radio client, thus building relationships in say, the Ministries of Energy, Health and Technology simultaneously. (This is a gross oversimplification just to illustrate my point about account holders). If the first case gradually makes a technical expert out of the lobbyist, the second quickly makes him a polymath.
When it comes to the environment in which the lobbyist functions, although the best and the brightest of this profession are political junkies by inclination, they may not necessarily operate in a political Mecca like Brussels or Washington D.C. where taxi drivers fill you in on the latest parliamentary gossip and hairdressers dole out lobbying advice. Most lobbyists work in cities where the profession is rare, and the practitioners make themselves discreet and thus suspicious. Poland falls squarely into the latter - here lobbyists have been compared to Darth Vader in respectable publications.
But this is not a Polish trait. I find the same misperception in every city not (over)run by lobbyists. Due to pop culture and in no small part, suggestive press coverage, many find it hard to believe that a lobbyist can be persuasive without resorting to bribery or blackmail. It’s a damning testament to our times that we find it improbable that a clearly presented solid argument anchored in facts and hard data can add to a debate and win an honest lawmaker over. A lobbyist’s persuasion skills are the tools of his trade and sometimes even of his life, as, for example, when a junior account executive was recently mugged at knifepoint and succeeded in negotiating back his personal belongings.
In Poland, celebrating its 20th anniversary as a democracy this year, the main piece of legislation regarding lobbyists was only passed four years ago. It legitimized the profession by making its practitioners wear bright red badges when they sit in the audience of parliamentary committee hearings, but otherwise it clearly lacked a clear definition and thus a basic understanding of what exactly it set out to regulate. To lobby is to advocate a client’s interests to government officials, most often to lawmakers and often in hopes that the laws being writing or amended will take into account the opinion of and the consequences to the segments of society concerned by the legislation. Instead of grappling with strict criteria, I suggest defining lobbyists, regardless of employer, remuneration rate or desired outcome, as any person who petitions the government for the sake of an entity other than his physical self. Such a broad definition would include organizations such as human rights activists and labor unions that would naturally, well, lobby for the term not to be applied to their case. Nonetheless, solid arguments can be advanced to counter the claims of these interest groups. After all, if the goal is to regulate, the lawmaker first needs to define the parameters of his regulatory reach. As this very example illustrates, at heart, lobbying is to participate in spirited debates within civil society; it’s a characteristic of a lively democracy.
The above is in sum my explanation, my retort to the faint gasps I hear when I introduce myself as a lobbyist at Warsaw’s cocktail parties. This American-born who calls herself a lobbyist is a curiosity in Poland. It stops polite chatter, jump-starts conversations; many seize the opportunity to ask whether some blue sky idea would make a viable campaign; others inquire as to what led me into the profession and how do I like it. One person admitted that I was the first lobbyist he ever met and was pleasantly surprised. Most are struck that I want to openly discuss lobbying, that I don’t attempt to hide or apologize for the field I work in.
Gaining employment in a controversial profession is probably the textbook worst manner to gently ease myself into the society of my forefathers. In practice, however, it was a thrilling way to discover Poland. I gained an invaluable grasp of both the legislative and the democratic process, met opinion-shapers and decision-makers, shared breathing space with Poles of great wit and intellect and, forgive the pun, polished my knowledge of those industries with government concerns, (ie: all of them). Today when I flick through The Economist and recall my teenage dreams and ambitions, I dare hope that in my own humble way, I am also honorably taking part in that “severe contest between intelligence, which presses forward, and an unworthy, timid ignorance obstructing our progress." CR
Picture: untitled by you are your atman from creativecommons.org
Anya Ogórkiewicz currently works in a government relations agency in Warsaw. Previously, she produced a regional natural gas conference and worked for a private equity group. Born in Chicago, raised in California, she lived twelve years in France, finished an M.Sc. at the University of Strasbourg and an M.A. at the College of Europe in Bruges. She likes long walks on the beach, especially at sunset when the oil rigs on the Caspian sparkle.
