The Greyness in White Papers

The most surprising thing about this particular public piece of information is that it was paid for and sponsored. Not to say that this particularly indicates fraud but as Jill Walker Rettburg states in her book Blogging, on page 98, "commercial blogging…is the field where the temptation to create fake blogging personas is the strongest." Yet, this article was not published "commercially." It is the type of literature that shows up in business spheres. Another surprising thing, at first glance, was the table of contents. It makes sense within a document produced that has so much information packed into one space, but it was surprising how linear and formal the information appears to be presented.
In the white paper article "Illegal to Be Homeless: The Criminalization of Homelessness in the United States," the objective is clearly stated  and the purpose for its existence is obvious; the document seeks to present itself as a sort of guide to the legality of homelessness, stating "The following report will document that people experiencing homelessness are subject to basic violations of their civil rights through the unconstitutional application of laws, arbitrary police practices and discriminatory public regulations." The authors seek to present that the issue is widespread and not just a local issue that requires immediate attention.
The reason this particular document does not feel familiar is because it is a document focused on legal issues but it is not produced by a team a lawyers—it is funded and produced by people who appear to have a vested interest in the problem. Where this blurs between "journalism" and other types of public discourse is that "a journalist is presumed to be outside the action…", according to Rettberg on page 104 of her book. This document was very clearly not produced by someone who is outside the action. In fact, many involved directly work with the homeless—the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, just to name a couple.
This document is taking several different occurrences and synthesizing them, correlating them and giving them an outcome. Criminalization of homelessness is caused by discriminatory public practices, racism, and the housing-income gap. It seeks to be rational and tries to avoid being enthymematic in regards to their claims staked. Often times, this is the kind of article that would be used as the basis for changes made in public policy, a document not really produced for public consumption but still available to the public eye. That indicates transparency and an attempt at authenticity.
These types of reports don't seek to say they are an expert on a particular field but they do attempt to build an argument based on germane evidence and studies done by others, building an implicit and explicit argument based entirely on facts. It tries to maintain its formal tone but yet it wants to be an authority, the backbone for many arguments to come.