Pollwatch: David Cameron's "blame Europe" strategy - a quick postscript

via noiseofthecrowd.com

Leo Barasi has provided some useful context for the Cameron-Osborne "blame Europe" narrative on the economy. Their "blame Labour for the cuts" narrative still has some way to go. But half the country now holds the coalition responsible for the cuts, at least in part. Time for a new story . . .

Posted via email from Neil Stockley's posterous

Narrativewatch: David Cameron's 'blame Europe' strategy

In the second third of this parliament, the one now beginning, and whose opening will be marked by Osborne's autumn economic statement on 29 November, Britain's economic woes will be laid rather less at Labour's door and rather more at that of the eurozone. That's why Cameron and Osborne are now constructing a very obvious narrative of continental European failure, from which Britain is thankfully (as they depict it) exempt, but which nevertheless continues to put the UK economy at risk. 

In some ways, blaming Europe is not as easy as blaming Labour. Labour is a stationary target, and both coalition parties can unite in dumping on it. Europe, by contrast, is a moving target that divides the coalition parties and emphasises their differences. But the political beauty for the Conservatives of blaming Europe is big. It goes down well with Tory activists. It allows Cameron and Osborne to frame their engagement with the EU as candid friends and it chimes with public opinion. And in particular it provides a ready-made and not entirely specious excuse for the failure of the government's economic strategy in the first third of the parliament.

via guardian.co.uk

In today's Guardian, Martin Kettle has a very perceptive article about the Cameron-Osborne narrative that "Europe is to blame" for Britain's economic woes.

Kettle's analysis picks up on the main purposes of political narratives. He brings out how they work.

First, narratives provide an account and an explanation for current problems, complete with heroes and, more importantly, fall guys and villains.

Second, they enable listeners to frame options for the future and work out what they need to do next -- in this case, to keep giving the coalition, or more importantly, the Conservative component, the benefit of the doubt.

"Blame Europe" has many of the properties of a successful narrative. It's easy to grasp and not completely implausible. And it plays to an emotional reflex that is very familiar to a large section - almost certainly a majority - of the British public.

Labour and the Liberal Democrats will have a hard time grappling with this narrative. Labour's best bet will be to pin the blame for Britain's economic problems on Cameron and Osborne and to argue that they have not kept us out of the Eurozone crisis.

Nick Clegg will have little choice but to blame the former Labour government -- unless he wants to recast his party's storylines about the EU. But will the public have moved on by 2015?

Posted via email from Neil Stockley's posterous

Narrativewatch: David Cameron, Winston Churchill and the bulldog

David Cameron’s speech to the Conservative Party conference has had a mixed reception from political commentators.

I thought the most interesting bit came at the very end of the speech.

We can be a country where people look back on their life and say: I've worked hard, I've raised a family, I'm part of a community and all along it was worth my while. We're too far away from that today but we can get there. 

It's not complicated, but not easy either - because nothing worthwhile is easily won. But you know, we've been told we were finished before. 

They said when we lost an Empire that we couldn't find a role. But we found a role, took on communism and helped bring down the Berlin Wall.

They called our economy the sick man of Europe. But we came back and turned this country into a beacon of enterprise.

No, Britain never had the biggest population, the largest land mass, the richest resources, but we had the spirit. Remember: it's not the size of the dog in the fight - it's the size of the fight in the dog. Overcoming challenge, confounding the sceptics, reinventing ourselves, this is what we do. It's called leadership.

James Kirkup of the Daily Telegraph quickly saw what kind of story the PM was pitching.

I don’t think you have to be a historian to get the impression that Mr Cameron would like you to think about British bulldogs, Sir Winston Churchill and the war.

. . . . Mr Cameron is pitching himself as the man to lead us into the battle to come.  Quietly, he’s recasting himself, changing his role from sunshine kid to economic war leader.

As James Kirkup suggests, that’s quite a hard transition to make.

What’s more, in starting to tell a Churchillian narrative, David Cameron has taken on a big challenge.

Let’s recall the basic elements of Churchill’s wartime narrative.  In his new book, All Hell Let Loose: the World at War (1939-45), Max Hastings says:

It is hard to imagine that Britain would have continued to defy Hitler after June 1940 in the absence of Winston Churchill, who constructed a brilliant and narrowly plausible narrative for the British people, first about what they might do, and later to persuade them of what they have done.

Harking back to the Spanish Armada and invoking the myth of the “strong island nation”, Churchill declared that “we shall never surrender . . . we will fight them on the beaches”.  The goal – “victory at all costs” - was never in doubt and nearly everyone had a part to play in the war effort.  By contrast, beyond getting rid of the public deficit, David Cameron’s strategy for winning the economic war and building a strong economy, is much harder to pin down

In 1940, Churchill could rally the British public and tell them “what they might do” because it always obvious who the enemy was – a real nation with a powerful military force and a demonic leader.  In 2011, it is not so clear who or what Mr Cameron wants to lead Britain and prevail against.

All through World War II, Winston Churchill told another, parallel story – that of the strong and purposeful community, fighting together, making equal sacrifices and winning together.  According to the latest data from Ipsos MORI, seven voters in ten perceive that the coalition government’s plans to reduce the national deficit will hit poor people hardest.  People don’t think that “we’re all in this together”.  The “strong community” archetype does not look like one that David Cameron can easily deploy.

None of this means that David Cameron should give up on trying to be an economic war leader.  He and his colleague may yet devise a strategy that the public can rally behind. In any case, fast-moving events could leave them with little choice.  For now, however, these words from the PM’s closing proration may be the most instructive:

Overcoming challenge, confounding the sceptics, reinventing ourselves, this is what we do. It's called leadership

David Cameron will find that he has more personal credibility on these counts than by trying to call Churchill, Henry V and the bulldog into action.  He could re-tell and apply the stories from his own political life to illustrate what his type of leadership is about.  In this respect, Cameron could take after Churchill who, lest we forget, embodied his own narrative by staying in London during the blitz, thereby exposing himself to the risk of physical danger. 

 

Posted via email from Neil Stockley's posterous

Nick Clegg's rating for "competence" may vindicate his coalition strategy

Could Nick Clegg’s strategy of taking “full ownership” of the coalition's decisions – even unpopular ones – may be paying off, after all?

Earlier this month, The Independent’s Andrew Grice summed up the accepted version of Nick Clegg’s approach to the coalition thus far:

The Deputy Prime Minister is convinced that his party would reap no dividend at all if it tried to let the Conservatives take the blame for the nasty medicine needed to cure the country's economic ills.

He hopes the Liberal Democrats will eventually get a reward for facing up to hard decisions, by showing they can be trusted in Government and are no longer a wasted vote.

This strategy, which now seems to be in the process of being modified, addresses the weakest points of the Liberal Democrats’ brand. So far, however, “owning the coalition” doesn’t appear to have done the party much good. According to YouGov, in mid-December 2010, our poll ratings for being “led by people of real ability” and having “leaders [who] are prepared to take tough and unpopular decisions” were still stuck in single figures, just as they were before the general election.

It may not be as simple as that. We also need to look at public perceptions of Nick Clegg who is the most accessible symbol of the party, the embodiment of our narrative. That is especially true in this era of quasi-presidential politics.

In The House magazine (17 January 2011, p.9), Professor Paul Whiteley of the British Election Study relates how, in their monthly surveys, the BES asks people to rank each party leader on a scale that runs from 0 (very incompetent) to 10 (very competent). I can’t find an electronic version of his article or the graph, so here are his main conclusions:

Surprisingly, Nick Clegg has been in the lead on this measure for almost the whole of the period [November 2009 to November 2010]. He overtook David Cameron in the competency stakes in December 2009 and has been ahead of him ever since.

Clegg’s rating was boosted by the general election campaign and, in particular, the first of the televised debates.

But the post-election unpopularity of the Liberal Democrats, which has seen their voting support plunge to half that of their general election vote share, has not affected his competency ratings very much.

Professor Whiteley goes on to add a cautionary note, that competency is but one dimension of leadership evaluations. He says that a leader should also be seen as likeable, trustworthy and in touch with ordinary people.

On these scores, the news for Clegg is mixed. The Ipsos MORI political monitor for December 2010 found that 27% of voters thought that he was “more honest than most politicians” compared to 33% for David Cameron and 24% for Ed Miliband.

Ipsos MORI also found that 43% of voters thought that Clegg was “out of touch with ordinary people”, compared to 51% for David Cameron and 34% for Ed Miliband.

Like all polling figures, these findings need to be seen in context. First, at the time of the election, Clegg was seen as the most honest and down to earth of the three leaders, according to Ipsos MORI. So, Cameron has now overtaken him in these areas.

Second, YouGov have tracked a downward trend since the election debates in Clegg’s ratings for being “in touch with the concerns of ordinary people”, “honest” and “sticking to what he believes in”. His best score, especially with Lib Dem and Conservative voters, is for being “charismatic”. [Anthony Wells provides some useful background, including on pre- and post-debate comparisons, here.]

Third, the BES figures cited above do not show the full impact of the tuition fees debacle. Ipsos MORI have traced the plunge in perceptions of Nick Clegg’s trustworthiness in the wake of the tuition fees vote.

Professor Whiteley finishes with the following suggestion.

[To] be seen as competent gives a leader a real advantage since it wins him an audience – voters will listen to a leader who they think is competent, whereas they are likely to dismiss a leader they think is incompetent.

I agree with Professor Whiteley, but I would add that being seen as “strong” is even more important. Last month, YouGov reported that just 5% of voters thought that Clegg was “strong” and 8% saw him as “decisive”. These were amongst his weakest areas just before election day [YouGov], when his popularity was at its peak so perhaps all is not lost. But voters might expect to see evidence of “strength”, which may go some way towards explaining the Lib Dems’ disappointing performance at the election.

Over the next couple of years, Nick Clegg will provide a test case for these theories. His future, and that of the Liberal Democrats, could well hinge on the way public perceptions of his competence, strength, likeability and trustworthiness pan out.

Narrativewatch: Canada's deficit cuts are not a simple story for UK politicians

As the prime minister, David Cameron warns of the need for massive spending cuts to bring down the UK's huge public deficit, the coalition is citing the experience of Canada's Liberal government during the 1990s. In 1992, Canada had a budget deficit of 9% of GDP. By 1997, they were showing a surplus. When they were in opposition, senior Conservatives studied the Canadian experience in some detail.

At the weekend, deputy PM Nick Clegg praised the way the Canadian Liberals consulted the public over where to make cuts -

"taking the people with them".

This is a political version of what Stephen Denning calls a springboard story:

a story that enables a leap in understanding by the audience so as to grasp how an organization or community or complex system may change.

He explains:

A springboard story has an impact not so much through transferring large amounts of information, but through catalyzing understanding. It enables listeners to visualize from a story in one context what is involved in a large-scale transformation in an analogous context.

But springboard stories need to be handled with care. There's usually more to them than the politicians let on, or understand. And context is key.

Today, the FT recounts how external developments - low interest rates, a rebounding global economy and a falling Canadian dollar - helped the country's numbers to come right.

Larry Elliott of The Guardian has described some of the differences between Canada's economy then and the UK's now:

Canada was aided by the pick-up in the global economy in the 1990s, and especially the strong US expansion. Britain does not have a fast-growing US for a neighbour: it has a eurozone mired in crisis.

There are other reasons why the Canadian experience may not be exported so easily. Today, The Guardian's Heather McRobie points to some important political-cultural distinctions. She says that the Canadian government took a comprehensive approach to deficit-cutting, with a high level of co-ordination between departments. She doubts that this country's Conservative-dominated coalition government could do the same.

Neil O'Brien of Policy Exchange has stressed that the Canadian government took a consistent, "no exemptions" approach -- and devolved responsibility for finding savings to officials. The latter would be a major departure for the UK's centralised model of government. O'Brien also points out that the size of the UK deficit gives the coalition a much bigger mountain to climb than Canada faced.

Yesterday, the Daily Telegraph highlighted the downsides of what happened in Canada:

The science budget was halved, while agricultural subsidies, overseas aid and transport were also badly hit . . .

. . . As provincial governments saw their health grants slashed, thousands of nurses were sacked and hospital waiting times soared. The shortage of new buildings also led to overcrowding and higher infection rates on wards.

But a report from The Times last year gives a somewhat different perspective:

. . .the federal administration of the Prime Minister, Jean Chrétien, a Conservative [sic] elected in 1993 . . . targeting the cuts carefully and calling on different departments to make very different sacrifices.

There were big cuts in fisheries (22 per cent), defence (more than 15 per cent), transport (50 per cent) and international aid (20 per cent) departments but benefits for the elderly increased by 15 per cent over six years and spending on aboriginal peoples and children rose by around 10 per cent.

[In May 2009, David Halpern of the Institute of Government developed some of these points in more detail.]

Perhaps we should be wary of the way UK commentators can cherry pick factoids from other countries' experiences (that is, tell stories). I speak from experience -- I sometimes think that New Zealand post-1984 has been used to back up every policy argument in the UK.

Here's another example. Andrew Sparrow of The Guardian has used an anecdote of how at least one hospital in Canada was blown up. But this was done under the provincial government in Alberta, which had targeted health and education spending.

Nick Clegg may have been on safer ground when he stuck to the way Canada's Liberals managed the politics of fiscal consolidation. Last year, Brian Tobin, another former Liberal minister who was involved in the Canadian deficit cutting exercise, was asked what were the lessons for the UK. His main conclusion:

"What needs to be done...is to speak frankly, openly and honestly.

"Don't try to over-simplify the issue. Don't try to put all the blame on the previous administration. Because if you're in a fiscal mess, it's often generational or structural."

This level of candour will be a new experience for UK politicians and voters. All the major parties were slated during the campaign for not being straight with people about the deficit and their plans to reduce it -- although I have to say the Liberal Democrats came off more lightly than the others.

Still, coalition ministers will need to get their narratives in order, and quickly. In today's FT, Paul Martin, who was Canada's finance minister in the 1990s, agrees that informing and consulting the public were hugely important elements in his success. But the article also points out that:

events beyond Canada's borders helped. The Mexican debt crisis broke just two months before Mr Martin was due to deliver his belt-tightening budget in early 1995. Canadians were jolted by a much-quoted Wall Street Journal editorial that described the Canadian dollar as the northern peso.

Posted via email from Neil Stockley

The lightsabre passes to a new generation of leaders

This week, we saw a real British revolution: the handover of power from a Labour government to the Conservative-Liberal Democrat adminstration, this country’s first coalition government since World War II.

But another transition took place this week, that may prove to be every bit as important. The baby boomers’ generation, embodied by the outgoing Labour prime minister, Gordon Brown (born 1951) and the party’s deputy leader, Harriett Harman (born 1950), were sent packing.

In their place came Conservative prime minister, David Cameron (born 1966) and Liberal Democrat deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg (born 1967). They are both representatives of what the American commentator Jonathan Pontell calls Generation Jones. This cohort was born between 1955 and 1967 and they are the real children and not the “flower children” of the 1960s, part of a demographic bridge that came between the “boomers” and Generation X, born between 1968 and 1980.

Pontell describes Generation Jones as:

practical idealists, forged in the fires of social upheaval while too young to play a part.

Yes, the UK has cabinet government, not a presidential system and some of the new coalition’s key players and senior office holders are not part of Generation Jones. The chancellor, George Osborne (born 1971) is a GenXer. The business secretary, Vince Cable from the Liberal Democrats, was born during World War II. Tory “big beast” Ken Clarke (born 1940) predates them all.

But the demographic tilt is unmistakeable. The foreign secretary, William Hague was born in 1961. The home secretary, Theresa May was born in 1956, the education secretary Michael Gove in 1967 and the defence secretary Liam Fox in 1961. On the Liberal Democrat side, the chief secretary to the Treasury, David Laws was born in 1965.

And the new parliament is dominated by Generation Jones. Dods Research has found that 291 of the 649 MPs elected so far were born between 1955 and 1967.

These UK politicians join other Jonesers who have reached the top of politics in recent years: Frances’s president Nicolas Sarkozy (born 1955), Germany’s chancellor Angela Merkel (born 1954), Australia’s prime minister Kevin Rudd (born 1957), London’s mayor Boris Johnson (born 1964) and New Zealand’s prime minister John Key (born 1961).

What marks these leaders out is their efforts to leave behind old political battles, and, perhaps, core ideologies. Sarkozy would rather that France forgot all about Paris in May 1968. Key was too young to protest against the Vietnam war and, astonishingly, once said that he could not remember whether he was for or against the 1981 Springbok tour. And, of course, Barack Obama offered Americans the opportunity to move on from the culture wars that started in the 1960s. He came to prominence by declaring, “there is no red state America, there is no blue state America; there is the United States of America”.

But whether they stand on the moderate left or the moderate right, the leaders from Generation Jones have been less clear about defining what they stand for, as opposed to what they want to cast aside.

The UK’s new leaders seem to fit the Jones pattern. David Cameron defined himself by breaking with Thatcherism and insisting that there is such a thing as society after all. Nick Clegg is the first leader of the Liberal Democrats who has not belonged to either the Liberal Party or the SDP. Much of the analysis of the UK’s new coalition government has focussed on the prevailing “pragmatism” of Cameron and Clegg. [Click here, here and here.]

Yet there may be more to Britain’s Jonesers than pragmatic politics; the "new politics" is not value-free. The May 2010 issue of Prospect magazine features a lengthy article about what David Cameron stands for. The writer, Wendell Stevenson, concludes that Cameron is motivated by the need to serve and to lead but has not yet formed a clear vision of where he wants to take the country. Cameron can point to a big idea: the “big society”, based on community and volunteerism, even if he has not been able to explain what it really means.

Nick Clegg has written and spoken extensively about:

"a progressive politics [that is] about empowerment, reducing dependency on the state, increasing social mobility through individual empowerment, releasing power from the centre politically . . ."

Many times he has described his mission as to “change politics and change Britain.”

As an active Liberal Democrat who was born in 1962 – a Jones year -- I am, of course, biased about all of this. But no, I don’t think it’s not quite as simple as, “my leader has ideals and the Tory doesn’t”. The two leaders seem be in broad agreement about the sorts of ideas outilned above, and the experience of office will test them both, and force them to re-evaluate and re-think their ideas and their political strategies and tactics. For now,we need to be clear about how we got to this point.

After the election resulted in a hung parliament, Cameron reached out to Nick and offered to begin talks aimed at sharing power in government. They succeeded; the Lib Dems did very well, despite coming to the table with a poor hand. Whatever anyone thinks of the new alliance between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, nobody can doubt that for both parties, it’s a risk of historic dimensions. Both Cameron and Clegg have put themselves and their parties on the line to make the “new politics” a reality.

Practical idealism, or what?

Welcome to the age of Generation Jones.

Posted via web from Neil Stockley

Cameron, Clegg show how stories can work - and how they can fail

Conservative leader, David Cameron, told a few anecdotes -- stories -- in Thursday’s TV debate. Politicians are often told, by people like me, that stories are the best way to get their messages across. But Cameron is being pilloried for telling stories.

According to the Leftfootforward blog, Cameron’s claims that Humberside Police had “five different police cars and that they were just about to buy a £73,000 Lexus” have been disputed by the police. The Met has challenged Cameron’s jibes about “form-fillers” as misleading and out of context.

You might want to have a play with the David Cameron anecdote generator. On a more serious note, Max Atkinson has asked whether all three leaders may have told too many anecdotes on Thursday night.

He may have a point. But I think the real issue may be the sorts of stories they told. The Australian consultancy Anecdote have suggested some tests for what makes stories have impact:

• "Clarity—you hear or read the story once and you get it. It's simple, clear and has a good narrative structure (time markers, characters, begin-middle-end).
• Emotional—it gets you in the gut. It doesn't matter what emotion it evokes but impactful stories evoke at least one strong emotion.
• Believable—it doesn't sound like bullshit. Facts and figures help but not too many. Details help with real people's names and specific dates and times.
• Transport—it transports you to relive the experience. You can see, hear, touch, smell and taste the experience.
• Surprising—it throws you a curve ball that you weren't expecting.
• Relevant—does it talk to the topic under investigation."

Cameron told an anecdote about meeting a “40-year-old black man” who had served in the Navy “for 30 years” and agreed that immigration was “out of control”. This may have been surprising but it wasn’t believable. The man’s age and experience, as recounted by the Tory leader, didn’t add up. Even more importantly, the accuracy of the story, like the police Lexus and the form fillers, has been called into question. The man in question has now disputed Cameron’s account and said that “Britain needs immigrants”.

I for one didn’t get the relevance of the Lexus story at the time and it evoked no particular emotional response.

Of the Anecdote tests, “emotional” and “relevant” seem the most important in political debates. When a politician uses an anecdote, it should help to express their overall narrative about what has gone wrong (and right) and their vision of the future. The anecdote should illustrate or set up a specific solution, a way forward that fits into the politician or party’s overall image. This is a political version of what Stephen Denning calls a springboard story. Cameron kept failing to provide clear solutions, even with his “my mother was a magistrate in Newbury” anecdote.

Nick Clegg told at least one good political springboard story with his anecdote about how restorative justice has been used successfully in Sheffield, where he has his own constituency. He explained how a Liberal Democrat solution has been tried somewhere and used stats to show that it has worked. And it tied into his big narrative, this time about how the other parties keep talking tough on crime and keep failing to deliver.

One more reason that he triumphed.

Posted via web from Neil Stockley

Generation Jones leaders should put their cards on the table this year

We are seeing a major shift in political power. Having ruled much of the world for more than a decade, the baby boomers --usually seen as the age cohort born between 1946 and 1961 -- are now on their way out. The boomers are being replaced by what the social commentator Jonathan Pontell calls Generation Jones*, a sub cohort born between 1954 and 1965.* They form a bridge between the baby boomers and Generation X, born between 1961 and 1981.

Evidence of the new shift piled up during 2008. In the United States, Barack Obama (born 1961) trounced John McCain, who was born in 1936 and, therefore, is not a baby boomer. Earlier in the year, however, Obama saw off Hilary Clinton, born in 1947 and the queen of the boomers, to become the Democratic party’s standard-bearer. On January 20 2009, Obama replaced a baby boomer, George W. Bush, who himself followed Bill Clinton, another baby boomer, in 2001. Obama’s inauguration marked the end of 16 years of boomer rule.

In the race for London mayor, Conservative Boris Johnson (born 1964) ousted Labour incumbent Ken Livingstone (born 1945 and arguably a baby boomer, if only just).

In my home country, New Zealand, National’s John Key (born 1961) defeated three term Labour prime minister, Helen Clark (born 1950).

These three joined other Generation Jonesers at the top, like France’s president Nicolas Sarkozy (born 1955), Germany’s chancellor Angela Merkel (born 1954), Australia’s prime minister Kevin Rudd (born 1957) and Sweden's prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt (born 1965). According to Jonathan Pontell, two-thirds of EU and NATO leaders now come from this cohort. Several key figures in Obama’s administration are also Jonesers.

There’s more. In this year’s UK general election, due in 2010, prime minister Gordon Brown (born 1951) will almost certainly lose to Conservative leader David Cameron (born 1966).

The change in ruling generations could have a profound of the substance and the style of politics. Baby boomer politics were all about enhancing personal freedom and self-fulfilment. Their legacy is 1960s and 1970s feminism, gay rights, the fight against apartheid, a new push for indigenous peoples’ rights, a new look at nationalism in Asia (well, Vietnam). Tony Blair, Bill Clinton and their contemporaries also carried on and sealed in the pursuit of greater freedom in the economic sphere. So turbo-capitalism is part of the boomer legacy too.

The theory is that Generation Jones still wants to change the world, but they are less ideological and more pragmatic. Last April, Pontell explained:

". . . We are practical idealists, forged in the fires of social upheaval while too young to play a part . . .

". . . Our practical idealism was created by witnessing the often unrealistic idealism of the 1960s. And we weren't engaged in that era's ideological battles; we were children playing with toys while Boomers argued over issues. Our non-ideological pragmatism allows us to resolve intra-Boomer skirmishes and to bridge that volatile Boomer-GenXer divide. We can lead."

I was born in 1962, which makes me one of Generation Jones, and Pontell’s argument rings a lot of bells with me.

Last year, however, the new generation leaders were ‘pragmatic’ enough but kept the ‘idealistic’ part of the formula under wraps.

On the moderate “left”, for example, “practical idealism” looks more like old-fashioned political caution. This has been a theme of several commentaries on Barack Obama’s first year in office. Drew Westen, the author of The Political Brain and a self-described “leftist”, has bitterly lamented the lack of fire in Obama’s belly and his reluctance to take risks, “to take anybody on.” Given Obama’s record and the fact that Generation Jones is meant to be about a pragmatic pursuit of ideals, I don’t think any of that is especially surprising.

Westen has also slated the president for having “no vision, no message” and of simply not wanting to enunciate a progressive vision of where his country should be heading in the 21st century.

In my experience, when those on the “left” accuse one of their own of lacking a progressive vision, they usually mean that s/he doesn’t subscribe to their vision. Westen has a point though. Obama’s core political beliefs have always been a hard to pin down and his political message is more opaque now than it was during the campaign. Politics Daily’s Walter Shapiro has called the forces driving the Obama presidency “elusive”. He points to a “never show your cards vagueness” on key issues in health care reform, on top of a reluctance to challenge Wall Street and the bonus culture and concludes that Barack Obama remains, “more than any president in memory, an enigmatic figure who defies easy categorization.”

Analyses of Australia’s Kevin Rudd (in office since December 2007) tend to use phrases like “work in progress”, “voters still don’t really know him” and “lacks a narrative”.

Jonesers from the moderate “right” have been open to similar sorts of criticisms. John Key has remained popular in his first year and more in office, partly because he has eschewed economic radicalism and stuck to middle of the political road. But Key is now under some pressure to explain how he will reposition New Zealand’s economy for the difficult challenges ahead. [click here, and here].

As for David Cameron, he is not in power and that so it is unfair to judge him by the above standards. But I’ve yet to hear a convincing definition of “Cameronism”. The Tory leader’s core beliefs remain a mystery. Such a comment may seem predictable from the likes of me, but a recent issue of The Spectator contained some scathing (and well-argued) articles claiming that Cameron has no “big idea”.

And, can anybody tell me what Mayor Boris is trying to achieve?

Pontell may be correct about Generation Jones and the opportunities that lie before it. President Obama is not fighting the old culture wars dating from the 1960s. Rudd has tried to fashion a fresh approach to social democratic politics. John Key has jettisoned the type of neoliberal ideology that caused his predecessors to self-destruct during the 1990s. In his quest to detoxify the Tory brand, David Cameron does not define himself in Thatcher-era frames. All of this is defensible, from an electoral point of view.

But I’m still not sure about the values and drivers of the leaders from Generation Jones - what their “practical idealism” is really all about. Perhaps there will be some clearer answers in 2010.

* I have previously written just about the Baby Boomers and Generation X, while mentioning a sub-cohort from 1955-65, but am happy to stand corrected and consider the theory about a distinctive “Generation Jones”.

On the party leaders' new year messages

Over the last week, the three main party leaders have given their new year messages.  Usually, I pay these comments little attention.   This time, however, I think they offered some strong clues about the stories the leaders will try to tell in the general election campaign, and, just as interestingly, how they might be tripped up.

 

The main opposition party’s theme will always be that “it’s time for a change” and, in telling a story, the obvious archetype is about “the rot at the top” that must be stopped.   In a clever message, David Cameron didn’t stick to the obvious.  He spoke about  our “broken politics”, but used an unexpected frame: “a new kind of politics”:

 

". . .  let's make sure the election is a proper argument about the future of the country, not some exercise in fake dividing lines.  Let's at least recognise the good intentions of our opponents. Let's be honest that whether you're Labour, Conservative or Liberal Democrat, you're motivated by pretty much the same progressive aims: a country that is safer, fairer, greener and where opportunity is more equal.  It's how to achieve these aims that we disagree about - and indeed between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats there is a lot less disagreement than there used to be  . . .

 

“ . . .  let's make 2010 the year for a new politics.  Let's be positive about our own policies as well as pointing out the consequences of our opponents' policies.  But above all, let's be honest about the problems facing the country and how we can solve them.  Yes, there will be an election this year: that much is certain.  And we can be certain too that the arguments will be fierce.  But let's make it a good clean fight.  And once the battle is over, we will need to rise above our differences and come together because that is the only way - strong, united leadership is the only way - we will sort out Britain's problems, halt our decline, and give this country the success that I know we can achieve."

 

[Thanks to Iain Dale for the text]

 

Some media commentators saw this as an attempt to “love bomb” Liberal Democrat voters. Cameron's motive was obvious: to win more seats from the Lib Dem and, perhaps as importantly, to squeeze the third party vote in Labour-Tory marginals.   What I found more interesting was the rhetoric that Cameron used.  The appeaIs to the national interest, shared values and a united Britain, above and beyond political argument and division, have long been one of the Liberal Democrat’s strongest appeals to voters. The Liberals and Liberal Democrats have often used “Punch and Judy” glove puppets to represent squabbling Labour and Conservative politicians. 

 

I believe the “unity” frame and rhetoric were also set up to give Cameron safe passage through the campaign and beyond.  He expects to be prime minister after the general election and to face a difficult time in government.  So he needs to establish himself in advance as a force for unity, who can bring the nation together.  But can Cameron and his party live up to the expectations that are being set and embody the narrative? 

 

If the main opposition party’s usual message is that it’s time for a change, the incumbent’s is “no, it isn’t, not yet”.  Longer serving, battle-weary governments asking voters for another chance are more likely to use a frame based on risk: “you may not like us very much but the other lot would be much worse”.   The Conservatives’ campaigns in 1992 and 1997 are good examples.  One worked and the other did not. 

 

In the most quoted part of Gordon Brown’s New Year message, he tried to tell a story about the dangers that the Conservatives present.

 

"There are some who say we must plan for a decade of austerity. If that happened it would also be a decade of unfairness where, while the privileged few can protect themselves, the majority lose out.

 

"I believe we can create a new decade of prosperity with opportunities fairly shared amongst all those who work hard and play by the rules. That is why we are fighting so hard to secure and sustain Britain’s recovery."

 

Brown is using a familiar playbook here. Incumbent left of centre parties are more likely to make urgent, if not desperate appeals based on their core values.  Jimmy Carter’s campaign for re-election in 1980 was a good example.  So were the NZ Labour Party’s campaigns of 1990 and 2008 and the Australian Labor Party’s effort in 1996. On all four occasions the gambit failed.  And Brown has a particular problem with this message: voters do not necessarily see Labour as the most “compassionate” or “socially egalitarian” party. At conference time, Populus found that the Conservatives were seen, albeit narrowly, as the party that have the best interests of ordinary people at heart if they had to cut public spending. Labour had a clear advantage when it came to “ensuring that the most vulnerable in society don't suffer” from any cuts.  But in November 2009, ICM polling showed that David Cameron’s Conservatives enjoyed a 1% lead as the party best placed to bring people out of poverty.

 

Longer-serving governments mired in recession are also inclined to promise “go for growth” strategies.  That’s to be expected.  They need to get a clear advantage as the best party for economic management.  They also have to project a sense of optimism and show voters that they have not run out of steam.  Sure enough, Brown promised to publish the first part of a "prosperity plan for a successful, fairer and more responsible Britain", including investment in high-speed rail, aerospace, the digital economy, clean energy and other "industries and jobs of the future".  But this message also runs straight into a brick wall: most voters now clearly prefer the Cameron-Osborne team over Brown-Darling to deal with Britain’s economic problems.

 

As the third party leader, Nick Clegg might have been expected to invite voters to cast a protest vote against both Labour and the Conservatives (“a plague on both their houses”).   Sure enough, he started with a story about “looking round the House of Commons during another Punch and Judy session of Prime Ministers Questions” while big problems mounted out  “in the real world”.

 

Nick invoked the archetype of the “rot at the top” – both the major parties.

 

"I don’t blame anyone for feeling a sense of despair about our clapped out political system. You are being taken for granted by the people in charge. Big money is hollowing out politics with some rich donors not even bothering to say whether they pay full British taxes or not. And to top it all the expenses scandals exposed some MPs as spivvy property speculators and tax evaders rather than public servants."

 

And then:

 

'This whole set-up has to change. That’s what 2010 should be all about. Big, permanent change for the better . . . 2010 must be the year we press the political reset button.  But that will only happen if we do things differently. More of the same won’t produce anything new. Of course both Labour and the Conservatives have learned to parrot the language of change. But where’s the proof they mean it?

 

'. . . If you like what the Liberal Democrats stand for, vote for it. If you want real change, not phoney change, vote for it. If you think things should be different, vote for it.”

 

Nick’s first challenge is to tell stories about “doing things differently”, offering specific outcomes that strike a chord with what voters think and feel, so that they see the Liberal Democrats as the party best placed to “clean up politics”.   They don’t at the moment.

 

Carrying on the “plague” / “rot” theme, Nick’s message used another interesting frame: the politics of belief.

 

". . . If we as Leaders want people to turn out to vote at all at the next General Election, we have got to show people our convictions, not just dividing lines, our beliefs, not just soundbites.

 

". . .  So as the countdown to the next General Election finally begins, I have a simple question for the other party leaders: what do you believe, really believe?"

 

Nick described his own over-riding belief as “fairness”.  That may well click with the Lib Dems’ brand image.  But it doesn’t work as a frame, let alone as a story. After all, what does “fairness” really mean?  How do target voters relate to such an abstract concept?  Nick referred to some specific policies, on schools and on taxes.  That’s a list, not a story.  If the politics of belief is going to be a success, then the Lib Dem campaign needs to tell some stories that link the policies up and explain what the party means by “fairness”, so that voters can see the benefits for them, their families and their communities.

Narrativewatch: Conversations with Nick Clegg

Here’s a frustrating paradox about the Liberal Democrats. One of the main difficulties we face in putting across a narrative of our own choosing is that other people – viz. the media – filter what we say. OK, all parties have to cope with filters and the media are more likely to ignore us altogether. That means election broadcasts are a golden opportunity for the Lib Dems to tell our story. Yet the party doesn’t always use these broadcasts –- or Nick Clegg's obvious talents as a communicator -- to best effect. We don’t use them to tell enough stories.

[Before going any further: if you don’t know why stories matter, click here, or here, or just remember the words of US Democrat political strategists James Carville and Paul Bagela:

"Facts tell, but stories sell . . . If you're not communicating in stories, you're not communicating.”]

Conservations with Nick Clegg, the Lib Dems’ two-part broadcast for the European elections has a lot of good points, especially Nick’s delivery and the production values -- though I claim no particular expertise in the latter. But the broadcast could have been so much better if it had told some stories.

Part 1 starts promisingly, as Nick introduces his town hall-style meetings and explains that, by getting out of Westminster and talking to people, he might go some way towards restoring peoples’ faith in politics. Soon after, Nick presents a more voter-friendly version of the narrative from his spring conference speech.

“Labour has completely lost its way . . . I don’t think people think that things would really be that different under the Conservatives – so I think it’s a great opportunity . . . there is a chance for change.”

Nick goes on to explain two specific policies: abolishing tuition fees; and cutting taxes for those on middle and low incomes. The stories are not fully developed, however, and, on taxes especially, the explanation has almost no human element or emotional impact.

Compare that answer to Part 2, when Nick is asked about how he would go about rehabilitating ex-offenders. He explains how Lib Dem councillors in Chard successfully used community justice panels to bring reoffending rates down. Nick combines a challenge plot with what Annette Simmons calls a “value in action” story. The latter are usually deployed to influence group or individual behaviours. No matter, his story from Chard illustrates clearly how he approaches the issues around crime and social exclusion. The Lib Dems are innovative and, where possible, prefer community-based solutions that prevent crime. The story is credible; the viewer can “see” it.

The other questioner asks how Nick he will convince people of the benefits of the EU. He replies that “we have to learn to act together” in Europe, to address a raft of problems, such as international crime, terrorism, the international economic crisis and environmental destruction. But there is no story to show how “acting together” is to Britain’s benefit. Much more to the point, this was an opportunity to invoke a challenge plot about how Lib Dem MEPs address these big issues.

By the end, the two broadcasts have not, in themselves, conveyed a story. There is a set up at the beginning of both parts. (“People have lost faith in politicians . . . they don’t trust them; this [town meetings] is just one attempt to cut through that . . .”) I may have missed it, but there does not appear to be any sort of resolution.

I hate to say this but, by way of comparison, David Cameron’s first broadcast for the 2009 elections is a story in itself. “Ordinary”, disillusioned voters are seen showing up at Cameron Direct events all over Britain (well, in key marginal seats) and saying what’s on their minds. The carefully edited footage shows the Tory leader listening and engaging with them on today’s big issues. At the end, at least some of the voters said that they were thinking of voting Conservative.

So why can’t the Lib Dems tell more stories of our own?