Narrativewatch: Obama's "Sputnik moment"

In his State of the Union speech on Tuesday, President Obama called for big investments in education, infrastructure, research and innovation as the best ways to make sure the US meets the challenge from an economically resurgent China. He wants to improve the education system, ensure there are more maths and science graduates, pioneer new industries, invest in R&D and encourage entrepreneurship.

Here’s his call to arms:

Half a century ago, when the Soviets beat us into space with the launch of a satellite called Sputnik, we had no idea how we'd beat them to the moon. The science wasn't there yet. NASA didn't even exist. But after investing in better research and education, we didn't just surpass the Soviets; we unleashed a wave of innovation that created new industries and millions of new jobs. This is our generation's Sputnik moment.

In recalling the time when a complacent America was galvanised into action after the Soviet Union launched the first Earth-orbiting satellite, and saying “now we must do it again”, Obama was telling a springboard story, but in a political setting.

(What’s a springboard story? Storytelling guru Stephen Denning defines it as:

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.

For more background, click here.)

Springboard stories can be as powerful as, well, as Saturn V rocket. But they are tricky things for politicians to keep under control, because others soon drop in context and spin. For instance, Slate’s Fred Kaplan noted the apparent contradiction between Obama’s call for the funding of "a level of research and development we haven't seen since the height of the space race," investing in biomedicine, information technology, and clean-energy technology, and his proposal to freeze annual domestic spending for the next five years.

Kaplan discussed how America prevailed over the USSR in the space race of the 1960s and concluded that “doing big things” (another key soundbite from the speech) usually needs a big injection of government funding.

There’s more to it though. Today, Don Lee and David Pierson of the Los Angeles Times show how the analogy between America’s current concern about China and the US/USSR space race doesn’t really stack up. They remind us that China’s attitude towards the US is not as aggressive or as belligerent as that of the Soviet leaders of the 1950s and 1960s. The level of economic integration – and dependence - between the US and China is well-documented and neither side wants to mess that up. Some companies may choose to have their innovative plant in China. Lee and Pierson make another telling point:

Perhaps most important, Washington was able to respond to Sputnik by pouring billions of dollars into a new space program. But today, the nation is deeply in debt.

The last comment goes to the heart of whether the springboard will work -- or, in this case, whether the rocket will leave the launch pad. This week, Dan Farber of CBS pondered whether Obama will be able to persuade private corporations, who are, after all, more likely to have the investment capital, as well as Congress, to put the billions of dollars in the innovation and technologies that will be needed if America is to out-innovate, out-educate, and out-build the rest of the world.

President Obama should be congratulated for trying to find his own version of Ronald’ Reagan’s “morning in America”. But he will need some robust, credible policies and incentives, as well as sound political strategies for pulling in private sector investment and spurring innovation.

I have long argued that sound policies need compelling narratives in order to be sold successfully. Obama’s “Sputnik moment” may prove that clever narratives need sound policies in order to stick.

As Lee and Pierson say:

If partisan strife leads to paralysis and neither [Obama’s] proposals nor alternatives are enacted — or if they fail to produce quick results and the public grows disillusioned — then the slow growth and high unemployment of today could stretch even further into the future.

Footnote: In case you missed it, Sarah Palin tried to peddle a counter-story on the “Sputnik moment”, but it all went a bit weird. Click here.

Obama at Tucson

Yesterday’s brilliant, inspiring memorial speech by President Barack Obama in Tucson, Arizona will, no doubt, be studied by students of speech, rhetoric and the presidency for years to come.

What stood out for me was the way Obama exhorted the American people to rise above partisan bickering, to pull together and become better citizens. He told a powerful story.

As Slate’s John Dickerson put it, the president memorialised the dead and celebrated the heroes. He told their simple but value-laden stories: Judge John Roll, “the hardest working judge within the Ninth Circuit”; George and Dorothy Morris “high school sweethearts who got married and had two daughters”; Phyllis Schenck, “a qifted quilter . . . whose life revolved around her three children”; Dorwan and Mavy Stoddart who “helped folks in need at the Mountain Avenue Church of Christ”; and Gabe Zimmerman, the aide who “made the cares of [Rep. Giffords] his own . . . seeing to it that . . . government was working for ordinary folks”.

The president had one more example:

And then there is nine-year-old Christina Taylor Green. Christina was an A student; she was a dancer; she was a gymnast; she was a swimmer. She decided that she wanted to be the first woman to play in the Major Leagues, and as the only girl on her Little League team, no one put it past her. She showed an appreciation for life uncommon for a girl her age. She'd remind her mother, "We are so blessed. We have the best life." And she'd pay those blessings back by participating in a charity that helped children who were less fortunate.

The point – the moral lesson – came when the president drew all the stories together and invited his countrymen and women to live up to and honour the examples set by Jared Loughner’s victims. Obama started the lesson by asking a question.

Their actions, their selflessness poses a challenge to each of us. It raises a question of what, beyond prayers and expressions of concern, is required of us going forward. How can we honor the fallen? How can we be true to their memory?

Here’s the core of the president’s answer:

Rather than pointing fingers or assigning blame, let's use this occasion to expand our moral imaginations, to listen to each other more carefully, to sharpen our instincts for empathy and remind ourselves of all the ways that our hopes and dreams are bound together.

Then came the rationale, rooted in his values and what Obama clearly hopes are the better angels of his country’s nature:

We recognize our own mortality, and we are reminded that in the fleeting time we have on this Earth, what matters is not wealth, or status, or power, or fame -- but rather, how well we have loved -- and what small part we have played in making the lives of other people better. And that process -- that process of reflection, of making sure we align our values with our actions -- that, I believe, is what a tragedy like this requires.

The president backed up the argument by presenting the fallen as embodiments of American values, the self-images of the nation:

We may not have known them personally, but surely we see ourselves in them. In George and Dot, in Dorwan and Mavy, we sense the abiding love we have for our own husbands, our own wives, our own life partners. Phyllis -- she's our mom or our grandma; Gabe our brother or son. (Applause.) In Judge Roll, we recognize not only a man who prized his family and doing his job well, but also a man who embodied America's fidelity to the law.

Of Rep. Giffords, he said:

In Gabby, we see a reflection of our public-spiritedness; that desire to participate in that sometimes frustrating, sometimes contentious, but always necessary and never-ending process to form a more perfect union.

And:

In Christina we see all of our children. So curious, so trusting, so energetic, so full of magic. So deserving of our love. And so deserving of our good example. If this tragedy prompts reflection and debate -- as it should -- let's make sure it's worthy of those we have lost.

The president spoke of the debt of honour we owe the victims:

. . . The loss of these wonderful people should make every one of us strive to be better. To be better in our private lives, to be better friends and neighbors and coworkers and parents. And if, as has been discussed in recent days, their death helps usher in more civility in our public discourse, let us remember it is not because a simple lack of civility caused this tragedy -- it did not -- but rather because only a more civil and honest public discourse can help us face up to the challenges of our nation in a way that would make them proud.

We should be civil because we want to live up to the example of public servants like John Roll and Gabby Giffords, who knew first and foremost that we are all Americans, and that we can question each other's ideas without questioning each other's love of country and that our task, working together, is to constantly widen the circle of our concern so that we bequeath the American Dream to future generations.

They believed -- they believed, and I believe that we can be better. Those who died here, those who saved life here -- they help me believe.

President Obama summed up the moral of the story thus:

Imagine -- imagine for a moment, here was a young girl who was just becoming aware of our democracy; just beginning to understand the obligations of citizenship; just starting to glimpse the fact that some day she, too, might play a part in shaping her nation's future. She had been elected to her student council. She saw public service as something exciting and hopeful. She was off to meet her congresswoman, someone she was sure was good and important and might be a role model. She saw all this through the eyes of a child, undimmed by the cynicism or vitriol that we adults all too often just take for granted. I want to live up to her expectations.

I want our democracy to be as good as Christina imagined it. I want America to be as good as she imagined it. All of us -- we should do everything we can to make sure this country lives up to our children's expectations.

There were some subtle metaphors too. When the president revealed that Rep. Giffords had opened her eyes during his visit with her, he may have been inviting the rest of us to open our eyes too, to see what really matters and how we can be better citizens.

And President Obama’s Tucson speech will be remembered for the powerful, pitch perfect way he told the nation’s story. He has had good reviews from the mainstream left and the mainstream right, because he gripped what his audience – the American people – were worrying about and then transcended the messy politics of the situation, offering them a higher path. In his own, more restrained way, Obama followed the empathetic example set by Bill Clinton at Oklahoma City in 1995.

As Max Atkinson has said: “read, mark, learn and inwardly digest”.

AV campaign uses storytelling with impact

Here’s some good news. Someone in the campaign for AV gets this storytelling thing.

Last month, I was the guest speaker at the Hackney Liberal Democrats’ AGM. At the end of the meeting, a man from the Yes to Fairer Votes campaign was given a bit of air time. He didn’t give lists of reasons for voting AV. Nor did he spout statistics. He told a simple story about his time in NUS. The point was, when he went to lobby MPs, those with safe seats were much less likely to give he and his colleagues the time of day. I’m sure that his story made an impact on those present.

Since then, I’ve come across this video – Ralph’s story - on the Yes to Fairer Votes website. Ralph, a decorated World War II navy veteran, tells us how he and members of his members fought in various wars,

“for what? For democracy”

but

“I’ve voted in every election for 64 years but my votes have been confiscated by the system.”

Ralph’s story works because it passes Anecdote’s tests for a story with impact. In particular, his story packs an emotional punch. Wait till you get to this:

“For all the say I’ve had, I might as well have died on the D-day beaches or on the Russian convoys or in the Pacific later on.”

And this:

“I hope that one day, before I pass away, I will have the privilege of casting a vote that counts for something [and] for once in my life, I’ll have my say.”

To some ears, Ralph’s story may sound too much like a case for proportional voting, which will not be on the ballot paper next May. But he makes the pitch for AV that is most likely to work with voters: the Alternative Vote would allow people to cast their first preference for the party they really supported without wasting their vote.

It looks as if someone has learnt the lessons from Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, in which ordinary Americans told stories about why they were voting for him. And the Yes to Fairer Votes website somehow reminds me of Barack Obama’s effort.

Posted via email from Neil Stockley's posterous

Why Tim Farron won the vote for Liberal Democrat president

So, Tim Farron MP is to be the next president of the Liberal Democrats. In a ballot of party members, he defeated ex-MP and London mayoral candidate Susan Kramer by a smaller margin than some expected.

Their merits and personal constituencies left the two candidates fairly evenly matched: parliamentarian vs. non-parliamentarian, rising male star vs. woman and safe pair of hands, career politician vs. graduate of professional life. There were few policy differences between them. Both candidates were somewhat vague as to how they would go about leading or changing the party organisation -- but the job itself is somewhat ill-defined.

No, this election was really about the party, its independence and self-esteem. Six months into the coalition, who could be relied upon to protect the party’s values and its integrity; who would stand up for its distinctive identity?

In one of Tim Farron’s first campaign e-mails he promised to be:

a strong, persuasive and distinctive voice.

He added:

Ministers can present the coalition’s arguments. I will present a Liberal Democrat view. I’ll explain what we stand for and what we are achieving in power. I'll spell out what is wrong with Tory policies.

Susan Kramer promised to be

a strong champion for grassroots members.

In her election address she promised to:

work to keep our distinctive Liberal Democrat voice, and will champion Liberal Democrat achievements at every level.

She also pledged to:

work to keep our party strong, unified, distinctive and true to its core beliefs.

It sounds as if the two candidates offered the same thing. Not quite. In an interview with Liberal Democrat News (29 October 2010), both Farron and Kramer were asked how much party members should feel free to express dissent in the coalition. Their answers were instructive. Here’s Kramer’s well-modulated reply, promising better internal communications:

Party members always have freedom of dissent. We don’t take instruction from our leaders. I would never want to see that change. It’s what makes our party stronger. However, our party must be in constant communication with our members. For example, many members, although having qualms about joining a coalition, felt very much included in the decision to go ahead and although it would mean compromise, felt it was right both for the sake of the nation and because it would also implement policies for which we had been fighting for generations. So we have a very aware membership but I would never wish the membership to feel it took instruction from the leadership.

Farron gave a simple illustration – a story - about how he would handle disagreement with the Conservatives, or coalition policies for that matter. He promised to speak out whenever he felt it was needed.

There’s nothing shameful about compromise [but] I think we got the compromise wrong on tuition fees. Liberal Democrats are entitled to fight for what they believe in. We know we didn’t win a majority but we must still feel proud to be Liberal Democrats. I think perhaps the most important part of my job is going to be raising party morale not just by going around eating chicken and tofu but by being the person you hear on the Today programme making you feel proud to be a Liberal Democrat. It may occasionally be spiky and adjunct but it isn’t dissent. It’s loyalty to the party.

Both candidates embodied their narratives. Tim Farron and his supporters constantly reminded us that he is an “activist”, a “campaigner” and “a communicator”. (Hvae you ever seen him barnstorming during the end-of-conference appeal?). Susan Kramer ran an online survey of party members, to find out their concerns, and held face-to-face conversations with members across the country. Her last campaign e-mail said :

I have already learned so much by listening to you and that will continue. I will use that knowledge you have shared to help the party grow and I will make sure you have the tools you need to campaign and build local success.

Everyone wants to be listened to. But Kramer came slightly unstuck because in politics, “listening” to people is a process, not an outcome. The Australian commentator, Don Watson, has even suggested that one of the consequences of the influence of management language in politics is that governments only want to claim that they're listening to people. He argues forcefully that a sense of authenticity has been lost, as a result of this kind of management speak.

By contrast, Tim Farron and his campaign team understood that you communicate in politics by telling stories that strike a chord with listeners’ emotions. In the Lib Dem presidential contest the emotional crux was party members’ anxieties about being smothered by the coalition and policies of which they disapprove. Above all, he recognised their need to keep feeling proud of being Liberal Democrats. You’ve got it. Tim the communicator will be on The Today Programme, Channel 4 News and in The Guardian and The Independent, setting the record straight and making party members feel OK. Such are the politics of belief. They have kept the liberal flame alive for generations now.

And Farron’s campaign made the most effective use of “heuristics” -- mental short cuts that enable people, especially low awareness voters to decipher issues and make choices. Susan Kramer had endorsements from Vince Cable, Chris Huhne and Jo Swinson. But Party members received a “vote for Tim” e-mail from Paddy Ashdown. (Paddy even compared Farron to the late David Penhaligon, a Liberal campaigning legend from the 1970s and 1980s.) And his election address carried endorsements, with photos, from Baroness Shirley Williams, former leader Sir Menzies Campbell and former chief executive and target seats guru Chris Rennard. Note that all of these have been, to some degree, sceptical about the coalition with the Conservatives.

Now, let’s see if Tim Farron can bring to the party’s communications the same intuitive storytelling skill that he brought to his presidential campaign.

Posted via email from Neil Stockley's posterous

Obama's lost year and the secrets of political storytelling

The New Yorker of 15 March has a fascinating article by George Packer, called “Obama’s lost year”. Packer traverses the political and strategic mistakes that the president has made, the opportunities he has lost over the past twelve months. [Sorry – there’s no hyperlink to the full article unless you’re a paying subscriber]

Inevitably, one of the issues that Packer discusses is Obama’s failure to craft a narrative and tell the American people a story about what he is doing, and why he is doing it.

“Phrasemaking, throughlines, frameworks and narratives simply aren’t the stuff of the Obama press office.”

Packer draws some important contrasts between Obama and Ronald Reagan, another president who ran into big economic and political problems in his first year. In so doing, Packer shows us what makes a political narrative work.

“Reagan could recover from battlefield setbacks because he was fighting a larger war. His talent for phrasemaking and anecdote derived from having a strong world view: unlike Obama, he began with a set of ideas and found the evidence to match them and the words to dramatize them.”

The article goes on to quote the leading Democratic political consultant, Paul Begala:

“[Reagan’s] point of departure was always philosophical. He explained how the world works. Roosevelt did the same thing.” [emphasis added]

Reagan blamed the nation’s woes on “decades of tax and tax and spend and spend”.

Later in the article, top Democratic pollster Geff Garin develops the same point and shows the crucial role that characters – heroes and villains –play in political stories.

“Reagan had a kind of robust narrative with real explanatory power for people. He had a political narrative that told people what he was doing and what the Democrats were doing: a narrative which is available to Obama: Jimmy Carter left the country in a mass, we’re making changes that are painful now but if we stay the course they’ll succeed, and why would anyone want to go back?” [emphasis added]

Notice also how Reagan’s story offered two alternative endings, one good, one bad, and left people to work the rest out for themselves.

During the last presidential election campaign, I wrote a lot on my blog about Obama’s gifts as a teller of stories. In fact, I unpretentiously named him the political storyteller of the year for 2008. But Packer is correct: as president, he has not rendered the country’s story in a way that is memorable and convincing. To quote Paul Begala: “[Obama] doesn’t situate it in a philosophy.”

No, a political narrative is not the same thing as an ideology. But the experiences of Reagan and Obama show that a successful narrative must be based firmly on a coherent set of ideas.

As Packer puts it:

“To be an effective communicator, a President needs a strong world view, a fundamental vision of why things are and the way they ought to be, which can be simplified into a few key ideas and images – in short, an ideology. For Obama and his advisers, there is no worse pejorative.”

The narrative, the story is the most powerful tool that a politician has to explain those ideas, convey the images and make them real to people.

Posted via web from Neil Stockley

"John Major the Movie": political narratives 101

I was interested to hear this week that the BFI is marking 75 years of party political broadcasts (PPBs). I don't think any of the parties has ever come up with a depth charge like the “Willie Horton” advert that helped destroy the 1988 Democratic presidential nominee Michael Dukakis or the New Zealand National Party’s infamous “dancing cossacks” in 1975.

Yet a few British PPBs are great case studies in political storytelling. One such is “John Major – the movie”, produced by the Conservatives for the 1992 general election. The Tories were the underdogs, after three hard terms in office, which had included the poll tax and a recession. The then prime minister was shown touring Brixton, where he grew up and lived as a young man, giving a low key exposition of his values and with some political homilies along the way. (“You can't cure unemployment with a short term stimulus . . . you do it by keeping inflation down.”)

Most importantly, the broadcast told voters a story – about John Major and his rise from humble beginnings, from Cold Harbour Lane to Downing Street. It was even titled The Journey! Major recalled his experience of being out of work. He talked about how the NHS had been there when his parents were aged and infirm. He had lived in multiracial Brixton and served on Lambeth Council. Major was projected as an unpretentious “man of the people”, meeting and chatting with people on the market. Many people said (and still do) that they were touched by his modesty and humility. The broadcast showed a leader who was connecting with voters and showing personal empathy with them. Major even concluded the broadcast by saying:

“. . . if you’ve done something or seen it or been it or felt it you can understand what it means and you can understand how it affects other people in their own individual lives.”

The broadcast enabled John Major to embody the Conservatives’ campaign narrative. They recognised that after years of Thatcher, British voters craved a change, to a more moderate, “caring” politics and a softer, more consensual style of leadership. The Tory story was that in dumping Thatcher and installing Major in her place, they had made already the change happen. And the low-key, ordinary, quintessentially English John Major -- “one of us – seemed a safer choice as PM than Kinnock.

The Conservatives were returned against the odds, gaining more votes than Tony Blair’s Labour Party in the landslide of 1997. Major stayed in Downing Street for five more years but his premiership was little short of a disaster, typified by the debacle of “Black Wednesday”. An “ordinary” leader wasn’t enough. And it’s unlikely that “Major the Movie”, on its own, won the 92 election for the Tories. (I’m reliably told that most of the feedback from the broadcast concerned the prime minister’s failure to wear a seatbelt.) Yet the broadcast did what all good political narratives should. It spoke directly to the emotional needs of voters in a clear and simple way; in this case, by simply allowing the leader to be himself – for better and for worse.

Nick Clegg and the Lib Dem brand - how voters see the Liberal Democrats (Part 2)

It looks as if the debate over the Liberal Democrats’ need for a narrative – a story – might be kicking off again.  [click here and here]  One element we talk about too little is the leader’s need to embody the party’s narrative, in order to make it more real, more authentic to voters.

 

In today’s quasi-presidential politics, voters use the leaders as quick ways to assess the parties, for good or ill.  If you don’t believe me, look at the Newsnight pre-party conference focus groups. Media coverage of Newsnight's focus groups and quantitative research and the Populus and Ipsos Mori pre-conference work has been dominated by voters’ views of the party leaders.

 

So, here’s a quick round up of what the above research tells us about voters see Nick Clegg.  [For more on the points made below about the Lib Dem brand narrative, click here.]

 

In some very positive ways, Nick embodies the party’s narrative.  One of the Lib Dems’ biggest advantages is that voters see us as the most “honest and principled” party.  According to Ipsos MORI, Nick (narrowly) came first out of the three main party leaders for being “more honest than most politicians”.  Likewise, in the Populus survey, he edged out David Cameron for  “meaning what he says” as opposed to “saying what he thinks people want to hear”.   

 

The strongest feature of the Lib Dem brand is that we are the party seen as most “for ordinary people, not the best off”.  But Populus don’t ask exactly the same questions about the leaders as they do about the parties. When they asked whether each leader was “good” or “bad for you and your family”, Nick had a net “good” score of plus 7 per cent, very close to Cameron (plus 10 per cent) and much better than Gordon Brown (minus 25 per cent).

 

Another big positive for the Lib Dems has been the way voters perceive us as the most empathetic party, understanding “the problems that ordinary people face” and “the way that people live their lives”.  Populus did not ask this question about the parties, as they have before.  But Nick scored quite well for being “in touch” as opposed to “out of touch”. His net score was plus 14 per cent, versus Cameron’s plus 28 per cent and Brown’s minus 39 per cent. And in the Ipsos MORI survey he was less likely than Brown or Cameron to be seen as “most out of touch with ordinary people”.

 

Now for the ways in which Nick may embody weaker aspects of the Lib Dem narrative.  There were some indications in the pre-conference research that the party is still not seen as quite “serious” or “substantial” enough.  This may be due to the old “wasted vote” counter-story and the perennial problems the party faces in getting media coverage.  Many voters feel they don’t know the Lib Dems well enough.

 

In the Populus leaders poll, Nick came last for being “up to the job of being prime minister”, “likely to get things done” and “substantial”.   Yet he was seen as “stronger” and more “decisive” than Brown.

 

The “invisibility” factor was very important here.  When they were asked specific questions about each leader, voters were much more likely to say “don’t know” about Nick.  And the Newsnight poll found that while thirty six percent had a favourable view of Nick, an equal number said they had never heard of him. 

 

Voters in the Newsnight focus groups found it hard to get a handle on the Lib Dems.  They also showed how much the profile and image of the party are bound up with those of the leader.   In many parts of the discussion the voters seemed to treat Nick / the leader and the party as the same thing.  “I didn’t know who he was” . . . “I never see him”  . . . “he’s never on telly” . . . “they’ve had so many changes of leader you feel like its not really investing the time in them because the next leader could be around the corner.”

 

This may, eventually, provide the solution to the Lib Dems’ low image problem.  When people in the focus groups were shown a clip of Nick speaking, they liked him.    Some made positive comments about him.  The Populus work showed that some of his key ratings, for instance “in touch / out of touch” and “good / bad for you and your family” have improved markedly since July 2008.  A drop in numbers saying “don’t know” provides part of the explanation.  And I have argued a few times that as the public gets to know Nick, they like him more.  This augurs well for the general election campaign, when the Lib Dems can expect to gain much more media coverage.

 

Some of the risks are obvious.  A lot is riding on one person and the party’s ability to mount (and fund) an effective campaign.  Other risks may have not have been thought through.  For instance, Nick could follow through on the findings above by being brutally “honest” about the need for fiscal rectitude.  But recent talk of “savage cuts” and “progressive austerity” may jar with people who expect Nick and the Lib Dems to be “good for themselves and their families”.  We’ll need to start telling a story about how the party’s solutions for public debt will be better for ordinary people over the long term.

 

Sounds too hard? Well, OK, we could have a bit less of the hairshirt and try bundling up a few popular-looking if expensive policies as “fair” and “for people”.  But what if most voters simply didn’t believe us and took all this as further proof that the Lib Dems are decent people whose policies don’t really add up? Or worse still, they got the idea from somewhere that after all his talk about the need for economic responsibility, Nick was not really being straight with them – not “honest” or “sincere”?  To coin the jargon, Nick and the party would no longer embody their narrative.  I wonder how many seats the Lib Dems would win then.

Storytelling with impact: Peter Mandelson's speech to the 2009 Labour Party Conference

Peter Mandelson’s speech to the Labour party conference was one of the stand-out political events of the week. I think it’s one of the best pieces of political storytelling we’ve seen all year.

The reasons that the speech worked so well weren’t so much about his passion or his delivery, which was weird in parts. It was impressive because of the stories Mandelson told and the ways he told them.

Let’s start with the easy bits. Any government asking for another mandate always tries to say to the voters, “give it to us more time – we deserve another go”. The subtext is usually “you can’t risk a change to the other side”. When a government is after a fourth term, the “don’t risk it” story is almost always the dominant one.

So it was with Peter Mandelson’s speech:

"The choice between a Conservative party whose judgements on the credit crunch were wrong, or a party providing leadership in the toughest of times . . experience and change with Gordon's leadership. Or the shallowness of David Cameron."

But there was so much more it than that. In trying to galvanise the downcast conference into being “fighters not quitters” and to be “restless for change”, Mandelson followed almost all the rules of good storytelling and added a few twists of his own.

Stephen Denning says that the first step in telling a powerful story is to gain the audience’s attention.(1) One method he suggests is to admit a vulnerability, or to making mistakes. Near the beginning of his speech, Peter Mandelson said:

"I love working for this party and those who work so hard for it – even if, at times, perhaps not everyone in it has loved me. I understand that. I made enemies, sometimes needlessly. I was sometimes too careless with the feelings and views of others.

"But please accept this. It was for one reason only. I was in a hurry to return this party to where it should be – in government to help the hard-working people of our country. I know that Tony said our project would only be complete when the Labour Party learned to love Peter Mandelson. I think perhaps he set the bar a little too high. Though I am trying my best."

By telling this story, Mandelson was also reminding the conference of “who he is” – a Labour man, through and through. The neat bit of self-deprecation came after this:

"I did not hesitate for too long [return to the government last year]. The pull was too great. The pull of coming back to serve my country when it was in the midst of the global whirlwind that had hit us. The pull of coming back to serve this Prime Minister, our leader, Gordon Brown – who was gripping this financial crisis, leading the fightback against it when so many others seemed caught in the headlights. But there was something else. It was the pull of coming back to serve our party. I did not choose this party. I was born into it. It is in my blood and in my bones."

The sub-text was an “I know what you are thinking” story. OK, you’ve never really liked me, Mandelson was telling delegates, but I’m going to validate your objections and then answer them head on.(2)

And Mandelson followed another classic piece of classic attention-gaining advice. He created his own frame, using the word “fight” or “fightback” nine times in his speech .

Denning’s second story telling step is to stimulate desire. He says that you can do it by telling a positive story - what Denning calls “a springboard story”:

"A simple story about an example where the change is already happening [that] connects with an audience at an emotional level and generates a new story in their minds that leads to action."

Mandelson told a springboard story – one of the best and riskiest I have seen in politics. For the story was really about himself.

"We must face facts. Electorally, we are in the fight of our lives. And, yes, we start that fight as underdogs. But if I can come back, we can come back."

Another way to stimulate desire is to offer a positive challenge. Mandelson’s “we’re fighters not quitters” rhetoric certainly did that. So did his closing preroration, with its call to “win for our party, for our country, for the British people.”

Denning also suggests “externalising the obstacles to change” by, for instance, casting people as antagonists or aliens. To Labour eyes, it’s obvious who these are – David Cameron, George Osborne and the rest of the Conservative Party.

But hang on: with Labour now into its thirteenth year in office, aren’t the Tories (or, as many of us say, the Liberal Democrats) the “change”? So Mandelson reached a lot higher, moving to reclaim the word “change” and reframe it in Labour’s terms. He told a story about how Labour would pursue “activist” strategies to ensure that Britain meets its full economic potential but that the Tories “just don’t get it”. He said that on three counts -limiting the recession’s damage to the economy tackling the deficit “without eating into the fabric of people’s lives” and investing in future growth, “the Tories are on the wrong side of the argument”. He went on to use the word “change” nineteen times..

In doing this, and with his claims of how the Tories have changed their image but not their substance, Mandelson was following Stephen Denning’s third step for sucessful storytelling. This is to “reinforce with reasons”, by telling “minimalist” stories that are usually set in the present or immediate future.

"I hope [Cameron and Osborne] can find the humility to acknowledge that at every point Tory policy would not just have put the recovery at risk but have made this recession deeper, longer and far far worse. As we get closer to the election, I want to see them and Tory candidates across the country explaining why they wouldn’t provide the money to help small businesses and families in this recession when they needed it most. No extra money to boost family incomes. No money for the tax deferment for business and no VAT cut. No additional money to help those who have tragically lost their jobs. No funding for the car scrappage scheme. They got it plain wrong at every step along the way."

No, 100 speeches like this between now and next May won’t save the Labour party. Some of the logic was faulty. Mandelson's many critics may call the speech self-indulgent and self-justifying. But after months of dreary lists and boring slogans, Mandelson told Labour exactly the sort of story they wanted to hear. It was no wonder the delegates cheered and the media swooned.


(1) Stephen Denning, The Secret Language of Leadership (Jossey Bass, 2007)
(2) See Annette Simmons, Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins (Amacom, 2007)

Storytelling with impact: Katy Gordon ppc in the Lib Dems' Real Women debate

As usual, I spent a fair bit of time in the hall at the Liberal Democrat conference. I enjoy policy debates. Also, I was looking out for examples of people using stories to support their arguments and policy ideas.

It was lean pickings I’m afraid, but one speech hit me right between the eyes: the speech by Katy Gordon, ppc for Glasgow North, in the debate on the Real Women policy paper. She was defending the paper’s most controversial proposal, to ban the use of digital retouching technology in advertisements aimed at under 16s and to work with industry professionals to ensure that legislation was appropriately worded to reflect these aims.

Take a look at what Katy Gordon said, almost at the beginning of her speech.

"I wanted to know if the proposals in this paper would be seen as more of the nanny state: those do-gooding Liberals getting worked up over trivia. So I took it along to a group of ordinary women in my constituency of Glasgow North, at the North West Women’s Centre in Maryhill. The group ranged from girls in their twenties to retired grandmothers, many of whom have faced real barriers in bringing up families. I asked them what they thought of media images of female beauty and whether there was any role for government on this issue.

"What struck me was that all of them independently came up with the proposals in this paper! From Gail, a retail manager, who asked whether we could put something in magazine pictures to say they are airbrushed to Denise, a caretaker, who suggested showing before and after photos so everyone could see the difference.

"What really struck home though was Trisha, who told me about her daughter, Mary-Ann. Mary-Ann is 20 and all the women agreed she is pretty but she is tall and she thinks of herself as fat. She is always comparing herself to the images in magazines and gets terribly depressed. In fact, Trisha is worried that she is secretly taking laxatives, in a desperate attempt to lose weight.

"Now the women were very clear that they had a responsibility to give their daughters the confidence to reject these unrealistic portrayals of female beauty. As Stacey said, you need to start young to get them to be confident in their bodies. Trisha tells Mary-Ann regularly that ‘she is a real woman and that beauty comes from the inside’, but however good a parent you are, you are up against the might of the media and the beauty industry."

Katy Gordon used stories, with real characters, a beginning and an end, to help build her case. Taken together, the stories pass the Anecdote test for what makes a story have impact. They are clear, believable and have strike an emotional chord. There’s an element of surprise: the “ordinary” women were, in effect, already calling for the same proposals as the party.

Katy Gordon told what Annette Simmons(1) calls an “I-know-what-you-are thinking story”:

"A trust-building surprise for you to share the audience’s secret suspicions that first validates and then dispels these objections without sounding defensive."

She acknowledged the objections held silently by many in the audience: that the policy paper that this was more “nanny state”, “do gooding” liberal “trivia” and then met them head on. “Nanny state”? “Do gooders”? “Trivia”? Yep, you’ve got it. Katy Gordon took the other side’s frames and broke them open with powerful stories.

Her stories were followed by some explanation and statistics, reinforcing the reasons for the proposed reforms.

At the very end of the speech came the “happy ending” that the proposals could bring.

"As Nick Clegg is stressing this week, if we want things to be different, we should choose something different.

"We need to think about Mary-Ann crying herself to sleep because she can’t attain the ideal body image, of Trisha worrying herself sick over how to cope."

And in very specific ways, Katy Gordon’s stories reinforced the values that her audience wanted to hear – that the Liberal Democrats are “different” - more “radical”, readier to take risks.

Why can’t more Liberal Democrat politicians use stories this effectively?

(1) Annette Simmonds, Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins (Amacom, 2007)

Nick Clegg makes progress on Lib Dem narrative

The Liberal Democrats may, at last, be “getting” this narrative thing.

Well, Nick Clegg is starting to tell people stories.

The Lib Dems’ first election broadcasts missed a number of opportunities in this regard. The latest broadcast, Change Politics for Good, sees Nick following Stephen Denning’s three essential steps for leaders who are persuading people to embrace change. The first is to get peoples' attention. Nick uses two of Denning’s methods. He emphases the magnitude of what is recognised as a major problem -- expensesgate (“there have been times when you have been so angry . . .” ) -- and asking viewers a question (“how we stop this from ever happening again?”).

Denning's Step number 2 is to generate desire for something different. Here, Nick identifies an external barrier (“this rotten old system” . . . “self-serving politics”) and frames a new version of the future that is different from the status quo (“we need a bigger change, not just tinkering at the edges”).

The final step is to reinforce the reasons for change. (“Unless we do things very differently, in a few years from now, we’ll just have more scandals, all over again.”) Nick explains how voters can progress from the current situation to the new tomorrow (“. . . the power to do things differently is in your hands . . .it is possible to change this rotten old system and you can decide to do it . . . so I am asking you to join a Liberal Democrat campaign to change politics from top to bottom, so something good can come of all this.”). This will also be familiar to readers of Denning’s book The Secret Language of Leadership.

In this morning’s Today interview, Nick explained how Lib Dem MPs have attempted to reform MPs’ expenses, against resistance from Labour and the Tories. Challenged about where the Lib Dems stand on Europe, he used what he called a “concrete example” – a story - to explain how we are “stronger together, poorer apart” in the EU. Lib Dem MPs voted for European arrest warrants that were used to break up a paedophile ring and for anti-terrorist measures. But Conservative and UKIP MEPs voted against.

And here’s a more interesting signpost. In Monday’s Guardian G2 interview, Nick picked up on the “real change” narrative from his spring conference speech and started to frame the choice facing voters.

“I think if a general election was held now, it would become an all-out national debate about how we rebuild British politics. The next general election will be dominated by: Who's going to rebuild the British economy? And who's going to rebuild British politics?”

We may be seeing the core of a Lib Dem narrative for the general election. Labour have wrecked our economy and ruined peoples’ faith in politics. But the Conservatives would be no better. So we need the Liberal Democrats to do the job of recovery and reconstruction.

Nick Clegg could embody the story of rebuilding “politics”. Vince Cable could do the same on rebuilding the economy.

Will we, can we, get that right?

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?

Narrativewatch: Green Party European Election Broadcast

The Green Party start their European election broadcast by showing what looks like the archetypal green “geek”, sitting behind a computer, in a dark and somewhat messy room. Then the (male) voice over reminds us why we may have doubts about the party. What gives?

The broadcast tries to tell an “I know what you are thinking” story. In her book, The Story Factor, Annette Simmons explains that if you name peoples’ objections first, you are that much closer to disarming them. She says:

"Telling an "I know what you are thinking" story can neutralise concerns . . . and dispel fears . . . without direct confrontation."

Simmons stresses the need for a subtle approach. I’m not sure that some of the broadcast’s statements (“if you think we're only concerned about the environment, think again . . .” ; “you might assume we don’t know much about the economy. . .”) are really what she has in mind.

Likewise, one of the party’s defences is to say “our policies cover the economy, jobs and human rights, to name but a few”. Another is that their economic policy will “create jobs”. But these are statements, not stories. So the Greens ask us to take them on trust – just like the other parties.

When trying to take on the “all talk and no action” charge, the broadcast offers a bit more detail – with, for instance, the Greens’ work in the European Parliament on GM food labeling and on toy safety. These don’t really amount to stories, despite the obvious potential they provide to use what Chip and Dan Heath call the challenge plot.

Still, the broadcast is partly saved by its visuals. The geek is replaced by a series of “ordinary guys” (yes, men), each of whom are seen working on a succession of diverse policy issues. The messy room becomes more and more tidy. And they stress the potential for the PR used in European elections (oops, wrong frame) to elect more Greens. The photos of the party’s candidates also try to convey their diversity.

The Greens’ broadcast tells another story. We keep hearing about villains – “big corporations” (whom other parties support for their own gains), “immoral bankers” and “unethical businesses”. They tell us that “[a] vote for the other parties will only result in more of the same . . .”. And guess who will “take on anyone who threatens your health, your community, or your future”.

Stop the rot at the top. A plague on all their houses. We’ve heard all that before somewhere. In this angry political climate, these story lines are too good for the Greens to miss.

“Just think what a change [voting Green] would make,” says the party leader, Caroline Lucas. But they may not have disarmed enough peoples’ objections or won enough trust. In these tough times, and with a public in a climate trance, the Greens do not tell a story with the sort of ending that grumpy, anxious voters are looking for.

Found: A quick guide to successful storytelling - plus an invitation from Neil

If you’re looking for some quick guides on how to tell stories that inspire and persuade people or, perhaps, encourage people to vote for you, then check out the website of Anecdote. Anecdote is an Australian consultancy that “helps business leaders engage their people to be even better collaborators, leaders and change agents using the power of business narrative”. The ideas and principles that they espouse are often applied in politics.

Anecdote have just published a short “white paper” called “Why some leaders inspire action while others are mostly forgettable”. The paper explains how and why stories are so effective and necessary for effecting change. It also suggests ways that putative leaders (and politicians?) can find their own stories. These can be summarised as follows:

1. Develop an awareness of the stories that swirl around you every day.

2. Move your style of speaking away from being predominantly rational and argument-based to being a good mixture of stories and argument. BUT start with examples, that turn negative case studies into positive stories.

3. Where possible, ask for feedback about what people infer about you from your stories.

Last week, Anecdote ran a “story week” that invited people to rate on line five different stories - i.e., one story on each day. The most interesting part was the criteria used to judge the chosen stories. The criteria, which are explained in some more detail here, were:

· Clarity: Is the story simple and clear

· Emotional: Did the story connect with you, have impact?

· Believable: Does it sound like it could actually have happened?

· Transport: When you read the story, could you picture yourself there?

· Surprising: Were any aspects of the story unexpected?

· Relevant: How relevant is it to the issue of 'leadership'?

· Overall: How memorable was this story for you?

This checklist is as accurate and useful as any that I’ve seen. I am especially impressed with the way Anecdote emphasises the need for stories to build an emotional connection between a leader (or politician, or audience) and his/her audience. This crucial point has been developed by the sage of storytelling, Stephen Denning, and Drew Westen, author of The Political Brain (2008). Yet it has too often been ignored by the political party of which I am a member.

Similarly, Anecdote also pick up on the theme that stories are sensory experiences. In her book, Whoever Tells The Best Story Wins (2007), Annette Simmons argues that we need to smell, taste, hear, touch and see stories that we hear if they are to have any impact.

The point that seems to be the least well explained is “relevance . . . to the issue of leadership.” On this one, Howard Gardner has the most to offer, when he argues that when leaders tell stories, they must convincingly embody those stories, in order to make themselves seem authentic.

“The creator must in some way embody his story although he need not be saintly . . . The story may grow out of the leader’s personal experiences and may well have been embodied in his or her daily living before being expressed overtly”. [Leading Minds (1995)]

For my views on how Thatcher, Churchill, Blair and Obama embodied their narratives– as well as some suggestions as to how some Liberal Democrat politicians might do it - please click here.

Now, here’s an invitation. The European / local election campaign is now underway. When you see any of the above elements of a successful story, from any politician or party, please post the details below.

Political storyteller of the year 2008

This is the time of year when people look back at the year, compile lists and make awards. So I’ve got an award of my own: which politician from any party, political persuasion or country, was the best story-teller of 2008?

It’s lean pickings from the Liberal Democrats, I’m afraid.

New leader Nick Clegg worked all year to tell a story: that Labour have had their day and can’t create a fairer Britain; the Conservatives won’t but the Liberal Democrats will make it happen. It was old third party wine in twenty first century bottles, but showed promise all the same. After the banks went bang, the media meta-narrative took a new turn: the government’s response to the recession and the “Brown bounce”. Nick's story was squashed flat. Ever since, the party has struggled to tell a story about the economy, as distinct from Vince Cable’s razor-sharp commentaries.

Ros Scott told a good story and thrashed MP Lembit Opik in the contest for party president. But it was an internal election, for an ill-defined job. Most of the previous incumbents have checked into the obscurity hotel.

And let’s not even talk about the Lib Dems’ campaign for the London mayor and assembly.

The Conservatives should have had an easier time of it. Telling their story – “it’s time for a change; Labour must go” – looks straightforward enough. But David Cameron has also been overwhelmed by the economic crisis. He has not told a convincing story about the crisis and, as the year closed, Cameron was losing the economic argument to Gordon Brown.

The Conservative politician who did the best job of telling a “time for a change” story was London’s new mayor, Boris Johnson. He doesn’t get first prize because, after six months, Johnson still hasn’t fashioned a “governing narrative” that helps Londoners to understand what he is trying to do. So far, in his honeymoon phase, that hasn’t mattered too much. It will in 2009, as a deep recession really hits a city that is well used to good times. If the mayor can tell a story and leads Londoners through the crisis, he will well on the way towards re-election.

Labour at last found someone who can tell a story: Gordon Brown! This must be one of the most ironic plot twists that British politics has seen in a long time. That’s partly because Brown’s failure to provide his government with a narrative has deeply frustrated Labour supporters.

There’s an even bigger irony: Brown had a narrative, that from his decade as chancellor: thanks to him, Britain’s economy was strong and stable and the years of “boom and bust” were over. The onset of recession and the reversals of financial economic policy should have finished him, for Brown no longer embodied his narrative. Yet telling stories has saved him, so far.

The Observer’s Andrew Rawnsley said it very well on Sunday:

As the banks crashed, Brown bounced. This is partly because he has been brilliant at spinning the blame for the crisis away from himself. The international institutions failed. So said the man who had chaired the reform committee of the IMF for many years. The bubble economy in America was the culprit. So said the man who recommended an honorary knighthood for Alan Greenspan, the father of that bubble. It was down to the reckless gambling of the bankers. So said the man who indulged a lightly regulated City for a decade. The Tories howled, but largely to no avail. Polling suggests that most voters were, and still are, broadly prepared to buy the prime minister's account of the origins of the recession.

So far, the public also seems ready to buy his “active government, for the people” versus the “do-nothing Tories, for the bankers” story lines that have appeared over the last few weeks. Yes, you’ve got it: ‘the enemy over the water’, ‘the rot within’, even the strong community; the old ones are always the best ones.

Brown’s achievement is weird for another reason. As he saved the world the banks and showed other countries how to stave off disaster, he seemed authoritative, confident and in command. Above all, he looked more experienced than the “novice” Cameron. The PM embodied the rest his story: “I can fix what they have done; the other guy can’t”.

But he hasn’t brought it all together. In another inversion of the usual rules of politics, Brown embodies a narrative he hasn’t quite told. He is more actions than words.

The narrative can’t be judged a total success, because Brown hasn’t won an election, or even overtaken the Conservatives in the polls. The job losses expected in early 2009 may well blow the story away. So Gordon Brown is not the story-teller of the year either.

To find the best story-teller of 2008, we have to go over the ocean.

In the United States presidential election, a first term African-American senator with a lean CV and a liberal voting record defeated his own party’s “front runner” and then saw off the formidable Republican machine. The key to understanding those victories must be the story that Barack Obama told and the way he told it.

First, Barack Obama caught the attention of the Democratic Party, and then the nation (and not the world), with his personal charisma and his compelling life-story.

Second, Obama made the case for change, in a way that connected with peoples’ emotions. His campaign slogan, “change we can believe in” and the way he kept using words like “chance,” “hope,” and “dream” built up trust in a cynical electorate and stressed the potential for progress. [For the linguistics expert Noah Bubenhofer’s new study of Obama’s rhetoric, click here]. He struck powerful chords with the party’s desire for “liberation” from past disappointments and the public’s desire for a break from the past eight years of Republican rule (“McCain – Bush”) rule in the White House. The use of inclusive rhetoric - we,” “you” (plural) and “us” - created what Bubenhofer calls “a strong feeling of community and identification between [Obama] and his audience”.

Third, Obama backed up the case for change with emotional and rational arguments. The way he discussed, in specific ways, the daily challenges facing average Americans, such as rising energy costs, mortgage worries and healthcare premiums, enabled him to connect and empathise with voters.

The emotional appeals were fortified by solid policy details (stories): promoting innovation and upward social mobility; ensuring that more people can have access to healthcare; building a better “safety net” for poorer people; cutting taxes for low income senior citizens and repeal tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans; widening access to education and launching an Apollo project for clean energy and energy independence.

Obama embodied his narrative. We have learned how a black man born in Hawaii to an immigrant father – who himself was born and raised in a small village in Kenya and “went to school in a tin- roof shack” - and a white, single mother struggled with a multiracial background and a broken home gained a world-class education and went on to become the first black man to edit the Harvard Law Review. This is a uniquely American story of identity and hope: Obama embodied the notion that exciting new things - change – can happen in America.

The newcomer represented a generational shift, away from the baby boomers, the neo-cons and culture war politics and towards a new sense of optimism about America’s future.

And whatever was thrown at him, Obama held his nerve. In the general election campaign, his level headedness and sense of composure did a great deal to reassure floating voters that Obama could lead.

In all of these ways, Obama told brilliantly a story about how America could leave behind the divisions of the past and find a new direction as one nation, united behind a common purpose. An optimistic story, about the future. “Yes, we can” and yes, he did.

That’s why Barack Obama, who will soon become the 44th president of the United States, is my political storyteller of the year.

Boris's victory and the power of political storytelling

If you want to see how political narratives really work, look no further than Boris Johnson’s successful bid to become Mayor of London.

It gives me no pleasure to say this –- and I was appalled at the number of Lib Dems who voted for him as their first or second choice -- the Tory candidate’s campaign came straight from the copybook of political storytelling.

In The Secret Language Of Leadership (2007), Stephen Denning argues that telling the story is the way to make a personal and emotional connection with an audience. It needs more than rational argument. Denning argues that a speaker (or leader, or politician) must: (1) get peoples’ attention, (2) stimulate the desire for change and (3) reinforce it with rational argument. You must offer solutions that are plausible and involve a happy ending.

Boris Johnson’s campaign was successful in crafting such a narrative. First, Johnson got the public’s attention because he is a very well-known tv celebrity and comedian, an established print journalist and columnist. In this age of celebrity, he was able to seem interesting, novel and above party politics, despite having been a Conservative MP since 2001. And for London politics, he was a new and interesting face.

Second, Johnson stimulated a desire for change. That was easy because after eight years in office, the Labour incumbent Ken Livingstone had made himself unpopular. Yesterday, the polling firm Ipsos-MORI published their ‘inbox’ for the new mayor. Based on 41,000 interviews for the London boroughs' and seven years of tracking data in the London survey, it shows that Londoners are satisfied with their city as a place to live. But they are concerned about the cost of living, housing, overall crime levels and in particular violent crime, traffic congestion and congestion charging. When asked which issues would decide their votes, respondents gave crime and policing, transport overall and healthcare as their top three. 

The Ipsos-MORI survey also showed that Livingstone had polarised the public over congestion charging and that people disliked his style and attitude. They thought that he had grown out of touch. 

Apart from healthcare, these became the top subjects of Johnson’s mega-message: Ken Livingstone must go.

Third, Johnson followed up his powerful “time for a change” theme with rational arguments. Nobody would ever call Boris a policy wonk but he had enough solutions on the big issues that were plausible to his target voters. Doubling the number of police on the buses, especially in outer London. Action on gang crime. Phase out bendy buses. Reform the congestion charge. Build more affordable homes. Stand up for Londoners on healthcare.  No, I wasn’t taken in and it will be fascinating to watch him try to keep all his promises.  My point is, policies do matter but it’s how you frame them that counts!

OK, Johnson sometimes floundered under questioning but the mood for change had built up. The media narrative was written – Ken out, Boris in.  The Tory campaign rammed it home by selling their man as the only change for the better. (I’ve seen that one used to great effect in Australian election campaigns. Just fancy that!)

Johnson embodied his narrative by being younger, newer and more approachable than Livingstone.  He is also a big personality but with a very different style and background to the outgoing mayor.  But he became serious and measured to the point of being dull, so it became harder to pin the “Boris the clown” tag on him.  As a tv celebrity, he could be engaging and compelling and this enabled him to discuss the issues in a way that struck a chord with disenchanted voters’ emotions.  Like most Londoners, he was upbeat about the city and its future.  Boris – for people usually refer to him by his Christian name only - seemed to offer voters a safe, unrisky change. A happy ending.

Let me be clear: I am sure that the ending won’t be happy, especially for some of those who live in the less leafy parts of London. 

I was pleased to vote for Brian Paddick for my first preference.  I appreciate that he was always going to struggle against the huge financial and media juggernauts behind the Labour and Tory candidates.  Also, it seems that Lib Dem supporters didn’t understand the voting system, but more on that later. 

We can’t let ourselves off the hook though.  The Tory story worked and we need to understand why.  Once again, our campaign had a meaty list of good policies.  But I don’t think that we told people a good story about why they should vote Lib Dem, for the Mayor or the GLA.

They responded accordingly.