I was giving my theory of networked political communications to a group of Dutch lobbyists when someone asked a rather awkward but important question.
I had been suggesting that we are in a new paradigm of political communications in Britain where bloggers, campaigning websites, mainstream media, and political party online messaging is creating a new networked political media. I even used my parable of the Cadbury gorilla.
If you look at the recent big political media events: David Davis’s resignation; McBridge and Guido; and the Telegraph and MPs expenses; they all involve a much more complex and fast-moving networked dynamic that brings new levels of interactivity, connectivity and instability to the political communications process.
In this environment, I argued, it pays to be transparent, open, interactive and to listen as well as talk to the public. So Downing Street got it wrong with the Brown YouTube video (and arguably with the No 10 Petition website) because it used new media but it did it in the old top-down, talking to you way.
It is a view shared, for example, by PR giant Richard Edelman.
Now what about the BNP and my Dutch guests?
Well we might worry about the BNP but the lovely, tolerant, liberal Dutch have arugably got a much worse problem with overtly racist politicians in their legislature. Geert Wilders’ right wing Freedom Party (PVV) got 17% of the vote and has four MPs. They have a less violent history than the BNP and fewer associations with outright fascist ideology but their policies are at least as extreme.
And as one of my Dutch guests said, they have become very popular without being at all networked. So where does that leave networked political communications? why bother?
These right-wing extremists have become popular in the digital age despite being very untransparent and non-interactive. There is no wiki where you can contribute to BNP policy formulation (if for some bizarre reason you might want to). The PVV in Holland, likewise, have got into power with a simple old-fashioned message of fear and loathing transmitted via traditional platforms and conventional campaign techniques.
In that sense, both the BNP and the PVV have got digital communications right. They have understood that however vile and nonsensical their policies and beliefs are, they are shared by a significant proportion of the population. People know very well that these people are racist and still vote for them. It is because they are angry and these parties articulate that anger in a way that releases all sorts of pent-up frustrations. They remind us that the biggest asset in politics today is authenticity.
You can use all the new media technology in the world. You can use all the online platforms available. You can be interactive and socially networked. But if you do not have a clear, authentic platform of real policies that address the politics of the real world, then you might as well pack up your laptop and give in to the extremists.
Democracy is a complicated business and hard work. We need democratic politicians because they are the suspension system for the vehicle of state. They are the shock absorbers between our ideals and the reality of compromise. Democracy in the digital age is even more complex.
But there are no short cuts. If political communications is to repair the distrust, disconnect and disgust that people feel about our politics then it has to adopt a more networked relationship with the media and the people.
In the short term, nasty parties with stupid policies will be able to take advantage of the failure of mainstream politics (and mainstream media) to connect with the people.
In the long-term the only answer is to repair the political system, or rather come up with one fit for the digital age. The route to more participatory politics is via more participatory political communications. Not everyone need become active but we can’t afford to leave so many people outside of the debate.
“The route to more participatory politics is via more participatory political communications. Not everyone need become active but we can’t afford to leave so many people outside of the debate.”
Hmmm. I don’t know if I believe that. The UK evidence appears to be that people tend not to want the kind of participation in politics offered by showing up at a ballot box. Or giving their credit card number to a political party – despite having political issues forced down their throats by TV news coverage, radio programmes and newspapers.
UK political communications are very good at communicating among UK elites, the problem is that broadening those communications out involves engaging with the kind of views you get in the comment sections of certain popular newspaper websites. And that’s deeply unappealing for many of the communicators.
The real missing element is a substantive outcome to political communications. Decisions are only for the executive, with occasional deliberation for the House of Commons.
We need to move towards being a plebiscitary not a parliamentary democracy for that to change. But that change too will bring its own problems.
I’m stopping before I sound like too much of a historian.
But that’s what I am suggesting.
You can’t just use new media techniques to do the old style politics. I agree that it’s not about using digital techniques to get people to ballot boxes. It’s about using digital devices to enable people to find new ways to take charge of (or responsibility for) their lives.
Not everyone will want to do it, but if you can engage with all the people 1% of the time more than we do now, then that is a massive increase in political communication.
When you look at the mess that politics is in, you would hope that they would see this as in their own interest, even though it means sharing power.
As you say, the ultimate incentive to participation is ‘substantive outcomes’. IIf the politicians don’t deliver that, then all the digital comms in the world will not rescue their reputation.
I can see politicians perhaps sharing power. I can’t see citizens wanting to share responsibility… as you say, the pols are the shock-absorbers.
I think where the BNP and PVV have got their tactics right is to show that they care about the issues that the electorate cares about – rather than speaking to them about their own policies and agenda. Some including me, would argue that Gordon Brown’s mistake has been his concern about his legacy rather than a ‘I will be lead by your concerns’ approach to the electorate. Whilst I believe in more participatory democracy I think people are more interested in politics that is based on their concerns not on ideology of left, right etc
“But if you do not have a clear, authentic platform of real policies that address the politics of the real world, then you might as well pack up your laptop and give in to the extremists.”
That’s the key. All the so-called ‘big three’ parties offer pretty much the same set of policies, certainly economically. At a time when neo-liberalist economics has been shown to have failed, you would expect organisations offering left/socialist policies to benefit. But few organisations are offering those policies. Those that do are presented as ‘fringe’ or ‘extremist’ by a media which doesn’t get the fact that politics exists outside the so-called big 3, the Westminster village and the cosy club. The mail I got last week from the Media Society about the Steve Richards meeting was a cry of impotent rage from a media establishment which cannot comprehend that people can make decisions outside the ones they are told they are allowed to make.
Some may be registering protest votes, many more are voting for other parties because they back what they say. Everyone needs to face up to that fact.
As is so often the case, ordinary voters are much more aware of the need for “real policies that address the politics of the real world” than a media which sees ordinary voters as uninvolved and uneducated because they don’t follow the lead s the media tells them to.
Charlie, I followed the link to what Richard Edelman supposedly said.
He is reported as saying “mass is dead” and the future is “public engagement”. But public is mass (people in general considered as a whole).
It also seems he said, the future (if not the present) is about aggregated – atomized – audiences. But if that is true then public relations is dead, too. Richard Edelman cannot have it both ways.
However, the link to JoHo is reporting what Richard supposedly said. So, we cannot be sure whether he said it.
But – regardless – the concept of mass (as in experiences, consciousness, mass action even) is still visible in Iran, is it not? The election of Obama? The outrage over MPs’ expenses in the UK? Princess’s Diana’s funeral? September 11, 2001? The impact of this recession? Jade Goody’s death? So, is mass dead? I think not. Evolving; but not dead.
It was always the case that people experienced the world not as part of the mass (working class or even British) but as individuals in small networks, with the mass bit coming in when we were touched by wider events and experiences (in Britain’s case in the 19th century, say, pride in the empire, and later in the 20th by guilt about it). That relationship between the individual and society is as true today as ever. Change is not the same as death – it is an expression of mass life itself.
But when we reach beyond the individual experience we seek to connect with or mould and evolve the mass, based on what they have in common in terms of their experiences and understanding. So, as long as there is a public (mass) there will be mass media and public (mass) relations (I argue).
Otherwise, Richard Edelman and me need to find a new industry to be part of.
they irate me so much but this is quite funny http://bnpbabes.co.uk/