tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/tv-debate-11786/articlesTV debate – The Conversation2020-09-22T09:55:28Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1466702020-09-22T09:55:28Z2020-09-22T09:55:28ZContrasting styles, some substance: 5 experts on the first TV leaders’ debate of NZ’s election<p>Prime Minister and Labour leader Jacinda Ardern and National Party leader Judith Collins have met for the first televised debate of the 2020 election campaign. With the results of the latest 1 News-Colmar Brunton poll released only an hour earlier, there was much at stake.</p>
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<p>While down slightly on previous polls, Labour was still in a position to govern alone — comfortably so if the Greens joined them in a coalition agreement. National was still well behind, clearly bleeding votes to ACT on its right. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, the debate was a fair and largely evenly matched contest, covering the COVID-19 response, border control, health, housing, employment, income inequality and climate change.</p>
<p>Our five experts watched the debate closely for what it revealed about policy, performance and the likely tone of the campaign to come.</p>
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<h2>Genuine differences in substance and style</h2>
<p><strong>Grant Duncan, Associate Professor for the School of People, Environment and Planning, Massey University</strong></p>
<p>Leaders debates are like reality TV. “Who gets voted off the island? Jacinda or Judith?” Fun to watch, but they misrepresent how elections work. </p>
<p>In their proportional representation system, New Zealanders do not vote for prime ministers; they vote for representatives — one local representative, and one party of representatives.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ardern-versus-collins-ahead-of-their-first-tv-debate-how-much-will-charisma-and-eloquence-matter-145840">Ardern versus Collins: ahead of their first TV debate, how much will charisma and eloquence matter?</a>
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<p>Despite misleading impressions, however, the first debate between the leaders of the two largest parties revealed genuine differences of style and substance. The debate delivered on substantial issues, from climate change to housing the poor.</p>
<p>Collins was quick to call out “nonsense” and often looked fed-up. She criticised the Ardern government for failing to reduce material hardship for the poor, even though her own plan to “stimulate the economy” with tax cuts would most benefit middle- to higher-income earners. She would raise housing supply through reforming laws that affect developers.</p>
<p>Ardern was reserved but sincere. She acknowledged that it’s been a tough time for New Zealanders, but backed public investment in people and their well-being. She saw climate change innovation as an opportunity for farmers and agriculture, not a cost.</p>
<p>Both leaders showed substance, but different styles. National will go for stimulus through tax cuts; Labour will stimulate through raising incomes for the lowest earners. I’d call it a draw.</p>
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<h2>Big questions on climate and inequality go unanswered</h2>
<p><strong>Bronwyn Hayward, Professor of Politics, University of Canterbury</strong></p>
<p>In the 2017 TVNZ election debates, no one was asked about climate change once. Thankfully it was raised early this time by Ardern and hammered home in questions — but the answers left a lot to be desired.</p>
<p>Collins played to her base, repeating the claim that New Zealand is so small, whatever it does won’t make a difference (it will), and that farmers feel bagged by the Greens and Labour (they do). It was left to Ardern to offer more substance and collaborative pathways forward: incentives for reducing emissions, cleaning up rivers (including urban rivers). </p>
<p>But beyond a bit of banter about electric vehicles, neither leader had a policy to fundamentally reduce our transport emissions. Pumped hydro schemes may help create jobs and provide stable energy supply over dry years, but neither tackled how we will afford the costs that are coming for homes and infrastructure exposed to sea level rise. </p>
<p>COVID-19 consumes us right now but climate change hasn’t gone away and neither has inequality. Again no one really answered the question posed by head girl of Aorere College, Aigagalefili Fepulea'i Tapua'i, about the stress on low-income school communities where students have to choose between study or taking a job to help their family. </p>
<p>There were gestures towards answers. Collins made the most direct connection, saying, “My husband is Samoan and had to leave school”, but had no solution. Ardern gestured towards raising the lowest incomes but didn’t make a firm commitment beyond saying, “I am not done with child poverty.”</p>
<p>The futures of young New Zealanders hang on what happens next.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/with-the-election-campaign-underway-can-the-law-protect-voters-from-fake-news-and-conspiracy-theories-146095">With the election campaign underway, can the law protect voters from fake news and conspiracy theories?</a>
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<h2>Ardern as hard to pin down as ever</h2>
<p><strong>Morgan Godfery, Māori Research Partnerships Manager, University of Otago</strong></p>
<p>“Optimism, and that’s what Labour will bring,” the prime minister said in her opening statement, which is strangely and typically, well, contentless. It’s part of the paradox that is Jacinda Ardern — she’s the global left’s standard bearer, the most popular New Zealand prime minister in living memory, a policy leader against the coronavirus, and yet it’s almost impossible to pin down her politics beyond that optimism. </p>
<p>Ardern promised 8,000 new homes are coming down the line, and that’s ostensibly leftist policy and politic. Yet the waiting list for public housing is 20,000 people long. Is 8,000 left enough? It’s certainly left — or centre! — enough to win. </p>
<p>Especially against a strangely flat and staggered National Party leader. People expect Judith Collins to go hard, because of course it’s a brand she cultivates, but it was a jarring juxtaposition: the hard woman (Collins) against the kind and optimistic prime minister. The advocate for a “border protection agency” (Collins) against the person who’s protected the borders (Ardern). It was hard to pin down, then, precisely what Collins was angry at. Other, of course, than the fact she’s leading the losing side.</p>
<h2>Questions remain around National’s border policy</h2>
<p><strong>Siouxsie Wiles, Associate Professor in Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, University of Auckland</strong></p>
<p>It’s no secret that I am supportive of the current government’s elimination strategy when it comes to dealing with COVID-19. The main thing I was looking to hear in the leader’s debate was a commitment from both Jacinda Ardern and Judith Collins that whatever government they lead would stick with that strategy. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/stardust-and-substance-new-zealands-election-becomes-a-third-referendum-on-jacinda-arderns-leadership-143262">Stardust and substance: New Zealand's election becomes a 'third referendum' on Jacinda Ardern's leadership</a>
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<p>The prime minister did that and reiterated the importance of a tightly managed and controlled border. In response, Collins brought up the need for “someone to be in charge”. With a National-led government that would be the job of a new border protection agency. I’m all in favour of an agency dedicated to defending us from pandemic threats, but focusing solely on our border won’t achieve that. Any agency should have a much broader remit that also addresses what makes us vulnerable to pandemics. </p>
<p>Collins also raised not letting anyone board a plane to New Zealand unless they test negative. This policy will certainly stop some infectious people from being able to travel but it won’t catch all of them. I really worry it’ll discriminate against those who can’t afford to, or aren’t able to, access testing. To me this policy runs the very real risk of stranding New Zealanders overseas while not really increasing the security of our border.</p>
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<h2>Both leaders will want to lift their game</h2>
<p><strong>Richard Shaw, Professor of Politics, Massey University</strong></p>
<p>These are as much performances as debates. Ardern edged Collins on leadership performance, looking and sounding like someone with a 32% lead over her opponent in the preferred prime minister ratings and whose party has a 17% buffer over its major opposition: measured, polite and committed to staying clear of the tit-for-tat. </p>
<p>Given the polls, Collins needed to force the issue: it showed in her regular interjections (some of which were to good effect) and willingness to take the contest to Ardern (occasionally not so successfully). </p>
<p>On the issue of policy fluency (your own but also the other side’s), a close call went — perhaps, maybe — narrowly to Collins. As to eloquence — verbal dexterity and rhetorical flow — Ardern had the edge on her opponent (especially in her closing statement), although Collins in pugnacious mode had an energy that Ardern lacked. </p>
<p>These presentational dimensions of politics matter, especially at a time when voters are looking for an emotional compact with leaders. Given the context, Collins may sleep the easier of the two tonight, but both will be looking to lift things a notch or several when they next meet.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/146670/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bronwyn Hayward is a co-ordinating lead author of the intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and a member of its core writing team. The views expressed here are her own.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Siouxsie Wiles is a Deputy-Director of Te Pūnaha Matatini, New Zealand's Centre of Research Excellence in complex systems which receives funding from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) for their COVID-19-related work. While not affiliated with the Labour Party, she has agreed to deliver in November the 2020 Mary Dreaver lecture. This annual lecture is held in celebration of the life and achievements of Labour MP Mary Dreaver, the first Auckland woman elected to the New Zealand Parliament. Proceeds from the event go towards supporting the campaigns of women candidates for the Labour Party in both local and national elections. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Grant Duncan, Morgan Godfery, and Richard Shaw do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>From policy to performance, a panel of five political experts analyses the first televised leaders’ debate of the 2020 New Zealand election campaign.Grant Duncan, Associate Professor for the School of People, Environment and Planning, Massey UniversityBronwyn Hayward, Professor of Politics, University of CanterburyMorgan Godfery, Māori Research Partnerships Manager, University of OtagoRichard Shaw, Professor of Politics, Massey UniversitySiouxsie Wiles, Associate Professor in Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata RauLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1229192020-03-19T12:04:07Z2020-03-19T12:04:07ZHow to make presidential debates serve voters, not candidates<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319966/original/file-20200311-116236-uuog23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=43%2C0%2C4892%2C3258&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Voters could know more about how each of these men think.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Election-2020-Debate/7bf710297c834634ad4ee94cf9f67fd1/11/0">AP Photo/Patrick Semansky</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://theconversation.com/presidential-debates-arent-debates-at-all-theyre-joint-press-conferences-125202">Presidential debates are not debates at all</a>. They provide candidates with opportunities to deliver their own pre-scripted messages, largely unchallenged.</p>
<p>Ideally, presidential debate scholars agree, these events should help voters <a href="https://www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/feature/democratizing-the-debates/">identify which candidate they agree with</a> most on key issues, and, as other academic debate coaches put it, see how a candidate would “<a href="https://www.thewrap.com/how-debate-coaches-would-fix-the-democratic-presidential-debates/">make decisions, implement policies, and think through complex problems</a>” if elected.</p>
<p>The debates, as currently structured, do achieve the first goal: Voters can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00335630.2015.994905">find out which candidate fits</a> with their views. However, the many Democratic presidential primary debates this election cycle have failed to give many a good idea of how any of the candidates would approach hard decisions once in office.</p>
<p>Fortunately, there are better debate formats. <a href="https://as.vanderbilt.edu/communication/people/john-p-koch/">I coach debate at Vanderbilt University</a>, and three new approaches in the field of competitive academic debate offer ideas that could help presidential debates serve multiple purposes – not just one.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319969/original/file-20200311-116232-yrc3r9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319969/original/file-20200311-116232-yrc3r9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319969/original/file-20200311-116232-yrc3r9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319969/original/file-20200311-116232-yrc3r9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319969/original/file-20200311-116232-yrc3r9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319969/original/file-20200311-116232-yrc3r9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319969/original/file-20200311-116232-yrc3r9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319969/original/file-20200311-116232-yrc3r9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Right now, candidates face journalists – but they could face subject-matter experts instead.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/moderator-and-the-new-york-times-national-editor-marc-lacey-news-photo/1176120053?adppopup=true">Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>Face a panel of experts</h2>
<p>Current presidential debates, based on <a href="https://theconversation.com/think-presidential-debates-are-dull-thank-1950s-tv-game-shows-128764">1950s game shows</a>, put candidates side by side on a stage to answer questions from a panel of journalists and respond to each other’s comments. There is little opportunity for deep questioning, which could reveal much more about candidates’ understanding of complex issues like foreign policy, health care and the economy.</p>
<p>This year, the Vanderbilt debate team started competing in the <a href="https://civicdebateconference.org/">Civic Debate Conference</a>, which tests different debate formats. One, called the Schuman Challenge, requires our students to <a href="https://eeas.europa.eu/delegations/united-states-america_en/31693/Schuman%20Challenge">discuss their ideas with experts</a>. The students are given a problem and asked to write a proposal to solve it, and then present and defend it in front of a group of people who know a lot about that issue. This year, for instance, students are exploring how the United States and the European Union should respond to alternative models of government in China.</p>
<p>This is an <a href="https://www.wm.edu/news/stories/2019/wm-team-aces-eu-foreign-policy-competition.php">intense process</a> that requires exhaustive research, argument preparation, deep knowledge and clear decisions. Our best students excel at this format – and it seems a useful way to test presidential candidates’ ability to study and prepare, then explain and defend their positions on public issues. </p>
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<span class="caption">Candidates could phone a friend, or an adviser, to show how they would marshal a team to address a particular issue.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/APTOPIX-Election-2020-Joe-Biden/84bf9f74febb4c58b0678025334bcf56/1/0">AP Photo/Mary Altaffer</a></span>
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<h2>Consult with advisers</h2>
<p>Another way to improve current debates would be to include their advisers in the debate process, since presidents often rely on them to make decisions.</p>
<p>At Emory University in 2019, Civic Debate member schools participated in an <a href="https://civicdebateconference.org/One-Person-No-Vote.php">event</a> about improving voting rights in the United States. First, all the students got information from experts at the <a href="https://www.civilandhumanrights.org/">National Center for Civil and Human Rights</a>. Then the schools’ teams devised and presented their solutions. After watching all the presentations, each team modified its ideas to reflect others’ proposals, and each presented a revised plan to the group.</p>
<p>For presidential candidates, the format could be adapted so candidates are given a topic, an opportunity to meet with their advisers, and then time to present their solutions. After hearing each other’s ideas, the candidates could then discuss each other’s plans in an attempt to identify the best course of action. </p>
<p>This would allow voters to see how a candidate would collect information, reflect upon disagreements, modify their own proposals and ultimately make a decision.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319967/original/file-20200311-116250-11dnmp2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319967/original/file-20200311-116250-11dnmp2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319967/original/file-20200311-116250-11dnmp2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319967/original/file-20200311-116250-11dnmp2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319967/original/file-20200311-116250-11dnmp2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319967/original/file-20200311-116250-11dnmp2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=560&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319967/original/file-20200311-116250-11dnmp2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=560&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319967/original/file-20200311-116250-11dnmp2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=560&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, candidates came together to support a cause.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Election-2020-MLK-Day/a8306c82687940339a34043f26773a7f/51/0">AP Photo/Meg Kinnard</a></span>
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<h2>Work as a team</h2>
<p>A third approach could involve having the candidates work as a team. </p>
<p>Traditionally, academic debate is a team sport, in which each team represents a particular university. However, the Civic Debate Conference has <a href="https://civicdebateconference.org/What-We-Owe.php">combined multiple schools into single teams</a>. The result is that debaters from various schools must find compromise and arrive at policy positions that all of the team’s members are willing – and able – to defend.</p>
<p>The presidency is not a dictatorship, and the American system of government requires compromise. It would be very revealing to team candidates up with each other – either by choice or randomly – to see how they work through their differences, and ultimately find out what they are willing to defend together.</p>
<p>It’s probably too much to try all three of these potential formats at once. But having multiple debate types over time might sustain the public’s interest. Additional formats would reveal more about candidates, helping help voters make their choices not only about whom they agree with, but whose way of thinking they find most appropriate for the presidency.</p>
<p>[<em>Like what you’ve read? Want more?</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=likethis">Sign up for The Conversation’s daily newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/122919/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John P. Koch does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Three new approaches in the field of competitive academic debate offer ideas that could help presidential debates serve both their public purposes.John P. Koch, Senior Lecturer and Director of Debate, Vanderbilt UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1303102020-01-21T13:44:32Z2020-01-21T13:44:32ZLaurence Fox: thanks for the chance to talk about the inequality that is rife in the UK’s entertainment industry<p>British actor, Laurence Fox, has been all over the media recently, condemning black and working-class actors for being “annoying” in speaking publicly about inequality issues. It all started when <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/lewis-star-laurence-fox-embroiled-in-question-time-race-row-flpzv0z95">he was on a panel in the BBC show</a>, Question Time and joined a discussion about the treatment of Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex, by the media. When an audience member, mixed-race university lecturer Rachel Boyle of Edge Hill University, remarked that, as a “white, privileged male”, he failed to pick up on the racism directed against Markle, he rolled his eyes and accused her of being racist.</p>
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<p>To call me a white privileged male is to be racist. You are being racist…</p>
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<p>In his interviews since then, Fox – who represents the third generation of one of the UK’s most influential theatre families – has expanded on his political philosophy, most recently <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/laurence-fox-1017-sam-mendes-racism-sikh-soldier_uk_5e26a931c5b673621f7b0060">accusing film director Sam Mendes</a> of “forcing diversity on people” by casting a Sikh soldier in his first world war epic 1917. This, Fox said in a recent podcast presented by James Delingpole, was “institutionally racist”. He went on to say:</p>
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<p>The most annoying thing is the minute a black actor – it’s the same with working-class actors – the minute they’ve got five million quid in the bank, every interview they do is about how racism is rampant and rife in the industry. And with working-class actors: ‘There’s not enough working class actors.’ You weren’t saying that when you didn’t have a fucking pot to piss in were you? You weren’t standing up for the working-class actors until you’re now no longer materially working class.“</p>
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<p>Controversial views, to be sure – and yet Fox is performing a sadly familiar and far from original role. As a well-known figure engaging in and seemingly enjoying an "attention economy”, why, we might ask, does Fox matter – and is there any point in amplifying these views? </p>
<p>For me, the value is in recuperative work. Not in recuperating him, but in correcting the narrative that inequality in the cultural industries isn’t a problem, and that all voices are heard equally. In thinking through Fox’s multiple media appearances, it’s critical to look not only at what is there, but also at what is left out. And in Fox’s case it’s evidence. </p>
<h2>Lack of diversity</h2>
<p>Recent reports on the state of the UK cultural industries evidence serious inequalities in relation to race, class and gender. The 2018 Creative London report <a href="http://createlondon.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Panic-Social-Class-Taste-and-Inequalities-in-the-Creative-Industries1.pdf">Panic! Social Class, Taste and Inequalities in the Creative Industries</a> found that in the industries of film, television and radio, only 4.2% of workers identified as Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME), and only 12.4% of those working in film, TV and radio were from working-class social origins. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311102/original/file-20200121-117927-c8hp88.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311102/original/file-20200121-117927-c8hp88.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311102/original/file-20200121-117927-c8hp88.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311102/original/file-20200121-117927-c8hp88.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311102/original/file-20200121-117927-c8hp88.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311102/original/file-20200121-117927-c8hp88.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311102/original/file-20200121-117927-c8hp88.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311102/original/file-20200121-117927-c8hp88.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The truth about diversity in film, TV and radio in the UK.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Creative London</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On stage and screen, the union, Equity, representing performers and creative practitioners, launched its <a href="https://www.equity.org.uk/getting-involved/campaigns/play-fair/">Play Fair</a> campaign in 2016, in order to “challenge the industry on the persistent under-representation of diversity, and discriminatory practice in the casting process”. Articulating the experiences of members, the report notes that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The lack of diversity on our stages, screens, airwaves and online is one of the biggest issues our industry faces, and members from diverse backgrounds have fewer working opportunities as a result.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In September 2019, the Ofcom annual <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0028/166807/Diversity-in-TV-2019.pdf">Diversity and Equal Opportunities in Television report</a> noted that “The UK’s television industry is strongly skewed towards people from privately educated backgrounds.”</p>
<p>In 2018, the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain <a href="https://writersguild.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/WGGB-Gender-Inequality-and-Screenwriters-Report.pdf">published a study</a> of the impact of gender on equality of opportunity for screenwriters and key creatives in the UK film and television industries. The results were conclusive: in television, the percentage of episodes written by women between 2005-2016 stood at a mere 28%. In film, the figures were significantly worse, finding that the percentage of all working female screenwriters over this ten-year period was just 16%. </p>
<h2>Whose story, whose voice?</h2>
<p>Another question that is relevant here relates to power. When analysing TV performances, for example, I ask my students to think carefully about whose story is being told, by whom, from what perspective and for what purpose. The ability and the privilege to speak up, is one fraught with power imbalance. Responding to Fox’s statement, actor Maxine Peake tweeted, questioning Fox’s motivation:</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1219216504224468992"}"></div></p>
<p>Whipping up emotion by playing the populist is easy when you’re given the voice to do so. Seeing and understanding that your own experience of the world isn’t necessarily that of others, is harder work. While Fox can’t control what he referred to on Question Time as his “immutable characteristics”, he can, if he’s willing, recognise his significant advantages.</p>
<p>Fox’s purposeful and public provocations, such as his recent Tweet, display his gamification of the debates he’s chosen to enter. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1218151838656204801"}"></div></p>
<p>It would seem that his cup really doth overflow, for the time being at least. But much is at stake here. Inequality and issues of power and privilege are important and need to be viewed critically and carefully. While Fox may have a variety of platforms from which to speak, it’s the evidence that needs to take centre stage.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/130310/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Beth Johnson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Race, gender and social class still play a massive part in deciding who gets ahead in film, TV and radio.Beth Johnson, Associate Professor in Film and Media, University of LeedsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1287642019-12-17T13:55:08Z2019-12-17T13:55:08ZThink presidential debates are dull? Thank 1950s TV game shows<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/306683/original/file-20191212-85428-1a33e5n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3716%2C2862&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Host Jack Barry, middle, is flanked by contestants on '21,' a 1950s TV game show.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Vivienne_Nearing,_Jack_Barry,_Charles_Van_Doren_NYWTS.jpg">Orlando Fernandez/New York World-Telegram and Sun/Library of Congress/Wikimedia Commons</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Televised political debates <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/09/2020-democratic-debates-arent-pleasing-anyone/598306/">continue to disappoint viewers and critics</a>. Sometimes they even <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2012/10/how-obamas-debate-strategy-bombed-082037">frustrate the participants</a> themselves. </p>
<p>That’s because, since their inception, nobody has been able to come up with a model that rival candidates would accept, and that would be useful and informative for the viewing public. The only debate arrangement everyone agreed to nearly 60 years ago largely remains in place today – the game show format.</p>
<p>The first TV debates were shaped by federal regulations, an enterprising network executive named Frank Stanton, and a series of negotiations that were hampered by a tight schedule and dueling campaigns. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/09/19/the-state-of-the-presidential-debate">As far back as 1936</a>, radio broadcasters wanted to air live debates between presidential candidates. But Section 315 of the 1934 Communications Act <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/315">required equal airtime be devoted to every announced candidate</a>, preventing broadcasters from limiting the debate pool. Stanton, president of CBS from 1946 to 1971, regularly proposed debates and often went to Washington to <a href="https://www.jfklibrary.org/sites/default/files/archives/JFKOH/Stanton,%20Frank/JFKOH-FNS-01/JFKOH-FNS-01-TR.pdf">lobby Congress</a> to change the law. In the late 1950s, he found his moment.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZRfPgFMYkmE?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">An episode of ‘The $64,000 Question’ from 1956.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The rise and fall of quiz shows</h2>
<p>Between 1955 and 1959, America’s prime-time television schedule became dominated by quiz shows. </p>
<p>Programs like “The $64,000 Question,” “Twenty-One” and “Tic-Tac-Dough” delighted audiences and turned contestants and the shows’ hosts into national celebrities. The shows were all pretty similar, designed to showcase intellect while letting viewers at home test their knowledge.</p>
<p>In 1958, though, <a href="https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/herbert-stempel">some players began to complain</a> that the shows were rigged, saying they were given the correct answers, or instructed to answer incorrectly, to boost suspense and attract viewers.</p>
<p>The revelations shocked the nation, leading to calls for political action and more regulation of television programming. Within the industry, <a href="https://www.rtdna.org/content/edward_r_murrow_s_1958_wires_lights_in_a_box_speech">critics and journalists called on TV networks</a> to renew investment in public affairs broadcasting.</p>
<p>Stanton seized the moment. He suggested televised political debates could be a way to redeem TV; NBC president Robert Sarnoff and other industry leaders joined him. Their lobbying was enough to get Section 315 suspended, and 1960 proved the perfect moment. </p>
<p>President Eisenhower was finishing his second term, and both Democrats and Republicans would be nominating new candidates. These two new nominees would need to appeal to the <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/us-presidents/kennedy-nixon-debates">broad, TV-watching American public</a> in new ways.</p>
<p>Stanton got both Vice President Richard Nixon – who had been a champion debater at Whittier College – and Senator John F. Kennedy to accept invitations to debate live on television. That’s when the really difficult negotiations began. </p>
<h2>Setting the debate structure</h2>
<p>Stanton’s earliest concept had the <a href="https://www.discoverlbj.org/item/oh-stantonf-19870722-2-01-10">two candidates facing a panel of journalists</a> who would ask questions, but representatives of both candidates were wary of the new idea. The whole format had to be agreed on by the TV networks, the political parties and the candidates themselves. </p>
<p>As communications scholar John W. Self explains, <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/presidential-debate-negotiation-from-1960-to-1988-setting-the-stage-for-prime-time-clashes/oclc/965143793">nobody really called the events “debates”</a> while the arrangements were being hammered out. Instead, they were always officially referred to as a “joint appearance series.” Every detail took a long time to agree on, as the election drew ever closer in the late summer of 1960.</p>
<p>Democratic Sen. Mike Mansfield publicly worried that this opportunity for fruitful exchange might end up as little more than “<a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/presidential-debate-negotiation-from-1960-to-1988-setting-the-stage-for-prime-time-clashes/oclc/965143793">a beauty contest, press conference, or quiz program</a>.” </p>
<p>Sure enough, the <a href="https://www.discoverlbj.org/item/oh-stantonf-19870722-2-01-10">time pressures</a> pushed everyone to agree on an established TV format Americans were familiar with: the quiz show. The required studios were easily available, the production staff already knew what to do, and journalists could easily moderate discussions in which candidates agreed not to directly question or answer each other.</p>
<p>To everyone involved, it seemed the safest way to ensure that each candidate might enhance their own reputation without risking damage to their campaign. </p>
<p>To the audiences, though, the similarity was obvious – and disappointing.</p>
<p>Historian Daniel Boorstin said they reduced “<a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/16085/the-image-by-daniel-j-boorstin/">great national issues to trivial dimensions</a>.” Scholar Richard Tedlow drew the parallel more sharply, concluding that “<a href="http://doi.org/10.2307/2712542">[t]he debates bore as little relationship to the real work of the presidency</a> as the quiz shows did to intellectuality.”</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The first Kennedy-Nixon presidential debate in 1960.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Designer’s regret</h2>
<p>Even Stanton eventually realized how his creation stymied real understanding. The best interrogators, he thought, would be the candidates themselves, who would have to understand and counter the weaknesses in each other’s ideas. </p>
<p>“<a href="http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/nny/stantonf/transcripts/stantonf_1_8_361.html">I would have the two candidates for president sit down</a> face to face in front of the camera, and take a single issue and discuss it,” he once explained. “I would have no questions from the press at all.”</p>
<p>He even considered the most obvious objection: What would happen if one of the candidates refused to engage properly, or wouldn’t let the other get a word in edgewise? </p>
<p>“<a href="http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/nny/stantonf/transcripts/stantonf_1_8_362.html">When you become candidates for president of the United States</a>, you don’t misbehave in front of, you know, forty million people,” he explained – perhaps a bit too optimistically. </p>
<figure>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The June 26, 2019, Democratic primary presidential debate.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Carried through the years</h2>
<p>Stanton and those early critics saw what TV audiences see decades later: These events are <a href="http://theconversation.com/presidential-debates-arent-debates-at-all-theyre-joint-press-conferences-125202">not debates</a> at all. There’s no informative interchange between the participants, no considered reasoning and very little clarity about what candidates think or propose. </p>
<p>Instead, the quiz master, usually a well-known broadcast journalist, gently interrogates each contestant. The questions can be pointed and specific, but the answers are always soundbites tested on focus groups. The candidates’ <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/05/19/politics/donald-trump-hug-philippe-reines-hillary-clinton/index.html">body language is rehearsed</a>, as is quickly changing the subject, ignoring questions or misdirecting the audience’s attention.</p>
<p>Just like on game shows, candidates are not supposed to question or interrupt each other, and specific moments are intended to humanize and personalize the candidates. Even <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/the-secret-history-of-the-presidential-debate-buzzer/2016/01/26/b2971dda-c2d7-11e5-8965-0607e0e265ce_story.html">buzzers are sometimes employed</a> to stay on time. The candidates get thanked for playing when the game is over, while the audience considers how and why the game was won – and by whom.</p>
<p>The whole production is tidy, predictable, nonthreatening and occasionally entertaining. That’s precisely why the two dominant political parties, and their candidates, still insist on the format.</p>
<p>[ <em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/128764/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael J. Socolow does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The only satisfactory debate arrangement everyone agreed to nearly 60 years ago largely remains in place today – the game show format.Michael J. Socolow, Associate Professor, Communication and Journalism, University of MaineLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1276682019-12-07T07:46:04Z2019-12-07T07:46:04ZBoris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn’s final election debate: academic experts on their claims<p>Boris Johnson, the UK prime minister, and Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the Labour Party, have gone head-to-head in the final live television debate before the UK votes on December 12. They were set a series of tricky questions by a live studio audience, who often referenced some of the less pleasant aspects of this campaign when addressing the candidates. So how did they do? Academic specialists have been investigating the key topics under discussion for some time so their work can help us gauge how successfully both men made their final pitch to the electorate. </p>
<h2>Brexit uncertainty is damaging the economy</h2>
<p>Ask the two party leaders about Brexit and things are bound to get heated very quickly. This final debate saw both men accusing each other of damaging the British economy by allowing Brexit uncertainty to continue. Corbyn says Johnson is not really going to “get Brexit done” with his plan and Johnson says Labour’s proposal to strike a new deal before holding a second referendum is a delay that is blocking billions of pounds worth of investment from flowing into the country. </p>
<p>Even before this election was called, Costas Milas, Professor of Finance at the University of Liverpool, had reached the same view – a lack of clarity over the nation’s future is harming its economic outlook. He made that clear in a series of <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-brexit-uncertainty-is-hurting-the-uk-economy-in-four-charts-122987">easy-to-read charts</a>.</p>
<p>He also concluded that only a fresh referendum can resolve the matter – but it’s not the kind of referendum Corbyn is proposing. </p>
<h2>Northern Ireland and the future of the union</h2>
<p>A few days prior to the debate, Corbyn released documents that, he says, prove Johnson’s Brexit deal will lead to trade barriers between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, thus proving that he is prepared to put Brexit before the union. Johnson’s response was to say that Corbyn has never cared about the union and supported the IRA during the Troubles. </p>
<p>In short, the exchange became highly emotive and symbolic very quickly. But a <a href="https://theconversation.com/dup-may-be-overestimating-opposition-to-irish-sea-border-in-northern-ireland-new-survey-126322">recent research project</a> suggests that unionist voters in Northern Ireland might actually be thinking about Brexit and the border in far more practical terms. It may not be the union-breaking issue the leaders think it to be.</p>
<p>Feargal Cochrane, Professor of International Conflict Analysis, School of Politics and International Relations, University of Kent, took the time to <a href="https://theconversation.com/dup-may-be-overestimating-opposition-to-irish-sea-border-in-northern-ireland-new-survey-126322">actually ask these voters</a> what they thought about the prospect of having a border down the Irish Sea after Brexit. And while they weren’t exactly excited about it, they were also not entirely opposed:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>People become more flexible when mitigating factors are brought into the picture. For example, they might be more open to having an east-west border if they are reassured that border checks were to be electronic, with only some random physical checks of goods crossing the border. That becomes preferable to the prospect of physical checks on all goods at the border, which might follow a no-deal Brexit.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The respondents were also much more open to the idea of a border if it was coupled with a promise of more funding for Northern Ireland – something for Johnson to think about, perhaps. </p>
<h2>Who has the right plan for the NHS?</h2>
<p>The NHS is a central theme of this election and, sure enough, it was one of the first topics raised by an audience member – a woman about to restart training as a nurse. Both parties promise big spending so we’ve been sifting through their manifesto pledges. And both come in for similar criticism about how realistic they’re really being. </p>
<p>Maria Goddard, Professor of Health Economics, University of York, <a href="https://theconversation.com/labour-manifesto-and-the-nhs-a-health-economist-gives-her-verdict-127553">assessed Labour’s plans</a> and concluded that its spending pledges amount to around and extra 4.3% per year – higher than historic averages. However, Goddard suggests the viability of Labour’s ambitious goals for projects like extra social care, mental health care and community care very much depend on how successful it would be at implementing its tax reforms. She also warned that however laudable many of the ambitious plans for staffing might be, the timeframe being proposed is unrealistic.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Paula Lorgelly, Professor of Health Economics at UCL, took on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/conservative-plan-for-the-nhs-but-does-it-add-up-127706">Conservative manfisto’s NHS proposals</a>. These amount to a 3.3% increase in spending “which falls well short of the 4% needed to address waiting times and the under-provision of much needed mental health services”. The party is promising 6,000 more general practitioners (GPs) and 6,000 more primary care professionals, as well as an extra 50,000 nurses. But, like Labour, the Conservatives failed to convince this expert that they’ve come up with a believable plan to pay for it all. </p>
<h2>US trade negotiations will take years</h2>
<p>Corbyn says far from “getting Brexit done” Johnson’s plan hinges heavily on the need to strike a trade deal with the US that will take seven years to negotiate. </p>
<p>Earlier this year, Michael Plouffe, Lecturer in International Political Economy at UCL, read over a document from the British government outlining its objectives for the US trade deal and <a href="https://theconversation.com/brexit-britains-weakness-exposed-in-us-trade-deal-documents-113077">produced an analysis</a>. He said the UK looks to be in weak position, concluding:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The emphasis is very much on the UK aligning itself with US standards.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>He found evidence that the US is eager to bring the UK into line with its (often lower) standards on food, agriculture, labour standards, environmental protection and anti-corruption measures and that its economic heft makes it the stronger partner. That’s not, of course, to say that it will get its way, but it certainly speaks to the likelihood of lengthy talks between to the two nations. </p>
<h2>Which party’s policies keep the country safe?</h2>
<p>The London Bridge attacker, Usman Khan, had already been convicted of a terrorism offence but was released from prison in 2018 after serving half his sentence. For two people so insistent that we should not politicise the attack on London Bridge that killed two people in the middle of this campaign, Johnson and Corbyn seem to have a lot to say about the policies each other’s parties have put in place that allowed such a situation to arise. </p>
<p>David Lowe, senior research Fellow at Leeds Beckett University Law School, specialises in terrorism and security policy. He helpfully set out the long series of <a href="https://theconversation.com/london-bridge-attack-why-longer-sentences-for-terrorist-offences-are-not-the-answer-128154">changes to the legal framework</a> in the UK that led to the current system. It turns out that the actions of both the Conservatives and Labour (and indeed the Liberal Democrats) have played their part over the years.</p>
<p>He also concludes that longer prison sentences are not the answer to this problem. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/300094/original/file-20191104-88372-xpdf2e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/300094/original/file-20191104-88372-xpdf2e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/300094/original/file-20191104-88372-xpdf2e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/300094/original/file-20191104-88372-xpdf2e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/300094/original/file-20191104-88372-xpdf2e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/300094/original/file-20191104-88372-xpdf2e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/300094/original/file-20191104-88372-xpdf2e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/the-daily-newsletter-2?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKGE2019&utm_content=GEBannerA">Click here to subscribe to our newsletter if you believe this election should be all about the facts.</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/127668/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
The party leaders clashed over Brexit, Northern Ireland and the NHS.Laura Hood, Senior Politics Editor, Assistant Editor, The Conversation (UK edition)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1272712019-11-20T14:15:40Z2019-11-20T14:15:40ZI watched Johnson and Corbyn’s debate with 100 undecided voters – here’s how they reacted<p>The televised head-to-head election debate between Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn delivered no knock-out blows, no decisive moment of triumph or debacle. In this respect, it was typical of such debates. All the evidence suggests that televised election debates are hardly ever gamechangers. They don’t recast public opinion in such a way as to determine the election outcome. </p>
<p>There is, however, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10584609.2015.1016639">abundant evidence</a> to suggest that debates do have an effect on undecided voters, particularly those with weak allegiance to parties or candidates. They change what undecided viewers think when it comes to the strengths and weaknesses of candidates, especially when they’ve had only minimal media exposure before the debates. Debates do also have an impact on close electoral races in which a relatively small number of votes might make a difference to the result.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Debating-the-TV-Debates-FINAL.pdf">Studies</a> of the UK debates since 2010 have consistently shown that younger and undecided voters are especially likely to watch TV debates with a view to making their minds up and to talk about them with others while they’re happening and afterwards. </p>
<p>I watched the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk-election-debate-what-academic-experts-make-of-johnson-and-corbyns-claims-127378">first debate of the 2019 UK election campaign</a> between Jeremy Corbyn and Boris Johnson in the company of 100 undecided voters, brought into the University of Leeds to watch Johnson and Corbyn while using a real-time response app.</p>
<p>The app allows users to instantly express their views in real-time. While watching the debate, our audience of undecided voters were asked to select statements on their mobile screen that reflected their feelings at any moment during the debate. Our audience of 100 people made just under 10,000 responses during the course of the debate. We shall have much more to say about that experiment in due course, but a few broad observations can already be made.</p>
<p>Firstly, there seemed to be two debates going on at the same time – one on the traditional question of which party could make a difference to public services and another on <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/brexit-9976">Brexit</a>. </p>
<p>When it came to the more traditional side of the discussion, our viewers were particularly responsive to Corbyn’s warnings about the Conservative government allowing the <a href="https://theconversation.com/will-drug-prices-rise-following-a-uk-us-trade-deal-126473">marketisation of the NHS.</a></p>
<p>For viewers who regarded the election as mainly being about Brexit, Johnson’s repeated mantra of “get Brexit done” and references to Labour’s “dithering” had a lot of resonance. For them, ending the impasse was an overriding priority.</p>
<p>The initial implication of the data is that how people responded to this debate depended upon whether it was viewed in the context of a one-issue Brexit election or a broader contest between sharply differing social visions. As we drill into the data we shall be exploring how these two perspectives on the election conflict and converge.</p>
<h2>Who do you hate least?</h2>
<p>It’s also worth noting that people like to see political leaders put on the spot. This not only dramatises political choice but allows people to make important evaluations about the character of the person who will become their representative on the global stage.</p>
<p>The contrast between Corbyn and Johnson as characters is stark. Both arouse intense reactions from people who oppose them. It may be that in these election debates, as in the <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-and-clintons-second-debate-american-politics-is-in-the-gutter-66718">US presidential debates between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in 2016</a>, the battle will be to establish which candidate fewest people can’t stand the sight of. </p>
<p>This debate was marked by the conspicuous absence of the <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2019-50450902">Liberal Democrat and Scottish National Party leaders</a>, both of whom could hold the balance of power after December 12. ITV defended this exclusion on the grounds that this was a prime ministerial debate.</p>
<p>It may well be that the multi-party leaders’ debates will be more significant events in 2019 than they have been in the past. Voters, many of whom will be casting tactical votes, will be interested to see if and how the parties align in an election determined by avoidance of the lesser evil. </p>
<p>This election campaign is going to be rich in televised debates but it is to be hoped that, as the campaign goes on, formats might become rather more creative. The questions the audience put to Corbyn and Johnson were sharp and penetrating, reminding us that politics is not about ideological abstractions, but lived experience. There is a widespread perception, especially among disengaged and undecided citizens, that politicians simply do not understand what life is like for ordinary people. Election debates are a public test of that suspicion. </p>
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/the-daily-newsletter-2?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKGE2019&utm_content=GEBannerA">Click here to subscribe to the UK edition of The Conversation newsletter if you believe this election should be all about facts.</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/127271/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stephen Coleman receives funding from ITV to conduct independent evaluation of televised election debates. </span></em></p>Both party leaders seem to elicit stronger negative responses than positive.Stephen Coleman, Professor of Political Communication, University of LeedsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1252022019-10-14T14:21:44Z2019-10-14T14:21:44ZPresidential ‘debates’ aren’t debates at all – they’re joint press conferences<p>Democratic presidential contenders gathered Tuesday evening in Ohio for the latest in a series of televised question-and-answer sessions in the lead-up to the 2020 primary season. </p>
<p>These sessions <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/democratic-debate-on-tuesday-features-a-surging-elizabeth-warren-and-a-recuperating-bernie-sanders-2019-10-12">are called debates</a> by their sponsors and the participants. But are they really?</p>
<p>Presidential debate scholars have long lamented that presidential debates are not really debates at all, but canned mini-speeches at what amounts to a joint press conference. </p>
<p>According to <a href="https://www.cengage.com/c/argumentation-and-debate-13e-freeley/">authors Austin Freeley and David Steinberg</a>, “Debate is the process of inquiry and advocacy, a way of arriving at a reasoned judgment on a proposition.” The literature on what constitutes that process is wide and varied, but there are widely acknowledged essential elements in that process.</p>
<h2>Engage and argue</h2>
<p><a href="https://as.vanderbilt.edu/communication/people/john-p-koch/">I am a communications scholar</a> who directs the debate program at Vanderbilt University. Here’s what I teach my students about debate. </p>
<p>First, the process involves participants engaging each other on a specific topic. They must answer and question each other’s arguments.</p>
<p>Second, it involves arguments for and against a given proposition related to a topic. For example, college debaters may debate a proposition such as: The United States federal government should substantially increase statutory restrictions on the war power authority of the president of the United States. </p>
<p>Finally, these arguments occur within an agreed-upon format that gives participants a chance to advocate for and defend their opinions. Format considerations that encourage direct argumentation and engagement include time limits, the ability to offer a rebuttal to an opponent’s arguments and cross-examination by participants.</p>
<p>If this all occurs, then an audience can potentially reach a reasoned judgment on the topic.</p>
<p>These are the essential elements of a debate. </p>
<h2>Lack of specifics</h2>
<p>Yet in the presidential debates of the last half-century, rarely are specific propositions presented as the focus of the debate. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/rhetorical-studies-of-national-political-debates-1960-1992/oclc/607729900">Presidential rhetoric expert Theodore Windt</a> says that in the 1960 presidential debates, “The candidates wanted only broad topics to be discussed… They did not want to debate specific propositions of policy… They would not really debate, either in format or form, but would answer questions from journalists about a wide range of topics.” </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gbrcRKqLSRw?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon’s 1960 debate lacked focus on specifics.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>That lack of focus has persisted to this day. So presidential debates are not really debates because presidential candidates answer wide-ranging and broad questions, not specific propositions.</p>
<p>And because candidates are answering questions from journalists, <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/presidential-debate_b_1733127">they are often not engaging each other</a>. Instead, they focus on responding to the moderator and playing to the audience. </p>
<p>For instance, MSNBC co-moderator Savannah Guthrie asked candidates at the June 27, 2019, debate, “Raise your hand if your government [health care] plan would provide coverage for undocumented immigrants.” That kind of question focused on engagement between candidates and the moderator, rather than between candidates.</p>
<p>The end result of these now-normalized conventions is that they make it hard to deeply discuss serious issues. Instead, this kind of format promotes the use of candidates’ focus-group tested messaging, “<a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781498515610/Political-Election-Debates-Informing-Voters-about-Policy-and-Character">one-liners and canned mini-speeches</a>.” There is little back and forth between candidates. Viewers hear monologue, not debate.</p>
<h2>Critical thinking</h2>
<p>One of the assumed benefits of Western-style debate is that it is educational to those listening. <a href="https://www.doi.org/10.1080/00335630.2015.994905">Research shows that viewers do learn</a> about candidate platforms during debates. </p>
<p>However, learning more about candidate platforms isn’t always the same as learning more about the pros and cons of a given issue or approach.</p>
<p>In short, this style of presidential debates may help voters identify which candidate shares their views, but they do not help them think critically about those views.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/125202/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John P. Koch does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Debates may help voters identify which candidate shares their views but they do not help them think critically about those views. That’s because presidential debates don’t live up to their name.John P. Koch, Senior Lecturer and Director of Debate, Vanderbilt UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/787742017-06-02T13:47:59Z2017-06-02T13:47:59ZIs Theresa May an unlucky gambler, or just a bad one?<p>For the person who chose and was able to call it, the 2017 general election was always going to be characterised by risk. But of all the gambles taken by a politician whose appeal was based largely on the avoidance of risk, that of not participating in the BBC’s televised debate may be the most damaging for Theresa May.</p>
<p>Rather like the calling of the election itself, it was a decision from which she could not renege without (self-summoned) humiliation. The <em>coup de théâtre</em> of the calling of the election itself was superseded by the soap opera of its casting.</p>
<p>As long as a month ago, some proclaimed May’s decision to hold an election <a href="https://twitter.com/martinjohnfarr/status/854338033805557760">a tactical masterstroke</a>. Now it could prove ultimately to be injurious. Anything less than a significant increase in the Conservative majority and this election will prove to have been an expensive (in more than one sense) folly.</p>
<p>The defence of TV debates is that they offer “cut through” to voters more than any other means of political communication. To those (the majority) who aren’t interested in politics or elections, debates constitute a means of assessing the product on offer as though using a price comparison website, with the additional rubber-necking allure of the television talent show. </p>
<p>The argument against is the protest that these performances are alien not only to historical but to actual British constitutional practice. Britain often does as the Americans do but a lesson had in a way been established, infamously, in the <a href="http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2021078,00.html">very first televised election debate</a> in 1960. Radio listeners thought Richard Nixon had won; television viewers felt John Kennedy was the victor.</p>
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<span class="caption">Kennedy and Nixon face off in 1960.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">wikipedia</span></span>
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<p>The element of theatricality appeals even when it may mislead. So it was when Britain had its first in 2010 that all felt need to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/apr/16/leaders-tv-debates-jonathan-freedland">agree with Nick</a> (Clegg). But it makes sense in a polity where one person ultimately is put in charge through a popular vote. It would make sense for Andys (<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-andy-burnhams-manchester-could-change-the-face-of-uk-politics-77258">Burnham</a> or <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/05/former-john-lewis-boss-wins-west-midlands-mayoralty-andy-street">Street</a>) for example, to have been elected as metro mayors after such a staging. The more profound absurdity is the grafting of a presidential model on a parliamentary system.</p>
<p>The presidentialisation of the British premiership has been accelerated by the fetish for public accountability. The greater irony, in 2017, is for the person who approved the most presidential general election campaign since 1970 to have eschewed the very platform expressly designed to elevate the incumbent, by failing to turn up. </p>
<p>The characteristics that prevail in this <em>ad hominem</em> format tend to be of quality (loudness) and inclination (speaking over others). Neither is likely to abet the competent fulfilment of public office. Alongside Jeremy Corbyn, the prominence of marginal figures added to the confusion. Two of the speakers spoke for parties that the vast majority of viewers won’t be able to vote for, while UKIP’s Paul Nuttall, whose last network televised appearance this was always likely to be, demonstrated what <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-28408043">Nick Griffin</a> had nine years earlier: that the oxygen of publicity can asphyxiate the inadequate.</p>
<h2>Pushing her luck</h2>
<p>It made as much sense in April 2017 as it did in <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/margaret-thatcher/10011227/Margaret-Thatcher-wanted-to-take-on-Callaghan-in-1979-leaders-TV-debate.html">April 1979</a> that a prime minister polling ahead of their challenger in personal ratings should avoid the risk of tripping up in (what would then have been the first) head-to-head appearance. James Callaghan did; once Margaret Thatcher had replaced him, so did she in subsequent elections.</p>
<p>For a prime minister who has often been associated with <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/a2f866fa-3319-11e7-bce4-9023f8c0fd2e">Thatcher</a>, and was happy to benefit from such comparisons, if not to encourage them, Theresa May’s vaunted iron-ness of spirit may instead reveal feet of clay. As Thatcher may have said – <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/historic_moments/newsid_8185000/8185773.stm">as she did of another heroic contemporary</a> – she’s “frit”.</p>
<p>What was taken to be a sign of strength has become one of weakness. The memes and hashtags of this age may well be pluralising and democratising but that’s why they’re also uncontrollable and impervious to influence. Today we have #wherestheresa, but posterity may summon the simpler: #hubris.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/78774/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Martin Farr does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Calling an election was a risk, as was opting out of the BBC live debate. And the PM may now be having some regrets.Martin Farr, Senior Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary British History, Newcastle UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/786462017-05-31T21:47:36Z2017-05-31T21:47:36ZMissing May: she was damned if she did and damned if she didn’t join the debate<p>Jeremy Corbyn’s late decision to participate in the BBC’s election debate injected some interest and potential excitement into an event that had risked being ignored.</p>
<p>With the <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-gain-tory-victory-theresa-may-general-election-8-june-yougov-opinium-polls-a7709961.html">polls narrowing</a> in Labour’s favour and with the party leader having performed well in the campaign so far, he hoped to maintain the momentum and increase pressure on the Conservatives. Despite speculation throughout the day about the intentions of Theresa May, the prime minister stuck with her original decision to stay away and send the home secretary, Amber Rudd, to represent the Conservatives in her place. Corbyn and Rudd also faced the representatives of the Scottish National Party (SNP), the Lib Dems, Greens, UKIP and Plaid Cymru in the debate.</p>
<p>The six questions put to the politicians by the invited audience were fairly predictable, covering living conditions, Brexit and immigration, public finances, national security, climate change and leadership. There were no real surprises, with Corbyn and other left-leaning politicians – Caroline Lucas of the Greens, Angus Robertson of the SNP and Leanne Wood of Plaid Cymru, as well as Tim Farron of the Liberal Democrats – repeatedly condemning the government for its cuts to welfare and public services.</p>
<p>Paul Nuttall of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) came under frequent attack from other leaders, while making his party’s stock points on Brexit, the necessity of immigration controls, and terrorism.</p>
<p>Rudd generally found herself in the position of defending the government’s record, although she also launched a number of attacks on Corbyn, particularly over what she called his “fantasy economics” and his votes against anti-terror laws. Corbyn came under occasional attack from Nuttall on terrorism. Pressed by the moderator, Mishal Husain, Corbyn also stumbled in defining what he meant by a “fair” immigration system.</p>
<p>Corbyn didn’t make the most of his late entry into the debate, although he didn’t make any obvious gaffes either. Of the smaller parties’ leaders, Lucas performed best, setting out a clear liberal-progressive vision of a fairer society, based on freedom of movement, opposition to Trident, and combating climate change. But it will probably have little effect, as the Greens are leaking votes to Labour, which now appears to be attracting the bulk of the anti-Conservative vote in England and Wales.</p>
<p>Was May right not to turn up? She received inevitable and trenchant criticism from the other leaders, particularly from Farron at the end, although not so much from Corbyn. That was perhaps surprising given the fanfare that surrounded Corbyn’s late decision to take part. He might have been expected to make more of May’s weakness in staying away.</p>
<p>In reality, May was damned if she did and damned if she didn’t. By not taking part, she was accused of running scared from the voters. But if she had turned up, she could have been accused of dancing to Corbyn’s tune, being seen to follow his lead in participating rather than following her own judgement. It would have been mocked as another u-turn.</p>
<p>As it was, the format of the debate would not have played to May’s strengths. She would have been angrily assailed by the other leaders and found herself having to shout to make herself heard or completely drowned out. She doesn’t have the type of combativeness in debate that Rudd possesses and used to some effect here. All in all, despite some embarrassing barbs about her non-appearance, May was probably better off sticking with her original decision.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/78646/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tom Quinn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>She faced criticism for not taking part in the BBC head-to-head, but the PM would have struggled had she done another late U-turn.Tom Quinn, Senior Lecturer, Department of Government, University of EssexLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/673072016-10-20T03:10:53Z2016-10-20T03:10:53ZClinton and Trump meet in final presidential debate: experts respond<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142431/original/image-20161020-848-10g4tch.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump sparred over the direction of the Supreme Court, immigration, the economy, and fitness to lead.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>With election day less than three weeks away, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump have clashed in the final presidential debate. The two sparred over the direction of the Supreme Court, immigration, the economy, US foreign policy, and fitness to lead.</em></p>
<p><em>The Conversation’s experts were watching the debate with an eye across the candidates’ performances and the key policy areas. Their responses follow.</em></p>
<hr>
<h2>Did the debate change any minds?</h2>
<p><strong>Dennis Altman, Professorial Fellow in Human Security, La Trobe University</strong></p>
<p>The final debate produced little that was new, little that was edifying, and probably changed very few minds. </p>
<p>Both candidates threw dirt at each other. Trump’s tactic was to deny. Clinton’s was to circumvent, as when she was asked about potential conflict of interest between her role as secretary of state and access given to donors to the Clinton Foundation.</p>
<p>In some ways this was the most substantial and least dramatic of the three debates, with genuine exchanges on policy. The questions covered the full gamut of issues facing a president, and the first 20 minutes drew predicable faultlines between the candidates on abortion, guns and immigration.</p>
<p>For a brief period it was possible to imagine this was another US presidential election, where both candidates accept the rules of the game and show some respect towards each other. That veneer proved flimsy. </p>
<p>Both questioned the fitness of the other to be president. Trump declared Clinton “should not be allowed to run”. He followed this up by refusing to say whether he would accept the results of the election, saying only he would “keep us in suspense”.</p>
<p>As Clinton pointed out, Trump has a record of calling foul whenever he loses, and his supporters are already calling the election rigged against him. Matt Bevin, the Tea Party Republican governor of Kentucky, has already said blood may need to be shed were Trump to lose. </p>
<p>The paranoid streak in American politics has never before reached the heights that it will in the wake of a Clinton victory, which looks likely.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Trump the wrecking ball</h2>
<p><strong>Nicole Hemmer, Assistant Professor, Miller Center, University of Virginia, and US Studies Centre, University of Sydney</strong></p>
<p>There is exactly one thing that matters from the third debate: Trump refused to say he would accept the results of the 2016 election.</p>
<p>Never before in the history of American democracy has a candidate made the legitimacy of the results contingent on his own judgement. It is the most demagogic, dangerous statement made in a presidential debate.</p>
<p>What else is to be said? There was policy tonight – more than we heard in the first two – but it just doesn’t matter.</p>
<p>Trump’s thin-skinned reaction to his poor poll numbers – his conspiratorial fantasy of a rigged election that has zero basis in reality – endangers the most vital part of America’s representative democracy: the peaceful transfer of power from one party to the next. It has been breached exactly once, leading to the Civil War. </p>
<p>There will be no civil war following November’s vote, but the stakes are still quite high. Trump has become a wrecking ball smashing into the foundations of American democracy. </p>
<p>If nothing else, the third debate made clear the stakes of the 2016 election. </p>
<hr>
<h2>Trump ignorant on policy issues</h2>
<p><strong>Kumuda Simpson, Lecturer in International Relations, La Trobe University</strong></p>
<p>During the final debate Trump once again demonstrated his startling ignorance on important policy issues – particularly on Iraq and Syria – and his propensity to brazenly lie about his past statements. Clinton, also once again, displayed her detailed understanding of those same issues. </p>
<p>Perhaps the most appalling moment was Trump saying he wouldn’t necessarily accept the election result – thus undermining the very bedrock of democracy. </p>
<p>While the third debate covered a lot of the same material as the previous debates, it also raised two important topics. Gun control and abortion rights are fundamental to understanding US politics. </p>
<p>Clinton and Trump declare vastly different views on these two issues. Trump is anti-abortion and pro-gun-rights. Clinton is pro-choice and in favour of “reasonable gun regulation”.</p>
<p>Since the 1973 Supreme Court decision in Roe v Wade, which declared abortion a constitutional right, conservative states across America have been aggressively legislating to restrict women’s access. Trump said if he were able to appoint several conservative justices to the Supreme Court they would absolutely overturn Roe v Wade. This would be a disaster for women’s rights to control their bodies and reproductive health.</p>
<p>Trump claimed he would hand legislative responsibility for abortion back to the states. We can already see the disastrous consequences of this, as many American states have already eroded what is a fundamental human right.</p>
<p>On gun control the difference was down to regulation. Trump is opposed to any regulation restricting particular types of guns or who can buy them. Clinton claimed she supported the Second Amendment, but with legislation that would close what’s known as the gun-show loophole and restrict access to certain types of weapons.</p>
<p>It is highly unlikely that either position would do anything to seriously tackle the staggering problem of gun violence in the US. Trump’s position certainly would not. Regulation is necessary and will help – but not solve – the problem. </p>
<p>The real issue here is gun violence in the US does not have one simple cause. It is a complex and multi-causal problem that deserves greater attention – and one that certainly was not going to be covered adequately in such a forum. </p>
<hr>
<h2>Debate all about character</h2>
<p><strong>Bryan Cranston, Online Lecturer in Politics, and PhD Candidate in Politics and History, Swinburne University of Technology</strong></p>
<p>The third and final presidential debate passed with few surprises.</p>
<p>There was never any doubt as to who was going to win the debate. The only way Trump could have won would have been if Clinton wasn’t there.</p>
<p>Ironically, Trump only needed to perform slightly better than his two previous debate disasters to be considered as having done a good job. Naturally, any attempt to portray Trump as anything less than the unmitigated winner of the contest will be seen by his campaign and supporters as further evidence of a conspiracy by the mainstream media to deny him the White House. </p>
<p>With their response to the opening question, Clinton and Trump steadfastly staked their claims to their respective party bases. Clinton affirmed her support for abortion rights, marriage equality, and campaign finance reform, while Trump focused on the Second Amendment and gun control. This was less a debate and more about rationalising an appeal to core supporters.</p>
<p>Trump was less than affirmative on his position regarding abortion rights. In fact, he didn’t answer the question, which will no doubt anger many evangelical and religious conservatives.</p>
<p>The debate only got worse for Trump when the topic turned to Russia and national security. In a debate about policy, facts were always going to play a major role, and this is perhaps the most significant deficit in Trump’s campaign. Clinton refuted all of Trump’s attacks by citing evidence, while Trump resorted to rhetoric. </p>
<p>Despite attempts to make it about policy, the final debate was all about character. Each candidate talked about why the other was unfit to serve as president.</p>
<p>It was a nasty, personal demonstration of two people seeking the highest political office in the world. Who won? The winner was overwhelmingly clear, and it wasn’t Trump.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67307/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Conversation’s experts respond to the third and final US presidential debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.Nicole Hemmer, Assistant Professor, Miller Center, University of Virginia, and US Studies Centre, University of SydneyBryan Cranston, Online Lecturer in Politics, and PhD Candidate in Politics and History, Swinburne University of TechnologyDennis Altman, Professorial Fellow in Human Security, La Trobe UniversityKumuda Simpson, Lecturer in International Relations, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/667272016-10-10T05:24:22Z2016-10-10T05:24:22ZTrump vs. Clinton: Three key moments from the second debate<p><em>Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton took the debate stage Sunday evening. We asked three scholars from the Washington University in St. Louis, where the debate was held, to pick a key quote from the evening and tell us why it was important.</em></p>
<h2>Rebecca Wanzo</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“This was locker room talk.” - Trump</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Donald Trump defended the content of a video leaked from Access Hollywood by saying that his discussion of grabbing and kissing women without their consent is part of an everyday culture of masculinity. Trump reinforced that in the debate, saying that the candidates needed to talk about “more important” issues. </p>
<p>Is it typical for men to brag and joke about sexually assaulting women? </p>
<p>Some <a href="http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/vio.2014.0022">studies</a> suggest that a troubling <a href="http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS2214-109X%2813%2970069-X/abstract">number</a> of men would rape women if they would not be punished. Masculinity scholar Michael Kimmel has written eloquently about how many boys are socialized into “<a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/9780060831356/guyland">guyland</a>,” which is a “privileged sense that you are special, that the world is there for you to take.” This is the kind of research that supports the claim that a “rape culture” exists. </p>
<p>If we take this scholarship seriously, then Trump may be correct in his statement that we live in a culture where men frequently joke about having, and attempting, sexual contact with women without their consent. Trump has never been convicted of sexual assault, but he has been <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/15/us/politics/donald-trump-women.html">accused</a> of sexual harassment and violence more than once. However, he stated in the debate that he has never attempted to have sexual contact with a woman absent her consent, drawing a line between action and speech.</p>
<p>Even if we choose to believe that the accusations against him, or his own claims about what he has done, are false, we are still left with the question of whether or not the “locker room” defense is a good one. His defense depends on a consistent rhetorical feature of his campaign – attacking “politically correct” speech and embracing racist and sexist speech as evidence of his truth-telling.</p>
<p>In Trump’s campaign, his sexist language has often been excused as part of what men do. Perhaps this tape hit a nerve because it supports what is still a contentious claim to many U.S. citizens bothered by “political correctness” – that how you see and talk about people inevitably has a relationship to what you do to them.</p>
<p><em>Rebecca Wanzo is author of “<a href="http://www.sunypress.edu/p-4915-the-suffering-will-not-be-telev.aspx">The Suffering Will Not Be Televised</a>.”</em></p>
<h2>Peter Kastor</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“I’m sorry I have to keep saying this, but he lives in an alternative reality.” –Clinton</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Clinton said these words in an effort to criticize Trump. But for all the words that Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton said tonight, more striking are two words they hardly said at all: Democrat and Republican. That near silence constitutes a striking break from previous debates, and a telling reminder of what makes this campaign so unusual.</p>
<p>The debate was highly personal, with both candidates heaping accusations on each other as individuals. But tonight, Trump and Clinton made clear that each of their candidacies is the logical result of democratizing the nominating process and weakening the importance of the political parties.</p>
<p>As a historian of the <a href="https://networks.h-net.org/node/7805/reviews/8508/sacher-kastor-nations-crucible-louisiana-purchase-and-creation-america">early American republic</a>, I study and teach about the presidency over its long history. For much of U.S. history, party leaders selected their nominees. This system came into being in the 1820s and 1830s before dying a slow death in mid-20th century and only truly <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/reformingthepresidentialnominationprocess_chapter.pdf">coming to an end</a> in the 1970s.</p>
<p>The system was supposed to be democratic. It replaced the caucus system through which members of Congress, meeting in isolation in Washington, selected nominees in the first quarter of the 19th century. But in the 20th century, the longstanding traditions of party nomination disintegrated in the face of criticisms that it blocked out party members. Critics charged that nominees were chosen in “smoke-filled rooms,” the products of corrupt and secretive deal-making.</p>
<p>Trump secured the nomination by bypassing the leadership of his party. In sharp contrast, Hillary Clinton pursued the presidency by building her strength within the Democratic Party. </p>
<p>But, when it came time for the two candidates to debate each other, they turned to a highly personal politics. Parties didn’t matter, only individuals. In an era when Americans are increasingly critical of the two major parties, this debate, for its strange moments, makes perfect sense. </p>
<p><em>Peter Kastor is author of “William Clark’s World: Describing America in an Age of Unknowns.”</em></p>
<h2>Jeffrey Q. McCune</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“Hillary is constantly talking about the inner cities of our country, which are a disaster. Education-wise. Job-wise. Safety-wise. In every way possible, I’m going to help the African-Americans, help the Latinos, Hispanics. I am going to help the inner cities.” –Trump</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Donald Trump has repeated this message across the country, in debates and political rallies. I believe this rhetoric denies the beauty and dynamic culture of “the African-American” and “the Latinos” across the nation. </p>
<p>Most importantly, it positions racial minorities at the center of the landscape of the inner city, intentionally excluding the role of white people and large corporations in <a href="http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/247816/evicted-by-matthew-desmond/9780553447439/">shifting</a> the environmental and cultural dynamics of communities of color.</p>
<p>Why does Donald Trump describe the inner city only as disastrous? Whom does he blame for creating this “disaster?” And, most importantly, what does fixing the inner city look like for Trump?</p>
<p>Sociologists from <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/B/bo15340705.html">Mary Patillo</a> to <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/R/bo15309863.html">Laurence Ralph</a> have long shown that the realities of crime and poverty in inner cities are a result of systemic and political decay. What is striking about Trump’s rhetoric is that he pitches the idea of inner-city decay as something he alone can fix, without any clear indicator of an intimate relationship with said communities. The inner city he continues to imagine in his rhetoric contains the Latina/os, African-Americans and women who, I believe, may take issue with his proposal to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico, his bragging of sexual assault and his claims of minorities as always suffering.</p>
<p>Trump’s inability to discuss minority communities beyond despair and decay is evidence of how he imagines black and brown life in America. This treatment of difference, combined with his rhetoric and treatment of women, makes his vow to be a “president for all people” a hard sale.</p>
<p><em>Jeffrey Q. McCune, Jr. is author of “Sexual Discretion: Black Masculinity and the Politics of Passing.” He is also collecting oral histories of Ferguson for “The Divided City,” an urban humanities initiative.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/66727/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Scholars from the Washington University in St. Louis react to the second presidential debate.Jeffrey Q. McCune Jr., Associate Professor of Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Washington University in St. LouisPeter Kastor, Professor of History & American Culture Studies, Washington University in St. LouisRebecca Wanzo, Associate Professor of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Washington University in St. LouisLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/666712016-10-10T04:20:04Z2016-10-10T04:20:04ZTrump and Clinton clash in second presidential debate: experts respond<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141029/original/image-20161010-2652-1cxq9uk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Tapes of Donald Trump making lewd remarks about women were an early focus in the debate.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Jim Bourg</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have met in the second of three presidential debates. The town-hall-style clash came just days after a video of Trump making lewd remarks about the treatment of women was made public. This became an early focus of the debate, while the two candidates later sparred over health care, tax reform and foreign relations.</em></p>
<p><em>The Conversation’s experts from Australia and the US were watching the debate. Their responses follow.</em></p>
<hr>
<h2>Clinton and Trump take different tacks</h2>
<p><strong>Nicole Hemmer, Assistant Professor, Miller Center, University of Virginia, and US Studies Centre, University of Sydney</strong></p>
<p>For audiences around the world there were two radically different debates, both taking place on the same stage.</p>
<p>Hillary Clinton offered a traditional town-hall debate, modelled after her husband’s performance in 1992. The town-hall style, based on daytime talk shows like The Oprah Winfrey Show, favours empathy, warmth, and a personal touch. </p>
<p>Aware of this, Clinton spoke directly to the audience members, asking them questions about their lives and ending her answers on an optimistic note. Her answers were aimed right at moderates and undecided voters.</p>
<p>Trump went in a different direction. He turned to the qualities that served him so well on competitive reality TV: ridicule, domination, shock. He shoe-horned aggressive rally lines into a roughly debate-like performance that was aimed squarely at his base. </p>
<p>For months his supporters have been chanting “Lock her up!” Tonight Trump promised to do just that, in a breathtaking attack not just on Clinton but on the rule of law. No nominee has ever – <em>ever</em> – vowed to use the office of the presidency to imprison his opponent. His supporters loved it.</p>
<p>Clinton and Trump took two different tacks in this debate. Clinton’s is more likely to expand her voter base, so it seems like the obvious winner. But as 2016 has been an unprecedented campaign, we’ll have to wait to see whether the electorate agrees.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Clinton fails to land a killer blow on weakened Trump</h2>
<p><strong>Timothy L. Lynch, Associate Professor in Political Science, University of Melbourne</strong></p>
<p>In one of the weakest positions imaginably for a presidential candidate, Trump should have been laughed off stage in St Louis. He wasn’t. He came to fight. </p>
<p>Trump’s belligerence was inversely proportionate to his status in the race and grasp of the facts. He wore a red tie, signalling aggressive intent. </p>
<p>Clinton punched away – diligently, intelligently, sometimes a little boringly – but she did not land a killer blow. Instead, Trump managed to turn his gross moral incorrectness – captured on video tape in 2005 – into some sort of additional claim to authenticity. He will surely lose in November but he hasn’t been beaten in this race, resisting blows that would have felled any other candidate.</p>
<p>It no longer seems to matter what he says or what of his previous conduct is unearthed. His supporters – of which there are probably still too few to get him over the Electoral College line – regard this as proof that he is the anti-politician they want. </p>
<p>Like the Terminator, Trump is seemly impervious to destruction. If it were not all in the service of Trump himself, such resilience would be almost worthy of admiration – but it is not and he isn’t.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Attacks on character make for a depressing spectacle</h2>
<p><strong>Kumuda Simpson, Lecturer in International Relations, La Trobe University</strong></p>
<p>It was difficult to know what to expect from the second debate. The past few days have been extraordinary and the debate was necessarily going to be an opportunity to see how Trump would deal with the unprecedented crisis his horrendous comments about women has precipitated. </p>
<p>The leaked video of Trump boasting about sexual assault was rightly the first issue addressed. His response was superficial at best.</p>
<p>His attempts to apologise quickly turned into an incoherent rant about Islamic State. Clinton’s reaction was, by contrast, articulate and scathing of the recent revelations, drawing a link between them and the consistently negative and divisive language that has characterised his campaign. </p>
<p>For much of the debate both candidates attacked each other’s character and temperament. It was a depressing spectacle to observe.</p>
<p>When they did talk about actual policies, a pattern emerged that was similar to the first debate. Trump was at his strongest when talking about working-class struggle and the need to restore manufacturing jobs across the country. This is not because his economic policies are detailed and realistic, but because his recognition of the hardship and fear workers in America feel about the future resonates with many.</p>
<p>On foreign policy, though, Clinton highlighted the vast difference in experience and understanding between the two.</p>
<p>Trump’s comments about Syria – particularly his claim that Russia and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad are fighting Islamic State and thus the US needs to work with them – once again demonstrated his deep ignorance of the various conflicts in the Middle East region. </p>
<p>Clinton rightly pointed out that neither Assad nor Vladimir Putin have gone after Islamic State in any serious manner. This is one of the many reasons the US has criticised both the Russian and Syrian leaders.</p>
<p>It is unlikely that this debate will change the minds of either Clinton’s or Trump’s supporters. What remains to be seen is whether the past few days have well and truly destroyed Trump’s hopes for the presidency.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Clinton’s performance exposes a courtesy gap</h2>
<p><strong>Tom Clark, Associate Professor, College of Arts, Victoria University</strong></p>
<p>This debate was less like a deciding moment, more like a snap audit. It cannot have shifted many views, but it clearly reflected where the campaign is up to and what its decisive issues now are. At the time of writing, the audience numbers are not clear — but the first debate <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/on-media/2016/09/first-trump-clinton-debate-smashes-ratings-records-228788">drew 84 million viewers</a>.</p>
<p>The 2016 campaign’s most significant events may have transpired over just the last few days: the <a href="http://time.com/4523749/hillary-clinton-wikileaks-leaked-emails-john-podesta">fizzer-of-a-scoop</a> from WikiLeaks; the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-government-officially-accuses-russia-of-hacking-campaign-to-influence-elections/2016/10/07/4e0b9654-8cbf-11e6-875e-2c1bfe943b66_story.html">Obama administration’s announcement</a> that Russian hackers are meddling in the campaign; the release of the <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/liveblogs/2016/10/trumps-tape-scandal-the-latest-updates/503480/">“Trump tapes”</a> and the subsequent <a href="http://www.npr.org/2016/10/09/497285704/heres-why-so-many-republicans-deserted-trump-over-this-comment">flood of Republican Party notaries</a> declaring they will not vote for Trump in November’s presidential election.</p>
<p>One of the standout elements when Clinton and Trump share a stage is that she behaves so much more courteously than he does. For the second debate in a row, Trump constantly interjected and spoke over his interlocutors; Clinton held off from interrupting but for one occasion. This time, the moderators were actively onto it, and kept pointing it out each time it happened.</p>
<p>Basic manners count for remarkably little among partisan zealots, but they count for a great deal among the uncommitted swinging voters who decide most elections in any two-party state.</p>
<p>After a week of big plays that have clearly resloped the ground in Clinton’s favour, this courtesy gap probably counts for more votes than any debating point traded in this dysfunctional conversation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/66671/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tom Clark receives funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kumuda Simpson, Nicole Hemmer, and Timothy J. Lynch do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Conversation’s experts respond to the second US presidential debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.Nicole Hemmer, Assistant Professor, Miller Center, University of Virginia, and US Studies Centre, University of SydneyKumuda Simpson, Lecturer in International Relations, La Trobe UniversityTimothy J. Lynch, Associate Professor in Political Science, The University of MelbourneTom Clark, Associate Professor, College of Arts, Victoria UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/655952016-09-27T04:59:44Z2016-09-27T04:59:44ZFour quotes from the first Clinton-Trump debate, explained<p><em>Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump faced off for their first debate at Hofstra University on Sept. 26. We asked a group of scholars to listen to the often heated exchange and react to just one quote related to their area of expertise. Here are those picks.</em></p>
<h2>Emily Blanchard, Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“They’re devaluing their currency… they’re using our country as a piggy bank to rebuild China, and many other countries are doing the same thing.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It is not surprising that trade, trade agreements and especially trade with China came under heavy fire in tonight’s debate. Trade – together with technology – has undeniably reshaped the American labor market over the past decade, partly <a href="https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/aer.20131578">at the expense of middle-class workers</a>. </p>
<p>But with this line about Chinese currency policy, Trump struck wide of the mark. First, the devaluation accusation leveled against China is <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/11e96e1e-03a7-11e5-b55e-00144feabdc0">out of date.</a> While most economists agree that earlier this century the Chinese central bank artificially depressed the value of its currency (which made Chinese exports more competitive in world markets), the <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/USDCNY:CUR">opposite</a> has been true for more than a year, as China has faced <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-myths-of-chinas-currency-manipulation-1452296887">mounting pressure</a> to prop up its currency in the face of outward capital flight. </p>
<p>Second, the idea that China is using its trade surplus with the U.S. “as a piggybank” to rebuild its economy demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of <a href="https://www.newyorkfed.org/aboutthefed/fedpoint/fed40.html">balance of payments accounting</a>. When a country runs a trade surplus, it is by definition acting as a net lender to the rest of the world. Likewise, when a country runs a trade deficit, it is a net recipient of saving by the rest of the world. By using its trade surpluses to buy U.S. assets (mostly T-bills), China has helped to keep U.S. borrowing costs phenomenally low for more than a decade. If anything, it is China that has been serving as the piggybank to rebuild the U.S. </p>
<p><em>Blanchard’s work centers on the economics and policy implications of globalization.</em></p>
<h2>Valerie Hudson, Texas A&M University</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“So let’s have paid family leave, earned sick days.” – Clinton</p>
<p>“As far as childcare is concerned and so many other things, I think Hillary and I agree on that.” – Trump</p>
</blockquote>
<p>While it was gratifying to see the first female presidential candidate from a major U.S. political party on stage tonight, what was perhaps even more gratifying was that for the first time, both candidates – one of whom will be our next president – agreed that paid family leave should be the law of the land. We are now one of only <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/ritarubin/2016/04/06/united-states-lags-behind-all-other-developed-countries-when-it-comes-to-paid-maternity-leave/#34b084425ada">two</a> nations in the world that does not provide paid maternity leave (Papua New Guinea is the other), despite the fact that research has shown that such leave <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22813939">decreases</a> levels of postpartum depression and <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/birt.12230/abstract">increases</a> levels of breastfeeding. Even with the Family and Medical Leave Act’s provisions, the leave is unpaid, and it is also unavailable to <a href="https://www.dol.gov/whd/fmla/survey/FMLA_Survey_factsheet.pdf">40 percent</a> of American workers. No matter who is elected, we will apparently finally have paid leave, and our children will not have to face the heart-wrenching choices their parents faced. </p>
<p>But there’s more that must be done, as positive a first step as this would be. The larger issue of the invisibility of (largely) women’s unpaid caregiving labor goes beyond paid family leave, and includes issues of <a href="http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20160518/NEWS/160519895">workplace fairness</a> for home health care workers, of the massive shortfall in <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/112892/hell-american-day-care">quality daycare</a> in our nation, and of the persistently high <a href="https://www.caregiver.org/women-and-caregiving-facts-and-figures">poverty rates of caregivers</a> in their old age. Those who represent the social safety net for the vulnerable in our society should not be forced to operate without a net themselves. And when important economic decisions are made for our country, primary caregivers should have a seat at the table to represent this critical element of our economy that would otherwise remain invisible.</p>
<p><em>Hudson is the coauthor of <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7312/huds16492">The Hillary Doctrine: Sex and American Foreign Policy</a>.</em></p>
<h2>Chad Williams, Brandeis University</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“I say nothing.” – Trump</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump delivered this blunt answer to debate moderator Lester Holt when asked about racial healing and what he might say to Americans who found his continued claims that President Barack Obama was not born in the United States racist. </p>
<p>Trump, instead of offering any semblance of remorse for his actions, took this opportunity to congratulate himself for compelling President Obama to produce his birth certificate and boasted that he was proud of his accomplishment. </p>
<p>Trump has recently gone to great lengths to paint himself as African-Americans’ best friend. <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/09/trump-black-outreach/501242/">He has done so</a> in part by depicting a hellish picture of black inner-city communities, exploited by Democratic politicians and ravaged by violence, disease and poverty, which only he can remedy by enforcing “law and order.” The false sincerity of Trump’s outreach was fully exposed by his callous disregard of the damage wrought by his birtherism campaign. </p>
<p>Trump launched his presidential aspirations <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/17/us/politics/donald-trump-obama-birther.html">by declaring</a> the first African-American president of the United States illegitimate. This was not just a personal attack on Barack Obama, but also an attack on the millions of black people who supported him and understood what it meant to have their American citizenship questioned.</p>
<p>Trump promises to be president for all Americans. He brags that African-Americans are flocking to his campaign. Yet <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/donald-trump-african-americans-worst-off-latest-push/story?id=42246717">recent polls</a> still place his support among black voters at between 3 and 6 percent. This is not an accident. When it comes to being a president that will care about the true concerns of African-Americans and address the nation’s deep-seated problems of racial injustice, Trump says nothing and offers nothing. </p>
<p><em>Williams is coeditor of <a href="http://www.ugapress.org/index.php/books/charleston_syllabus/">Charleston Syllabus: Readings on Race, Racism and Racial Violence</a>.</em></p>
<h2>Richard Painter, University of Minnesota</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“I have no reason to believe that he’s ever going to release his tax returns, because there’s something he’s hiding. …I think the question is, were he ever to get near the White House, what would be those conflicts? Who does he owe money to? Well, he owes you the answers to that, and he should provide them.” – Clinton</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Clinton and Trump went back and forth on his refusal to disclose his tax returns. The exchange seemed to reveal that on the whole he has paid relatively little tax, but that cannot be verified without the returns.</p>
<p>Trump said that the returns were not being released because they were under audit, but Clinton did not follow up with him as to what that has to do with public disclosure and how disclosure could in any way interfere with the audit. </p>
<p>More important, there was not a detailed discussion of what we could learn from the tax returns that we cannot learn from his <a href="http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/TrumpFinancialDisclosure20150722.pdf">Form 278 Financial Disclosure</a> that he did file as a candidate. He said that there is relatively little we could learn from the tax returns, but tax returns have very different information than Form 278, so his claim that the two overlap is not true. First, the tax returns disclose what tax provisions he benefits from, which is an important issue. Are they loopholes or intended tax benefits that Congress has put in the code? </p>
<p>He should not be embarrassed about paying less tax if that is the way the tax code is structured, but he should be up front about that and how as president he would either change the tax code so people like him pay more or whether he would keep it the same. </p>
<p>Second, he talks a lot about businesses making money by sending jobs overseas. Tax returns would tell us a lot about how much income he earns overseas (generally income is taxed where it is made). The Form 278, by contrast, does not require significant disclosure of the geographic location of income and assets. Many of the LLCs and corporations on his Form 278 may be organized in the U.S. but have assets and income overseas. His tax returns would provide some information about this. </p>
<p>There is nothing inherently wrong with Trump or anyone else investing overseas and deriving income overseas or even creating jobs there, but he should be open about how his own business practices relate to the issues he is talking about. We need the tax returns in order to do that.</p>
<p><em>Painter served as chief White House ethics lawyer during the George W. Bush administration.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/65595/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>My book on campaign finance reform titled Taxation only with Representation: The Conservative Conscience and Campaign Finance Reform (2016) was funded by Harvard University and by Take Back our Republic, a campaign finance reform group. I am a board member of Take Back our Republic.
I am receiving no compensation for these activities.
I have endorsed Hillary Clinton for president but I am not working for or receiving any compensation from any candidate or campaign. I am a member of the Republican Party.
I am representing pro bono several congressional candidates in a FEC and federal court case seeking to strengthen federal regulation of Super PACs.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Valerie Hudson receives funding from the US Department of Defense, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, and the Compton Foundation. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chad Williams and Emily J. Blanchard do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>We asked a group of scholars to listen to Clinton vs. Trump and pick just one quote to react to. Here’s what the experts heard.Chad Williams, Associate Professor of African and Afro-American Studies, Brandeis UniversityEmily J. Blanchard, Associate Professor, Dartmouth CollegeRichard Painter, S. Walter Richey Professor of Corporate Law, University of MinnesotaValerie Hudson, Professor of International Affairs, Texas A&M UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/661242016-09-27T03:37:25Z2016-09-27T03:37:25ZTrump and Clinton face off in first US presidential debate: experts respond<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/139356/original/image-20160927-20126-1ehlgy2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The first presidential debate was marked by interruptions from Republican nominee Donald Trump.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Adrees Latif</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have met in the first of three presidential debates as the race to the White House heats up. The at-times-fiery encounter was <a href="https://twitter.com/FiveThirtyEight/status/780602161398968320">marked by interruptions</a> by the Republican nominee as the two candidates sparred over economic growth, free trade, race relations and American foreign policy.</em></p>
<p><em>The Conversation’s experts from Australia and the US were watching the debate with an eye to key questions. Their responses follow.</em></p>
<hr>
<h2>Trump the bully or Clinton the baiter?</h2>
<p><strong>Nicole Hemmer, Assistant Professor, Miller Center, University of Virginia, and US Studies Centre, University of Sydney</strong></p>
<p>It was a case of Clinton interruptus. Fifty-one times over the 90-minute debate, Trump shouted, interjected and scoffed as Clinton spoke. </p>
<p>Not only did he interrupt three times more than Clinton, but the nature of his interruptions was striking. He seemed unable to contain – or possibly to control – himself, champing to answer every charge she made.</p>
<p>And that seems to have been Clinton’s goal. Throughout the night, she deftly slipped into her answers the kinds of challenges Trump has been unable to resist. </p>
<p>Case in point: in her second answer, she pointed out that Trump didn’t build his fortune from scratch. His father gave him a million-dollar loan, and later a US$14 million inheritance. Clinton then contrasted that with her own father, a drapery maker who “worked really hard”.</p>
<p>The charge ruffled Trump, who brushed off moderator Lester Holt’s next question to defend the “very small loan” his father gave him. </p>
<p>Then Clinton mentioned Trump had cheered on the housing collapse. Trump butted in: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>That’s called business, by the way. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>That was just the beginning. Every time Clinton mentioned one of his outlandish statements or questioned his business bona fides, Trump unravelled a little more. The impression viewers were left with at the end of the night was a peevish Trump next to a patient Clinton, an image that underscored the wide gulf in the two candidates’ temperaments.</p>
<p>With the first debate at a close, one of the big stories will be about Trump the bully. But the bigger story should be Clinton the baiter.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Trump thrilled his fans, but did he win any new ones?</h2>
<p><strong>David Smith, Senior Lecturer in American Politics and Foreign Policy, Academic Director of the US Studies Centre, University of Sydney</strong></p>
<p>Both sides are probably going to believe their candidate won this debate.</p>
<p>Trump’s consistent refrain was that his great wealth is evidence he “has the right ideas” to bring prosperity to America. His response to Clinton’s accusation that he has paid no income tax was:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It means I’m smart. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>When she brought up his 2006 comments that he hoped the housing bubble would collapse so he could make money from it, he shrugged it off as:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>That’s called business. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>This will thrill his supporters, who agree with his admonition that Clinton and other politicians have failed for decades to prevent the loss of jobs and industries to other countries.</p>
<p>As expected, Clinton was well prepared with answers to policy questions, while also showing a willingness to attack Trump on character grounds. </p>
<p>Clinton’s supporters will welcome the fact that she directly questioned Trump’s business credentials, though they may worry that both candidates spent a long time talking about Trump himself, which always seemed to work in his favour during the Republican debates.</p>
<p>Clinton’s calmness in the face of Trump’s explosive bluster will be evidence to many that she is far better suited to the presidency.</p>
<p>The election may be decided by who can bring out more of their own party’s supporters on the day. Both candidates are historically unpopular and distrusted by many in the electorate. This debate is unlikely to have changed anyone’s mind, but it may give supporters on both sides added motivation.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Trump couldn’t lose, but did Clinton change voters’ minds?</h2>
<p><strong>Bryan Cranston, Online Lecturer in Politics, and PhD Candidate in Politics and History, Swinburne University of Technology</strong></p>
<p>The first presidential debate of 2016 promised to be the most watched in history. Viewers were not interested in policy; they tuned in to watch the latest saga of the longest-ever episode of Jerry Springer in the hope of witnessing a metaphorical car crash.</p>
<p>The debate had the potential to change the race, ever so slightly, and Clinton was the only candidate capable of doing this. Trump’s supporters are locked in. No-one is wavering about whether or not they will vote for him. Voters either love him or hate him; his support is unequivocal. There were no votes at stake for Trump in the debate.</p>
<p>Clinton, on the other hand, is trying to appeal to America’s undecided moderates. This group comprises traditional independent voters and newly disenchanted Republicans who are trying to decide whether to vote for her, a third party, or simply stay home on election day.</p>
<p>Unlike Trump, Clinton has votes to win – and lose.</p>
<p>The public is already well aware of Trump’s views and his volatile nature. For the first few minutes he managed to keep it together, but that soon changed as he continually interrupted and talked over Clinton. At times Clinton’s composure did appear to wobble, and – for a moment – it looked like she was going to respond to Trump in kind.</p>
<p>Clinton performed as expected. There was no “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWXRNySMW4s">You’re no Jack Kennedy</a>” moment, nor did she flop. She followed the mantra of her campaign and played it safe.</p>
<p>Going into the debate, Clinton was viewed by many Americans as <a href="https://www.qu.edu/news-and-events/quinnipiac-university-poll/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=2274">being untrustworthy</a>. This is despite <a href="http://www.politifact.com/">Politifact</a> having found that Clinton tells untruths 22% of the time, compared with Trump’s 69%, and that Clinton tells the truth 28% of the time, compared with Trump’s 4%.</p>
<p>What this shows is that public perception of Clinton does not match reality. This debate did nothing to change that.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Clinton outguns Trump on the key policy issues</h2>
<p><strong>Kumuda Simpson, Lecturer in International Relations, La Trobe University</strong></p>
<p>I have to admit to being somewhat surprised by the first presidential debate. Clinton performed better than I expected and Trump ended up floundering.</p>
<p>The debate didn’t start well for Clinton. Her description of investment in infrastructure and renewable energy, along with making the wealthiest Americans pay their “fair share” of tax, doesn’t sell as well as Trump’s populist rhetoric about China stealing American jobs.</p>
<p>Yet Trump quickly fell to pieces. On race and foreign policy Clinton didn’t have to work hard to highlight Trump’s deeply contradictory and ignorant positions on key issues such as criminal justice reform, Iran and nuclear proliferation.</p>
<p>Trump’s call to bring back “stop and frisk” policies in response to questions about race relations highlighted once again his deeply troubling attitudes to African-Americans.</p>
<p>When it came to foreign policy Clinton clearly demonstrated her far superior grasp of the issues, as well as her disdain for Trump’s consistent misunderstanding of the Iran nuclear deal and the importance of NATO.</p>
<p>Trump’s claim that the Iran nuclear deal empowered Iran is a fundamental misunderstanding of the last 12 years of US-Iran policy. As Clinton accurately pointed out, the diplomatic deal has stopped Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapons capability for at least the next decade, while giving the US and the international community unprecedented access to monitor Iran’s nuclear facilities.</p>
<p>Clinton ended the Securing America segment with the warning that words matter. She directly addressed those of us watching the election outside the US, reassuring allies that America would honour its commitments. Once again she highlighted how erratic and dangerous a Trump presidency would be.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/66124/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Conversation’s experts respond to the first US presidential debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.Nicole Hemmer, Assistant Professor, Miller Center, University of Virginia, and US Studies Centre, University of SydneyBryan Cranston, Online Lecturer in Politics, and PhD Candidate in Politics and History, Swinburne University of TechnologyDavid Smith, Senior Lecturer in American Politics and Foreign Policy, Academic Director of the US Studies Centre, University of SydneyKumuda Simpson, Lecturer in International Relations, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/659842016-09-23T15:11:41Z2016-09-23T15:11:41ZClinton and Trump get ready to rumble – but do the debates actually matter?<p>The upcoming <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/24/us/politics/presidential-debate-hillary-clinton-donald-trump.html">televised presidential debates between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump</a> are undoubtedly the most eagerly anticipated for many years. No doubt there are various surprises in store – this has been, after all, the most surprising of campaigns. </p>
<p>People will be particularly fascinated to see if Trump dials down his bombastic rhetoric and perhaps even adds some substance to the vague policy pronouncements he has made so far. To a lesser extent, many will also be interested in whether Clinton can add the necessary zest to what some consider her lacklustre style, and whether she can prove she’s made a sterling recovery from her <a href="https://theconversation.com/clintons-stumble-and-the-paradox-of-the-vulnerable-leader-65279">recent bout with pneumonia</a>. </p>
<p>It’s possible that some voters may in fact change their minds based on what they see in the two’s only on-camera encounters. And yet, barring a true disaster or devastating triumph, it’s unlikely that anything the candidates say or do will make much difference to the overall result.</p>
<p>This might not seem all that surprising for these two candidates in particular. Leaving aside how long they’ve both been in public life, social media and the 24-hour news cycle have put Clinton and Trump under incredible scrutiny ever since they announced their respective candidacies – and their every sentence and gesture has already been analysed in the greatest detail. </p>
<p>Trump in particular has received more free publicity from the networks and Twitter than even he could afford, and it’s highly unlikely that he will say anything that the US public hasn’t heard before. Similarly, voters’ impressions of Clinton are apparently so deeply entrenched that she probably won’t change many people’s minds.</p>
<p>Yet there are also broader reasons why presidential TV debates are less important than we might imagine. </p>
<h2>Looking the part</h2>
<p>Even before the media environment became as saturated as it is today, <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/110674/presidential-debates-rarely-gamechangers.aspx">debates were rarely, if ever, decisive in presidential elections</a>. The exception was possibly the very first TV debate in 1960, which pitted the then vice-president, Richard Nixon, against John F. Kennedy. </p>
<p>At the time, the election was so close that the young, relatively inexperienced but highly telegenic Kennedy was able to reap the benefits of putting his case directly to viewers. He was the underdog; a relative unknown in comparison to Nixon and so had more to gain from such national exposure. Nixon, as the establishment figure, had a lot to lose. </p>
<p>In the end, Kennedy’s narrow victory may well have been because of his debate performances. But his success also demonstrated another important feature of television debates: that viewers take more notice of what they see than what they hear. </p>
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<p>Notoriously, television viewers responded very favourably to Kennedy’s film-star good looks, but were turned off by Nixon, who refused to wear make-up and looked sweaty and uncomfortable under the studio lights. In contrast, those who listened on the radio believed that Nixon had come out on top. It seems that viewers saw Kennedy as more “presidential” than Nixon, especially given his calmness under pressure. Kennedy did work hard to exploit some of Nixon’s weaknesses on policy, but in the end, that turned out not to be the point.</p>
<p>Kennedy’s success was one of the reasons that neither of his two successors, Lyndon B. Johnson and then a resurgent Nixon, participated in any such events when they were running for the presidency. Although some debates were held in the primaries, there were no face-to-face contests between presidential candidates in 1964, 1968 or 1972.</p>
<p>The next debates were held in 1976, another tight campaign. These yielded a notorious moment in the second encounter between Gerald R Ford and Jimmy Carter, when the incumbent Ford appeared to throw the election away with a poorly judged remark declaring that there was no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe. As myth has it, this gaffe stalled Ford’s polling surge; he ultimately lost the election.</p>
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<p>Yet even this was not decisive. Although the comment did the president no favours, it’s highly debatable whether it in fact had an impact on the overall result; Ford actually <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/08/the-myth-of-gerald-fords-disastrous-soviet-domination-gaffe/493958/">closed the polling gap</a> with Carter between the debates and the general election. People’s reactions to the debate had less to do with the substance of his remark and much more with the media’s constant replay and analysis of that moment, which continues to mar Ford’s reputation to this day.</p>
<h2>Selective memory</h2>
<p>This pattern has continued in the election cycles that have followed, as slips and awkward moments rather than substance provide the media with dominant themes. Many people recall vice-presidential candidate Dan Quayle’s cack-handed attempt to compare himself to Kennedy in 1988, or George Bush senior’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBrW2Pz9Iiw">ill-judged glance at his watch</a> when listening to a question in 1992; few probably remember much about what policies they discussed, or whether, if they won, they carried them out.</p>
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<p>If anything, the shortcomings of the TV debate format have become more pronounced in the current cycle. Although neither of the main candidates in this year’s election wants for national exposure, the primary debates have tended to favour the underdog and those who claim to be outsiders. </p>
<p>On the Republican side, Trump’s various moderate competitors were one by one <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-republicans-know-nothing-outsider-candidates-are-still-on-top-49978">hobbled and engulfed</a>; Clinton, for her part, spent months slugging it out with her remarkably successful left-wing rival Bernie Sanders, never quite landing a televised knockout punch and ultimately only <a href="https://theconversation.com/hillary-clinton-wins-democratic-nomination-the-experts-react-60490">defeating him properly</a> after six months of primaries. </p>
<p>While credible policy proposals seem to matter less than ever, things that would have once been considered catastrophic gaffes have become par for the course. Indeed, one could argue that Trump’s success so far is because he has built his campaign on half-truths and outright lies without care for the consequences.</p>
<p>So despite all the anticipation, this year’s debates probably won’t tell us very much about what will happen after the president takes office next January; the analysis will almost certainly focus less on what the candidates have to say and more on how they say it. Voters will no doubt tune in in great, possibly record-breaking numbers, but they’ll come away with precious little sense of what’s in store for their country. </p>
<p>Equally, the spectacles we’re about to witness might be pyrotechnic enough, but they’re unlikely to decide the result in November. And in the unlikely event that they do, it won’t be for the right reasons.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/65984/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Priest does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The impact of presidential debates has always been overrated – and when they do make a difference, it’s for the wrong reasons.Andrew Priest, Lecturer in Modern US History, University of EssexLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/651972016-09-23T03:43:09Z2016-09-23T03:43:09ZTrump and Clinton debate strategies that can make anyone a better public speaker<p>Public speaking is an anxiety-inducing task for most us, yet it’s also a necessary one, whether you’re a corporate CEO, a high school teacher or a presidential candidate. And like the rest of us, candidates stumble when speaking in public. </p>
<p>Donald Trump’s tendency to speak off the cuff, for example, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/14/us/politics/donald-trump-campaign-gop.html?_r=0">has long rattled</a> his campaign aides, even as it’s also a source of his popularity. His <a href="http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/09/trumps-guide-to-winning-through-gaffes-214269">numerous gaffes</a> are infamous – from insulting women, war heroes and most minority groups to <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/16/politics/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-guns-secret-service/">taunting Hillary Clinton’s bodyguards</a> to disarm. </p>
<p>Clinton’s biggest problem is of a different nature. She has struggled to overcome the persistent impression that she’s <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/02/05/heres-what-the-research-tells-us-about-whether-sexism-is-hurting-hillary-clintons-prospects/">inauthentic, cold and distant</a>. This is something that she and her team have <a href="http://fortune.com/2016/07/31/hillary-clinton-warm/">worked on</a> a great deal recently. </p>
<p>The candidates’ most important public speaking event is coming up: the first presidential debate on Sept. 26, which The New York Times <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/30/us/politics/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-debate.html">calls</a> “the most anticipated in a generation.” No wonder, as the perceived winner has <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/08/14/the-presidential-debates-will-almost-surely-decide-the-election.html">generally gone on</a> to win the election. </p>
<p>While presidential candidates face the same obstacles speaking in public as the rest of us, their stakes couldn’t be higher. Fortunately for Clinton and Trump, there are research-based strategies to become more effective orators – techniques that we can use too.</p>
<h2>Debate prep 101</h2>
<p>As Trump and Clinton prepare for the debates, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/inside-debate-prep-clintons-careful-case-vs-trumps-wrestlemania/2016/08/27/ce05291c-6bbb-11e6-99bf-f0cf3a6449a6_story.html">prominent media outlets</a> have been evaluating what they need to do to win. <a href="http://nation.foxnews.com/2016/09/20/inside-look-trump-campaign-debate-prep">Trump’s challenge</a> is staying calm and on point, while <a href="http://www.npr.org/2016/09/22/494901644/how-clinton-and-trump-are-preparing-for-the-first-presidential-debate">Clinton’s</a> is to convey emotions and avoid coming off as distant and isolated. </p>
<p>However, the most important thing for both candidates will be staying on top of their mental game. Both are <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/30/us/politics/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-debate.html">trying to figure out</a> ways to rattle their opponent and make them appear unworthy of the presidency.</p>
<p>Being mentally fit means dealing with the <a href="http://www.forbes.com/2006/12/13/most-common-fears-forbeslife-cx_avd_1214commonfears.html">very common fear</a> of public speaking, known as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossophobia">glossophobia</a>. Yet public speaking is vital not only in politics but also in many careers, especially in business as one progresses into senior management and leadership positions.</p>
<p>Fortunately, a little work can go a long way in building confidence and addressing these fears. <a href="https://www.academia.edu/5431076/Public_speaking_treatment._Trainer._trainee">Research shows</a> that those with some training in public speaking not only improve their own communication but can successfully teach others to give better speeches. </p>
<p>As a <a href="http://intentionalinsights.org/trump-feels-your-anger-andanxiety-how-neuroscience-helps-explain-trump-triu">scholar of the role emotions play in public life</a>, I teamed up with Patrick Donadio – a <a href="http://www.communicatingwithimpact.com/home.html">speech coach with over 30 years of experience</a> providing leaders with <a href="https://sellfy.com/p/BbAE/">useful presentation tips</a> – to figure out the best strategies to address oratorical fears. Together, we came up with a set of research-informed techniques that anyone can use – including candidates for the highest office in the land.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138889/original/image-20160922-25460-1jmhm5d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/138889/original/image-20160922-25460-1jmhm5d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138889/original/image-20160922-25460-1jmhm5d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138889/original/image-20160922-25460-1jmhm5d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138889/original/image-20160922-25460-1jmhm5d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138889/original/image-20160922-25460-1jmhm5d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/138889/original/image-20160922-25460-1jmhm5d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">The first debate, between Nixon and Kennedy, showed the consequence of appearing nervous.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/scriptingnews/2542066071/in/photolist-4SCKFn-4KsmnW-cEKv5Y-fkScao-7HQLPD-aPkDEz-dJTkVc-aPkCL6-aPkDa6-aPkCpF-aPkDox-aPkCAH-aPkD1T-GoHTm-5ohngk-5omazG-5omHBj-5ohs8K-amWFt6-GoHTJ-aJd9Ac-5ohrS4-5om8Zo-6sh7ZK-5ogSo6-5ogU2F-5omHtE-5om92W-5omHW7-5omGiJ-aJd9xM-5ogSp4-5ohs32-5ogSFt-5ogSM6-5om9c3-4EbLux-5ogU7e-5omHdG-5omFtd-5ogSHk-5omvvm-GoHTb-8pCitK-5om8Db-5omFCA-5om91E-5omaBy-5omJG3-5ogSyz">Dave Winer/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<h2>Dealing with fear</h2>
<p>In the first-ever televised <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/us-presidents/kennedy-nixon-debates">presidential debate</a> between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy in 1960, the former appeared sweaty and nervous, while the latter looked calm and well-prepared. </p>
<p>On election day, JFK won the popular vote by a meager 0.2 percent. As 6 percent of voters claimed that the debates that year were the deciding factor, both Clinton and Trump would be wise to focus on managing any potential anxiety they might experience to avoid Nixon’s fate. </p>
<p>Sure, some anxiety is useful. It gets the <a href="http://journals.lww.com/jonmd/Citation/1964/12000/THE_PSYCHOPHYSIOLOGY_OF_ANXIETY__WITH_A_REVIEW_OF.9.aspx">adrenaline pumping</a> and can give you energy and enthusiasm. Still, beyond that, if you don’t deal with the fear, you’re unlikely to do well no matter how hard you try. <a href="http://intentionalinsights.org/living-intentionally-3-steps-to-gaining-agency">Intentional thinking</a> strategies can help you manage your emotions – and the source of your fear.</p>
<p>It’s helpful to remember that your fear is not unique. There would not be as much <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03637758109376055">extensive research</a> on speech anxiety if it were. Knowing that this is a common phenomenon should relieve some of the fear, as it shows that you are not alone.</p>
<p>Clinton, for example, <a href="http://www.vox.com/2016/9/8/12851878/hillary-clinton-control-emotions-sexism-humans-new-york">learned as a young woman</a> to control her emotions, which has served her well. Now, however, she needs to do the opposite and overcome fears she may have showing her emotions to avoid <a href="http://www.vox.com/a/hillary-clinton-interview/the-gap-listener-leadership-quality">being perceived</a> as cold and aloof. </p>
<p>In turn, Trump may need to overcome any anxiety he may experience about not being <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/mark-cuban-donald-trump-debate-2016-7">sufficiently knowledgeable</a> about the issues at hand.</p>
<h2>Positive thinking wins the day</h2>
<p>One way to do that is to <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2014/10/07/353292408/why-saying-is-believing-the-science-of-self-talk">boost your mood</a>.</p>
<p>Give yourself a pep talk and psyche yourself up. Some people meditate, others pray, others listen to music and others jog. You can <a href="http://www.thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/264489-obama-i-curse-to-deal-with-stress">even curse</a> to relieve the stress, as does President Barack Obama. There are many ways to elevate your mood.</p>
<p>Similarly, try <a href="http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/stress-management/in-depth/positive-thinking/art-20043950">positive thinking</a>. Study after study has revealed that positive thinking helps address stress and anxiety and leads to better mental and physical health. In the context of speech-making, remind yourself that you know more about the topic than the audience does. You may not be a global expert, but, chances are, if you’ve done your research, you’ll know more than the vast majority of listeners.</p>
<p>This is <a href="http://www.npr.org/2016/09/22/494901644/how-clinton-and-trump-are-preparing-for-the-first-presidential-debate">probably not as big of a concern</a> for Clinton, who is well-known as a policy wonk, but Trump is less practiced and so would be wise to give himself a pep talk before he walks on stage.</p>
<h2>Take care of your body</h2>
<p>Even if you use the strategies above, you may get a little nervous right before you get up to speak. You may also experience some excess energy. Don’t try to get rid of it all – believe me, you can’t – but you do want to eliminate some of it. Try “tense and relax” techniques.</p>
<p>For example, you could <a href="http://intentionalinsights.org/7-surprising-science-based-hacks-to-build-your-willpower">clench and relax</a> your fists. Clench your fists really hard and then release them. If you notice a lot of tension in your neck, try shoulder shrugs. Push your shoulders up to your ears, hold them there for 10 seconds, and release. Former Republican presidential candidate Scott Walker, for instance, <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/06/politics/gop-pre-debate-rituals-republican-cleveland/">goes for a run</a> before debates.</p>
<p>Finally, make sure you’ve had enough sleep, water and a good meal before giving your speech, and don’t forget to use the restroom. You don’t want to have an embarrassing moment <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/12/20/finally-an-explanation-for-hillary-clintons-long-bathroom-break/?_r=0">like Clinton did</a> during a debate when she was late coming back from a bathroom break. </p>
<h2>Visual prep and practice</h2>
<p>Most importantly, practice what you want to convey and how you want to convey it to gain more confidence and speaking exposure. </p>
<p><a href="http://psychcentral.com/lib/what-is-exposure-therapy/">Studies show</a> that gradual exposure to fear-inducing stimuli – known as <a href="http://www.div12.org/sites/default/files/WhatIsExposureTherapy.pdf">exposure therapy</a> – combined with relaxation techniques such as those described above is a safe and effective means of decreasing anxiety and building confidence. </p>
<p>Since it is especially helpful to simulate the exact environment in which your speech will take place, another way to do that is to try practicing in the same location you will be giving it and imagine what it will be like when you’re doing it live. </p>
<p>Clinton and Trump, for example, may want to make a quiet visit to the Hofstra University auditorium, where the first debate will be held. </p>
<p>If doing that is impractical for you, try <a href="http://psychcentral.com/lib/guided-visualization-a-way-to-relax-reduce-stress-and-more/">visualization</a>, a strategy that doesn’t require you to leave your home. It involves visualizing yourself delivering a perfect speech in front of a rapt audience. This <a href="https://mdsoar.org/handle/11603/2234">research-based</a> strategy is <a href="http://fiercegentleman.com/visualize/">widely employed</a> in a similar way by top athletes and actors, such as Will Smith, Tiger Woods and Venus and Serena Williams. </p>
<p>Clinton’s <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/10/who-will-win/497561/">background</a> in previous political debates gives her an edge there, as she can easily imagine what it’ll be like more precisely than Trump. </p>
<p>Visualization doesn’t replace actual practice, of course. When you do practice, it’s still optimal to create an environment that simulates the situation well. For instance, if you’re planning to give a presentation to potential investors, ask friends or colleagues to role play and ask tough questions. </p>
<p>Both Clinton and Trump are engaging in <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/08/30/why-the-presidential-debates-could-really-matter-this-time/?utm_term=.f1507d4f803c">thorough preparations</a>. We know that Clinton <a href="http://www.uspresidentialelectionnews.com/2016/09/trump-and-clinton-prepare-for-first-presidential-debate/">is doing</a> mock debates, which will likely serve her well during the event itself. We have no confirmation of whether Trump is doing the same. </p>
<p>The candidates also <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/hillary-clinton-prepping-for-two-trumps-at-debate-1474415274">need to study each other</a> as much as they study the content, since their goal is to win, not just to convey information. If your goal in public speaking is to outdo a competitor, as in a debate or contract bid, you must study that opponent and make sure that you take advantage of her/his weaknesses, while defending against her/his strengths. </p>
<h2>From first speech to inaugural address</h2>
<p>These tips, widely used by experienced speakers like Trump and Clinton, can <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/da.20090/abstract">help anyone minimize the impact</a> of speaking anxiety. The sooner you get up in front of a group, realize that you have something important to say and say it, the sooner you’ll get rid of your fear.</p>
<p>Speaking is a skill that grows stronger with practice and weaker with disuse. The secret to improving your speaking skills is experience. </p>
<p>Remember, your first speech may be your worst speech, but you will keep getting better and less anxious going forward. After all, not even presidential candidates become excellent public speakers overnight.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/65197/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Gleb Tsipursky is the leader of Intentional Insights, a nonprofit organization that popularizes research-based strategies from behavioral sciences for a broad audience. Several links are to research-based articles from the Intentional Insights website. </span></em></p>Even Trump and Clinton have oratorical anxieties. Here are some research-based strategies presidential candidates and the rest of us can use to overcome them.Gleb Tsipursky, Assistant Professor of History, The Ohio State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/599032016-05-29T11:14:28Z2016-05-29T11:14:28ZTurnbull and Shorten face off in leaders’ debate: experts respond<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124394/original/image-20160529-10041-civshi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Who took the points in the first leaders' debate of the 2016 campaign?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Tracey Nearmy</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten have met in the first official debate of the 2016 election campaign, with spending on health and education, action on climate change, and the nature of leadership high on the agenda.</p>
<p>Questioned by a panel of three journalists, Turnbull claimed Labor has:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… not one measure that will deliver stronger economic growth or deliver more jobs.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Shorten, for his part, said Labor had “learnt our lesson” from the “difficult” Rudd-Gillard period of disunity and could be trusted on key policy areas such as schools funding, Medicare and climate change.</p>
<p>The Conversation’s experts watched the debate closely with an eye across these key policy areas and the leaders’ performances. Their responses follow. If you missed the debate, you can catch up on QUT professor of journalism, media and communication Brian McNair’s live tweeting <a href="https://storify.com/ConversationEDU/brian-mcnair-tweets-the-leaders-debate?utm_source=embed_header">here</a>.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Debate low on substance, but Shorten takes the points</h2>
<p><strong>Natalie Mast, Associate Director, Performance Analytics, University of Western Australia</strong></p>
<p>Malcolm Turnbull started the debate by positioning Australia within Asia and claiming he has the economic plan to secure high wages and future economic prosperity. Innovation, more jobs and more growth were his take-home messages.</p>
<p>Bill Shorten framed his opening statement by arguing Labor could be trusted on education, Medicare and the economy. His key messages focused on fairness and trust.</p>
<p>Given the debate lasted an hour, both leaders were heavy on rhetoric and low on detail. Throughout, Turnbull and Shorten ignored questions to deliver what seemed like mostly prepared answers. Turnbull twice failed to answer Laura Tingle’s first question: if he would govern in a manner more fitting to what voters had expected if he attains his own mandate.</p>
<p>Turnbull’s responses were generally framed within the prism of strong economic growth. Shorten claimed Labor’s principle in setting its policies to take to the electorate was one of “more repairs to the budget bottom line than spends”.</p>
<p>Shorten’s repeated attacks on the A$50 billion company tax cut over ten years, and in particular the fact the four big banks would benefit, suggest Labor’s focus groups aren’t supportive of the cuts “to the top end of town”.</p>
<p>Shorten did deliver a “zinger” that is likely to resonate within the segments of the electorate disappointed they haven’t seen the “real” Malcolm:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I genuinely lead my party, whereas your party genuinely leads you.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Turnbull tried to wedge Shorten on the issue of asylum seekers and offshore detention, while Shorten tried the same tactic in regard to climate change.</p>
<p>Overall, Shorten looked the slightly stronger of the two, appealing directly to voters. However, Turnbull’s articulate style exudes leadership. It’s likely the outcome won’t make much of a difference in terms of swaying voters.</p>
<hr>
<h2>A clear difference on economic issues</h2>
<p><strong>Saul Eslake, Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow, University of Tasmania</strong></p>
<p>The division between the two major parties over economic issues ahead of this federal election is arguably clearer than at any other election since 1998 (when “the” economic issue was the Howard government’s proposal to introduce the GST). </p>
<p>The Coalition’s “plan for jobs and growth” has, as its centrepiece, a staged reduction in company tax, initially focused on “small” businesses but eventually reducing the rate paid by all businesses by five percentage points. </p>
<p>Labor, by contrast, believes – as Bill Shorten put it this evening – that “in order to have sustainable growth, you need to have fairness”, which it in turn believes will be attained by more spending on education and health, as opposed to a cut in company tax.</p>
<p>The problem for those watching or listening to the debate who are not already irrevocably committed to one of these perspectives or the other is that both leaders hold to their respective position as articles of faith, rather than as the outcome of reasoned argument. </p>
<p>Malcolm Turnbull was “in business” before entering parliament at the age of 50: as a result, he “knows” that lower taxes prompt businesses to invest, and to create jobs. Shorten, however, “knows” as a result of the time he spent “standing up for ordinary workers” before entering parliament that increased spending on education and health, rather than tax cuts for “the top end of town”, is what will “deliver” stronger economic growth.</p>
<p>I didn’t find either leader’s reasoning persuasive. Turnbull is right, in my view, to argue that stronger economic growth makes increased spending on education, health and other social programs affordable. But he didn’t convince me that the best way to achieve stronger economic growth was to cut company tax – especially for small businesses.</p>
<p>New figures released by the ABS on Friday show that businesses with fewer than 20 employees have generated just 5% of the total increase in private sector employment over the five years to 2014-15 (compared with 66% by businesses with 200 or more employees). </p>
<p>Shorten made no attempt to rebut Turnbull’s point that Australia’s experience does not support the view that merely spending more on education necessarily guarantees better educational outcomes, let alone stronger economic growth.</p>
<p>Both leaders evaded important questions. Turnbull didn’t explain how tax cuts that primarily benefit foreign companies and the big banks would result in increased economic growth. Shorten didn’t explain how his policies will result in a lower budget deficit over the four years to 2019-20 – although we will apparently get those answers “well before” election day.</p>
<p>Before they got onto climate change and “stopping the boats”, the two leaders clearly delineated the key differences in their approach to economic issues. But they each have a long way to go in convincing voters their approach is the better one.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Both trumpet their belief in education – but not the detail</h2>
<p><strong>Bronwyn Hinz, Policy Fellow at the Mitchell Institute, Victoria University</strong></p>
<p>The debate clearly demonstrated the relative importance of education policy to the Coalition and to Labor, as well as their conceptualisation of what it encompasses.</p>
<p>Malcolm Turnbull didn’t mention it in his opening address, speaking instead on innovation, jobs and growth.</p>
<p>By contrast, Bill Shorten mentioned education within the first minute or so of his opening address, arguing that investment in high-quality education – specifically with well-funded public schools – was one of three key elements of Labor’s “Positive Plan for the Future” and a foundation of their plan for economic growth.</p>
<p>Shorten frequently returned to schools, and education and fairness more generally. He argued “you can trust Labor to stand up for education and training”; “we will properly fund all schools, government schools, according to their needs” and that they’ll make sure “all kids get a decent crack at getting to university”.</p>
<p>It is highly significant and encouraging that Shorten mentioned “childcare” as a key element of Labor’s “positive plan for education”. <a href="http://www.mitchellinstitute.org.au/reports/quality-early-education-for-all/">Reams of research</a> show high-quality early childhood education (preschool and the early learning that precedes it) is increasingly recognised to be at least as important as schooling. </p>
<p>While Australia has made huge advances in both participation rates and service quality in early learning in recent years, we are still playing catch-up with other advanced nations. One-third of young children do no attend preschool for the hours needed to make a difference, and children in disadvantaged areas have fewer high-quality early education and care services available to them. Research shows greater investment in this space is one of the most significant investments in education and productivity that governments can make.</p>
<p>Turnbull proclaimed his belief in “the transformative effect of education”. He said that “of course we believe that government funding must be allocated on the basis of need” while quickly reminding viewers that educational outcomes have been worsening over time despite total school education expenditure by governments increasing.</p>
<p>This is true. And the reason it is true is because much of this increased expenditure hasn’t been targeted to where educational needs have been greatest. </p>
<p>Independent schools serving very affluent communities and charging tens of thousands of dollars each year in fees still reap thousands in government funding, while public schools serving the down-and-out struggle to make ends meet on half to one-third of that amount. Disadvantage is increasingly concentrated in government (public) schools, yet funding to non-government (Catholic and independent schools) has <a href="http://research.acer.edu.au/aer/14/">historically increased much faster</a>, largely due to Commonwealth government largesse.</p>
<p>I was surprised that neither Shorten nor Turnbull said the word “Gonski”. Instead they spoke more about fair or needs-based schools funding. I was also surprised that neither went into the <a href="https://theconversation.com/federal-election-2016-whats-on-the-table-for-schools-58399">details of their policies</a>, both of which were announced some time ago, and both of which encompass much more than funding quantums.</p>
<hr>
<h2>Still little the wiser on healthcare spending</h2>
<p><strong>Jane Hall, Professor of Health Economics and Director, Centre for Health Economics Research and Evaluation, University of Technology Sydney</strong></p>
<p>Both leaders were asked for their medium-term plan for funding health care. The sustainability of the system as we know it means ensuring that no Australians are prevented from receiving care due to the costs. </p>
<p>Sustainability also requires balancing revenue and expenditure – but, cutting expenditure for one funder often means moving the burden of costs somewhere else. For example, the 2014 budget measure to save Commonwealth outlays on public hospitals just moved the problem to the states. And any increase in co-payments for pharmaceuticals moves the cost to consumers.</p>
<p>Health policy has been a key point of difference and a vote-grabber since Medicare began. This time, the government is banking on economic growth that is sufficient to support a generous social welfare safety net. Labor is campaigning on bulk billing, the freeze on Medicare rebates, no increase in the co-payments for pharmaceuticals, and trust to defend Medicare.</p>
<p>There is no magic level of bulk billing that is right or essential for Medicare as we know it. Bulk billing is most important in general practice where 84% consultations are bulk-billed. GP bulk-billing rates have been rising; they are currently at the highest level since Medicare began.</p>
<p>The Labor government introduced the Medicare rebate freeze as a temporary (nine-month) measure in 2013. This meant the 2013 annual increase was not awarded. Under the Coalition government the freeze has been extended to 2020. The freeze on rebates does not mean there is a freeze on doctor fees; doctors are free to set their fees at any level. So what is a freeze likely to mean for the longer term?</p>
<p>The widespread availability of primary care without an upfront fee is an important way of ensuring access to health care, particularly for the economically disadvantaged. The backlash over the introduction of the $7 co-payment attempted in the 2014 budget shows this has become an iconic issue for Medicare.</p>
<p>There are five weeks to go before election day. Labor has promised that a hospital funding policy is still to come. Plenty of time for more hats and more rabbits, then.</p>
<hr>
<h2>A matte makeup debate</h2>
<p><strong>Tom Clark, Associate Professor, College of Arts, Victoria University</strong></p>
<p>Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten walked from Federation Square to the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Saturday, striving together to make political leadership relevant to things their constituents care about. Sunday’s debate extended that collective spirit.</p>
<p>It was a remarkably flat debate, where the matte facial makeup seemed to take all the lustre off the discussion. It was full of such wooden and forced remarks as the leaders’ media advisors train them to avoid. They made not a single point to lift the home viewer’s gaze above the horizon. They could barely even offer us a cheap and nasty laugh to remember them by – not even at each other’s expense.</p>
<p>What we saw and heard was guided by an assumption that most or all of the participants share. Political insiders know most voters are not paying close attention to the election campaign yet, but believe that situation will change at some moment before the 2 July poll date.</p>
<p>Exactly when that will happen, the pollsters can only speculate. But it is a moment they are anxious to see arrive as soon as possible. Because this is a longer campaign than usual, there is less than the usual confidence that voters will tune into Australia’s greatest reality TV show in a timely fashion.</p>
<p>In the interim, the leaders and the pundits keep rehearsing their lines, aiming to develop really good ones by the time the broad electorate takes notice, and hoping not to make any mistakes too memorable along the way.</p>
<p>And meanwhile, the politicians and their media co-creators are working together to give the rest of us reasons to care, however uncharismatic the effect. The co-operative front reveals their assumption that we don’t particularly care just yet.</p>
<p>This debate is a conspicuously clear sign the major parties have accepted a mutual need to prop up popular engagement with the Australian democracy they lead. It is work they desperately need to unite in, if they want to protect this cosy duopoly they have overseen since 1941.</p>
<p>Will it be too little too late?</p>
<hr>
<h2>The debate in tweets</h2>
<p><strong>Brian McNair, Professor of Journalism, Media and Communication, Queensland University of Technology</strong></p>
<iframe src="https://storify.com/ConversationEDU/brian-mcnair-tweets-the-leaders-debate/embed?border=false" width="100%" height="750" frameborder="no" allowtransparency="true"></iframe>
<p></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/59903/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Natalie Mast is chair of The Conversation's editorial board.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian McNair receives funding from the Australian Research Council. He is a Chief Investigator within the Digital Media Research Centre at QUT.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jane Hall receives funding from the NHMRC and the Commonwealth of Australia as represented by the Department of Health through a Centre for Research Excellence under the Australian Primary Health Care Research Institute.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Saul Eslake is a Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of Tasmania and an independent consulting economist. He is a former Chief Economist of the ANZ Bank and of Bank of America Merrill Lynch Australia.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tom Clark receives funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bronwyn Hinz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Conversation’s experts respond to the first Turnbull-Shorten debate with an eye across key policy areas and the leaders’ performances.Natalie Mast, Associate Director, Performance Analytics, The University of Western AustraliaBrian McNair, Professor of Journalism, Media and Communication, Queensland University of TechnologyBronwyn Hinz, Policy Fellow at the Mitchell Institute, Victoria UniversityJane Hall, Professor of Health Economics and Director, Centre for Health Economics Research and Evaluation, University of Technology SydneySaul Eslake, Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow, University of TasmaniaTom Clark, Associate Professor, College of Arts, Victoria UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/410532015-04-30T22:33:57Z2015-04-30T22:33:57ZParty leaders on Question Time: how did they do?<p>David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg faced a grilling from the public in a special election edition of BBC Question Time. They were quizzed on immigration, the NHS and the economy. Our political experts have rated each party leader’s performance.</p>
<h2>David Cameron</h2>
<p><strong>Mark Garnett, Senior Lecturer in Politics at Lancaster University</strong></p>
<p>Great delivery, shame about the script. In his Question Time performance, David Cameron showed the kind of fluency and ability to engage with an audience that seems to elude him in televised confrontations with other leaders. Voters have all heard about his experiences with the NHS, but his sincerity is apparent every time he pays tribute to the care his disabled son Ivan received before his death. If any of the questions affected his composure, it never showed.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80006/original/image-20150430-30702-f1vvej.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80006/original/image-20150430-30702-f1vvej.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=558&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80006/original/image-20150430-30702-f1vvej.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=558&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80006/original/image-20150430-30702-f1vvej.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=558&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80006/original/image-20150430-30702-f1vvej.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=701&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80006/original/image-20150430-30702-f1vvej.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=701&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80006/original/image-20150430-30702-f1vvej.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=701&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Still got it.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">BBC</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is not to say, however, that Cameron responded to all the questions thrown at him with a satisfactory answer. It’s still not clear how the Tories would shave <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/generalelection/conservative-secret-plan-for-12bn-welfare-cuts-10140610.html">£12bn</a> from a welfare budget which has been under attack for five years, for example.</p>
<p>He also failed to clarify the ingenious methods he will deploy to prise an extra £5bn out of tax avoiders and evaders. The loudest applause from the audience during the PM’s appearance came when a questioner asked why he had <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-it-comes-to-tv-debates-cameron-is-no-coward-hes-calculating-38469">refused</a> to debate head-to-head with Miliband. On its own, this issue would not have hurt Cameron much, but it’s obviously damaging in combination with his slippery approach to more substantive questions.</p>
<p>The overall impression, then, was that Cameron has lost none of his gusto as a political performer: indeed, the main party leaders seem far less jaded than the voters. But beneath the polish the flaws were too apparent to make this the moment when the Conservatives finally freed themselves from the deadlock of the polls. </p>
<h2>Ed Miliband</h2>
<p><strong>Wyn Grant, Professor of politics at the University of Warwick</strong></p>
<p>Ed Miliband went further than he has gone before in ruling out any kind of deal with the SNP. A coalition was never on the agenda, but he also specifically ruled out a confidence-and-supply arrangement. Indeed, he went so far as to say that he would rather not be in government than depend on the SNP. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80008/original/image-20150430-30705-89z7yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80008/original/image-20150430-30705-89z7yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=645&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80008/original/image-20150430-30705-89z7yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=645&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80008/original/image-20150430-30705-89z7yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=645&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80008/original/image-20150430-30705-89z7yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80008/original/image-20150430-30705-89z7yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80008/original/image-20150430-30705-89z7yw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rough ride.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">BBC</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This suggests that he realises that Conservative are cutting through to voters with warning about the risks of such an arrangement. However, it also suggests that he feels confident enough to call the SNP’s bluff, realising that they would not vote down measures on which they agree with Labour. Even so, it is a high risk strategy.</p>
<p>The Labour leader came in for tough questioning on the issue of Labour’s spending plans. A number of members of the audience pressed him hard on his denials that the last Labour government had overspent, suggesting that this undermined claims that a Miliband government would be fiscally responsible.</p>
<p>Looking nervous at the beginning, Miliband stepped down from the podium towards the audience and tried to address questioners by name. He was able to repeat some by now familiar messages and added another – that child benefit and tax credits were now on the ballot paper. But he received a grilling on immigration and his opposition to holding an EU referendum. His claim was that he would under promise and over deliver. It was his <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32544421">toughest television appearance</a> so far, and in some ways the least impressive, but it does not fundamentally undermine a campaign that has enhanced his credibility as a leader.</p>
<h2>Nick Clegg</h2>
<p><strong>Matt Cole, Teaching Fellow at the University of Birmingham</strong></p>
<p>Nick Clegg had three jobs to do in his Question Time appearance. He needed to boost Liberal Democrat performance, especially in the party’s existing seats; set out his post-election strategy to the country and potential coalition partners; and save his own seat, currently under threat according to <a href="http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2015/04/south-swindon-thanet-south-and-sheffield-hallam/">recent polls</a>. And, to be fair, two out of three ain’t bad.</p>
<p>Progress was made on the last aim: Clegg was a winning personality, less stilted than the other leaders, and only a little shaken by questions about his political future and Treasury minister Danny Alexander’s decision to <a href="https://theconversation.com/danny-alexanders-last-minute-leak-poor-form-but-good-politics-41051">reveal</a> unpublished coalition plans earlier in the day in a bid to discredit the Conservatives.</p>
<p>Few parliamentary candidates have the luxury of 30 minutes’ TV exposure a week before polling, and Clegg may be grateful he made effective use of it.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80011/original/image-20150430-30729-rvd76p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80011/original/image-20150430-30729-rvd76p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80011/original/image-20150430-30729-rvd76p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80011/original/image-20150430-30729-rvd76p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80011/original/image-20150430-30729-rvd76p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=791&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80011/original/image-20150430-30729-rvd76p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=791&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80011/original/image-20150430-30729-rvd76p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=791&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Relevant.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">BBC</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On the second matter – of coalition – Clegg made only partial use of a big opportunity. The striking feature of the sessions with the other leaders was their almost pathological denial of the likelihood of having to form a coalition after May 7, at which the audience expressed repeated frustration.</p>
<p>With the field open to present himself as the new realist of multi-party politics, Clegg made his pitch for negotiation and set out the red-line issues that would be non-negotiable if another party were to approach the Lib Dems to form a coalition. The language of absolute promises – vows, pledges and contracts – should have been abandoned by now. Nobody can guarantee delivery in a multi-party system, and now the public knows it. Sacrifices are a transparent part of the process requiring explanation, not apology. Politicians should offer priorities, not promises.</p>
<p>On the first, most immediate issue the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/blog/live/2015/apr/30/question-time-cameron-miliband-and-clegg-interviews-live#block-55429ac4e4b07879681b8c5d">Guardian/ICM poll</a> showed Clegg was the best performer for 19% of viewers. It’s not Cleggmania, but these days, the Liberal Democrats almost never see a national poll of any kind put them in double figures, and this will give some real heart to some of the party’s candidates.</p>
<p>Overall, Liberal Democrat policies and achievements got a better airing than they have had for some time. Clegg has his critics within his party, but his resilient performance reflects the fact that the party itself has survived far worse times and is not “irrelevant” – as one member of the audience suggested.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/41053/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The final big pitch to the voters has been made. So who came out on top?Mark Garnett, Senior Lecturer in Politics, Lancaster UniversityMatthew Cole, Teaching Fellow, Department of History, University of BirminghamWyn Grant, Professor of politics, University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/403582015-04-16T22:21:22Z2015-04-16T22:21:22ZChallenger debate shows Cameron should be afraid — but not as afraid as Nick Clegg<p>Without uttering a single word, David Cameron managed to bomb in the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32328664">third 2015 election debate</a>. By not showing up to a broadcast that, despite all the spin, he could certainly have been part of, he was an easy target for the five party leaders who did take to the stage.</p>
<p>All five were united in their attack on Cameron for the no-show, with Ed Miliband offering a direct challenge to the Prime Minister to debate him head on. And all, with the exception perhaps of Nigel Farage, were united in their wish to keep Cameron out of Downing Street. </p>
<p>But without a doubt, the biggest loser of this debate was the man no-one even mentioned – Nick Clegg. The fact that none of the challenger leaders even felt the need to reference him in their discussion highlighted just how easily the Liberal Democrats could fall through the cracks in this election. Clegg was irrelevant to this debate and could well become irrelevant to the discussion about who becomes part of the next government. </p>
<p>Things may not be so great for Miliband either – even if he did give a strong performance against the other challengers. The last question from the audience in this debate was what the respective parties would be looking for if they were part of post-election negotiations.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"588798488386895872"}"></div></p>
<p>While it took almost a full hour-and-a-half for it to be formally acknowledged, what viewers were actually seeing from the start of the debate were coalition negotiations unfolding before their very eyes – as the Conservative Party press office pointed out on <a href="https://twitter.com/CCHQPress">Twitter</a>.</p>
<p>Miliband has clearly met his match in Nicola Sturgeon. Confident, measured and effective, the SNP leader was firmly on message, using the Prime Minister’s absence to hammer home her message on standing up to the establishment.</p>
<p>Neatly expanding her usual anti-Tory rhetoric, she stepped up the pressure on Miliband, arguing that there was “not a big enough difference” between him and Cameron. She was critical of Labour policy on the Trident nuclear weapons system and on austerity, highlighting Labour’s manifesto jargon and pressing Miliband on precisely where Labour would make cuts. “Tory-lite,” she said, is just not going to cut it for voters.</p>
<p>Despite giving him a tough time, she once again made it clear that the SNP would “never ever” do a deal with the Conservatives but that she is very open to a deal with Labour – as long as it offers “something better”. And Miliband may soon come to regret his response. </p>
<p>The Labour leader very forcefully declined her offer. Describing the “profound differences” between their parties, he bluntly stated that there would be no coalition with the SNP.</p>
<p>With the polls still too close to call and a Labour majority by no means certain, Miliband’s rejection of Sturgeon could be a decision that will come back to haunt him. </p>
<p>And if he does end up backtracking and forming a coalition with the SNP, he will find that Sturgeon is a more difficult coalition partner than Clegg ever was for Cameron.</p>
<p>The SNP is already a party of government and Sturgeon personally has a position in Scotland that quenches her thirst for power. If she became part of a Labour-SNP coalition she would bring an air of confidence and a ministerial experience that the Liberal Democrats never had. Sturgeon’s line that she could “help Labour be bolder” is definitely more than just election talk.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/40358/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
A coalition negotiation has unfolded live on TV, and the incumbents quickly became irrelevant.Louise Thompson, Lecturer in British Politics, University of SurreyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/397342015-04-03T13:08:01Z2015-04-03T13:08:01ZSprawling leader debate was just the ticket for bored British voters<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77008/original/image-20150403-9306-1a1j8gu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Now we have a choice of weakest links.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">ITV</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The leadership debate screened on ITV on April 2 marked a historic moment in British politics. While 2010 brought the British public the first ever televised debates, the 2015 version saw seven leaders take to the stage together for the first time.</p>
<p>Before, during and after the debate, much of the social media and pundit reaction reflected an obsession with the messiness of the multi-party set-up. Before the broadcast, the most popular Twitter hashtag was #massdebate, trending over ITV’s chosen #leadersdebate. The double entendre provided much hilarity for <a href="http://mashable.com/2015/04/02/mass-debate-uk-election/">users</a>.</p>
<p>Others compared the format to a game show. One tweeter complained that <a href="http://mashable.com/2015/04/02/uk-election-debate-in-tweets/?utm_cid=mash-com-Tw-main-link">“The Weakest Link Celebrity Specials have really gone downhill”</a>.</p>
<p>Even seasoned observers of British politics struggled to come to terms with the decision to include the smaller parties. After the broadcast, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/apr/02/itvs-leaders-debate-turns-into-the-mess-club-7">Stuart Heritage</a>, commenting in the Guardian described it as a “long, slow, claustrophobic mess that nobody could win.”</p>
<p>Most media coverage sought to frame the debate in terms of the contest between Miliband and Cameron. The BBC, which has long <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/our_work/editorial_standards/impartiality/breadth_opinion.html">struggled to overcome</a> a narrow understanding of impartiality in terms of conflict between the Conservative and Labour parties, missed an opportunity in the News at 10. Here, deputy political editor James Landale focused on the clash between the two party leaders, describing it as “the only chance for David Cameron and Ed Miliband to debate openly”.</p>
<h2>When multi-party debates are the norm</h2>
<p>Between complaints about the messiness and an obsessive focus on two of the leaders, something important has been missed. This was an exciting moment in British politics. For once, the British public has heard a diversity of voices before polling day. For two hours, the election campaign became more than just a <a href="https://theconversation.com/stunts-gaffes-and-horse-races-the-2015-election-is-business-as-usual-for-the-uk-media-38366">horse race</a> between the two favourites.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77010/original/image-20150403-9332-s1orbs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77010/original/image-20150403-9332-s1orbs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77010/original/image-20150403-9332-s1orbs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77010/original/image-20150403-9332-s1orbs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77010/original/image-20150403-9332-s1orbs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77010/original/image-20150403-9332-s1orbs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77010/original/image-20150403-9332-s1orbs.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wood takes on Miliband.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ITV</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In many European democracies, this type of debate is the norm. In the recent Dutch elections, <a href="http://politicsinspires.org/run-tv-debates-multi-party-system/">twelve parties were included</a> in a series of mini-debates, each featuring two leaders going head to head.</p>
<p>In <a href="http://www.lse.ac.uk/media@lse/documents/MPP/LSE-MPP-Policy-Brief-13-Televised-Election-Debates-in-the-UK.pdf">German elections</a>, the two main party leaders debate one-on-one but any party with representatives in the Bundestag is also invited to participate in a second debate so sprawling it was originally called the Elephant Round. </p>
<p>In Canada, the Bloc Québécois is included in debates broadcast across the country, despite the fact that the party only has candidates standing for election in Québec.</p>
<h2>Breath of fresh air</h2>
<p>The UK debate may have been messy and difficult to read in terms of winners and losers but it told voters much about the actual policies of each party. To avoid descending into farce, it was necessary to adhere to a strict programme of questions on the biggest issues of the campaign – the NHS, immigration, the economy and social inequality.</p>
<p>It signalled the change towards a more diverse landscape in British politics. It is a shift that could energise citizens who are fed up with the <a href="http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2015/03/parties-seem-rather-old-and-tired-say-voters/">two-party model</a> that has prevailed for so long. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77011/original/image-20150403-9345-3q4gpv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77011/original/image-20150403-9345-3q4gpv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=318&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77011/original/image-20150403-9345-3q4gpv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=318&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77011/original/image-20150403-9345-3q4gpv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=318&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77011/original/image-20150403-9345-3q4gpv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77011/original/image-20150403-9345-3q4gpv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/77011/original/image-20150403-9345-3q4gpv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Sturgeon takes down Cameron.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ITV</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A real range of views and voices were represented in the debates. The inclusion of the SNP and Plaid Cymru, fielding candidates only in Scotland and Wales, played out with their leaders placing their answers in their national contexts, rather than speaking to the audience as a whole.</p>
<p>But the three women leaders – Natalie Bennett for the Greens, Nicola Sturgeon for the SNP and Leanne Wood for Plaid Cymru – also took on the main party leaders in direct and often progressive attacks. They challenged them on their past records and suggested that voters could no longer trust their pre-election promises.</p>
<p>The first-past-the-post electoral system continues to privilege the large parties but there is <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/clare-coatman/first-past-post-damning-report-on-system-that-fails-fairness-test">growing clamour</a> for a more inclusive form of representation. The seven-way debate may have been difficult to digest at first, but it has ultimately shown how this can be done.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39734/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<h4 class="border">Disclosure</h4><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Karin Wahl-Jorgensen received funding from the BBC Trust to carry out the content analysis for their 2012-2013 breadth of opinion impartiality review.</span></em></p>The leadership debate screened on ITV on April 2 marked a historic moment in British politics. While 2010 brought the British public the first ever televised debates, the 2015 version saw seven leaders…Karin Wahl-Jorgensen, Professor; Director of Research Development and Environment, School of Journalism, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/397092015-04-03T10:19:07Z2015-04-03T10:19:07ZFarage frozen out by leaders in TV debate – just as he wanted<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/77001/original/image-20150402-9312-1bfjgrv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C40%2C1255%2C716&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Farage was largely ignored by Cameron and Miliband</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">ITV</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Nigel Farage has used his appearance in a seven-way party leaders debate to confirm his status as both the most unashamedly populist and polarising figure in UK politics. </p>
<p>Repeatedly painting himself as the insurgent candidate among the Westminster elite, Farage made some notably animated interventions in an otherwise largely sterile two-hour broadcast. He called on the other leaders to “get real” on the economy and urged them to tell the truth on EU immigration.</p>
<p>His most memorable intervention though, was surely his incendiary comment about how much it costs the NHS to treat foreign patients with HIV. This prompted a visceral reaction from the other leaders, with Plaid Cymru’s Leanne Wood telling him <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/generalelection/general-election-leaders-debate-you-should-be-ashamed-of-yourself-farage-told-as-he-lashes-out-at-foreigners-with-hiv-10153615.html">he should be ashamed of himself</a>.</p>
<p>Neither David Cameron nor Ed Miliband chose to confront the UKIP leader in any substantive way on this most contentious issue. They stood back and let Wood chide Farage on their behalf.</p>
<p>And yet, one can’t help feeling Farage knew what he was doing. This was not the first time he has quoted figures on HIV patients. By picking a subject which was so emotive he could be sure to get press coverage – which has been lacking in the first week of the campaign. He was also aiming for a positive reception from his target audience – disaffected voters who see UKIP as a party that “tells the truth”. </p>
<h2>Changing the record</h2>
<p>While UKIP policies are often characterised as narrowly focused, playing on fears of immigration and dislike of the EU, Farage developed a broader narrative as the evening went on. The call for the return of grammar schools is a particularly salient issue in <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/mar/06/pupils-caught-in-middle-of-drive-to-expand-kents-grammar-schools">Kent</a>, where Farage hopes to win a parliamentary seat. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, there was also evidence of a broader and longer-term strategy beyond England. Farage called for a revision of the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/sep/19/what-is-barnett-formula-how-work-scotland-wales-northern-ireland">Barnett formula</a> so that Wales gets more public funding.</p>
<p>This is an increasingly important issue in Welsh politics and while UKIP may not win any seats in Wales in 2015, it is on course to secure its first representation in next year’s <a href="http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/assembly-election-poll-predicts-eight-7359687">Welsh Assembly elections</a>. </p>
<h2>Focus on local issues</h2>
<p>But there were failures for Farage too. The strict format and studio layout meant he was unable to land a telling blow on Cameron – which must have been a key objective.</p>
<p>In fact, despite some debate with Clegg, Farage found himself largely frozen out by the three main party leaders. In polling conducted immediately after the debate, he was rated as both the worst and best performer on the night. </p>
<p>This might actually be good for UKIP though. In the wider context of the election campaign Farage may be fortunate that while it appears he performed well enough to sustain the party’s position in the polls, he did not emerge as a clear winner.</p>
<p>Many Liberal Democrat strategists blame Nick Clegg’s success in the first leaders’ debate in 2010 for a change in tactics that ultimately <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8667121.stm">cost the party seats</a>.</p>
<p>UKIP is projected to win between one and four seats on May 7. In order to achieve this, or better, the party will need to focus its energy on local campaigning and not be distracted by national political events.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39709/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jonathan Kirkup does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The UKIP leader was ignored by most of the other leaders in the seven-way TV debate.Jonathan Kirkup, Lecturer in Politics, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/397272015-04-02T22:28:14Z2015-04-02T22:28:14ZElection debate: Cameron coasts, Farage falls flat and Sturgeon steals the show<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76994/original/image-20150402-9335-d2v01r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The SNP and Plaid leaders worked together to show up the pack.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">ITV</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It nearly didn’t happen, but for the first time ever, the British public has heard from seven party leaders in one TV debate. And for the first time ever, Natalie Bennett, Nigel Farage, Nicola Sturgeon and Leanne Wood were given a very public platform to debate with the main party leaders.</p>
<p>For weeks we have heard that the inclusion of the minor parties was a strategic move by David Cameron; that their inclusion would dilute the impact of a Labour leader who would undoubtedly have done his homework. And indeed, the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/apr/01/david-cameron-aims-to-highlight-risk-of-political-chaos-in-leaders-tv-debate">pre-debate chatter</a> ahead of the broadcast cited Farage and Cameron as the most likely winners.</p>
<p>As <a href="http://theconversation.com/red-yellow-green-and-tartan-colour-clash-or-political-dream-team-38559">I argued last month</a>, the most obvious common ground between the small parties is their anti-austerity rhetoric. And the three women played heavily on that during the two-hour show.</p>
<p>As the first of the three to speak, Bennett set the scene. She argued that voters “deserve better” than the current austerity package on offer. Sturgeon built on this, highlighting the “positive change” the SNP could bring to austerity Britain. It was also a big feature of their closing statements – Sturgeon arguing that the UK can’t afford any more cuts and Bennett stressing that austerity was a choice, rather than a certainty.</p>
<h2>Three-pronged attack</h2>
<p>Sturgeon was clearly the leader of the three, with the Plaid and Green leaders rallying around throughout. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76997/original/image-20150402-9339-lpc93p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76997/original/image-20150402-9339-lpc93p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=615&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76997/original/image-20150402-9339-lpc93p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=615&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76997/original/image-20150402-9339-lpc93p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=615&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76997/original/image-20150402-9339-lpc93p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=772&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76997/original/image-20150402-9339-lpc93p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=772&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76997/original/image-20150402-9339-lpc93p.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=772&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wood and Sturgeon.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ITV</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>At times the gender divide was striking. Sturgeon for instance argued that “none of these guys can be trusted on tuition fees”. In 2010 the catchphrase of the debate was <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/apr/16/leaders-tv-debates-jonathan-freedland">“I agree with Nick”</a>’, but the theme of this leader debate was very much “I agree with Nicola”. Afterwards, Sturgeon continued this solidarity, <a href="https://twitter.com/NicolaSturgeon/status/583745747499253761">tweeting her support</a> for her “friend” Leanne Wood. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/blog/live/2015/apr/02/leaders-debate-cameron-and-miliband-go-head-to-head-with-other-parties-live#block-551db556e4b0b3f858ca67f1">average of the three post-debate polls</a> showed the benefits of this strategy. Bennett and Wood received very modest support, with just 4% and 3% rating them as the winner, while Sturgeon forged ahead with 22%. Combined, their 29% is far above that of either Cameron or Miliband.</p>
<h2>Old guard on the back foot</h2>
<p>Cameron looked very confident in his second appearance on a live pre-election show, but he didn’t really engage with the three women. And he didn’t need to. His eyes were on Miliband.</p>
<p>The Labour leader has <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/ed-miliband/11475189/Ed-Miliband-rules-out-formal-coalition-with-SNP.html">already ruled out a coalition</a> with the SNP and seemed to be trying to sweep the issue under the carpet. He directed most of his attacks at Cameron, preventing Sturgeon and her colleagues from grabbing any more of the limelight than they already had.</p>
<p>The SNP leader seemed content with this – and it fit nicely with her tactic of emphasising that she disagrees with all of the three main parties. Once again, she was backed up by Wood and Bennett who were also at pains to emphasise that they were very different to the traditional political parties. </p>
<p>By far the worst performance of the night came from Nigel Farage. The UKIP leader was predicted to do well – and he didn’t fare too badly in the post debate polls. But his strategy was poor. The tunnel vision approach of concentrating solely on Europe was too predictable. At one point Sturgeon even quipped that there was simply nothing he wouldn’t blame on immigrants. His monomania may help retain the UKIP vote, but it certainly won’t increase it.</p>
<p>All in all, Farage was very effectively cut out by Sturgeon, Bennett and Wood. The three now seem to be playing the opposition game a lot more effectively than he can.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39727/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
It nearly didn’t happen, but for the first time ever, the British public has heard from seven party leaders in one TV debate. And for the first time ever, Natalie Bennett, Nigel Farage, Nicola Sturgeon…Louise Thompson, Lecturer in British Politics, University of SurreyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/397122015-04-02T15:47:19Z2015-04-02T15:47:19ZHow to spot the bullshit in the TV leadership debates<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76916/original/image-20150402-9328-1hqxdju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Which one wants to cut taxes again?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">confused from www.shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>As we battle on through the TV election debates, some are already rolling their eyes. Many have stopped following the news altogether for fear of seeing more coverage. Why do we loathe the election so deeply? The answer, I believe, can be captured in one word: bullshit. </p>
<p>The number one feature that most citizens hate about election campaigns is the vast quantities of bullshit they generate. The politician spin machine goes into over-drive and starts to mass produce vast quantities of linguistic detritus.</p>
<p>Terms like “hard working taxpayers”, “long-term economic plan” and the “squeezed middle” are carefully constructed but tend to show only the vaguest connection to reality.</p>
<p>Bullshit, it has been <a href="http://www.stoa.org.uk/topics/bullshit/pdf/on-bullshit.pdf">argued</a>, is essentially a lack of concern with the truth – an indifference to how things really are. A long-term economic plan might sound desirable, for example, but it’s not exactly clear how such a plan would fare in an an unpredictable global economy. </p>
<p>So how do we know we are faced with bullshit? Recently I have been reading the small, but rapidly growing <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=A4CBZu_5rKoC&oi=fnd&pg=PA1&dq=deeper+into+bullshit+cohen&ots=blb_HwPuLs&sig=F8esEg-OzOAL5uWmWR8oY7jfwYY#v=onepage&q=deeper%20into%20bullshit%20cohen&f=false">literature</a> on the topic for a book which I am writing on bullshit in organisations. It provides some handy tips for anyone watching the leadership debates in the run up to this election. Here are some questions you can ask if you think you might be being sold bullshit.</p>
<h2>What is the evidence?</h2>
<p>If a voter wants to work out whether they are dealing with bullshit, they can start by asking what the evidence is to back up a claim. Bullshitters trade in empty claims. Their statements rely on abstract terms with no clear connection to facts. Look out for mentions of values, beliefs or ambitions. These words could mean almost anything and they’re difficult to pin down. </p>
<p>Most politicians are well prepared though. They’ll have some anecdote or maybe even a statistic ready to defend their point. If this happens, the voter needs to start asking exactly how trustworthy their evidence is. Is it rigorous study based on a large data-set? Was it undertaken by independent researchers? Or was it produced by a biased think tank and based on answers from a small number of people?</p>
<h2>Where is the logic?</h2>
<p>Clearly there are some statements – such as future plans – that can’t be backed up by facts alone. In these cases, we have to look at the logic of the argument. Often bullshit involves a lack of clear logic between connecting parts of a statement. There might be some appealing buzzwords, but we don’t get a sense of how all these buzzwords fit together.</p>
<p>We can ask some elementary questions to help us decide. Is there a clear and sensible connection between the various parts of a statement? Do the detailed practical recommendations logically follow from the broader claims? Does the statement align with the broader principles of a politician or a party? If, for example, a politician starts talking about funding public services but at the same time their party is committed to large scale tax cuts, you might start detecting bullshit. </p>
<h2>Who benefits?</h2>
<p>One of the most troubling features of bullshit is the maligned intention lurking behind it. Instead of trying one’s best to describe the truth of a situation, a bullshitter wants to impress and convince. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76924/original/image-20150402-9345-lhlwp7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76924/original/image-20150402-9345-lhlwp7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76924/original/image-20150402-9345-lhlwp7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76924/original/image-20150402-9345-lhlwp7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76924/original/image-20150402-9345-lhlwp7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76924/original/image-20150402-9345-lhlwp7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76924/original/image-20150402-9345-lhlwp7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">What about voters who are looking for a worse plan, Ed?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Chris Radburn/PA</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>To identify the interests behind a statement, the voter needs to ask the basic question made famous by Cicero: <em>cui bono?</em> – who benefits? If we were to accept the argument, who would be better off and who would be worse off? We might also ask what kind of impression the person is trying to create with an argument.</p>
<p>What kind of image are they presenting and why? We might also ask what an argument diverts our attention from. For instance, focusing on additional funding for one type of service might divert our attention from much larger cuts to other services.</p>
<h2>What does it actually mean?</h2>
<p>A statement or word can be called bullshit if it is impossible to define. Politicians love such terms became they don’t have to pin them down. They can also be turned to almost any purpose. Citizens, on the other-hand loathe them, precisely because they are confusing and ambiguous.</p>
<p>Clarifying what a statement means involves asking whether we can put it into our own words without changing its meaning or checking if the same word means the same thing to someone else. When you hear a politician talking about “British values” in the debates, ask the person next to you what that means. If you come up with a different answer, you may be on the receiving end of some bullshit.</p>
<p>Some claims fit all four bullshit criteria. They lack evidence and logic, are driven by maligned intentions and are difficult to clarify. The technical term for such claims is “pure bullshit”. This particularly refined form of bullshit is often fairly easy to spot and easily dismissed. </p>
<p>It is the bullshit that only fits into one or two criteria that is hardest to process. It might be backed up by some evidence but little logic. It might be uttered with the best intentions but be impossible to define. This is the type that you are most likely to encounter when watching a political debate. Good luck spotting it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39712/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andre Spicer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Your essential guide to sorting the policy from the platitudes.Andre Spicer, Professor of Organisational Behaviour, Cass Business School, City, University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/394492015-03-27T16:44:01Z2015-03-27T16:44:01ZForget Miliband v Cameron, the debates could be more important for small parties<p>Britain’s election is off to a flying start. On the first night of the official campaign, the opening televised “debate” saw prime minister David Cameron and opposition leader Ed Miliband facing a monstering from veteran political interviewer Jeremy Paxman, and rather less aggressive questioning from an invited studio audience. </p>
<p>The broadcast was watched by around <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-32064712">2.6m viewers</a> – lower than the 9m who watched Britain’s first televised leaders’ debate in 2010. Inevitably, the focus during and after the broadcast, was on “who won?” But establishing that is surprisingly hard.</p>
<p>For a start, it depends who you ask. Immediately after the debate, BBC Newsnight journalist Allegra Stratton, speaking from the “spin room”, called the contest for Miliband, based largely on her reading of the candidates’ performances and the body language of their debate teams as they returned from the studio. </p>
<p>While she was on air, results were released from a <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2015/mar/26/election-2015-david-cameron-ed-miliband-jeremy-paxman-live-updates#block-55148dfde4b0cbe13ce31ff7">Guardian/ICM poll</a> of 1,123 viewers, which claimed they saw Cameron as the winner, by a margin of 54% to 46%. Although good news for the PM, it was hardy evidence of a knockout – and could even by spun as surprisingly good news for Miliband: given how low pre-debate opinion of him was, getting so close on the night could be presented as a considerable achievement.</p>
<p>But that wasn’t the end of the matter. Another poll conducted in the immediate aftermath of the debate by YouGov for the Times produced an <a href="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/redbox/topic/yougov-polling-for-red-box/a-virtual-dead-heat">effective dead heat</a> (51% calling a Cameron win to 49% for Miliband). </p>
<p>Meanwhile, analyses of trending comments on new social media during the debate suggested that, among those commenting on Twitter and Facebook, the advantage lay with Miliband. One study, <a href="https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/demosdebate/index.html?file=debatedata.csv">conducted by Ipsos MORI</a>, looked at the relative balance of positive and negative tweets about each leader during the debate. Of 29,598 tweets mentioning Cameron, 35% were positive but 65% were negative. For Miliband the picture was reversed: 10,755 tweets during the debate mentioned him, and his positive/negative ratio was 62:38.</p>
<p>Confused? Don’t be. Two things are worth bearing in mind: advance preparation makes a clear-cut result less likely; and to a considerable extent, viewers call the debate based on their pre-existing prejudices. While the debates are not inconsequential, they are not necessarily the game-changers which news organisations might suggest.</p>
<h2>Great expectations</h2>
<p>In some ways, we should not be too surprised that perceptions of the debate outcome placed the two leaders so close. Both Cameron and Miliband had been preparing extensively for the ordeal ahead. Though car-crash performances can never be ruled out, the parties and their leaders are leaving as little as possible to chance. And in the opening debate, both protagonists kept their respective cars on the road without major mishap.</p>
<p>But party leaders enter these events with a weight of expectation already on their shoulders. Many viewers have already made up their minds about them and are more likely to pick up on features of their debate performances which confirm those pre-existing views rather than on features which challenge them. </p>
<p>In 2010, the first-ever round of televised leaders’ debates during a British election saw just this phenomenon. The British Election Study (the leading academic survey of British voters) <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17457289.2011.562609#abstract">asked respondents to its internet campaign panel</a> whether they had watched that year’s debates and (if they had) who they thought had “won”.</p>
<p>Two-thirds claimed to have seen at least one debate. Of this group, only 17% thought Labour prime minister Gordon Brown had come across best overall in the debates, and 61% thought he had performed worst; 31% thought David Cameron (then the leader of the opposition) had won, while 34% thought him the loser. But the stand-out winner was Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats, rated the winner by 52% of those BES respondents who watched a debate (only 4% rated him the overall loser). </p>
<p>So far, so conventional. The clear narrative of the 2010 campaign was that Clegg won the debates. But a more interesting question is who thought well or badly of each leader’s performance. The BES is useful here because it was a panel survey, interviewing the same people before, during, and after the campaign. Before the campaign (and therefore before any of the leader broadcasts had taken place), respondents were asked how they intended to vote (and, for those with a view, whether they were definite or just leaning more to one party than to any other).</p>
<p>As the diagram below shows, each leader’s debate performance was rated much more favourably by people who were already leaning towards his party than by people who were not. For instance, while Gordon Brown’s ratings were uniformly dire among those who were already thinking of voting Conservative or Liberal Democrat, he was much more likely to be rated the debate winner by those who were already thinking of voting Labour (48% of those who said before the campaign that they were definite Labour voters and who had seen a debate thought Brown was the winner). The picture is similar for David Cameron: those who were already thinking of voting for the Conservatives were very likely to rate him the winner, while very few indeed of those intending voting for the other parties did so. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76288/original/image-20150327-16105-jix39o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76288/original/image-20150327-16105-jix39o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76288/original/image-20150327-16105-jix39o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76288/original/image-20150327-16105-jix39o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76288/original/image-20150327-16105-jix39o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76288/original/image-20150327-16105-jix39o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76288/original/image-20150327-16105-jix39o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76288/original/image-20150327-16105-jix39o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>There’s an important lesson here. How viewers see the debates is heavily coloured by their prior partisanship. We tend to see what we want to see.</p>
<p>But another key lesson emerges from the 2010 experience. Nick Clegg really did do well in the debates. Unlike his two rivals, he picked up substantial plaudits not only from those intending voting for his own party, the Liberal Democrats, but also from those intending voting for the other parties. Among those who initially thought they would definitely vote Labour, for instance, he ran neck-and-neck with Brown in perceptions of who won the debate. </p>
<p>Why? In large part, this was a function of visibility. Going into the 2010 campaign, Brown and Cameron had already been subject to extensive media exposure and public comment. But Clegg was much less of a known quantity for most voters. While they had largely already made up their minds about the first two, the debates were the moment when they first encountered Clegg – and they liked what they saw.</p>
<h2>Novelty factor</h2>
<p>There is a subtler lesson from 2010 too. Three debates took place on consecutive weeks during that campaign. As the following graph of opinion poll trends during the 2010 campaign shows, so-called “Cleggmania” peaked immediately after the first debate, when he did most to introduce himself to most voters: his poll ratings, and his party’s, surged, while both the Conservatives and Labour fell.</p>
<p>But in later debates, the novelty of a new and congenial figure on the stage wore off, and the other leaders did more to counter his charms. Support for the Liberal Democrats fell back somewhat (though remaining above pre-debate levels), while Conservative support rallied and Labour’s position stabilised.</p>
<p>By the election itself, the Liberal Democrats were only slightly ahead of where they might have been expected to be, given trends before the debates – while Labour was only slightly behind (the Conservatives came out of the process in more or less the same position as they went in). While the debates galvanised interest in the campaign, therefore, whether they had any real effect on the outcome is moot.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76289/original/image-20150327-16130-3uut1b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/76289/original/image-20150327-16130-3uut1b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76289/original/image-20150327-16130-3uut1b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76289/original/image-20150327-16130-3uut1b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76289/original/image-20150327-16130-3uut1b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76289/original/image-20150327-16130-3uut1b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/76289/original/image-20150327-16130-3uut1b.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>Roll the picture forward to 2015. This year, too, voters’ already strong views of the major parties mean that (barring major gaffes) their leaders will have to work hard in the debates to change their parties’ fortunes substantially. The big change since 2010 is that this now includes Clegg. </p>
<p>All three leaders are now debating, not just against each other, but against the public’s heavily entrenched views of them. While that does not rule out dramatic reversals of fortune, it does make them much less likely.</p>
<p>But, in the coming debates, attention will turn not just to the major party leaders, but also to the leaders of the Scottish and Welsh nationalist parties (major figures in their own regions, of course) and of UKIP and the Greens. If the experience of the 2010 debates is anything to go by, that’s where to look for debate-induced drama. If the televised debates are to make or break any careers in 2015, watch the dark horses.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39449/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charles Pattie does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There’s not much to be gained for major party leaders, but small parties have all to play for.Charles Pattie, Professor of Electoral Geography, University of SheffieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/394392015-03-27T14:22:44Z2015-03-27T14:22:44ZDebate success for Miliband? Yes, but not quite hell yes<p>Given that his personal ratings have been so low, and behind those of the Labour party in general, the only way was up for Ed Miliband in his first major TV appearance of the election campaign.</p>
<p>The Conservatives were reluctant to have Miliband in a direct debate with David Cameron because it might boost his credibility as a prime ministerial candidate, so Miliband found himself questioned alone by Jeremy Paxman and a studio audience on Sky and Channel 4. This came directly after Cameron had run the same gauntlet.</p>
<p>As it turned out, Miliband is generally agreed to have exceeded expectations. Admittedly, the YouGov opinion poll issued immediately after the broadcast had Cameron ahead by 51% to 49% and ICM put the margin at 54% to 46%. But given the gap between them in personal ratings and the fact that David Cameron has the authority of a prime minister, Labour can be relatively encouraged by these results.</p>
<p>On social media, David Cameron does not seem to have done as well as would be expected of a prime minister. Miliband came away with a <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-trending-32071377">higher proportion of tweets</a> rating his performance positively.</p>
<p>Miliband’s set out a vision of a fairer and more equal Britain with some passion – and that was his biggest strength in this appearance. He made it clear that he wants to move on from the New Labour view of inequality – which was, for him, too relaxed. He wants to get tough on poverty rather than just leaving the rich to get wealthier, like New Labour.</p>
<p>He also turned the tables on Jeremy Paxman, winning studio applause when he warned the abrasive interviewer not to make assumptions about the election result so early in the campaign, telling him: “you are important, but not that important”.</p>
<p>He was on less strong ground when Paxman pressed him on whether he thought there was a natural limit on migration into the UK. <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/general-election-2015/11388347/As-the-general-election-draws-closer-Blue-Labour-has-a-non-Miliband-manifesto-waiting-in-the-wings.html">Blue Labour</a> supporters and those in the north of England are concerned that Labour is vulnerable to UKIP on this issue. A focus group organised by YouGov for <a href="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politics/article4394515.ece">The Times</a> thought that Cameron was more convincing when talking about immigration.</p>
<p>Miliband acknowledged that New Labour had taken too light a touch on banking regulation, but argued that the size of the debt when they left office was due to the global financial crisis rather than mismanagement. He also conceded that the Millennium Dome was not a good use of public money.</p>
<p>But he failed to address something important that his party has never dealt with. This is the charge that by expanding spending after 2001 they eroded what was a projected budget surplus that could be set aside for a rainy day. </p>
<p>Asked by Paxman whether he was a North London geek, he replied “who cares?” The trouble is that some voters might. Given a list of ten positive and negative attributes about each party leader, a <a href="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politics/article4392397.ece">YouGov survey</a> saw respondents select out of his depth, weak and weird in relation to Miliband.</p>
<p>More television successes might help to counteract this impression. His “Hell yes, I’m tough enough” response to Paxman’s questions about his fitness for the job of prime minister has already been picked up in the media as a central message from the programme.</p>
<p>One should never exaggerate the effect that these television discussions have. Nick Clegg came away from the 2010 debate with glowing reviews but was not able to translate his success into seats and votes.</p>
<p>Miliband’s relative success in this first appearance may boost the morale of Labour activists and that, in turn, would help in the all-important <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-planning-for-ground-war-for-2015-election-while-admitting-tories-could-outspend-them-3-to-1-9955402.html">ground war</a>. Whether it will move the polls away from a virtual dead heat remains to be seen, but I doubt it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/39439/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Given that his personal ratings have been so low, and behind those of the Labour party in general, the only way was up for Ed Miliband in his first major TV appearance of the election campaign. The Conservatives…Wyn Grant, Professor of politics, University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.