tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/political-debate-7851/articlesPolitical debate – The Conversation2023-08-23T19:09:52Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2105252023-08-23T19:09:52Z2023-08-23T19:09:52ZWhat would Aristotle think about the current state of politics?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543825/original/file-20230821-19874-gmn9pf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3840%2C2160&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Aristotle is considered the founder of political science. He probably wouldn't be surprised at the state of political discourse in modern times. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/what-would-aristotle-think-about-the-current-state-of-politics" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>In recent years, <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-hatred-and-othering-of-political-foes-has-spiked-to-extreme-levels/">political debate has degenerated into ever more aggressive partisan mudslinging and character assassination</a>, with no room for a reasoned and non-rancorous discussion of competing alternatives in assessing the policy issues of the day. </p>
<p>This trend is only likely to intensify as we enter a presidential election season in the United States in the months to come. </p>
<p>As the author of a book about philosophers, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108333856"><em>Tyranny and Revolution: Rousseau to Heidegger</em></a>, it seemed like a good time to see what the founder of political science — Aristotle — had to say about how civic deliberation should unfold.</p>
<h2>Political animals</h2>
<p>Aristotle famously wrote that <a href="https://doi.org/10.5406/janimalethics.6.1.0054">“man is by nature a political animal.”</a> </p>
<p>That means as human beings, we fulfil our purpose through engaging in a civic dialogue with fellow citizens regarding the meaning of justice. Those conversations are meant to be guided by reason. </p>
<p>But for Aristotle, this definition was a high-water mark for political debate, rarely if ever achieved. Most of the time, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198868385.003.0006">Aristotle argued, public debate about justice, equality and who should have political authority is fractious</a> — and even leads to the breakdown of all debate in insurrection and civil war.</p>
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<p>Aristotle believed that the biggest and most widespread source of political tension is the struggle between the haves and the have-nots. It’s the universal cause of unrest because, while one can be good at math as well as good at cooking, or a talented painter and a talented lawyer, a better doctor than a chess player or a worse violinist than a teacher, there are two things that nobody can be at the same time: rich and poor.</p>
<p>That’s why the haves and have-nots are at loggerheads. Society must address that potential source of conflict before it can aim for a higher politics dedicated to promoting virtue, reason and the good life.</p>
<h2>Democrat/oligarch showdowns</h2>
<p>This is where Aristotle was at his most revealing about how political debate should take place. He focuses on the two most antagonistic factions, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198868385.003.0006">the democrats versus the oligarchs.</a> </p>
<p>The democrats claim that because they are all equal, everyone is equal in every respect. The oligarchs reply that because they have demonstrated their superior virtue by acquiring more property than the democrats, they are superior to them in every way. </p>
<p>But for Aristotle, the state must assess the respects in which people are equal and the respects in which they are unequal, and determine on that basis who should have political authority.</p>
<p>Everyone is fundamentally equal, but society recognizes differing contributions and rewards them with recognition and often with wealth. Society has an obligation to protect everyone’s basic rights and to establish a level playing field, whereby people can compete to get ahead in life unhindered by a disadvantaged background, poverty or a lack of connections. </p>
<p>That is a responsibility of the state, because for Aristotle, virtue was meritocratic and not the result of an accident of privileged birth.</p>
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<img alt="A stone statue with a body of water behind it." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543831/original/file-20230821-15-8qnuy3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/543831/original/file-20230821-15-8qnuy3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543831/original/file-20230821-15-8qnuy3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543831/original/file-20230821-15-8qnuy3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543831/original/file-20230821-15-8qnuy3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543831/original/file-20230821-15-8qnuy3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/543831/original/file-20230821-15-8qnuy3.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">
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<span class="caption">Aristotle didn’t believe in pure idealism or materialism.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
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<h2>Idealism versus realism</h2>
<p>This brings us to Aristotle’s key point about how public debate should unfold. </p>
<p>Each participant, he observed, argues for a certain idea of a just political system while at the same time seeking to advance their own self-interest. </p>
<p>But the argument they make regarding justice isn’t just an ideological camouflage for their self-interest, as we might regard it today. As Aristotle puts it, each party “fastens on” a degree of truth regarding the different possibilities for devising a just society, while at the same time the element of truth in their position is combined with their desire for a bigger piece of the pie. </p>
<p>In other words, in Aristotle’s view there is no such thing in political life as a <a href="https://www.tekedia.com/sociological-imagination-between-idealism-and-realism/">pure idealist or a pure materialist</a>. Idealism and realism cannot be disentangled from one another.</p>
<p>Prudent participants in civic dialogue should be aware of that combination of realism and idealism in others and in themselves, Aristotle argued. That awareness should moderate their expectations for the degree to which perfect justice could or even should come to pass.</p>
<h2>Hobbes, Kant</h2>
<p>Aristotle’s understanding of public debate seems a blend of England’s <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hobbes/">Thomas Hobbes</a> — who argued that without government, life would be “nasty, brutish and short” — and Germany’s <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Immanuel-Kant">Immanuel Kant</a>, who believed that without freedom, moral appraisal and responsibility would be impossible. </p>
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<p>It resists the reduction of prudent civic dialogue to either a grasping materialism that has no concern for a just society or an ideal of justice so pure that it demands citizens put aside any interest in their material well-being. Both extremes are likely to engender hostility and strife. </p>
<p>Perhaps the worst political leadership would be someone who combined a degree of <a href="https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/12/how-bad-are-billionaire-politicians-for-democracy.html">inherited wealth that made them unable to appreciate the everyday economic difficulties</a> most people face with ideological extremism. In short, it would be a leader with the danger of pure idealism combined with great privilege.</p>
<h2>Constants remain</h2>
<p>Circumstances are of course very different today than in Aristotle’s time. </p>
<p>But some constants remain, especially the potential for violent disagreement between the haves and have-nots. </p>
<p>Like any other theoretical rule of thumb, Aristotle’s advice about political debate cannot guide us to specific answers or solutions to the concrete policy issues of the day. </p>
<p>But it can remind us that political debate should be peaceful, that we should respect the convictions of others as we would like them to respect our own and that we should be realistic enough to understand that self-interest will always be a factor in what the public expects from justice.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210525/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Waller R. Newell 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>Aristotle believed that the biggest and most widespread source of political tension is the struggle between the haves and the have-nots. More than 2,000 years later, he’s got a point.Waller R. Newell, Professor of Political Science and Philosophy, Carleton UniversityLicensed 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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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319971/original/file-20200311-116245-16skoc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319971/original/file-20200311-116245-16skoc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319971/original/file-20200311-116245-16skoc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319971/original/file-20200311-116245-16skoc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319971/original/file-20200311-116245-16skoc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319971/original/file-20200311-116245-16skoc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319971/original/file-20200311-116245-16skoc9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/319971/original/file-20200311-116245-16skoc9.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>
<figcaption>
<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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</figure>
<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/1309842020-02-27T14:02:50Z2020-02-27T14:02:50Z4 science-based strategies to tame angry political debate and encourage tolerance<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315531/original/file-20200214-11000-zm7uyy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4688%2C3100&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The vast majority of Americans are sick and tired of being so divided.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/concept-debate-political-argument-symbol-two-463236158">Lightspring/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>“Climate change is a hoax,” my cousin said during a family birthday party. “I saw on Twitter it’s just a way to get people to buy expensive electric cars.” I sighed while thinking, “How can he be so misinformed?” Indeed, what I wanted to say was, “Good grief, social media lies are all you read.” </p>
<p>No doubt my cousin thought the same of me, when I said Republican senators are too afraid of the president to do what’s right. Not wanting to create a scene, we let each other’s statements slide by in icy silence. </p>
<p>As a psychology professor and clinical psychologist in private practice, I know my relationship with my cousin would have improved if we could have discussed those issues in a nonthreatening way. If only.</p>
<p>I’m not alone in my frustration – and my desire for change. A December 2019 poll conducted by Public Agenda/USA TODAY/Ipsos showed <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/hiddencommonground/2019/12/05/hidden-common-ground-americans-divided-politics-seek-civility/4282301002/">more than nine out of 10 Americans</a> said it’s time to reduce divisiveness, which they believe is exacerbated by government leaders and social media. People want to stop the animosity and relate to one another again. But how?</p>
<p>Based on my knowledge of psychological research, here are four approaches you can use to overcome divisiveness.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315533/original/file-20200214-10991-18fz2ev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315533/original/file-20200214-10991-18fz2ev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315533/original/file-20200214-10991-18fz2ev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315533/original/file-20200214-10991-18fz2ev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315533/original/file-20200214-10991-18fz2ev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315533/original/file-20200214-10991-18fz2ev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315533/original/file-20200214-10991-18fz2ev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315533/original/file-20200214-10991-18fz2ev.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>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Don’t isolate yourself from people with different points of view.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/group-diverse-people-planting-tree-together-604302530">Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>1. Connect</h2>
<p>Avoiding interactions with people who have different opinions <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/poq/nfw001">perpetuates divisiveness</a>. Risk connecting with these people. Relate through activities you enjoy such as volunteering, joining a “<a href="https://meetup.com">Meetup</a>” group or starting a book club. You could even invite people from various backgrounds to a potluck dinner at your home. </p>
<p>What activities like these share is a common goal, which creates a cooperative atmosphere instead of a competitive one. Research demonstrates that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/002200276200600108">contact alone does not ensure cooperative interaction</a>. To truly connect, you both have to demonstrate respect while working on a common goal.</p>
<h2>2. Find common ground</h2>
<p>It’s important to remember the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/0030-5073(76)90020-9">basic need to feel secure</a> is shared by all people. Focusing on commonalities can lead to a deeper understanding of another person, while focusing on differences will lead to arguments. </p>
<p>An argument involves two people asserting one is right while the other is wrong. But what gets lost in this scenario is the common ground of the problem they both are trying to wrestle with. </p>
<p>Restate the problem. Together, brainstorm all the different ways it might be solved. </p>
<p>For example, a person might say the only way to protect America from terrorism is to sharply limit immigration. Instead of challenging that immigration must be limited, you can restate the problem – then ask if there might be ways to deal with terrorism besides limiting immigration. You might find some solutions you agree upon. </p>
<h2>3. Communicate</h2>
<p>Listen more and talk less. Show the other person you have understood what they said before jumping in with your thoughts. </p>
<p>Everyone wants to be acknowledged as heard. If they are not, they will continue to press their point. So, to stop an argument in its tracks, start listening and reflect back what you’ve heard.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315536/original/file-20200214-10991-1eq4ksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315536/original/file-20200214-10991-1eq4ksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315536/original/file-20200214-10991-1eq4ksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315536/original/file-20200214-10991-1eq4ksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315536/original/file-20200214-10991-1eq4ksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315536/original/file-20200214-10991-1eq4ksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315536/original/file-20200214-10991-1eq4ksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315536/original/file-20200214-10991-1eq4ksd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">It’s tempting to tune out, but don’t.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/two-young-guys-friends-beards-arguing-1299444667">Fran jetzt/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>You’ve probably experienced listening for only what you want to hear – and possibly found yourself not listening at all. You may just be waiting to give a knee-jerk reaction to what the other person is saying. </p>
<p>To listen well, you need to first open your ears, eyes and heart. Examine your biases so you can hear without judgment. Suspend your self-interest and stay with what the other person is saying. Then tell that person what you heard.</p>
<p>Showing <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037%2Fa0036738">empathy does not mean you necessarily agree</a> with what the other person is saying. It just means you’re reassuring the other person you have listened before making your own statement. </p>
<p>Now, it’s time for you to share where you’re coming from. Take a deep breath. Cool down and reassess your thoughts so you can give a considered response, instead of a quick reaction. You can disagree without being disrespectful.</p>
<p>Communication using the above process leads to a conversation instead of an argument and builds a more <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01449290310001659240">trusting relationship</a>. It takes only one of you to create an empathetic conversation, as <a href="https://booklocker.com/books/9605.html">empathy begets empathy</a>. The more compassionate understanding you give, the more you get.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315538/original/file-20200214-10995-2gnhs3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315538/original/file-20200214-10995-2gnhs3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315538/original/file-20200214-10995-2gnhs3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315538/original/file-20200214-10995-2gnhs3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315538/original/file-20200214-10995-2gnhs3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315538/original/file-20200214-10995-2gnhs3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315538/original/file-20200214-10995-2gnhs3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315538/original/file-20200214-10995-2gnhs3.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>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Be skeptical and recognize when you are being manipulated by divisive content.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/closeup-portrait-upset-sad-skeptical-unhappy-464427374">eakkaluktemwanich/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>4. Learn to critically evaluate media</h2>
<p>Don’t passively accept all that you see and hear. There are <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/research/how-to-combat-fake-news-and-disinformation/">too many sources</a> of distorted facts, unsupported opinions and outright lies available today. Critically evaluate what is being presented by considering the source and fact-checking the content.</p>
<p>Above all, if the message seems fake, don’t share it. Google has a <a href="https://toolbox.google.com/factcheck/explorer">fact-checking tool</a>, and <a href="https://firstdraftnews.org/training/">First Draft News</a> has tools to evaluate false content and the way it is disseminated. You can also consult <a href="https://fullfact.org">Full Fact</a> and <a href="https://guides.lib.jjay.cuny.edu/c.php?g=618074&p=4300850">CUNY’s fact-checking guide</a>. So, when you hear or see someone sharing fake information, don’t challenge it. Instead, show how to fact check the information.</p>
<p>Avoid anger and hate in the content you consume. Evaluate whether it is seeking to pit you against another person or group. Follow media that supports empathy, compassion and understanding. But don’t get lulled into a bubble by reading only content you agree with. Help children and teens, not only to critically evaluate media, but also to become kind and caring toward people who are different from them. Teach tolerance by showing tolerance. Yes, you are only one person trying to create change, but your influence does matter. </p>
<p>As for me, the next time I see my cousin, I plan to listen with empathy; let him know I understand his point of view; and try to identify a common goal around which we can share our perspectives.</p>
<p>[ <em>You’re smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation’s authors and editors.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=youresmart">You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/130984/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Beverly B. Palmer 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>A psychologist explains how to reestablish civil political conversation in your own life.Beverly B. Palmer, Professor Emerita of Psychology, California State University, Dominguez HillsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1305222020-02-05T18:24:47Z2020-02-05T18:24:47ZCivility in politics is harder than you think<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313794/original/file-20200205-149789-1s6gk1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=409%2C49%2C5054%2C3587&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tears up her copy of President Donald Trump's State of the Union speech.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/State-of-the-Union/3f5a733be936418587630790c1ceb3f3/23/0">AP Photo/Patrick Semansky</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tore up the text of President Donald Trump’s State of the Union speech in full public view, her supporters saw defiance of both his policies and his earlier refusal to shake her hand. But her <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/conservatives-blast-pelosi-tearing-copy-trump-s-state-union-address-n1130531">political opponents cried foul</a>, calling it “unbecoming” and “nasty.” This is yet another example of why U.S. citizens of all political stripes <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/07/18/americans-say-the-nations-political-debate-has-grown-more-toxic-and-heated-rhetoric-could-lead-to-violence/">agree that politics has become unacceptably uncivil</a>.</p>
<p>People say they want everyone to have cool heads and polite exchanges of views, even during important political debates. Some may even want a return to a kinder, gentler time when <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/20/us/politics/senate-dining-room-is-one-more-casualty-of-partisanship.html">Democrats and Republicans ate breakfast together</a> at the same table in the Senate cafeteria.</p>
<p>That’s not realistic, in my view. It is a good idea to stay calm when dealing with other people. But it may be that civility is too demanding, asking too much of passionate human nature. As I argue in my new book, “<a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/overdoing-democracy-9780190924195?cc=us&lang=en&">Overdoing Democracy</a>,” a better idea of civility involves not the total absence of hostility or escalation, but avoiding those extremes unless truly necessary.</p>
<p>The problem Pelosi encountered lies in differing views of when an impassioned act is considered appropriate and when it is an example of incivility. People are prone to see, and complain about, incivility in their political opponents, while being blind to, and silent about, the same flaws in themselves and those like them. And once they spot an opponent being uncivil, they free themselves to retaliate in kind.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313373/original/file-20200203-41490-1vunz7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313373/original/file-20200203-41490-1vunz7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313373/original/file-20200203-41490-1vunz7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=597&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313373/original/file-20200203-41490-1vunz7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=597&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313373/original/file-20200203-41490-1vunz7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=597&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313373/original/file-20200203-41490-1vunz7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313373/original/file-20200203-41490-1vunz7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313373/original/file-20200203-41490-1vunz7g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">U.S. Sen. Margaret Chase Smith, left, laughs and shakes hands with a supporter of Barry Goldwater, one of her Republican rivals for the presidential nomination, in 1964.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-Associated-Press-Domestic-News-New-Hamps-/9f3990d177e24972a609b306b851ea0f/45/0">AP Photo</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Passion is appropriate</h2>
<p>Political debates invoke differing ideas of justice and fair play, opportunity and oppression. When disagreeing about these things, people tend to see one another as not merely mistaken but actually in the wrong. Heat and fervor are to be expected when important matters are in dispute.</p>
<p>Indeed, a louder voice or sharper tone are sometimes necessary in order to communicate the urgency of the issue under discussion, and to grab the attention of those who might be inclined to overlook it. </p>
<p>It can even be appropriate to antagonize a person, especially if they are powerful and locked into their prejudice. For this reason, political satire and mockery are within civility’s bounds. But it’s always better to be restrained, since civil antagonism can quickly shift into, or at least be seen as, intimidation and harangue.</p>
<h2>Context matters</h2>
<p>Properly understood, civility is more a matter of a person’s internal mood than of their directly observable behavior. When judging someone to be uncivil, it’s not necessarily the person’s aggravated tone or excessive volume, but how appropriate it is for them to speak that way in the given moment.</p>
<p>So determining civility means judging a person’s character and motives. But when it comes to people who disagree with us, humans are remarkably poor judges. </p>
<p>A recent study shows that people generally regard those <a href="https://www.people-press.org/2019/10/10/partisan-antipathy-more-intense-more-personal/">with opposing political views</a> to be untrustworthy, close-minded, dishonest and unpatriotic. Unsurprisingly, people tend to blame their opponents – not themselves or their allies – for the incivility that has spread throughout politics.</p>
<p>Similarly, people’s assessment of political behavior <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-015-9313-9">sticks closely to partisan allegiances</a>. People tend to approve of what their side does, and disapprove of the actions of the other side. This is true even when both sides do the same thing. So if a political ally engages in potentially objectionable political behavior, like stealing the opposition’s campaign signs, people tend to be more forgiving than when an opponent does the same thing.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313793/original/file-20200205-149742-quynwl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313793/original/file-20200205-149742-quynwl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313793/original/file-20200205-149742-quynwl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313793/original/file-20200205-149742-quynwl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313793/original/file-20200205-149742-quynwl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313793/original/file-20200205-149742-quynwl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313793/original/file-20200205-149742-quynwl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313793/original/file-20200205-149742-quynwl.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>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lately, when senators eat together – like Democrat Claire McCaskill and Republican Jeff Flake did in 2018 – it’s more likely to be for political purposes like fighting political ‘pork’ than interpersonal connection.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/senatormccaskill/25009263767/in/photostream/">Sen. Claire McCaskill/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A vicious cycle</h2>
<p>Civility is a two-way street, an obligation between two people. It’s like the playground rule of keeping your hands to yourself, which still lets you defend yourself against an attack. Kids have to keep their hands to themselves, so long as others do the same.</p>
<p>So people tend to be overly sensitive to apparent incivility from opponents, and often feel free to respond with incivility themselves.</p>
<p>The result is tragic. People across the political spectrum agree that <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/07/18/americans-say-the-nations-political-debate-has-grown-more-toxic-and-heated-rhetoric-could-lead-to-violence/">incivility is poisonous</a>. However, rebuilding civility requires people to trust their political opponents and believe they are well-intentioned and willing to reciprocate. </p>
<p>Partisan divides have rendered many Americans nearly incapable of regarding their rivals in so positive a light. Civility might be practically impossible today. At the very least, it is more difficult than many people suppose, because of the human tendency to feel contempt, not compassion, for opponents.</p>
<p>[ <em>You’re too busy to read everything. We get it. That’s why we’ve got a weekly newsletter.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybusy">Sign up for good Sunday reading.</a> ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/130522/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert B. Talisse 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>It’s easy to perceive a political opponent as being uncivil – and that opens the door for an uncivil reply as well.Robert B. Talisse, W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy, Vanderbilt UniversityLicensed 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>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gbrcRKqLSRw?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<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>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vJ6MrDO0kgY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<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/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>
<figure>
<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/1219622019-08-16T12:53:35Z2019-08-16T12:53:35ZHow Democrats can win back workers in 2020<p>Labor unions and the workers they represent were once the <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/how-democratic-party-lost-its-soul/">heart and soul</a> of the Democratic Party. </p>
<p>The 2016 presidential election revealed just how much that has changed. Hillary Clinton <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/michigan-hillary-clinton-trump-232547">lost in key battleground states</a> like Michigan and Wisconsin in part <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/18/us/politics/2020-candidates-election-2016.html">because she took labor support for granted</a>. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://gcgj.mit.edu/new-paper-worker-voice-appear-ilr-review">survey</a> my team of labor scholars at MIT conducted about five months after the election showed that most workers feel they lack a voice at their jobs. Many Americans apparently felt that Donald Trump did a much better job than Clinton showing he was on their side and had a plan to help them. </p>
<p>As I watch the 2020 presidential debates, I wonder: Will Democrats make the same mistake? Or will they return to their roots and put the full range of workers’ needs and aspirations front and center in their campaigns?</p>
<h2>What workers want</h2>
<p><a href="http://inthesetimes.com/features/democrats-2020-candidates-labor-stances-union-endorsements.html">Some of the candidates</a> vying to be the 2020 nominee have offered plans to support organized labor, but they mainly endorse bills already in Congress to shore up collective bargaining rights. None have offered a clear vision and strategy for assuring workers have a voice in the key decisions that will shape the future of work. </p>
<p>This won’t be enough to give workers the stronger and broader voice at work they are calling for today. </p>
<p>In our 2017 survey, we learned two key things about what workers actually want.</p>
<p>First, a majority of workers reported they have less say and influence than they believe they ought to have on a broad array of workplace issues, ranging from compensation and job security to concerns about sexual harassment and how new technologies will affect their jobs and careers. </p>
<p>Thus, there is a significant “voice gap” on both traditional “bread and butter” issues as well as emerging ones that lie beyond the reach of traditional collective bargaining. Workers want these voice gaps filled.</p>
<p>Second, just under half of nonunion workers in America would join a union today if given the opportunity to do so, a level of interest that is at a <a href="https://gcgj.mit.edu/new-paper-worker-voice-appear-ilr-review">40-year high</a>. This translates into 58 million potential new union members that, if mobilized and supported, could restore the Democrats’ lost soul and keep them in power long enough to really do the things that would make the economy work for workers.</p>
<p>Instead, I’ve seen <a href="https://time.com/5639682/2020-democratic-debate-detroit/">throwaway lines at debates</a> merely signaling support for unions, which I don’t believe <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/labor-unions-take-their-time-in-choosing-2020-candidates-to-endorse-11558785600">will be enough</a> to win back the workers that voted for Trump. </p>
<h2>A 2020 worker platform</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/who-wants-to-join-a-union-a-growing-number-of-americans-102374">2017 survey</a> and <a href="https://iwer.mit.edu/research-resources/">our subsequent research</a> demonstrate that what workers really need is a <a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-how-workers-would-spend-the-corporate-tax-cut-if-they-had-a-voice-90604">new social compact</a> governing work that lifts their voices. </p>
<p>This desire is also clearly being expressed in the growing number of collective actions taking place across the country. For example, the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/23/politics/teacher-strikes-politics/index.html">teachers who have gone on strike</a> in at least half a dozen states did so not only for higher wages but to ensure their students were getting the financial support they needed. <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-googles-employees-walked-out-and-what-it-could-mean-for-the-future-of-labor-106305">Google workers</a> staged a walkout late last year to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/08/technology/google-arbitration-sexual-harassment.html">force their company</a> to change sexual misconduct policy. </p>
<p>A new compact will of course require reforming basic labor law by protecting freedom of association and providing workers access to collective bargaining and other forms of representation. Today it’s <a href="https://www.doi.org/10.1177/001979390806200101">almost impossible for workers</a> to join a union if management resists.</p>
<p>And it will require opening up labor law to more fundamental changes to give workers a seat on corporate boards and a voice in how new technologies will affect their jobs and providing new avenues for resolving harassment claims.</p>
<p>But more than that, workers need politicians to give them a strong and forward-looking platform that both restores collective bargaining and new ways to address broader workplace issues such as harassment policy and technological change. </p>
<p>Doing so might not only help Democrats reclaim the White House in 2020 but help the party regain its soul as well. </p>
<p>[ <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=signupinsight">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter to get insight each day</a></em> ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/121962/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Thomas Kochan 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>Hillary Clinton arguably lost in 2020 because she took workers for granted. Will Democrats make the same mistake again?Thomas Kochan, Professor of Management, Co-Director of the MIT Sloan Institute for Work and Employment Research, MIT Sloan School of ManagementLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1205052019-07-25T20:00:34Z2019-07-25T20:00:34ZTwitter isn’t just for political hashtag warriors. Many still use the social network to just hang out<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284936/original/file-20190719-116569-jkkf39.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=5%2C5%2C3599%2C2388&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Twitter and other social media platforms may not be lost entirely to the political partisans and propagandists.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>As a social media platform, Twitter does not have the most glowing reputation. If you just rely on what you hear about it, you might think Twitter is no more than a hotbed for raging politics and viral campaign hashtags. But is that all there is? </p>
<p>The news media’s intense focus on political strife is misleading. In our <a href="https://doi.org/10.2478/nor-2019-0011">new research</a>, we studied Twitter from a different angle, and found it has important social functions as well. </p>
<p>This matters. As calls for social media regulation grow, it’s critical we see Twitter and other platforms in all their facets to make sure any possible new legislation affecting the social media platform doesn’t cause collateral damage in other areas.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/twitter-is-right-to-have-special-rules-for-donald-trump-its-recognising-that-not-all-tweets-are-equal-120547">Twitter is right to have special rules for Donald Trump – it's recognising that not all tweets are equal</a>
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<hr>
<p>In <a href="https://doi.org/10.2478/nor-2019-0011">our study</a>, we developed the term “phatic sharing” to describe Twitter activity that serves such a social function. </p>
<p>It’s remarkable that the phatic practices from the early days of the platform still persist after more than a decade, and it should give us hope that Twitter and other social media platforms may not be lost entirely to the political partisans and propagandists.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1153099207856685056"}"></div></p>
<p>It’s a symptom of the biases in news coverage as well as in much scholarly research that such social practices on the platform are often overlooked, and that we focus instead mainly on high politics.</p>
<h2>Twitter in a day</h2>
<p>Rather than looking only for the hashtags and accounts we knew about already, <a href="https://doi.org/10.2478/nor-2019-0011">our research</a> took a snapshot of <em>all</em> Australian Twitter activity on an ordinary day in 2017, analysing 1.3 million tweets. </p>
<p>This helped us find user practices often overlooked by researchers and journalists, precisely because they don’t seek the limelight and don’t attach to visible hashtags and viral memes.</p>
<p>We found that hashtags like #auspol constitute a minority practice: more than three-quarters of all Australian tweets that day did not contain any hashtag. This means that any research that only focuses on hashtags like #auspol fails to capture the <a href="https://eprints.qut.edu.au/79308/">full range</a> of Twitter activity.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284458/original/file-20190717-147307-15lno8r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284458/original/file-20190717-147307-15lno8r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284458/original/file-20190717-147307-15lno8r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284458/original/file-20190717-147307-15lno8r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284458/original/file-20190717-147307-15lno8r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284458/original/file-20190717-147307-15lno8r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284458/original/file-20190717-147307-15lno8r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284458/original/file-20190717-147307-15lno8r.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Interaction network between Twitter accounts in the Australian Twittersphere, 22 March 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Axel Bruns & Brenda Moon / QUT Digital Media Research Centre</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The breadth of topics over the course of the day becomes clearer from a network visualisation of interaction patterns among Twitter users, shown above. </p>
<p>Yes, there’s a solid cluster of users talking about domestic and international politics. But similarly, there are many other groups in the network that stay well away from such topics and talk about what’s important to their own lives.</p>
<h2>Shooting the breeze</h2>
<p>Of the distinct groups of accounts we identified through our network analysis, the most numerous and most active over a day are the phatic sharers – a cluster of accounts using Twitter in a completely different way from the political hashtag warriors. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-urgent-need-for-media-literacy-in-an-age-of-annihilation-117958">The urgent need for media literacy in an age of annihilation</a>
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<p>There is no clear thematic focus to what these accounts do. Roughly half their tweets are retweets, contain URLs, or both, and a quarter are original tweets that neither @mention or retweet anyone else. Only about 5% of their tweets are hashtagged.</p>
<p>So, we interpret this group as using Twitter essentially as a place to hang out and shoot the breeze. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284935/original/file-20190719-116543-g5qyqo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/284935/original/file-20190719-116543-g5qyqo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284935/original/file-20190719-116543-g5qyqo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284935/original/file-20190719-116543-g5qyqo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284935/original/file-20190719-116543-g5qyqo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284935/original/file-20190719-116543-g5qyqo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/284935/original/file-20190719-116543-g5qyqo.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">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Donald Trump’s prolific tweeting has helped boost Twitter’s image as being full of political strife.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
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<p>They’re not interested in a wider reach for their tweets (otherwise they’d use hashtags). They mainly share personal updates and observations, or they retweet the things they encounter as they hang out on Twitter.</p>
<p>In other words, they’re using Twitter as it was <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/18/this-is-jack-dorseys-very-first-drawing-of-twitter-from-2005.html">originally intended</a>, not as what it has become in the years since the social media platform launched.</p>
<h2>Not just ‘pointless babble’</h2>
<p>Some might see such practices as a waste of time. A 2009 <a href="http://www.pearanalytics.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Twitter-Study-August-2009.pdf">report</a> on how people used Twitter at the time described similar activities as “pointless babble”. </p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-not-to-like-instagrams-trial-to-hide-the-number-of-likes-could-save-users-self-esteem-120596">What's not to like? Instagram's trial to hide the number of 'likes' could save users' self-esteem</a>
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<p>But to dismiss what we see here so glibly would be a mistake. For the users involved, phatic sharing can be important for personal expression and as a tool to maintain social ties.</p>
<p>This means they’re posting updates, sharing links, and retweeting other people’s posts not because they contain breaking news or engage with national and international events, but because this continuous communicative presence on the platform has a social – <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phatic_expression">phatic</a> – function. This is similar to the small talk we might engage in at work, with friends, or at social events.</p>
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<p>It doesn’t matter so much what’s said, but that it is said at all. In offline reality, speaking and interacting maintains our place in the social network, rather than becoming just a silent bystander. </p>
<p>The same, it seems, applies on Twitter. For phatic sharers, simply following the tweets of others is not enough.</p>
<p>And that is perhaps the central point here: as a practice, phatic sharing reclaims Twitter as a truly social network, rather than simply as a source of breaking news or a place for public debate between politicians, journalists, and activists. </p>
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<em>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/most-adults-have-never-heard-of-tiktok-thats-by-design-119815">Most adults have never heard of TikTok. That's by design</a>
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<p>So next time we’re offended by Donald Trump’s latest Twitter outbursts, or frustrated by the predictably partisan battles in domestic political tweeting, why not just unfollow those accounts and find some more interesting people to connect with? </p>
<p>You’ll need to look beyond the trending hashtags (and in fact, beyond hashtags altogether) to find them, though.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/120505/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>This research was supported by the Australian Research Council through the ARC Future Fellowship project Understanding Intermedia Information Flows in the Australian Online Public Sphere (FT130100703) and the ARC LIEF project TrISMA: Tracking Infrastructure for Social Media Analysis (LE140100148).</span></em></p>‘Phatic sharing’ reclaims Twitter as a truly social network, rather than simply as a source of breaking news or a place for public debate between politicians, journalists, and activists.Axel Bruns, Professor, Creative Industries, Queensland University of TechnologyBrenda Moon, Data Scientist, Queensland University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1064532019-01-31T19:13:18Z2019-01-31T19:13:18ZThe vomit principle, the dead bat, the freeze: how political spin doctors’ tactics aim to shape the news<p>It’s election season again and behind the scenes, the political “spin doctors” are working around the clock.</p>
<p>They are the campaign advisers, social media strategists, press secretaries and others who craft political messages to help “sell” their candidate. The term “spin” is contested, of course, and like the phrase “fake news” has become an easy retort for people who reject any version of events that does not reflect their own. </p>
<p>But the fact is any good spin doctor employs a range of overt and covert tactics to get their message across, and I’ve listed some below.</p>
<p>This list is <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1329878X16634870">drawn</a> <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1461670042000246089">from</a> a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0363811115301776">range</a> <a href="https://scribepublications.com.au/books-authors/books/sideshow">of</a> <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229676143_Spin_From_Tactic_to_Tabloid">academic</a> and other <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books/about/Public_Relations_Democracy.html?id=KQNBU4-svD4C&redir_esc=y">sources</a>, <a href="https://www.academia.edu/14805537/RE-ASSESSING_THE_PUBLIC_S_RIGHT_TO_KNOW_The_shift_from_journalism_to_political_PR">and</a> my own personal experience as a “spin doctor”. (I was once a media adviser to Labor’s Anna Bligh, a former Queensland premier. I am also married to one.) It is by no means exhaustive, but it provides an overview of some of the traditional tactics employed by political media advisers and politicians.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/its-reputation-that-matters-when-spin-doctors-go-back-to-the-newsroom-81088">It's reputation that matters when spin doctors go back to the newsroom</a>
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<h2>Overt and covert spin tactics</h2>
<p>British researcher Ivor Gaber <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/016344300022004008">talked</a> about “overt” and “covert” tactics used by press secretaries in the Blair government in the UK. </p>
<p>Overt refers to standard or benign public relations tactics, such as writing press releases, staging events, giving speeches and appearing in the media. </p>
<p>Covert, on the other hand, refers to a range of cynical techniques to manage information - these are the more malign tactics most people associate with “spin”.</p>
<p>The list below contains a wide range of “covert” tactics drawn from a range of research and personal experience. Each of these tactics is employed in a bid to exert control over the way the news media report the message:</p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>the leak:</strong> these are strategic leaks offered by politicians or their staff to journalists, in exchange for no scrutiny. In other words, you only get the leak if you promise not to seek comment from the opposing side, or other critics. This is <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1461670X.2015.1065196">increasing</a> and is a real problem</p></li>
<li><p><strong>the freeze:</strong> punishing journalists for negative reporting</p></li>
<li><p><strong>the spray:</strong> a form of bullying and intimidation, this is another way of punishing journalists for negative coverage. Many political reporters who file an unfavourable story can expect to “cop a spray” over the phone after it’s published</p></li>
<li><p><strong>the drip:</strong> the act of keeping favoured reporters on a drip of exclusive information</p></li>
<li><p><strong>staying on message</strong>: the goal of every public appearance or interview by a politician. In itself, it’s not a malign tactic, but the constant repetition of the same messages without answering questions can be a form of obfuscation</p></li>
<li><p><strong>pivoting:</strong> this refers to politicians shifting away from a difficult question or issue to the one he or she wants to talk about</p></li>
<li><p><strong>the vomit principle:</strong> this rule of thumb is widely referred to in political offices. The idea is that if you repeat something so often you feel like vomiting, only then is it likely to be cutting through with the public</p></li>
<li><p><strong>playing a dead bat</strong>: this refers to not responding to a media inquiry or giving a minimal response in an effort to kill the story</p></li>
<li><p><strong>the truth, but not the whole truth:</strong> this refers to being selective with what one reveals, sharing only the most beneficial or least damaging information</p></li>
<li><p><strong>throwing out the bodies/taking out the garbage:</strong> these tactics are used to disclose damaging information under the cover of a major distraction. The classic example often used is that of Jo Moore, a media adviser in the Blair government in the UK. On the day of the 9/11 attacks she <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1358985/Sept-11-a-good-day-to-bury-bad-news.html">sent out an email saying</a>: “It is now a very good day to get out anything we want to bury. Councillors expenses?” Other common days to bury bad news are Christmas Eve, New Year’s Eve, grand final day, Melbourne Cup day, or a distraction like a royal visit</p></li>
<li><p><strong>get rid of it now:</strong> the aim of this tactic is to release all of the damaging information on an issue at one time, so the negative story can be dealt with quickly rather than allowing it to bleed on for weeks in the media. One media adviser I interviewed explained it like this: “It’s a truism in politics - If you’ve got to eat a shit sandwich you’ve got to eat it straight away… The advice was always, ‘Get rid of it now. Go and deal with it now’.”</p></li>
<li><p><strong>fire-breaking:</strong> setting up or staging a diversion to distract attention away from another issue. In the film <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120885/">Wag the Dog</a>, the US president fabricates a war in Albania to distract from a sex scandal. Less extreme examples would be launching a new policy to distract from a negative issue in an attempt to shift the media’s attention</p></li>
<li><p><strong>kite-flying:</strong> this means testing or floating an idea before making a commitment to announce it</p></li>
<li><p><strong>feeding or starving a story:</strong> feeding a story means keeping it alive by commenting on it in the media. Starving a story means starving it of oxygen by not commenting on it. The theory being that after a while the media will get bored and move on</p></li>
<li><p><strong>keeping out of the media/being a small target:</strong> this is a useful tactic if the politician is unpopular and affects the polls, has a controversial portfolio or is an accident-prone poor performer</p></li>
<li><p><strong>flying under the radar:</strong> this refers to just quietly getting on with things without publicising it</p></li>
<li><p><strong>dishing dirt:</strong> this is where old claims suddenly emerge publicly before or during an election in an effort to smear someone’s reputation. The “dirt” can come from outside or inside a party. It’s a tactic used to try to destroy someone’s career</p></li>
<li><p><strong>dog-whistling:</strong> <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/opinion/why-politicians-love-to-play-the-wedgeandblockgame-20150901-gjca68.html">using specific subtle language</a> and messages to target a particular section of the audience</p></li>
<li><p><strong>wedging:</strong> this tactic involves raising an issue that is popular in the electorate and sensitive to the party you are opposing to “wedge” them in to a difficult position and sow division in the party. </p></li>
</ul>
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<p>To hear Caroline Fisher in conversation with Michelle Grattan in a special election spin-themed episode of our podcast <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/podcasts/trust-me-podcast">Trust Me, I’m An Expert</a>, click <a href="https://theconversation.com/trust-me-im-an-expert-how-to-spot-the-work-of-a-political-spin-doctor-this-election-season-106338">here</a> or search for it in your podcast app.</p>
<h2>New to podcasts?</h2>
<p>Podcasts are often best enjoyed using a podcast app. All iPhones come with the Apple Podcasts app already installed, or you may want to listen and subscribe on another app such as Pocket Casts (click <a href="https://pca.st/VTv7">here</a> to listen to Trust Me, I’m An Expert on Pocket Casts).</p>
<p>You can also hear us on Stitcher, Spotify or any of the apps below. Just pick a service from one of those listed below and click on the icon to find Trust Me, I’m An Expert.</p>
<p><a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/trust-me-im-an-expert/id1290047736?mt=2&ign-mpt=uo%3D8"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233721/original/file-20180827-75984-1gfuvlr.png" alt="Listen on Apple Podcasts" width="268" height="68"></a> <a href="https://www.google.com/podcasts?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly90aGVjb252ZXJzYXRpb24uY29tL2F1L3BvZGNhc3RzL3RydXN0LW1lLXBvZGNhc3QucnNz"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233720/original/file-20180827-75978-3mdxcf.png" alt="" width="268" height="68"></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/the-conversation/trust-me-im-an-expert"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233716/original/file-20180827-75981-pdp50i.png" alt="Stitcher" width="300" height="88"></a> <a href="https://tunein.com/podcasts/News--Politics-Podcasts/Trust-Me-Im-An-Expert-p1035757/"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233723/original/file-20180827-75984-f0y2gb.png" alt="Listen on TuneIn" width="318" height="125"></a></p>
<p><a href="https://radiopublic.com/trust-me-im-an-expert-Wa3E5A"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-152" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233717/original/file-20180827-75990-86y5tg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=268&fit=clip" alt="Listen on RadioPublic" width="268" height="87"></a> <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/7myc7drbLJVaRitAMXLB7V"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237984/original/file-20180925-149976-1ks72uy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=268&fit=clip" width="268" height="82"></a> </p>
<hr><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/106453/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Caroline Fisher is a former media adviser to Anna Bligh. Her husband, Matthew Franklin, is a media adviser to Labor MP Anthony Albanese. </span></em></p>Any good political spin doctor employs a range of overt and covert tactics to get their message across. Here are some of the most common ones.Caroline Fisher, Assistant Professor in Journalism, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1043772018-11-05T11:41:53Z2018-11-05T11:41:53ZEven a few bots can shift public opinion in big ways<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242368/original/file-20181025-71020-1unqn6t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Adding bots into an online discussion can definitely affect the views of real people.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/robots-hands-typing-on-keyboard-3d-706565200">Tatiana Shepeleva/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Nearly <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/1810.12398">two-thirds of the social media bots</a> with political activity on Twitter before the 2016 U.S. presidential election supported Donald Trump. But all those Trump bots were far less effective at shifting people’s opinions than the smaller proportion of bots backing Hillary Clinton. As my recent research shows, a <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/1810.12398">small number of highly active bots</a> can significantly change people’s political opinions. The main factor was not how many bots there were – but rather, how many tweets each set of bots issued.</p>
<p>My work focuses on <a href="http://mitmgmtfaculty.mit.edu/zlisto/">military and national security aspects</a> of social networks, so naturally I was intrigued by concerns that bots might affect the outcome of the upcoming 2018 midterm elections. I began investigating what exactly bots did in 2016. There was <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2017/01/18/russias-radical-new-strategy-for-information-warfare/">plenty</a> of <a href="http://time.com/4783932/inside-russia-social-media-war-america/">rhetoric</a> – but only one basic factual principle: If <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-russian-government-used-disinformation-and-cyber-warfare-in-2016-election-an-ethical-hacker-explains-99989">information warfare efforts</a> using bots had succeeded, then voters’ opinions would have shifted. </p>
<p><a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=SA6zXVIAAAAJ&hl=en">I</a> wanted to measure how much bots were – or weren’t – responsible for changes in humans’ political views. I had to find a way to identify social media bots and evaluate their activity. Then I needed to measure the opinions of social media users. Lastly, I had to find a way to estimate what those people’s opinions would have been if the bots had never existed.</p>
<h2>Finding tweeters and bots</h2>
<p>To narrow the research a bit, my students and I focused our analysis on the Twitter discussion around one event in the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-37684418">lead-up to the election</a>: the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/10/us/politics/transcript-second-debate.html">second debate between Clinton and Trump</a>. We collected 2.3 million tweets that contained keywords and hashtags related to the debate. </p>
<p>Then we made a list of the roughly 78,000 Twitter users who posted those tweets and constructed the network of who followed whom among those users. To identify the bots among them, we used an <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/1805.10244">algorithm based on our observation</a> that bots often retweeted humans but were not themselves frequently retweeted.</p>
<p>This method found 396 bots – or less than 1 percent of the active Twitter users. And just 10 percent of the accounts followed them. I felt good about that: It seemed unlikely that such a small number of relatively disconnected bots could have a major effect on people’s opinions.</p>
<h2>A closer look at the people</h2>
<p>Next we set out to measure the opinions of the people in our data set. We did this with a type of machine learning algorithm called a <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-computers-help-biologists-crack-lifes-secrets-48416">neural network</a>, which in this case we set up to evaluate the content of each tweet, determining the extent to which it supported Clinton or Trump. Individuals’ opinions were calculated as the average of their tweets’ opinions. </p>
<p>Once we had assigned each human Twitter user in our data a score representing how strong a Clinton or Trump backer they were, the challenge was to measure how much the bots shifted people’s opinions – which meant calculating what their opinions would have been if the bots hadn’t existed.</p>
<p>Fortunately, a model from <a href="http://doi.org/10.2307/2285509">as far back as the 1970s</a> had established a way to gauge people’s sentiments in a social network based on connections between them. In this network-based model, individuals’ opinions tend to align with the people connected to them. After slightly modifying the model to apply it to Twitter, we used it to calculate people’s opinions based on who followed whom on Twitter – rather than looking at their tweets. We found that the opinions we calculated from the network model matched well with opinions measured from the content of their tweets.</p>
<h2>Life without the bots</h2>
<p>So far we had shown that the follower network structure in Twitter could accurately predict people’s opinions. This now allowed to us to ask questions such as: What would their opinions have been if the network were different? The different network we were interested in was one that contained no bots. So for our last step, we removed the bots from the network and recalculated the network model, to see what real people’s opinions would have been without bots. Sure enough, bots had shifted human users’ opinions – but in a surprising way. </p>
<p>Given <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2017/04/03/522503844/how-russian-twitter-bots-pumped-out-fake-news-during-the-2016-election">much of the news reporting</a>, we were expecting the bots to help Trump – but they didn’t. In a network without bots, the average human user had a pro-Clinton score of 42 out of 100. With the bots, though, we had found the average human had a pro-Clinton score of 58. That shift was a far larger effect than we had anticipated, given how few and unconnected the bots were. The network structure had amplified the bots’ power.</p>
<p><iframe id="UJpPF" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/UJpPF/2/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>We wondered what had made the Clinton bots more effective than the Trump bots. Closer inspection showed that the 260 bots supporting Trump posted a combined 113,498 tweets, or 437 tweets per bot. However, the 150 bots supporting Clinton posted 96,298 tweets, or 708 tweets per bot. It appeared that the power of the Clinton bots came not from their numbers, but from how often they tweeted. We found that most of what the bots posted were retweets of the candidates or other influential individuals. So they were not really crafting original tweets, but sharing existing ones.</p>
<p>It’s worth noting that our analysis looked at a relatively small number of users, especially when compared to the voting population. And it was only during a relatively short period of time around a specific event in the campaign. Therefore, they don’t suggest anything about the <a href="http://time.com/5286013/twitter-bots-donald-trump-votes/">overall election results</a>. But they do show the potential effect bots can have on people’s opinions.</p>
<p>A small number of very active bots can actually significantly shift public opinion – and despite <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/07/06/twitter-is-sweeping-out-fake-accounts-like-never-before-putting-user-growth-risk/">social media companies’ efforts</a>, there are <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-do-so-many-people-fall-for-fake-profiles-online-102754">still large numbers of bots out there</a>, constantly tweeting and retweeting, trying to influence real people who vote. </p>
<p>It’s a reminder to be careful about what you read – and what you believe – on social media. We recommend double-checking that you are following people you know and trust – and keeping an eye on who is tweeting what on your favorite hashtags.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/104377/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tauhid Zaman is a registered Democrat.</span></em></p>Measuring Twitter bots’ effects on the opinions of real people can yield surprising results about what makes them influential.Tauhid Zaman, Associate Professor of Operations Management, MIT Sloan School of ManagementLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1017002018-09-07T10:56:26Z2018-09-07T10:56:26ZWhy do people talk politics online? Because they don’t care what you think<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/235366/original/file-20180907-90568-1hpbzh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Sharing their views, regardless.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock/Sfio Cracho</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Wading into a political debate online can be a minefield. Search any comment section or thread on a social media site, and you’re likely to come across some pretty strong views. But that’s not necessarily just the nature of the debate. It could also reflect the kind of personalities that are drawn to online discussions of this kind. </p>
<p><a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1461444818795487">In our research</a>, we’ve found that people who don’t care about what others think are more likely to engage in politics on social media. This might have an effect on what they say online and contribute to the vitriolic tone that puts so many off engaging in public online conversations. It might also be decisive in selecting the political content that people come across in their feeds.</p>
<p>When social media first became popular in the 2000s, people thought it would enable a more diverse set of people to participate in the political debate. Anyone could post something. Anyone could see their words spread to millions of people’s news feeds. </p>
<p>But for many people, politics is a <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-talk-about-politics-with-your-family-92776">sensitive issue</a>, and they care about their audience. On social media, the audience is invisible unless they react by commenting, liking or sharing. So even if you are interested in politics, the chances are that if you are sensitive to being socially rejected, you will stay away from posting, sharing or commenting on political issues unless you are sure that they are uncontroversial in your social network.</p>
<p>We, a group of scholars from political science, psychology, and communication studies, decided to study the personality traits of people who post political content on social media compared to those who do not. We measured several traits, but found one that was especially interesting: rejection sensitivity.</p>
<p><a href="https://psychology.iresearchnet.com/social-psychology/personality/rejection-sensitivity/">Rejection sensitivity</a> is a well-established measurement in social psychology that measures social risk propensity. That means looking at how afraid you are that someone will reject you for something you have said or done by asking how you would react to a number of hypothetical situations. How you’d feel about being rejected by a close friend, walking up to a stranger at a party, and so on, are all part of a puzzle. From the answers to these questions, we can calculate a rejection sensitivity index for every individual. A low value indicates low sensitivity to rejection and vice versa.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/235380/original/file-20180907-90578-ete9sh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/235380/original/file-20180907-90578-ete9sh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235380/original/file-20180907-90578-ete9sh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235380/original/file-20180907-90578-ete9sh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235380/original/file-20180907-90578-ete9sh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235380/original/file-20180907-90578-ete9sh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235380/original/file-20180907-90578-ete9sh.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">
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<span class="caption">Some people find online debate easy breezy.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>We then studied the relationship between rejection sensitivity and political activity on social media in a unique survey, distributed to about 2,000 Swedish residents. We then interviewed 60 young Swedes in order to get a better understanding of why they either took part in political debate online or not.</p>
<p>The statistical analysis showed that even after controlling for age, education, gender and political interest, rejection sensitivity has a significant effect on engagement. Above all, individuals with a high fear of being rejected avoid sharing political content to their network.</p>
<p>For example: a 30-year-old man or woman with a university education and an interest in politics who has a high degree of rejection sensitivity is 40% less likely to share or post political content than someone with the same characteristics but with a low fear of being socially rejected.</p>
<h2>Thick skin</h2>
<p>Although we found that a substantial share of the respondents in the study – 37% – had been active in political debate on social media in one way or another, it was clear that the most active group had certain characteristics. </p>
<p>In the interviews, it was obvious that for many people, sensitive issues are best discussed in private settings. Face-to-face with a friend or a colleague, it’s easier to adjust something you have said if you realise you’ve caused offence or discomfort. On social media – at least under your own name – you always run the risk of being misunderstood, or silently condemned. And since you are known by the company you keep, even having a <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/facebook-108">Facebook</a> friend with controversial views might put you in a bad light.</p>
<p>Some people, however, simply don’t seem to care about whether anyone will be offended by what they say and will gladly share their views. As a result, the content that is actually posted and shared in social media feeds is to a higher degree produced by those with a low fear of being socially rejected. </p>
<p>So what does this actually mean? This is still an open question. The only thing we know is that active people are not afraid of social sanctions. That doesn’t mean that they are excessively stubborn or one-sided. Nor does it mean that they are resistant to facts or harbour extreme views. It’s even possible that these people have an easier time keeping to the target issue. In fact, it may be better if more people were less afraid of being rejected, since such fear has been shown in previous research to lead people to adapt to more extreme attitudes and become increasingly willing to engage with more extreme groups.</p>
<p>However, it could also be the case that this personality bias leads to creating an even more polarised political environment with a confrontational tone that has the effect of scaring people away from political discussion online. As social media gradually becomes the most important source for political information, discussion and news for citizens, this will have major repercussions for democracies worldwide.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/101700/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nils Gustafsson receives funding from the Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg Foundation (who provided funding for this study), the Swedish Research Council, and the Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation.
Elin Fjellman provided assistance with the focus groups. Malena Rosén-Sundström, Senior Lecturer in Political Science at Lund University is the Principal Investigator of the research project of which this study is a part.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Annika Fredén received funding from the Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg foundation for this study. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emma A. Bäck receives funding from Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg foundation for this project. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Hanna Bäck receives funding from the Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg foundation for this project.</span></em></p>Research suggests people with a high degree of rejection sensitivity are 40% less likely to take part in political debates online.Nils Gustafsson, Senior Lecturer in Strategic Communication, PhD in Political Science, Lund UniversityAnnika Fredén, Senior Lecturer in Political Science, Karlstads UniversityEmma A. Renström (prev. Bäck), Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, University of GothenburgHanna Bäck, Professor of Political Science, Lund UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/987382018-06-28T14:34:39Z2018-06-28T14:34:39ZFrom alternative facts to tender age shelters – how euphemisms become political weapons of mass distraction<p>The recent images of children in cages provided yet another reason to throw your head into your hands over America’s inhumane treatment of immigrants. So – for most of us – it was a great relief to hear that Donald Trump eventually gave into pressure and signed an executive order to stop enforcing the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jun/20/babies-and-toddlers-sent-to-tender-age-shelters-under-trump-separations">laws mandating the separation of children</a> from their parents. But there are still many hundreds of young people detained in the euphemistically termed “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/shortcuts/2018/jun/20/tender-age-shelters-a-new-way-to-describe-the-kidnapping-of-children">tender age shelters</a>” – in reality, prisons for children and toddlers. </p>
<p>Who comes up with these terms? They are not fooling anyone – especially as “tender” and “shelters” have completely different meanings to what is, in fact, the enforced separation of children who are then held in cages. That’s the trouble with euphemisms – they can enrich language, but in the hands of politicians they can be strategically used to mislead and disguise brutal practices, concepts and ideas. Euphemisms – or what are known in some quarters as “<a href="https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/weasel-words.html">weasel words</a>” – are used to conceal the truth of unpalatable situations or practises so that they are easier for the public to accept. </p>
<p>Who can forget “collateral damage” – or rather the incidental deaths and injuries of unintended and non-combatant victims? The euphemism - from the Latin word <em>collateralis</em>, which means “together with” – was adopted by the US military in the mid-20th century to describe the unintentional deaths that occurred “together with” the targeting of legitimate targets. The term was <a href="https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/97000.html">first used in the 1961 article</a> “Dispersal, Deterrence, and Damage” by Nobel Prize-winning economist D.C. Schelling. He argued that weapons could be designed and deployed in such a way as to avoid collateral damage and thus control the war.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"749665745643053057"}"></div></p>
<h2>Aristotelian ‘logos’</h2>
<p>Historically, euphemisms are part of the rhetorical speech styles (from the Greek <em>rhêtorikê</em>) associated with the oratory skills necessary for political speeches, where persuasion is primarily the intended effect. Rhetoric can be defined as the “art of discourse” or, more precisely, the “art of persuasive discourse”. It is the ability to persuade an audience mostly through linguistic strategies.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225118/original/file-20180627-112607-y0hxjh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225118/original/file-20180627-112607-y0hxjh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225118/original/file-20180627-112607-y0hxjh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225118/original/file-20180627-112607-y0hxjh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=803&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225118/original/file-20180627-112607-y0hxjh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1009&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225118/original/file-20180627-112607-y0hxjh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1009&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225118/original/file-20180627-112607-y0hxjh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1009&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Bust of Aristotle: Roman copy after a Greek bronze original by Lysippos.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This style of speaking dates back to classical times and to Aristotle and his concept of “logos” or how audiences are persuaded by the reasoning contained in an argument conveyed by the speech. “Logos” represents what Aristotle called one of the three “modes of proof” – along with “ethos” (which relates to the speaker’s personality and the audience believing that the speaker is trustworthy and honest) and “pathos” (where persuasion is evoked through emotions, brought on by engagement and empathy). </p>
<h2>Newspeak</h2>
<p>According to Orwell in <a href="http://www.orwell.ru/library/essays/politics/english/e_polit">his 1946 essay</a> “Politics and the English Language”, the use of euphemisms also helps to avoid the mental images that more direct language would conjure up. Take, for example, the ambiguous language of “doublethink” and “newspeak” in Orwell’s dystopian 1948 novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Defenceless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called <em>pacification</em> … Such phraseology is needed if one wants to name things without calling up mental pictures of them.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Euphemisms are not just limited to politician-speak, they are very much part of everyday communication and can be found in abundance when dealing with taboo subjects. They help us to politely navigate our way around talk of death, sex, sexual orientation and genitalia. Expressions such as “<a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9248.1990.tb00566.x">economical with the truth</a> (read "lies”) and “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-2337,00.html">tired and emotional</a>” (read “drunk”) are now so embedded into our vernacular that no-one pauses to think twice about these indirect word choices. But, for politicians, weasel words are an integral part of the rhetorical toolkit – a style of spoken or written language that functions to persuade.</p>
<h2>Alternative facts</h2>
<p>It didn’t take long for the Trump administration to wheel out one of the more ridiculous euphemisms of recent times. The day after Trump’s inauguration, the counsellor to the US president, Kellyanne Conway, came up with the much-derided “alternative facts” to counter accusations that the then White House press secretary Sean Spicer had lied about the crowd size at Trump’s inauguration. </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/VSrEEDQgFc8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Politicians of all stripes quickly come to realise how useful it can be to soften the impact of unpopular actions with some carefully chosen weasel words. Former UK prime minister Tony Blair was a great user of euphemisms in his political discourse. Many examples can be found in his interviews and speeches in 2003 to justify the Second Gulf War on Iraq, for example. He spoke of the “liberation of Iraq” (meaning occupation), “peace-keeping” (meaning war) and these could only be achieved by “removing Saddam” (meaning his death rather than forcing him from a position of power).</p>
<p>A decade earlier, the slaughter, torture and imprisonment of Bosnian Muslims in Serbia was described as “<a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/ethnic-cleansing">ethnic cleansing</a>” when there is nothing purifying about these war crimes. </p>
<p>The US government’s “<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11723189">enhanced interrogation techniques</a>” is another example of strategic word choices to disguise systematic torture. When he was US president, Barack Obama tended to avoid using the word “war”, preferring to use words such as “effort”, “process”, “fight” and “campaign” to describe the military action against ISIS, Iraq and Syria as it lessens the violence that war connotes.</p>
<p>Euphemisms have become part of political discourse that intentionally obscures, misleads or distracts audiences from unpleasant truths. Unfortunately, this is what politicians do with language and this is how they win support for otherwise unpalatable policies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98738/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marina Lambrou 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>Why don’t politicians just say what they mean? Because we might not like it.Marina Lambrou, Associate Professor in English Language and Linguistics, Kingston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/919282018-02-15T13:58:54Z2018-02-15T13:58:54ZSteven Pinker lauds reason, but people need freedom – this might not end well<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206547/original/file-20180215-131003-1rvfph3.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Pinker is touring his new book 'Enlightenment Now'.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ASteven_Pinker_G%C3%B6ttingen_10102010b.JPG">G ambrus/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The dictates of reason tell us what we ought to do to survive and flourish. But we neither have to like them nor obey them. As <a href="http://www.online-literature.com/wilde/1305/">Oscar Wilde put it</a>, we are rational animals that always lose their temper when called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason. We rebel.</p>
<p>We do so because we can hold something dearer to us than reason. As the former Harvard psychologist, now spiritual teacher, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKV_DuUcpws&feature=youtu.be&t=43m19s">Ram Dass noted</a>, we may rather be free than right. Freedom continually threatens a revolt against dictatorial reason. The waves of Romanticism constantly crash against the walls of the Enlightenment. They threaten to cause calamity. In the era of Trump and Brexit, they may already have.</p>
<p>An excellent <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/317051/enlightenment-now-by-steven-pinker/9780525427575/">new book</a> published this week by another Harvard psychologist, Steven Pinker, argues the solutions to the formidable problems we face lie in reason. This is consistent with the Enlightenment principle that reason must be used to understand our world and overcome human folly. After dismissing faith, authority, and gut feelings as “generators of delusions”, Pinker argues that the use of reason when making decisions is “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/feb/11/reason-is-non-negotioable-steven-pinker-enlightenment-now-extract">non-negotiable</a>”.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206585/original/file-20180215-131021-1zjlt4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206585/original/file-20180215-131021-1zjlt4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=918&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206585/original/file-20180215-131021-1zjlt4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=918&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206585/original/file-20180215-131021-1zjlt4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=918&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206585/original/file-20180215-131021-1zjlt4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1154&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206585/original/file-20180215-131021-1zjlt4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1154&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206585/original/file-20180215-131021-1zjlt4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1154&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Pinker’s latest.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/317051/enlightenment-now-by-steven-pinker/9780525427575/">Penguin Random House</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Unfortunately, trying to tell people they must do something can backfire. In a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOYLCy5PVgM">classic 1963 study by Stanley Milgram</a>, participants were instructed by a scientist to give increasingly severe electric shocks to a fellow human being in another room. You can get a feel for the study, based on a modern version, <a href="https://youtu.be/Xxq4QtK3j0Y?t=23s">here</a>. </p>
<p>A staggering 65% of participants continued to administer shocks all the way up to the maximum possible 450 volts. However, when the study was partially reproduced in <a href="https://www.scu.edu/media/college-of-arts-and-sciences/psychology/documents/Burger-et-al-SPPS-2011-5.pdf">2009</a> something interesting happened. When participants wavering about obeying their instructions were told, “You have no other choice, you must go on”, all chose to disobey. </p>
<p>One explanation for this starts with <a href="https://selfdeterminationtheory.org/SDT/documents/2000_RyanDeci_SDT.pdf">self-determination theory</a>. This proposes that we have a basic psychological need for autonomy; a need to feel in control of our fate; a need to have “a feeling of choice”. </p>
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactance_(psychology)">Psychological reactance</a> is a measure of how strongly you are motivated by this need for autonomy. Its levels <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16719727">can vary</a> from person to person and across the life span – being greatest in the “terrible twos”, adolescence and the senior years. It reaches its zenith in the famous statement of Patrick Henry: “Give me liberty, or give me death”.</p>
<p>If this feeling is threatened, you may take steps to regain it, such as by doing what has been prohibited, or <a href="http://psycnet.apa.org/record/1970-05062-001">believing less strongly what you are told must be the case</a>. Indeed, higher levels of reactance are <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16719727">associated with greater rates of smoking and drinking in adolescents</a>. </p>
<p>It is not just people who can take away our feeling of choice by constraining us. The dictates of reason can be experienced as threatening it too. The Enlightenment has encouraged us to view reason and freedom as brothers in arms. However, under certain conditions, they may have their hands round each other’s throats.</p>
<h2>Two plus two is four?</h2>
<p>In totalitarian states, reason can be a tool of liberation. For example, in George Orwell’s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four">Nineteen Eighty-Four</a>, Winston Smith is tortured by an agent of the state to make him say, believe and even perceive that two plus two equals five. As <a href="https://www.crisismagazine.com/1984/life-freedom-the-symbolism-of-2x2-4-in-dostoevsky-zamyatin-orwell">Mihajlo Mihajlov has noted</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>When Orwell’s hero is fighting for ‘two plus two is four’, when he repeats this over and over again as a secret formula for life and freedom – we have to realize that for him ‘two plus two is four’ is the symbol of freedom, freedom from manipulation by the omnipotent party.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>As countries throw off their tyrants, new ones emerge. The very laws of nature itself and the dictates of reason can now be experienced as tyrannical. Even “two plus two is four” can be experienced as oppressive. </p>
<p>This idea was portrayed by Fyodor Dostoyevsky in his novella, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notes_from_Underground">Notes from the Underground</a>. Here, the character of the Underground Man explains how:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Two times two makes four seems to me simply a piece of insolence. Two times two makes four is a fop standing with arms akimbo barring your path and spitting. I admit that two times two makes four is an excellent thing, but if we are going to praise everything, two times two makes five is also a very charming little thing … man is a frivolous and incongruous creature, and perhaps, like a chess player, loves only the process of the game, not the end of it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This simple sum has now become, to quote Mihajlov again, a “symbol of human unfreedom in relation to the laws of nature”. The Underground Man’s revolt against this is his fight for self-determination. He values freedom over everything else, including reason and his own interests:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>What has made them conceive that man must want a rationally advantageous choice? What man wants is simply INDEPENDENT choice, whatever that independence may cost and wherever it may lead. And choice, of course, the devil only knows what choice.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Balancing reason with freedom</h2>
<p>The dictates of reason can hence be overthrown by our need for freedom. If this merely produced stroppy two-year-olds and rebellious teens, this would be (just about) bearable. However, much more significant consequences are possible.</p>
<p>For example, imagine there is a political candidate or option being widely portrayed as the obvious and perhaps only sane choice. Could this drive some voters to vote for the alternative (potentially even against their own rational self-interests) in order to feel they are choosing freely? Could this have played a small but significant role in the 2016 US presidential election? What about Brexit?</p>
<p>Steven Pinker’s argument that the use of reason is crucial to continuing <a href="https://stevenpinker.com/publications/better-angels-our-nature">the progress we see in so many aspects of our society</a> is undoubtedly correct. The use of reason and the scientific method have freed us in ways previous generations could not have imagined. But unless we take into account the buried threat to reason posed by our intrinsic need to feel free, we may find ourselves slipping off the rails of progress.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/91928/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon McCarthy-Jones receives funding from the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation.</span></em></p>The psychologist proposes reason as a solution to all our problems, but telling people they must do something can backfire.Simon McCarthy-Jones, Associate Professor in Clinical Psychology and Neuropsychology, Trinity College DublinLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/890262017-12-12T02:40:31Z2017-12-12T02:40:31ZHow conservatives use identity politics to shut down debate<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/198678/original/file-20171212-9392-1sdxnt9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">One of the worst examples of identity politics came from Malcolm Turnbull on Monday's Q&A program.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">ABC News</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Conservatives are currently obsessed with identity politics. </p>
<p>Almost every issue of The Australian comes with a fusillade against the ways identity politics threaten civic discourse. And a <a href="http://www.afr.com/opinion/editorials/the-open-society-is-under-threat-20170926-gyosn4?login_token=ZUjbz-dVwigvhskFMZ9uixhbT93AFZAADtLOGSd-bKTmSAmDZ4pRy2pUe4E6XQrgnfBZQUv9PXVXfBl5Pzp1QA&expiry=1513040566&single_use_token=Q-XBT5jNUxcDEUH8F9Dq5i8KkI62qyQb6ozAllrld0YSSrV7FNPPg5brtCQp2wgM9qqQ_C8iLL3Q7DGbtQJIgA">Financial Review editorial</a> in September warned:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… thoughts, expression and questioning are now more likely to be silenced in the excess of identity politics, where race, gender, sexuality and group-think declarations have replaced class as the key political dividers.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Yet one of the worst examples of identity politics came from Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in his <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/txt/s4758471.htm">Q&A appearance</a> on December 11. In opposing the idea of an elected Indigenous Advisory Council, he claimed that politicians such as <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Parliamentarian?MPID=M3A">Ken Wyatt</a> and <a href="http://www.alp.org.au/linda_burney">Linda Burney</a> represent Indigenous Australians. In fact, they represent the electors of Hasluck and Barton – few of whom are Indigenous.</p>
<p>It is great that there are Indigenous politicians in parliament (Turnbull somehow forgot the two Labor senators, <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Parliamentarian?MPID=SR5">Pat Dodson</a> and <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Parliamentarian?MPID=122087">Malarndirri McCarthy</a>). But they are not there to “represent” Indigenous Australians any more than <a href="http://www.financeminister.gov.au">Mathias Cormann</a> is there to represent Belgian-Australians.</p>
<h2>Political party identities</h2>
<p>The primary identity of politicians in our system is their political party. Sometimes other identities will seem more important, as in the case of the four openly gay Liberal MPs who pushed their party toward a free vote on marriage equality, or <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Parliamentarian?MPID=WF6">Michael Danby’s</a> support for Israel – which goes far beyond the views of his party.</p>
<p>What these cases suggest is the complex and overlapping nature of identities, and the trap of defining anyone by only one identity. Nor does belonging to a particular group, whether through race, ethnicity or gender, mean one automatically speaks “for” that group. <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/history/past-prime-ministers/margaret-thatcher">Margaret Thatcher</a> or <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Parliamentarian?MPID=SE4">Bronwyn Bishop</a> never sought to speak “for women”.</p>
<p>Identity politics, as we understand them, are often assumed to have emerged from the women’s, black and gay movements in the early 1970s. There is an earlier history, linked to the development of nationalist movements in 19th-century Europe, and the growth of anti-colonial movements across European empires.</p>
<p>Identity politics are born when people feel excluded because of something important to their sense of self – whether it be race, gender, sexuality or language. But they are also thrust upon people, as in the tragic case of those Jews who believed themselves to be 100% German until the Nazis came to power. </p>
<p>A sense of a shared history is crucial to empowering people who have been oppressed, and sometimes made invisible. When I was a schoolboy in Hobart we were taught that there were no Tasmanian Aborigines, who had effectively been wiped out by settlement. Today more than 4% of the state’s population identify as Indigenous.</p>
<h2>Not necessarily born this way</h2>
<p>Conservatives are particularly disturbed by the idea that gender identities might be fluid, which seemed their central concern in the marriage equality debate. </p>
<p>Ironically many of those who defend ideas of gender fluidity also believe their sexual identity is, in Lady Gaga’s words, “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wV1FrqwZyKw">born this way</a>”. In both cases the rhetoric ignores the evidence of both history and anthropology. </p>
<p>Identity politics are neither inherently left nor right. Some Marxists denounced the new social movements as threatening class unity, in terms rather like those who now see identity politics as fracturing a common polity.</p>
<p>One of the common <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/11/why-hillary-clinton-lost/507704/">criticisms</a> of Hillary Clinton’s US presidential campaign was that she spoke too often to specific groups, rather than in the language of inclusion. This is an odd argument given Donald Trump’s <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/donald-trump-president-supporters-attack-muslims-hijab-hispanics-lgbt-hate-crime-wave-us-election-a7410166.html">blatant attacks</a> on Hispanics and Muslims, which were clearly an appeal to white Americans who felt their identities were under threat.</p>
<p>Most critics of identity politics speak as if they were above identity, when in practice their identities are those of the dominant group. <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Parliamentarian?MPID=BK6">Pauline Hanson</a> excludes Aborigines, Asians and Muslims from her view of Australian identity, cloaked in the language of patriotism.</p>
<p>Like Hanson, those who attack identity politics are often most zealous in defending their own versions of identity. Current proposed changes to citizenship requirements are supported by an emphasis on “Australian values”, as if these are both self-evident and distinguishable from more universal values of political and civil rights. </p>
<p>On the same Q0&A program Turnbull defined Australian values as based upon “multiculturalism”, which acknowledges that contemporary society is a mosaic of different and overlapping identities and communities. It is possible to argue that respect for cultural diversity is a national value, while ignoring the question whether Australian law treats all cultural values equally. </p>
<p>In practice, cultural diversity is clearly subordinate to a legal and political system heavily based on British precedents. A genuine multicultural identity might start by extending the term “ethnic” to include people of British ancestry, as much an “ethnicity” as any other. </p>
<h2>Identity as a means of exclusion</h2>
<p>Identity politics threaten democratic debate when they become a means of shutting down any comment that does not grow entirely out of experience. </p>
<p>Writers have been <a href="http://www.afr.com/lifestyle/arts-and-entertainment/books/the-new-and-troubling-debate-over-what-is-a-problematic-book-20171113-gzkluo">criticised</a> for creating characters who do not share their author’s race or gender; speakers shunned for expressing views that are deemed “insensitive”.</p>
<p>Writer Germaine Greer may have <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-25/germaine-greer-defends-views-on-transgender-issues/6883132">views</a> on transgender issues that should be opposed. But they should be met with rebuttal, not a refusal to listen. Critics of identity politics are right that zealousness in protecting identities can itself become repressive. </p>
<p>Identity politics become dangerous when they become an argument for exclusion. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, the most dangerous examples of exclusion come from those who clam to speak for “the people”, a term which itself depends upon a certain version of identity. The populists who attack identity politics do so while creating their own, limited image of national identity.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/89026/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dennis Altman 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>Conservatives are often critical of ‘identity politics’ for silencing dissenting views. But on ABC’s Q&A on Monday night Malcolm Turnbull presented a very narrow vision of national identity.Dennis Altman, Professorial Fellow in Human Security, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/864132017-10-30T13:32:33Z2017-10-30T13:32:33ZPolitics in schools? Yes, if we want children to be active citizens<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192029/original/file-20171026-13327-y9p57.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Children have the right to express their opinions and be heard.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Joseph Sohm/Shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The rights of children have come under the spotlight in South Africa recently. Corporal punishment, which has been <a href="https://www.acts.co.za/south-african-schools-act/index.html">banned</a> in the country’s schools since 1996, is now also <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/gauteng/groundbreaking-judgment-outlaws-spanking-11636583">illegal in the home</a>. </p>
<p>This latest ruling was justified on the basis that children, like adults, have a right to be protected from assault. While the ruling itself has provoked <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/religious-leaders-slam-spanking-ban-1980050">some controversy</a>, the idea of children having “<a href="https://www.unicef.org/crc/files/Protection_list.pdf">protection rights</a>” – the right to be protected from violent, abusive, cruel or exploitative treatment – has not.</p>
<p>“<a href="https://www.unicef.org/crc/files/Participation.pdf">Participation rights</a>”, by contrast, seem to be much more controversial. These, along with protection rights, are accorded to children in Article 12.1 of the United Nations <a href="https://www.unicef.org/crc/">Convention on the Rights of the Child</a>. Children are assured that they not only have a right to express their views on matters affecting them, but that these views will be given “due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child”.</p>
<p>Recently, a photograph was posted on Twitter that showed three boys holding up school shirts featuring a South African political party’s logo. The resulting outrage – fuelled by former UK cricketer <a href="https://maritzburgsun.co.za/42784/maritzburg-college-social-media-storm-eff-cricketer-kevin-pietersen/">Kevin Pietersen</a>, who attended the school in question while growing up in South Africa – suggests that many are uncomfortable with allowing children their participation rights.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"918834292020584448"}"></div></p>
<p>People have often <a href="http://www.debate.org/opinions/should-politics-be-discussed-in-schools">questioned</a> whether politics “should be allowed” in schools. The issue here is whether or not politics affects children. And the answer is yes. We want our children to flourish. To ensure that they do, we need to help them develop their sense of good and evil, justice and injustice. Understanding and engaging with politics is crucial to this development.</p>
<h2>Politics and power</h2>
<p>Politics is ultimately and essentially about power. Children are arguably one of the least powerful groups in society. Political scientist Jessica Kulynych <a href="http://peopleplacespace.org/frr/childrens-and-young-peoples-participation-in-political-spaces/">has argued</a> that society does not see children as political actors and as such, fails to include them in the public sphere. This prevents children from enjoying participation rights: they cannot express their views on matters affecting them.</p>
<p>Schools – the place where children spend so much of their time – have very entrenched power relations. Pupils are the least powerful and most vulnerable in these relationships. They spend much of their time listening to those who have power over them and so many decisions about students are taken without their input. </p>
<p>It’s a common complaint across Africa - and across the globe – that young citizens are <a href="https://theconversation.com/apathy-among-young-people-stands-in-the-way-of-africas-demographic-dividend-64065">particularly unengaged</a>. Turnout is especially low during South African elections among <a href="https://issafrica.org/about-us/press-releases/new-study-reveals-reasons-for-low-voter-turnout-among-sa-youth">young voters</a>.</p>
<p>But how can we expect young voters to be politically involved if we prevent them from “being political” while they are in school? Schools could be the perfect space for children to learn about and engage with politics.</p>
<p>Talking about <a href="https://thepoliticalclassroom.com/">their book</a>, The Political Classroom: Evidence and Ethics in Democratic Education, Diana E. Hess and Paula McAvoy argue that being able to talk about politics is a skill that people need to learn. Schools seem the obvious place to learn this skill: they are not just there to teach students maths and science – they are surely meant to educate young people to become good citizens and contributors to their country. </p>
<h2>Kids are political animals, too</h2>
<p>The Greek philosopher Aristotle <a href="http://www.the-philosophy.com/man-political-animal-meaning-aristotle-quote">famously claimed</a> that “man is a political animal”. His justification for this was two-fold; he said “It is a characteristic of man that he alone has any sense of good and evil, of just and unjust” and also pointed out that we have the gift of speech. </p>
<p>These two capacities allow us form relationships with each other and through association (in families, clubs, societies, and indeed the state), we are able to experience what Aristotle called <a href="http://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_eudaimonism.html">eudamonia</a> – human flourishing. </p>
<p>There is no reason for children to be excluded from developing their abilities as “political animals”. If we keep them out of politics, we deprive them of their right to speak – even about issues that make us uncomfortable.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86413/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Heidi Matisonn 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>We want our children to flourish. To ensure that they do, we need to help them develop their sense of good and evil, justice and injustice. Engaging in politics is crucial to this development.Heidi Matisonn, Lecturer, Philosophy, Politics and Law Programme Co-ordinator, University of KwaZulu-NatalLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/846452017-09-27T00:54:26Z2017-09-27T00:54:26ZThe surprising connection between ‘take a knee’ protests and Citizens United<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187646/original/file-20170926-17379-1nbcljc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones joined his team in taking a knee before a game on Sept. 25.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Matt York</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Citizens United, the Supreme Court ruling that some fear <a href="http://time.com/4922542/democrats-citizen-united/">is destroying American democracy</a>, may also be showing us how to heal it. </p>
<p>The most recent example of this is the reaction to President Donald Trump’s comments suggesting that sports owners <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/24/sports/nfl-trump-anthem-protests.html">should fire players</a> who kneel during the national anthem. As the president does so often, he placed business leaders in the difficult position of deciding whether to speak out at the risk of alienating customers and courting further controversy. </p>
<p>In this case, many league officials and owners chose to do just that, <a href="https://twitter.com/NFLprguy/status/911580084141772801/photo/1">labeling</a> Trump’s words “divisive” and <a href="https://twitter.com/WarriorsPR/status/911671456928382976/photo/1">defending their players’ right</a> to “express themselves freely on matters important to them.” <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/early-lead/wp/2017/09/25/cowboys-players-take-a-knee-with-owner-jerry-jones-before-standing-for-anthem/?utm_term=.d00ae10138dc">Some owners</a> “took a knee” alongside their players. </p>
<p>While corporate speech is often assumed to favor only conservative causes, my research on attorney advertising reveals the extent to which free speech rights for companies <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2445771">also advances</a> causes important to liberals. </p>
<p>I would argue that Citizens United – a Supreme Court opinion that has produced bitterly partisan reactions – ironically offers a pluralistic vision of corporate speech as well as a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=6233137937069871624">full-throated defense</a> of the kind of political speech <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-corporate-ceos-found-their-political-voice-83127">we are now witnessing</a> from business leaders. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187671/original/file-20170926-10570-1sisnqg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187671/original/file-20170926-10570-1sisnqg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187671/original/file-20170926-10570-1sisnqg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187671/original/file-20170926-10570-1sisnqg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187671/original/file-20170926-10570-1sisnqg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187671/original/file-20170926-10570-1sisnqg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187671/original/file-20170926-10570-1sisnqg.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">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier, center, resigned from Trump’s manufacturing council because of the president’s muted reaction to the violence in Charlottesville, Va. The council soon disbanded after that.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Speaking out in the age of Trump</h2>
<p>Whether to speak out when Trump takes a position that is at odds with the rights of their employees or their own or company’s values has become a fundamental dilemma for many business leaders in the Trump era. </p>
<p>Many have done so on <a href="http://fortune.com/2017/08/14/ken-frazier-trump-charlottesville-response/">Charlottesville</a>, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/06/01/elon-musk-quits-donald-trumps-advisory-councils-paris-accord/">climate change</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/sundarpichai/status/890247543686397952">transgender service in the military</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/09/06/amazon-and-microsoft-are-supporting-a-15-state-lawsuit-to-protect-daca/?utm_term=.988cbc9f1414">Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals</a>. Others have <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/corporate-americas-awkward-embrace-of-trump-will-continue">stayed silent</a>, seeming to support the notion that inserting themselves into political controversies would be to step out of bounds. </p>
<p>In this view, business should be separate from politics, and corporations should leave political discourse to private citizens. But for better or worse, our system protects business leaders speaking up. And the Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United describes why it’s so important. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187668/original/file-20170926-10570-6opbe0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187668/original/file-20170926-10570-6opbe0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187668/original/file-20170926-10570-6opbe0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187668/original/file-20170926-10570-6opbe0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187668/original/file-20170926-10570-6opbe0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187668/original/file-20170926-10570-6opbe0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187668/original/file-20170926-10570-6opbe0.jpg?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">They may not be people, but they’re made up of them.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Toby Talbot</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Citizens United, the left’s bete noir</h2>
<p>In 2010, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=6233137937069871624">Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission</a> overturned a law that limited corporate finance of certain political ads on First Amendment grounds. The reaction from liberals and those who favor limits on campaign finance was <a href="http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2010/02/25/the-devastating-decision/">fierce</a>.</p>
<p>President Barack Obama famously <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=deGg41IiWwU">criticized</a> the opinion during a <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/State_of_the_Union/state-of-the-union-2010-president-obama-speech-transcript/story?id=9678572">State of the Union address</a>, with the justices who issued the ruling sitting a few feet away:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>According to a Time magazine survey of law professors, the opinion ranks among <a href="http://time.com/4056051/worst-supreme-court-decisions/">the worst since 1960</a>.</p>
<p>And yet, like any political lightning rod, Citizens United is both less and more than it seems. </p>
<p>Constitutional scholar Justin Levitt <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41308528?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">characterized</a> the opinion as an incremental change from previous law, which offered corporations no shortage of options for political influence. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1740-1461.2012.01265.x">Another study</a> found that companies spent more on politics after Citizens United but it ultimately hurt shareholders – it was essentially a form of corporate waste. Spending additional corporate dollars on campaigns awash in advertising may not produce much of <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjNg9CAssPWAhVBXWMKHVp8D_8QFggmMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fpeople.umass.edu%2Fschaffne%2Flaraja_schaffner_spendingbans.pdf&usg=AFQjCNGCK5ryfKuvJ9A-bvaLmbV7efoUyA">a return</a> on investment.</p>
<p>Beyond its legal impact, Citizens United offered a vision of democracy that embraces the unique and important role that business leaders play in political discourse. In other words, exactly what we’ve seen when business leaders stand up to Trump.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/E2h8ujX6T0A?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
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<h2>Business leaders bridging divides</h2>
<p>Citizens United stands in part for the idea that the First Amendment provides strong protection for political speech, even if it originates from a company. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2h8ujX6T0A">Corporations may not be people</a>, but, to paraphrase the movie “Soylent Green,” they are <a href="https://vimeo.com/193955387">made of people</a>. </p>
<p>In this view, corporations are groups of people on par with labor unions or nonprofits, and their joint viewpoints are deserving of protection.</p>
<p>At a time of deep partisan division, business leaders may be the rare voice deemed credible across the political spectrum. Small businesses are among the <a href="http://news.gallup.com/poll/212840/americans-confidence-institutions-edges.aspx">few remaining institutions</a> that inspire a high level of confidence from both Republicans and Democrats. Tech companies also still enjoy <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/poll-little-confidence-major-american-institutions-n697931">high levels</a> of trust. Importantly, among those who are losing confidence in the “system,” business is seen as <a href="https://www.edelman.com/global-results/">the most trusted</a> institution.</p>
<p>To this, one might respond, why ruin a good thing? Perhaps business leaders should lie low and preserve their reputation. But it is a mistake to assume that any statements in opposition to Trump are themselves divisive. </p>
<p>In this regard, even diluted corporate rhetoric offers the comparative benefit of articulating a few things that Americans have in common. After Charlottesville, the CEO of Campbell Soup – a symbol of mainstream values if there ever was one – <a href="https://www.campbellsoupcompany.com/newsroom/press-releases/campbell-ceo-resigns-from-presidents-manufacturing-jobs-initiative/">issued a statement</a> that “racism and murder are unequivocally reprehensible.” It may not be revolutionary, but at least it’s a point upon which virtually every American can agree. </p>
<p>Citizens United also argued that corporations have a unique viewpoint in the <a href="http://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3484&context=caselrev">marketplace of ideas</a>. In this conception of speech, corporate voices are worth protecting because voters find them valuable or important. As the Supreme Court <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=6233137937069871624">explained</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“On certain topics corporations may possess valuable expertise, leaving them the best equipped to point out errors or fallacies in speech of all sorts, including the speech of candidates and elected officials.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In this vein, corporations represent a credible source of information and context on policy matters.</p>
<p>The Trump administration’s decision to terminate DACA is often invoked as a moral issue. However, in a lawsuit against the administration, tech leaders explained that it was also a business issue, describing how its termination will affect their ability to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/09/06/amazon-and-microsoft-are-supporting-a-15-state-lawsuit-to-protect-daca/?utm_term=.fb7cf1118ac6">recruit and retain top talent</a>. Likewise, when NFL owners and coaches defend their players, it’s an opportunity to provide context for how the kneeling controversy relates to racial justice.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187667/original/file-20170926-31238-c81frg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187667/original/file-20170926-31238-c81frg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187667/original/file-20170926-31238-c81frg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187667/original/file-20170926-31238-c81frg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187667/original/file-20170926-31238-c81frg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187667/original/file-20170926-31238-c81frg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187667/original/file-20170926-31238-c81frg.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">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Colin Kaepernick (7) began taking a knee during the national anthem last year to protest police brutality.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Daniel Gluskoter/AP Images for Panini</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>For business leaders, it’s personal</h2>
<p>To be sure, Citizens United has had some of the negative impact liberals feared. In particular, <a href="http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/685691">one study</a> estimated that corporate spending following Citizens United measurably improved Republican prospects in state legislatures. </p>
<p>When corporations have the option to engage in unlimited spending, it gives them a <a href="http://heinonline.org/hol-cgi-bin/get_pdf.cgi?handle=hein.journals/gslr27&section=43">louder voice</a> than others in the electoral process.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, the kind of statements we’ve heard from NFL and NBA team owners offers a counterpoint to the kind of corporate speech most feared by commentators following Citizens United – that of faceless corporations pouring money into elections in service of their “greedy ends.” Instead, these statements have an intensely personal character. They show leaders sharing their own personal experiences and how those experiences are reflected in the organizations they run.</p>
<p>When NFL team owner Shahid Khan <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/sports/wp/2017/09/24/shahid-khan-the-jaguars-owner-who-stood-with-his-team-has-long-espoused-the-american-dream/?utm_term=.40c47b159691">linked arms</a> with his players during the national anthem before a game, it sent a symbolic message to his players – and to everyone watching – about his vision of an inclusive America that honors diversity “in many forms – race, faith, our views and our goals.” </p>
<p>It may not be the kind of corporate speech that we imagined. But it’s exactly what we need.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84645/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth C. Tippett made a contribution to the Hillary Clinton campaign.</span></em></p>Team owners’ defense of their players ‘taking a knee’ during the national anthem shows the vital role business leaders play in political discourse – one championed by Citizens United.Elizabeth C. Tippett, Assistant Professor, School of Law, University of OregonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/830792017-08-28T23:00:22Z2017-08-28T23:00:22ZFree expression at universities gagged by anti-Trump backlash<p>We are living in difficult and worrisome times.</p>
<p>There has been a resurgence of racism, misogyny, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia and nativist nationalisms in many parts of the world — <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/london/london-nationalist-rally-1.4263721">including Canada</a>.</p>
<p>This renaissance of hate has been intensified by the actions of Donald Trump before and after his election. Fortunately, many have responded against the hate. For some, regrettably, part of that response has been to call for suppression of free speech. </p>
<p>As the director of the Centre for Free Expression at Ryerson University, I was deeply troubled when Ryerson recently <a href="http://m.bpt.me/event/3054862">decided to cancel a panel discussion</a> whose topic, ironically, was to be “The Stifling of Free Speech on University Campuses.”</p>
<p>The panel discussion — scheduled to include University of Toronto psychologist <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-friday-edition-1.3786140/i-m-not-a-bigot-meet-the-u-of-t-prof-who-refuses-to-use-genderless-pronouns-1.3786144">Jordan Peterson</a> and former Rebel Media journalist <a href="http://nationalpost.com/news/canada/politicians-contributors-distance-themselves-as-rebel-medias-meltdown-continues">Faith Goldy</a> — was not a march riddled with Klan and neo-Nazis. It was a group of three conservative academics and one right-wing journalist whose ideas are odious to many people, including me. But then, my ideas are likely odious to them.</p>
<h2>The security excuse</h2>
<p>The university said it <a href="http://nationalpost.com/news/canada/facing-pushback-ryerson-cancels-panel-discussion-on-campus-free-speech">cancelled the event after a security review</a> concluded it was “not equipped to provide the necessary level of public safety for the event to go forward.” The violent confrontation and deaths in Charlottesville may have both spooked Ryerson officials and made their decision seem prudent to many.</p>
<p>Opponents of the planned panel contributed to the fears — with their Facebook page headlined “No Fascists in Our City” adorned initially with a photo of a crossed-out swastika and a call for mass turnout to stop the panel. “This shit stops now. Either you’re with us or you’re not….”</p>
<p>In cancelling the event, Ryerson gave in to intimidation, prevented a panel discussion of difficult ideas and disagreement over deeply held views, and denied free speech rights to those with opposing views.</p>
<p>Part of freedom of expression is the right to dissent, protest and criticize, but that right does not extend to intimidation, harassment or violence that denies others their free speech rights.</p>
<p>Differences of views are the lifeblood of any university and essential to the mission of advancing knowledge and educating students. Most universities even have statements of principle that guarantee and support free expression.</p>
<h2>Depriving views</h2>
<p>Yale University’s <a href="https://news.yale.edu/2016/10/28/statement-free-speech-yale">statement</a> says “to curtail free expression strikes twice at intellectual freedom, for whoever deprives another of the right to state unpopular views necessarily also deprives others of the right to listen to those views.”</p>
<p>The University of Toronto’s <a href="https://www.utoronto.ca/about-u-of-t/mission">statement of purpose</a> guarantees the “rights of freedom of speech, academic freedom, and freedom of research. And we affirm that these rights are meaningless unless they entail the right to raise deeply disturbing questions and provocative challenges to the cherished beliefs of society at large and of the university itself.”</p>
<p>Ryerson’s decision to cancel the event violates its own <a href="http://www.ryerson.ca/content/dam/senate/documents/Statement_on_Freedom_of_Speech_May_04_2010.pdf">Freedom of Speech policy</a> which states:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Ryerson does not avoid controversies, difficult ideas, or disagreements over deeply held views. When such disagreements arise within the University or within a broader social context, the University’s primary responsibility is to protect free speech within a culture of mutual respect. The right to freedom of speech comes with the responsibility to exercise that right in an atmosphere free of intimidation and in an environment that supports the free speech rights of those with opposing views.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This is not a new issue. During the anti-Communist hysteria of the McCarthy period in the 1940s and early ‘50s, many universities abandoned their commitments to academic freedom and freedom of expression. Loyalty oaths were imposed on faculty and many professors accused of being Communists were fired.</p>
<p>The then-president of Yale University, Charles Seymour, famously said in 1949: “There will be no witch hunts at Yale because there will be no witches. We do not intend to hire Communists.”</p>
<p>In her book <em><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1986/09/28/books/cold-war-on-campus.html?mcubz=1">No Ivory Tower</a></em>, Ellen Schrecker summarized the role of the universities during this period: “In its collaboration with McCarthyism, the academic community behaved just like every other major institution in American life. Such a discovery is demoralizing … . Here, if anywhere, dissent should have found a sanctuary. Yet it did not.”</p>
<h2>Cowardice and complicity</h2>
<p>That harmful legacy of university cowardice and complicity took years to overcome. We need to remember this past if we do not want to relive it, albeit in the name of new passions and different ideologies and concerns.</p>
<p>Instead, it appears as if we are starting down a dark road that threatens the <em>raison d’être</em> of the university and the fundamental rights to freedom of expression <a href="http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/Const/page-15.html">guaranteed</a> by Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms.</p>
<p>If standing by its principles requires a university to make a greater investment in security personnel to protect freedom of expression, that must be seen as a proper cost of doing business. </p>
<p>If threats continue to blossom, then there needs to be discussions with governments to ensure universities have the additional financial resources to ensure free expression does not fall victim to intimidation.</p>
<p>Not only are censorship and suppression fatal to the purpose of the university, they undermine the foundation of democratic society.</p>
<p>When individual rights to freedom of expression are diminished or taken away for an allegedly good cause, they are necessarily invested in some higher authority that is given the right to determine what is acceptable. </p>
<p>The result is censorship from above — ultimately the state — with the likelihood that the champions of that censorship today are its vulnerable targets tomorrow.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/83079/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Turk 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 the academic appointment above.</span></em></p>Differences of opinion are the lifeblood of universities and essential to advancing knowledge. But some universities are giving in to intimidation by cancelling events with controversial speakers.James Turk, Director, Centre for Free Expression & Distinguished Visiting Professor, Toronto Metropolitan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/764622017-07-06T20:18:56Z2017-07-06T20:18:56ZBook review: The Death of Expertise<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174334/original/file-20170619-28805-17lbqbv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A new book expresses concern that the 'average American' has base knowledge so low that it is now plummeting to 'aggressively wrong'.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>I have to start this review with a confession: I wanted to like this book from the moment I read the title. And I did. Tom Nichols’ <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-death-of-expertise-9780190469412?cc=au&lang=en&">The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters</a> is a motivating – if at times slightly depressing – read.</p>
<p>In the author’s words, his goal is to examine:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… the relationship between experts and citizens in a democracy, why that relationship is collapsing, and what all of us, citizens and experts, might do about it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This resonates strongly with what I see playing out around the world almost every day – from the appalling state of <a href="https://theconversation.com/grattan-on-friday-the-finkel-plan-will-test-malcolm-turnbulls-ability-to-deliver-significant-reform-79530">energy politics in Australia</a>, to the frankly bizarre condition of public debate on just about anything in the US and the UK.</p>
<p>Nichols’ focus is on the US, but the parallels with similar nations are myriad. He expresses a deep concern that “the average American” has base knowledge so low it has crashed through the floor of “uninformed”, passed “misinformed” on the way down, and is now plummeting to “aggressively wrong”. And this is playing out against a backdrop in which people don’t just believe “dumb things”, but actively resist any new information that might threaten these beliefs.</p>
<p>He doesn’t claim this situation is new, per se – just that it seems to be accelerating, and proliferating, at eye-watering speed.</p>
<p>Intimately entwined with this, Nichols mourns the decay of our ability to have constructive, positive public debate. He reminds us that we are increasingly in a world where disagreement is seen as a personal insult. A world where argument means conflict rather than debate, and ad hominem is the rule rather than the exception. </p>
<p>Again, this is not necessarily a new issue – but it is certainly a growing one.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174338/original/file-20170619-28772-1vjio62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174338/original/file-20170619-28772-1vjio62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174338/original/file-20170619-28772-1vjio62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174338/original/file-20170619-28772-1vjio62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174338/original/file-20170619-28772-1vjio62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174338/original/file-20170619-28772-1vjio62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174338/original/file-20170619-28772-1vjio62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174338/original/file-20170619-28772-1vjio62.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&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="attribution"><span class="source">Oxford University Press</span></span>
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<p>The book covers a broad and interconnected range of topics related to its key subject matter. It considers the contrast between experts and citizens, and highlights how the antagonism between these roles has been both caused and exacerbated by the exhausting and often insult-laden nature of what passes for public conversations.</p>
<p>Nichols also reflects on changes in the mediating influence of journalism on the relationship between experts and “citizens”. He reminds us of the ubiquity of Google and its role in reinforcing the conflation of information, knowledge and experience.</p>
<p>His chapter on the contribution of higher education to the ailing relationship between experts and citizens particularly appeals to me as an academic. Two of his points here exemplify academia’s complicity in diminishing this relationship. </p>
<p>Nichols outlines his concern about the movement to treat students as clients, and the consequent over-reliance on the efficacy and relevance of student assessment of their professors. While not against “limited assessment”, he believes:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Evaluating teachers creates a habit of mind in which the layperson becomes accustomed to judging the expert, despite being in an obvious position of having inferior knowledge of the subject material.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Nichols also asserts this student-as-customer approach to universities is accompanied by an implicit, and also explicit, nurturing of the idea that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Emotion is an unassailable defence against expertise, a moat of anger and resentment in which reason and knowledge quickly drown. And when students learn that emotion trumps everything else, it is a lesson they will take with them for the rest of their lives.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/entry/poll-civil-service-experts_us_5849d515e4b04c8e2baeede9">pervasive attacks</a> on experts as “elitists” in US public discourse receive little sympathy in this book (nor should these). Nichols sees these assaults as entrenched not so much in ignorance, more as being rooted in:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… unfounded arrogance, the outrage of an increasingly narcissistic culture that cannot endure even the slightest hint of inequality of any kind.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Linked to this, he sees a confusion in the minds of many between basic notions of democracy in general, and the relationship between expertise and democracy in particular. </p>
<p>Democracy is, Nichols reminds us, “a condition of political equality”: one person, one vote, all of us equal in the eyes of the law. But in the US at least, he feels people:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… now think of democracy as a state of actual equality, in which every opinion is a good as any other on almost any subject under the sun. Feelings are more important than facts: if people think vaccines are harmful … then it is “undemocratic” and “elitist” to contradict them.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The danger, as he puts it, is that a temptation exists in democratic societies to become caught up in “resentful insistence on equality”, which can turn into “oppressive ignorance” if left unchecked. I find it hard to argue with him.</p>
<p>Nichols acknowledges that his arguments expose him to the very real danger of looking like yet another pontificating academic, bemoaning the dumbing down of society. It’s a practice common among many in academia, and one that is often code for our real complaint: that people won’t just respect our authority. </p>
<p>There are certainly places where a superficial reader would be tempted to accuse him of this. But to them I suggest taking more time to consider more closely the contexts in which he presents his arguments.</p>
<p>This book does not simply point the finger at “society” or “citizens”: there is plenty of critique of, and advice for, experts. Among many suggestions, Nichols offers four explicit recommendations. </p>
<ul>
<li><p>The first is that experts should strive to be more humble. </p></li>
<li><p>Second, be ecumenical – and by this Nichols means experts should vary their information sources, especially where politics is concerned, and not fall into the same echo chamber that many others inhabit. </p></li>
<li><p>Three, be less cynical. Here he counsels against assuming people are intentionally lying, misleading or wilfully trying to cause harm with assertions and claims that clearly go against solid evidence. </p></li>
<li><p>Finally, he cautions us all to be more discriminating – to check sources scrupulously for veracity and for political motivations. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>In essence, this last point admonishes experts to mindfully counteract the potent lure of confirmation bias that plagues us all.</p>
<p>It would be very easy for critics to cherry-pick elements of this book and present them out of context, to see Nichols as motivated by a desire to feather his own nest and reinforce his professional standing: in short, to accuse him of being an elitist. Sadly, this would be a prime example of exactly what he is decrying. </p>
<p>To these people, I say: read the whole book first. If it makes you uncomfortable, or even angry, consider why. </p>
<p>Have a conversation about it and formulate a coherent argument to refute the positions with which you disagree. Try to resist the urge to dismiss it out of hand or attack the author himself.</p>
<p>I fear, though, that as is common with a treatise like this, the people who might most benefit are the least likely to read it. And if they do, they will take umbrage at the minutiae, and then dismiss or attack it. </p>
<p>Unfortunately we haven’t worked how to change that. But to those so inclined, reading this book should have you nodding along, comforted at least that you are not alone in your concern that the role of expertise is in peril.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/76462/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rod Lamberts has received funding from the ARC and The Department of Industry, Innovation an Science.</span></em></p>Tom Nichols’ book The Death of Expertise examines why the relationship between experts and citizens in a democracy is collapsing, and what can be done about it.Rod Lamberts, Deputy Director, Australian National Centre for Public Awareness of Science, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/767662017-05-04T11:15:15Z2017-05-04T11:15:15ZEmmanuel Macron takes step closer to French presidency with strong performance in fiery debate<p>Emmanuel Macron was a virtually unknown figure in French politics before 2012. Now, as leader of the new political movement En Marche! he finds himself in the position of being the defender of French liberal democratic values in the second round of the French presidential elections against the far-right Marine le Pen. </p>
<p>Many doubted that he would hold his own during the televised debate between the two candidates on May 3, the only one before the second and final round of voting on May 7. But Macron delivered a masterclass performance in public speaking. </p>
<p>A relative newcomer to politics, Macron has espoused policies that are too left-wing for many voters on the right, and too right-wing for many voters on the left. Yet during the debate, he proved he could deliver a clear and coherent message. He also proved that Le Pen’s programme could not stand the light of scrutiny.</p>
<h2>Timing, tone, and attitude</h2>
<p>Macron’s approach during the debate was pitch perfect. With both candidates given the same amount of talking time, Macron’s mastery of his own time was remarkable. He took control of the debate at the beginning, taking more time than Le Pen to deliver a message that both played on national pride, but also accused her of telling lies and spreading nonsense. After letting his opponent talk more in the middle of the debate, Macron finished strong, unmasking Le Pen’s contempt for the French justice system, while urging the French to be optimistic about the future. </p>
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<p><a href="https://academic.oup.com/jcr/article-abstract/21/1/205/1853761/Message-Order-Effects-in-Persuasion-An-Attitude">Research</a> has shown that people remember and are persuaded more by information they receive either at the beginning of a message, or at the end, rather than in the middle. At the beginning and at the end of the debate, Macron was at his strongest. </p>
<p>The debate was full of accusations and insults on both sides, making it uncomfortable to watch. It is well known that <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=g4CSBQAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=mutz+incivility&ots=oeGsaXktS-&sig=gDZlhD0X_6CJmZGwFnHYknXGYuA#v=onepage&q=mutz%20incivility&f=false">people do not like</a> incivility in debates. But here Macron was again a step ahead of his opponent. While he accused her of telling lies and not having her facts right, his accusations were for the most part specific, relating to what she had done, or had proposed to do or had said. When justified, people are <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1540-5907.2010.00494.x/full">more willing</a> to accept incivility in debate. </p>
<p>On the other hand, he also debunked her accusations, for example when she accused him of being in charge of the takeover of a mobile phone company at a point when he did not hold elected office. At the end of the debate, she was reduced to simply shouting out the names of politicians who had endorsed Macron while he was espousing his vision for the future of France. </p>
<p>His nonverbal demeanour was also striking. Looking straight into the camera or straight into his opponent’s eyes, sitting slightly leant backward, shoulders straight, speaking with a clear, strong and calm voice, he exuded confidence. Opposite him, Le Pen often crossed her arms, leant forward, and lost eye contact. <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/political-science-research-and-methods/article/candidate-confidence-and-electoral-appeal-an-experimental-study-of-the-effect-of-nonverbal-confidence-on-voter-evaluations/ADE9ABD349F24E692440AD2F9DAA4CBC">Research</a> has shown that displaying nonverbal confidence is very important for voters’ impressions of a candidate’s leadership and winning potential. </p>
<h2>Catching up to do</h2>
<p>Since taking over the reins of the Front National from her father in 2011, Marine Le Pen has strived to convince the public that the <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-a-bid-to-detoxify-the-far-right-marine-le-pen-wants-to-appeal-to-french-jews-73993">party has changed</a>, that it is no longer a party catering to a niche electorate of the extreme right, but can be a party in government. Numerous <a href="http://www.seuil.com/ouvrage/marine-le-pen-prise-aux-mots-cecile-alduy/9782021172102">analyses</a> of her discourse throughout the year have shown this not to be the case, and that the changes <a href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41253-016-0012-7">are simply image based</a>. </p>
<p>During the debate, the lack of viability of FN policies, such as on removing France from the euro, and Le Pen’s inability to show command of state and economic affairs, such as when she was surprised to learn that many medical drugs are produced outside of France, was obvious. She painted the FN’s familiar apocalyptic picture of France, full of despair and bleakness, mentioning key phrases such as “national interest” multiple times, but offered nothing else new. </p>
<p>Macron, on the other hand, clearly expressed his desire to change the way things are done in France, and to do so with a pragmatic approach that takes advantage of the current strengths of France, her people and her place in Europe and the world. On every topic raised during the debate, he presented a clear plan of action. He talked about small and very small businesses, about the problem of youth radicalisation, about schools, about fiscal policy, and about people with disabilities.</p>
<p>While both candidates’ performances may not change how people vote (Macron still has a <a href="https://ig.ft.com/sites/france-election/polls/">20 percentage point lead</a> in the polls), it may have changed why people vote. No longer to stop Le Pen, but for Macron as a candidate and for his programme.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/76766/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Delia Dumitrescu 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>Marine Le Pen and Emmanuel Macron went head-to-head in the final debate before the second round of voting on May 7.Delia Dumitrescu, Lecturer in Media and Cultural Politics, University of East AngliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/768172017-04-28T13:21:58Z2017-04-28T13:21:58ZTheresa May and the art of political forgetting: a special way to use and abuse history<p>The only thing more overtly political than the <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Metahistory-Historical-Imagination-Nineteenth-Century-Europe/dp/0801817617">production of history</a> is the instrumental and often cynical <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Thinking-Time-History-Decision-Makers/dp/0029227917">use and abuse of history</a> by politicians. They are forever legitimising their actions by co-opting history to their side.</p>
<p>Depending on requirement, politicians sometimes construct their actions as <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-856X.2006.00264.x/abstract">moving with the tides of history</a>. At other times, they set out to drive a wedge between “then” and “now”. Creating a rupture with the past opens new narrative spaces which elites can fill with fresh information more in line with their current interests.</p>
<p>In political speeches, the use of words such as “new” and “change” are the most obvious indicators that politicians are bringing history into line with their present requirements. Examples from the recent past include the <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/New-Labour-European-Union-History/dp/0719076412">Tony Blair governments</a>, which were branded as progressive. They were avowedly “New” Labour, not the “Old” Labour of left-leaning socialism and state planning. </p>
<p>In the US, Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign was themed around “change”, a rhetoric he stood by right until his <a href="http://variety.com/2017/biz/politics/president-obama-final-tweet-potus-twitter-1201964977/">final tweet</a> in office. Borrowing from Obama, David Cameron also spoke a lot about “change” as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2009/oct/08/david-cameron-speech-in-full">leader of the Conservative Party</a>. For these politicians, history was brought to bear in the service of progress, as they saw it.</p>
<p>But the current British prime minister is putting history to rather different uses. Theresa May invokes history to ensnare the public in a collective process of political forgetting.</p>
<p>May wants to overlook her own recent past on the Europe question and ignore any <a href="http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/66177/">positives</a> that came out of the UK’s period as a European Union member to make Brexit easier to swallow for those still opposing it. Her decision to call an early general election indicates that she also wants to generate a large enough mandate to manage Brexit as she sees fit. She wants to limit contests from opponents on all sides, not least Brexit hardliners in her own party and government.</p>
<p>May’s use of history is calculated to carve onto the national political consciousness a “May Year Zero”, beginning in 2017.</p>
<h2>Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind</h2>
<p>May walked through the famous Downing Street black door in July 2016. She was the last candidate standing at the end of the Conservative Party’s bloody internecine leadership contest instigated by Cameron’s resignation. Recriminations, regret and a palpable sense of foreboding were in the air after the referendum, and Cameron’s departure had come as a surprise. A unity candidate was needed, someone who could pull together different factions of the Conservative Party, along with a country which had revealed itself to be divided nearly down the middle on the Europe question.</p>
<p>Naturally, on taking power, May’s background and career profile were <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36660372">mined for the minutest evidence</a> about what she thinks about various issues. And of course, May campaigned for Remain in the 2016 EU referendum.</p>
<p>Her lengthiest intervention was <a href="http://www.conservativehome.com/parliament/2016/04/theresa-mays-speech-on-brexit-full-text.html">a speech</a> delivered in April 2016. It was not a wholehearted endorsement of the EU: very few UK politicians with any nous go that far, hence her refrain that “Britain could cope outside the European Union”. The speech did, though, set out to convince her audience that the UK should be part of a reformed EU.</p>
<p>History was everywhere in this speech, yet May referred to it only to encourage her audience to forget it. This was history treated ironically. May reminded the country that this was not 1940, when the UK “stood alone” against the axis powers. Nor was it 1957, when the Rome treaties were signed (without Britain), founding modern European integration. Nor was it 1973, when the UK joined the European Economic Community. Nor indeed was it 1992, when the <a href="https://europa.eu/european-union/sites/europaeu/files/docs/body/treaty_on_european_union_en.pdf">Maastricht Treaty</a> transformed the EEC into the EU. History was dumped as unceremoniously as it had been dug up.</p>
<p>In case anyone was in doubt, May reminded us: “We are in 2016.” And in those four words lie her philosophy of history. The idea is to draw a line under the past so that the prime minister can move on personally from her recent personal past as a Remainer, the Conservative Party can forget its travails over Europe, and the country can unite behind a post-Brexit vision.</p>
<p>May’s engagement with historical time is more urgent for her than for most politicians. She badly needs to distance herself from her immediate past, and the UK from its EU history.</p>
<p>May, we can infer, wants us to remember only as far back as July 13 2016 – the day she became prime minister. This is for two reasons. First, everything that came before her accession to office potentially can be used to undermine the credibility of a Remain campaigner (even a lukewarm one) turned Brexit prime minister.</p>
<p>Second, the contemporary history of European unity is widely recounted by the progressive forces in UK politics and civil society organising themselves to oppose Brexit at the general election and beyond. The only change May wants is a huge Conservative majority after the 2017 election. It would give her a mandate to govern if not unrestrained or unopposed, then certainly more effectively until 2022. The change May needs personally, is to be known not as an ex-Remainer, but as the leader who delivered a successful Brexit.</p>
<p>Expect this most pragmatic of prime ministers to play fast and loose with historical time in a bid to achieve the level of political forgetting she requires. May will only excavate memories of the past to bury them more deeply.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/76817/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Oliver Daddow 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 the academic appointment above. He tweets @oliver_daddow</span></em></p>Politicians often mould historical fact to suit their needs, but the current PM would rather just forget the past altogether.Oliver Daddow, Assistant Professor in British Politics and Security, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/701882016-12-22T19:10:31Z2016-12-22T19:10:31ZA very diplomatic Christmas: how to avoid a coup at the dinner table this year<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150215/original/image-20161214-2478-16379fg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Asking people for their thoughts is inherently a generous act, as we are giving our time to hear them.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Politics and religion at the dinner table, over a Christmas meal with all the relatives – what could possibly go wrong?</p>
<p>If the thought doesn’t appeal to you, it’s worth considering how this potentially fraught situation could be understood with a view to resolving tensions and perhaps coming to a mutual understanding. </p>
<p>And it’s also worth considering when it might be best to smile and nod and leave well enough alone. Either way, there’s usually scope for some sort of progress if we are willing to ride a few swells of social unrest in order to arrive at calmer waters.</p>
<p>Let’s take the example of cousin Glenda, who is contemptuous of those with political views unlike her own conservative ones, and of uncle Angus, who embraces far-left social policies. </p>
<p>Whenever someone says something politically liberal, Glenda quite viciously attacks the sentiment. The usual taunts include criticism of socialism, lamentation of the number of bludgers out there, and how unions are enemies of civilisation. Angus inevitably follows with accusations that Glenda is self-centred and uncaring, with a tendency towards fascism. </p>
<p>It happens every year without fail, causing everyone to absorb themselves in the meal and try desperately to change the topic of conversation. So what’s to be done?</p>
<h2>Find out what people think, not just what they say</h2>
<p>In general, people give their views without much in the way of explanation for how they arrived at them. </p>
<p>Often this pathway is not easy to articulate to oneself, let alone to others. Knowing this provides us with a strategy to ease tensions and a way to understand why some people are so upset when their views are challenged.</p>
<p>What we need to do is to understand each other’s positions in as much detail as possible, and to interpret each other’s arguments with as much <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-theres-so-little-real-argument-in-todays-political-debate-59586">honesty and charity</a> as we can.</p>
<p>So, we might ask cousin Glenda to explain to us what she means when she speaks against socialism, and why she thinks the central philosophy of socialism is not desirable. Done with a genuine desire to understand her position, this can be non-threatening – after all, we are asking for her advice. </p>
<p>If she treats this well, we might further inquire as to how she sees unions as undesirable. We could show our own ignorance by suggesting unions may have done some good things in the past, so how does she see that they have become less useful? </p>
<p>Angus might then be willing to explain how his understanding of fascism relates to the situation. This kind of gentle probing also ensures that Glenda and Angus are aware themselves of the implications of their ideas and of the basis on which each is formed.</p>
<p>What such a strategy does is to help us connect to what others are thinking, not just saying. If we can understand how others hold a particular position, we have a better chance of understanding them as a person – but also, if we like, to change their minds. It can even get those willing to explain themselves to examine their own ideas more closely. </p>
<p>This can be a good thing, but it can also be problematic. When people express a view with conviction and then struggle to justify that view, it can result in frustration and anger. It’s not fun to publicly fail to justify why even you should believe what you say. </p>
<p>Still, getting people to explain their thinking is a way to connect with them and, at the least, have a respectful conversation. This is better than the alternative.</p>
<h2>Understand each other’s narratives</h2>
<p>A clash of ideologies cannot result in a synthesis of ideas without a desire to engage and understand. In the absence of genuine inquiry, we resort to making crude caricatures of each other that we imagine represent those silly enough not to think like us. This is lazy thinking, but we are all guilty of it.</p>
<p>It’s a fascinating phenomenon that we all think we are the exemplar of the rational person, and therefore anyone who doesn’t think like us must be irrational or less informed.</p>
<p>But what it really comes down to is <a href="https://theconversation.com/post-truth-politics-and-the-us-election-why-the-narrative-trumps-the-facts-66480">the narrative</a> that binds how we see the world and our role in it. If someone’s views threaten the integrity of that narrative, we are motivated to reject them.</p>
<p>Angus and Glenda probably have very strong narratives, and they are not necessarily open to change. But rather than reject Angus and Glenda, or be rejected by them, we can express a genuine desire to inquire into their beliefs and their thinking. Drilling down to the core of their value system, we might find we are not so different after all. </p>
<p>Asking people for their thoughts is inherently a generous act, as we are giving our time to hear them. Maybe that’s a good way to understand the meaning of Christmas.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/70188/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Ellerton 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>Politics and religion at the dinner table, over Christmas with all the relatives – what could possibly go wrong?Peter Ellerton, Lecturer in Critical Thinking, The University of QueenslandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/689542016-12-12T03:41:07Z2016-12-12T03:41:07ZTrump trolls, Pirate Parties and the Italian Five Star Movement: The internet meets politics<p>We blame the internet for a lot of things, and now the list has grown to include our politics. In a turbulent year marked by the U.K.’s decision to leave the European Union and the election of Donald Trump, some have started to wonder to what extent the recent events have to do with the technology that most defines our age.</p>
<p>In the aftermath of Trump’s victory, commentators accused Facebook of being <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/markrogowsky/2016/11/17/facebook-with-great-power-comes-great-responsibility/#380f552d6e7d">indirectly responsible</a> for his election. Specifically, they point to the role of social media in spreading virulent political propaganda and fake news. The internet has been increasingly presented as a possible cause for the <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-a-post-truth-election-clicks-trump-facts-67274">post-truth culture</a> that allegedly characterizes contemporary democracies.</p>
<p>These reactions are a reminder that new technologies often stimulate <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/10.1080/13688804.2014.898904">both hopes and fears</a> about their impact on society and culture. The internet has been seen as both the harbinger of political participation and the main culprit for the decline of democracy. The network of networks is now more than a mere vehicle of political communication: It has become a powerful rhetorical symbol people are using to achieve political goals. </p>
<p>This is currently visible in Europe, where movements such as the <a href="http://piratar.is/en/">Pirate Parties</a> and the Italian <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-italys-five-star-movement-69596">Five Star Movement</a>, which we have <a href="http://mcs.sagepub.com/content/36/1/105.abstract">studied</a>, build their political messages around the internet. To them, the internet is a catalyst for radical and democratic change that channels growing dissatisfaction with traditional political parties.</p>
<h2>Web utopias and dystopias</h2>
<p>The emergence of political enthusiasm for the internet owes much to U.S. culture in the 1990s. Internet connectivity was spreading from universities and corporations to an increasingly large portion of the population. During the Clinton administration, Vice President Al Gore made the “<a href="http://www.ibiblio.org/icky/speech2.html">Information Superhighway</a>” a flagship concept. He linked the development of a high-speed digital telecommunication network to a new era of enlightened market democracy. </p>
<p>The enthusiasm for information technology and free-market economics spread from Silicon Valley and was dubbed <a href="http://www.imaginaryfutures.net/2007/04/17/the-californian-ideology-2">Californian Ideology</a>. It inspired a generation of digital entrepreneurs, technologists, politicians and activists in Silicon Valley and beyond. The <a href="http://time.com/3741681/2000-dotcom-stock-bust/">2000 dot-com crash</a> only temporarily curbed the hype.</p>
<p>In the 2000s, the rise of sharing platforms and social media – often labeled as “<a href="http://www.oreilly.com/pub/a/web2/archive/what-is-web-20.html">Web 2.0</a>” – supported the idea of a new era of increased participation of common citizens in the production of cultural content, software development and even political revolutions against authoritarian regimes.</p>
<p>The promise of the unrestrained flow of information also engendered deep fears. In 1990s, the web was already seen by critics as a vehicle for poor-quality information, hate speech and extreme pornography. We knew then that the Information Superhighway’s dark side was worryingly <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1996/01/15/business/limiting-medium-without-boundaries-you-let-good-fish-through-net-while-blocking.html">difficult to regulate</a>.</p>
<p>Paradoxically, the promise of decentralization has resulted in few massive advertising empires like Facebook and Google, employing sophisticated <a href="https://theconversation.com/western-democracys-new-maxim-surveillance-and-soft-despotism-48879">mass surveillance techniques</a>. Web-based companies like Uber and Airbnb bring new efficient services to millions of customers, but are also seen as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-uber-opens-cities-only-to-close-them-59067">potential monopolists</a> that threaten local economies and squeeze profits out of impoverished communities.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://techliberation.com/2011/01/31/the-case-for-internet-optimism-part-1-saving-the-net-from-its-detractors/">public’s views</a> on digital media are rapidly shifting. In less than 10 years, the stories we tell about the internet have moved from praising its democratic potential to imagining it as a dangerous source of extreme politics, polarized echo chambers and a hive of misogynist and racist trolls.</p>
<h2>Cyber-optimism in Europe</h2>
<p>While cyber-utopian views have lost appeal in the U.S., the idea of the internet as a promise of radical reorganization of society has survived. In fact, it has become a defining element of political movements that thrive in Western Europe.</p>
<p>In Italy, an anti-establishment party know as the Five Star Movement became the second most-voted for party in Italy in the 2013 national elections. According to <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-politics-5star-idUSKCN0ZM130">some polls</a>, it might soon even win general elections in Italy.</p>
<p>In <a href="http://mcs.sagepub.com/content/36/1/105.abstract">our research</a>, we analyzed how the Italian Five Star Movement uses a mythical idea of the internet as a catalyst for its political message. In the party’s rhetoric, declining and corrupt mainstream parties are allied with newspapers and television. By contrast, the movement claims to harness the power of the web to “kill” old politics and bring about direct democracy, efficiency and transparency in governance.</p>
<p>Similarly in Iceland, the Pirate Party is now poised to lead a <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/pirate-party-may-step-in-as-iceland-hits-election-stalemate-a7435971.html">coalition government</a>. Throughout the few last years, other Pirate Parties have emerged and have been at times quite successful in other European countries, including <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/137305/rise-fall-pirate-party">Germany</a> and <a href="http://pol.sagepub.com/content/31/3/121?patientinform-links=yes&legid=sppol;31/3/121">Sweden</a>. While they differ in many ways from the Five Star Movement, their leaders also insist that the internet will help enable new forms of democratic participation. Their success was made possible by the powerful vision of a new direct democracy facilitated by online technologies. </p>
<h2>A vision of change</h2>
<p>Many politicians all over the world run campaigns on the promise of change, communicating a positive message to potential voters. The rise of forces such as the Five Star Movement and the Pirate Parties in Europe is an example of how the rhetoric of political change and the rhetoric of the digital revolution can interact with each other, merging into a unique, coherent discourse.</p>
<p>In thinking about the impact of the internet in politics, we usually consider how social media, websites and other online resources are used as a vehicle of political communication. Yet, its impact as a symbol and a powerful narrative is equally strong.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/68954/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>While the US is reeling from rampant fake online news, political movements in Europe are using the internet as a powerful democratic symbol to win elections. Will cyber-optimism or pessimism win?Andrea Ballatore, Lecturer in Geographic Information Science, Birkbeck, University of LondonSimone Natale, Lecturer in Communication and Media Studies, Loughborough UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/696792016-11-30T16:42:20Z2016-11-30T16:42:20ZKate Bush, Theresa May and the trouble with political partisanship<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148139/original/image-20161130-17000-cgs23z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Red shoes, blue soul?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/49815666@N04/4938974521/in/photolist-8wrx48-9u8G3C-6etisy-2qhNKD-85QHgf-8fGVRE-6kiNg-6NLe6x-6NQpuy-7f9Q3F-3T5VgC-6tza2N-7MtbAQ-4ADBTz-p1jrJG-p35Xqg-p3jq4G-oKRqtr-oKRoXv-oKRCZE-oKS6Qb-p35XPx-p3mjJ2-oKS6HY-p3jrsy-oKREXY-p3micV-p35YVR-p1jsGy-oKS6mW-p35Xz4-p3mjyx-oKREfW-71PLP2-3mvUXn-pdfkd3-pczNjW-ptMMPR-pczas1-pcyT2e-dGPjis-6MGEnP-6MLPvN-6MGCBg-6MLPxW-6MGCBF-6MGCCn-6MHGBZ-6MLRgy-6MLPyo">Marion Roper</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Kate Bush has <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2288226/backlash-against-kate-bush-after-pop-queen-calls-theresa-may-the-best-thing-thats-happened-to-us-in-a-long-time/">created a stir</a> with remarks she made to the Canadian magazine <a href="http://www.macleans.ca/culture/arts/in-conversation-with-kate-bush/">Maclean’s</a>. Bush explained that she “really liked” Theresa May, who she described as “wonderful” and the “best thing that’s happened to us in a long time”.</p>
<p>It wasn’t long before people were tweeting their horror at the apparent evidence that <a href="https://twitter.com/search?vertical=default&q=Kate%20Bush%20is%20a%20Tory&src=typd">“Kate Bush is a Tory”</a>. Fans appeared outraged that the singer they had followed with devotion was praising a right-wing government. There seemed to be an assumption that an artist like Kate Bush is, by definition, left-wing.</p>
<p>Of course artists do not owe their political affiliation to any one ideology. But the notion of artists as necessarily left-wing has endured. It is one Stewart Lee grappled with in 2013 when he pondered <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/world/2016/11/no-identity-politics-not-blame-failures-left">“where are all the right wing stand-ups?”</a>. Lee ultimately concluded that comedy is about punching up and the right, by definition, can only punch down.</p>
<p>Perhaps this is where the outcry stems from. Kate Bush can’t be a Tory, she’s one of “us”. If her fans are as invested in the artist as the art, maybe this feels like a betrayal. Or if you’ve always hated her anyway, vindication. But why does politics produce such a visceral response? </p>
<h2>Political intolerance</h2>
<p>The reaction is indicative of wider political research showing that although left-wingers are more socially tolerant, they tend to be more politically intolerant. One can’t imagine such an outcry from Conservatives if Bush expressed admiration for Jeremy Corbyn.</p>
<p>Political scientist <a href="https://www.research.manchester.ac.uk/portal/Rob.Ford.html">Rob Ford</a> has <a href="https://www.bitebackpublishing.com/books/more-sex-lies-and-the-ballot-box">written</a> about just this.</p>
<p>A 2012 survey found that a quarter of Labour voters would be upset if their child married a Conservative supporter. Conservatives, on the other hand, were relatively more relaxed about the prospect of a left-winger in the family.</p>
<p>The liberal left were more tolerant of ethnic minorities and those on benefits joining the clan but apparently couldn’t find space round the dinner table for a right winger. </p>
<p>Similarly, those on the left would be far more upset if a potential in-law was a Sun or Daily Mail reader than those on the right would be about readers of The Guardian or Mirror.</p>
<p>The reasons forwarded for this are that social groups exist as stereotypes – and, societally, the right is viewed more negatively.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"803547103515578368"}"></div></p>
<p>This political intolerance shows that politics is embedded in wider society. Voting isn’t just something that you do at election time. As Ford suggests, political affiliation “is a social act which for many affirms or reaffirms who they are (and, equally, who they are not)”. </p>
<p>But if you assume the other side is evil it becomes relatively hard to win around their voters, let alone understand their feelings and concerns. Hyper-partisanship can be dangerous. It can, to an extent, explain why Donald Trump <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/demographics-arent-destiny-and-four-other-things-this-election-taught-me/">won 90%</a> of the registered Republican vote earlier this month. This despite his <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/trump-ideology/">ambiguous ideological positioning</a> and controversial comments about (amongst others) women, Mexicans – and the Republican establishment.</p>
<p>Hyper-partisanship also explains why voters explain away any potential positives in their opponents and see negatives where there may be none. In the US, for example, <a href="http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/11/republicans-suddenly-think-the-economy-is-getting-better.html">measuring perceptions</a> of whether the economy is improving provides telling results.</p>
<p>Immediately before the presidential election, 16% of Republicans thought that the economy was getting better, compared to 61% of Democrats. Post-election, the Republicans who thought the economy was improving had tripled to 49%, whereas the Democrat figure had fallen to 46%.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"803667552509591552"}"></div></p>
<p>Returning to Kate Bush, it’s worth noting that praise does not mean political endorsement. Politics is more than just putting a cross in a box. It is unsurprising, but perhaps unfair, that fans project their politics – their own view of the world – onto someone who they consider to have had an integral part in shaping it. However, having a different opinion (and a relatively benign one at that) does not disqualify a body of work.</p>
<p>The problem with hyper-partisan politics is that it deepens distrust on both sides of the debate. This threatens political institutions. At a time when anti-establishment politics is on the march and a president elect is actively questioning the legitimacy of an election that he won, the threat to fundamental institutions is stark.</p>
<p>Contemporary understandings of politics and democracy have been challenged in 2016. There are no easy solutions. However, one might suggest that a bit of understanding and respect – on both sides – may go a long way.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69679/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sam Power receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council.</span></em></p>The backlash against the singer’s warm words for Theresa May are a reminder of a certain kind of intolerance.Sam Power, Doctoral researcher, Sussex Centre for the Study of Corruption, University of SussexLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/689062016-11-25T07:30:56Z2016-11-25T07:30:56ZPolitical dialogue is a lost art in Venezuela and the Vatican’s intervention won’t help<p>For the uninitiated, it is difficult to understand what’s wresting Venezuela apart. For the past year, a convoluted political confrontation – the product of the hardening and mutually exclusive interests held by the government of president Nicolas Maduro and the political opposition – has been roiling on.</p>
<p>With tensions so high and <a href="http://www.entornointeligente.com/articulo/7663383/Confrontacion-de-poderes-en-Venezuela-con-consecuencias-impredecibles">angry, hungry citizens struggling to get by</a>, the Vatican <a href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/erasmus/2016/10/venezuela-and-vatican">recently launched</a> <em>mesas de discusion</em>, mediated discussions between the two sides. </p>
<p>Given the myriad, deep-set and long-held <a href="http://www.correodelcaroni.com/index.php/nacional-2/item/50817-vaticano-entra-de-lleno-en-la-mediacion-de-la-crisis-politica-venezolana">conflicts facing this country</a> that make dialogue nearly impossible, I fear the proposed talks will make little progress. </p>
<h2>A country on the edge</h2>
<p>Some of Venezuela’s problems are well reported. It has the region’s <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21694588-inflation-test-latin-americas-central-banks-return-old-enemy">worst inflation</a>, <a href="http://www.notilogia.com/2016/11/precio-de-la-canasta-alimentaria-venezuela.html">food and medicine shortages</a> and newly resurgent poverty-related ailments such as <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/International/venezuela-crisis-rampant-shortages-leave-country-shambles/story?id=40261315">Chagas’ disease and malaria</a>, once vanquished.</p>
<p>What’s less easily discerned from outside is how this decline in citizen well-being also contributes to Venezuela’s political instability. </p>
<p>Ruled by the <a href="https://panampost.com/pedro-garcia/2016/07/04/venezuela-hunger-poorest-widespread/">logic of survival</a>, people are less able to provide input into the functioning of their government. Venezuelans have to stand in long lines to buy basic food (either that or be price gouged by unscrupulous black-market merchants), and it’s common to see people hitting pharmacy after pharmacy until they finally find their diabetes medication or birth control pills. </p>
<p>Citizens are also simply less willing to take part in politics. After so much disappointment, Venezuelans <a href="http://notiespartano.com/2016/11/14/68-desconfia-la-disposicion-dialogo-del-chavismo/">do not trust politicians or their political parties</a>. This lack of confidence, combined with deep polarisation, curtails the efficacy of the democratic system.</p>
<p>These are the fundamental problems that Venezuelans face. But, by all appearances, the political establishment has no idea, or doesn’t care. They’ll talk, but only about the distribution of power: who stays, who goes, and who will do what, when. </p>
<h2>Death of the social contract</h2>
<p>The modern Venezuelan story starts with Hugo Chavez’s rise to power in 1998, marking the end of the two-party power-sharing system that had kept the country stable but corrupt since 1958. People had lost faith in the capacity of elites to solve problems and <a href="http://www.eluniversal.com/opinion/130414/el-fin-de-la-cuarta-republica">to represent their interests</a>, so along came Chavez.</p>
<p>The story of his “<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/30/world/americas/chavez-restyles-venezuela-with-21stcentury-socialism.html">21st century socialism</a>” is well known. Chavez, a charismatic individual perfectly suited for political leadership, managed to rally and satisfy the ignored masses over 18 tumultuous years, while <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2013/03/05/venezuela-chavezs-authoritarian-legacy">breaking basic constitutional principles</a> and alienating the wealthy. </p>
<p>During that time, Venezuela <a href="http://www.npr.org/2013/04/19/177809667/post-chavez-venezuela-grows-more-not-less-polarized">grew increasingly polarised</a>, its social fabric ripping at the seams. <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/democraciaabierta/michael-penfold/venezuela-where-polarising-is-so-easy">Intolerance became part of the political discourse</a>, making it easy to disqualify people who appear to be different from economic or cultural backgrounds. </p>
<p>Today, the social contract is all but nullified. </p>
<p>The current deep conflict began nearly a year ago when the opposition swept <a href="http://www.entornointeligente.com/articulo/7498836/VENEZUELA-Medios-internacionales-resenan-victoria-de-la-oposicion-en-las-parlamentarias-07122015">parliamentary elections in December 2015</a>. They now hold an absolute majority in the National Assembly. </p>
<p>Venezuela’s heavily oil-based economy was already crumbling. Maduro took power as international oil prices were dipping, and <a href="http://www.avn.info.ve/contenido/%C2%BFc%C3%B3mo-afectan-bajos-precios-del-petr%C3%B3leo-econom%C3%ADa-nacional">the drop in cash flow has been painful for the country</a>. The government cannot afford to buy goods and services on the international market, <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2016/10/21/498867764/episode-731-how-venezuela-imploded">further hindering the productivity</a> of an economy that was already hugely dependent on imports. </p>
<p>Today, empty coffers make it impossible for Maduro to satisfy the demands of the public like Chavez used to. This weakens the populism that has long served as social control over the country’s poorest sectors, and <a href="http://www.npr.org/2016/10/30/499985897/protesters-continue-effort-to-recall-venezuelan-president">foments discontent</a> in the form of impeachment efforts and political violence. Polls in Venezuela are notoriously unreliable, but one in August put <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-idUSKCN10Q28M">Maduro’s approval ratings at around 20%</a>. </p>
<h2>Democracy without the people</h2>
<p>Since the opposition’s resurgence, the relationship between the National Assembly and executive branches has become more confrontational, even violent. The dynamic is only slightly easing thanks to <a href="http://www.el-nacional.com/mundo/Luis-Almagro-Santa-Sede-Venezuela_0_949705311.html">third-party mediation</a> from the <a href="http://www.unasursg.org/en">Union of South American Nations </a> and <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/10/25/americas/venezuela-government-opposition-talks/">the Vatican</a>. </p>
<p>Venezuelans’ gravest social problems are, of course, linked to this troubled political dynamic. The Pope’s <em>mesas de discusión</em> aim to help the various parties secure an agreement to work toward reducing political conflict and restoring the constitutional regime. But there’s one major problem: it’s all being done without the people. </p>
<p>One look at <a href="http://efectococuyo.com/politica/conozca-las-propuestas-que-presenta-la-mud-en-las-mesas-de-dialogo">the agendas</a> makes clear that they’re thinking about political representation and partisan interests, not social representation and the necessities of the populace. </p>
<p>The proposed priority items are: the release of political prisoners, government stability, and the restoration of full powers of the National Assembly, which was recently <a href="http://www.eluniversal.com/noticias/politica/tsj-dictado-sentencias-contra-asamblea-nacional_622598">held “in contempt” by the Supreme Court</a>.</p>
<p>Where’s the social agenda, the solutions around food and medicine and jobs? What’s the date for the next round of elections?</p>
<p>In addition to the distance between the underlying logic and interests of the proposed dialogue and citizens’ urgent needs, the proposed dialogues will reach another impasse due to their inherently limited reach. </p>
<p>Venezuela’s damaged social fabric can’t be fixed by political agreements about administrative functions. For Venezuela to heal, democracy must be restored, and that means citizens must take part in defining the agenda and making decisions. </p>
<h2>Power plays</h2>
<p>The government and the opposition hold a dichotomous vision about dialogue and its consequences. For president Maduro and the Chavistas, it’s about simply staying in power after a dismal year. For the opposition, the <em>mesas</em> represent a powerful opportunity to deligitimise the leadership and offer themselves as a viable alternative. </p>
<p>This is surely not the peace and reckoning the Vatican hoped for.</p>
<p>By <a href="http://latinbusinessmagazine.com/negociacion-consideraciones-previas/.html">definition</a>, political accords <a href="http://latinbusinessmagazine.com/la-negociacion-integrativa/.html">must fulfil at least two conditions</a>. Both sides must be willing to establish mutually beneficial agreements, and each must consider the other a valid interlocutor. Only in this way will dialogue between factions not just reflect partisan preference but also guarantee follow-up and implementation. </p>
<p>Venezuela is set up to fail on both accounts. To succeed, it must establish mechanisms for channelling the needs of broader society in order to reconstruct the healthier, stabler lives Venezuelans once knew. That won’t be easy, and I hope to explore possible solutions in a future article.</p>
<p>In the meantime, citizens won’t even be seated at the Pope’s negotiating table. When the rules of the game are set by those in power, it’s always the people who lose.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/68906/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Miguel Angel Latouche 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>In a time of hunger and violence, Venezuela’s proposed peace talks are narrowly focused on power distribution. But where’s the seat for the countries citizens?Miguel Angel Latouche, Associate professor, Universidad Central de VenezuelaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/685612016-11-10T19:51:52Z2016-11-10T19:51:52ZDonald Trump tweeted himself into the White House<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/145466/original/image-20161110-25055-114b1a5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=400%2C0%2C4030%2C2519&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Trumpisms at your fingertips.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Campaign-2016-Trump/638a4cdb2728415caf657b3eefe47b9c/3/0">AP Photo/John Locher</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Donald Trump’s presidential election victory has been described as <a href="http://theconversation.com/five-things-that-explain-donald-trumps-stunning-presidential-election-victory-66891">stunning</a>, <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/joelkotkin/2016/11/09/donald-trumps-presidenti-victory-demographics/#ffb7dda79a8b">shocking</a> and having elicited a “<a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2016/11/09/trump-triumphs-medias-primal-scream-is-heard-round-world.html">primal scream</a>” from the media. The president-elect resonated enough with more than 59 million Americans that they pulled the lever for him in the voting booth and propelled him to a win.</p>
<p>Trump connected with his supporters both in person and on social media, particularly via Twitter. He was back tweeting mere hours after delivering his victory speech. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"796315640307060738"}"></div></p>
<p>Trump’s affinity for Twitter is well-documented. One political operative characterized the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/06/us/politics/donald-trump-twitter-use-campaign-2016.html">candidate’s presence on the social networking site</a> as “a continuous Trump rally that happens on Twitter at all hours.” His perceived dexterity led some to <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2016/02/donald_trump_is_the_best_at_twitter_here_s_why.html">declare him the best</a> on social media and winner of the social media war. </p>
<p>But how much influence did Twitter have during the 2016 presidential election? As a law professor who researches the internet’s impact on the tangible world, I believe the answer to this question could, in some ways, transform the way political candidates manage their campaigns for years to come. </p>
<h2>Politics in the palm of your hand</h2>
<p>With more than <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/282087/number-of-monthly-active-twitter-users/">300 million active users</a> in the first three-quarters of 2016, Twitter allows people to interact with droves of friends and followers in 140 characters or less. While <a href="http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/sociology/political-sociology/avoiding-politics-how-americans-produce-apathy-everyday-life?format=PB">Americans tend to avoid discussions about politics offline</a>, social media environments like Twitter make it nearly impossible to avoid political interactions on the internet. Though research shows that few Clinton or Trump supporters have <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2016/08/03/few-clinton-or-trump-supporters-have-close-friends-in-the-other-camp/">close friends in the opposing camp</a>, social media extends these connections significantly. With Twitter in particular, users are statistically more likely to <a href="http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/10/25/the-political-environment-on-social-media/">follow people they do not know personally</a> than with Facebook, where users often connect to those with whom they have some personal connection. </p>
<p>This is particularly powerful when you consider the impact social media has on political opinions. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0894439309335162">Long hours of exposure to political discourse</a> can enhance participation in politics, and communication with others galvanizes political activity around common concerns. One in five people <a href="http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/10/25/the-tone-of-social-media-discussions-around-politics/">report changing their views</a> on a political or social issue because of something they read on social media, and nearly the same amount say they changed their views about a specific candidate based on what they read there. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/145467/original/image-20161110-25077-y88hxt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/145467/original/image-20161110-25077-y88hxt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/145467/original/image-20161110-25077-y88hxt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/145467/original/image-20161110-25077-y88hxt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/145467/original/image-20161110-25077-y88hxt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/145467/original/image-20161110-25077-y88hxt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/145467/original/image-20161110-25077-y88hxt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/145467/original/image-20161110-25077-y88hxt.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>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Perhaps Ivanka and Donald Jr. are retweeting quips from their dad.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/GOP-2016-Convention/629ac925b7d34eeab843f177e6baba17/1/0">AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Trump’s uncensored tweets persuaded</h2>
<p>Trump was remarkably effective at harnessing this type of social media power to influence opinions. His campaign successfully crowdsourced a message of anger and fear by <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/HICSS.2010.412">leveraging the knowledge, contacts and skills</a> of his followers to disseminate his tweets widely. For example, Trump would receive <a href="https://blog.monkeylearn.com/donald-trump-vs-hillary-clinton-sentiment-analysis-twitter-mentions/">nearly double the number of Twitter mentions</a> as Hillary Clinton each day, even though (or maybe because) his messages were <a href="http://www.vox.com/2016/11/7/13550796/clinton-trump-twitter">much more negative</a>. He also boasted about 40 percent more Twitter followers than his democratic rival.</p>
<p>Trump developed a rapport with his followers by maintaining his own Twitter account throughout much of his campaign. Clinton primarily used a media team – and it showed. Experts have pointed out that because Trump’s tweets largely <a href="http://www.cio.com/article/3137513/social-networking/twitters-impact-on-2016-presidential-election-is-unmistakable.html">sounded like they came directly from him</a> – seeming off-the-cuff and unvetted by media pros – they were quite persuasive for his supporters. </p>
<p>This type of relationship development proved to be critical, as fans and followers joined Trump’s movement and developed into large voting blocs. Scott Adams, who created the “Dilbert” comic strip, spent much of the election season <a href="http://blog.dilbert.com/post/152644376081/the-persuasion-scorecard-update-one-week-out">writing about Trump</a> as a master of persuasion, particularly through his strong use of fear.</p>
<p>Quantitatively, Trump’s apparently unfiltered posts reiterating this messaging regularly resulted in <a href="http://www.salon.com/2016/09/25/trumps-twitter-dominance-whos-the-obama-of-2016-it-might-not-be-who-you-think/">much more Twitter engagement</a> for him than Clinton. Trump’s followers would replicate and share his message in droves. Some described having an “<a href="http://bigthink.com/connected/trump-twitter">emotional connection</a>” to him and would spend hours pushing his message to their own networks, even though they were not officially affiliated with the Trump campaign.</p>
<p>In addition, Trump’s posts created a feedback loop, whereby posts on social media made it to television news – getting for free what would have cost the <a href="http://www.marketwatch.com/story/trump-has-gotten-nearly-3-billion-in-free-advertising-2016-05-06">equivalent of US$3 billion</a> in media coverage and advertising costs. He ultimately <a href="http://www.marketwatch.com/story/donald-trump-spent-the-least-to-win-votes-delegates-2016-05-04">spent less money per vote and per delegate</a> than anyone running for president this year, but obtained the highest level of visibility. </p>
<p>This is not to suggest that Clinton didn’t have her own successes. Responding to an insult from Trump, she earned the <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/441944/hillary-clinton-social-media-effective">most retweeted tweet of the campaign season</a> when she suggested that Trump delete his Twitter account.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"740973710593654784"}"></div></p>
<p>But Trump monopolized Twitter and the news cycle and ultimately obtained the most electoral votes. </p>
<h2>Harnessing the tech of the day</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/26/opinions/jones-trump-social-media/">Historians have noted</a> that disruptive technologies have the power to transform political elections. Franklin D. Roosevelt used the new medium of radio to deliver his fireside chats because his opponents controlled many of the newspapers in the 1930s and he <a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/content/fireside-politics">wanted to avoid newspaper bias</a>. John F. Kennedy, four days after narrowly defeating Richard Nixon, <a href="http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2021078,00.html">stated that</a> “it was the TV more than anything else that turned the tide.” Television, the new medium of the day, had exploded in popularity during the decade preceding the 1960 election. It seems that Trump took several pages out of history to help pull off one of the biggest upsets in modern election history. </p>
<p>I imagine researchers will study Trump’s campaign tactics for years to come. In fact, <a href="http://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/43019033/Twitter_and_The_2016_U.S._Presidential_Campaign_A_Rhetorical_Analysis_Of_Tweets.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAJ56TQJRTWSMTNPEA&Expires=1478801537&Signature=kGb%2BZps2Te9U05aMhnBMZQnCUNk%3D&response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DTwitter_and_the_2016_U.S._Presidential_C.pdf">analyses of Twitter’s impact</a> on the 2016 presidential election have already begun. The New York Times even recently cataloged all of the “people, places, and things” <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/01/28/upshot/donald-trump-twitter-insults.html?_r=0">Trump insulted on Twitter</a>. Trump’s unconventional methods, originally ridiculed by traditional pundits <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/article/439115/donald-trumps-unconventional-campaign-no-longer-effective">as ineffective</a> and sounding like a “<a href="http://www.dailypnut.com/2016/07/nutshell-donald-trumps-campaign/">rushed, high school term paper</a>,” thrived on Twitter’s quick and unfiltered universe. His campaign could test acerbic messages in near real-time with his followers and determine whether to continue them on the campaign trail. </p>
<p>Traditional politicians looking to remain in office may discover that Trump’s unconventional rise has created a new normal for campaign strategies. Unsurprisingly, Twitter users whose posts get a lot of engagement through likes, retweets and replies <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1313405">post more frequently</a> than users who do not. And research also shows that <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0142390">emotions on Twitter are contagious</a> – both negative and positive tweets generate more of the same on the platform (with positive tweets <a href="http://psychcentral.com/news/2015/11/10/positive-emotions-often-shared-via-twitter/94640.html">being more contagious</a>). As <a href="http://web.stanford.edu/%7Ejesszhao/files/twitterSentiment.pdf">emotion played a role</a> in this year’s political campaign, unlocking the secrets to wide and permanent dissemination will bode well for political candidates who harness the power of Twitter and other social media forms… at least until the next innovation comes along.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/68561/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shontavia Johnson 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>What can future politicians learn from the president-elect’s social media presence while on the campaign trail?Shontavia Johnson, Professor of Intellectual Property Law, Drake UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.