Thursday, 22 October 2009

Political persuasion in action

When considering political persuasion most would probably concern themselves with voting behaviour, the exercise of political power and the yah-boo sucks politics of political parties and individual elected representatives.

I am reminded by Vaughan Bell at Mind Hacks, that political persuasion is more that partisan or governing politics. Political persuasion also includes how we shape opinion and influence personal behaviour on a range of non-partisan issues. This short interview talks about how a report on climate change might influence wider opinion.

I am particularly intrigued by Robert Gifford's suggestion that an effective message is comprised of five elements. I think these, especially the fourth and fifth are achievable within such issues as personal health and global warming, but I don't think that party politicians use all of this five element approach. One, two and three - yes - but not the last two. It would be interesting to see if politcians turned matters on their heads and said that the electrorate are the real heroes.

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