We invite you to help refresh the media's tired templates of campaign coverage to address issues people really care about
Jay Rosen and Amanda Michel
guardian.co.uk,
Thursday 8 December 2011 08.05 GMT
Article history
Early days of hope, with Senator Barack Obama on the campaign stump in North Carolina, October 2008. Photograph: Jim Young/Reuters
In a few weeks, the Iowa caucuses will officially kick off the 2012 campaign for president and we'll begin to get answers to the questions that obsess our political press: who's gonna win? What is the winning strategy?
We're equally obsessed with a different question: how can Americans get a "win" in the election of 2012? Meaning: the kind of dialogue they deserve, a campaign that connects to their deepest concerns and helps them make sense of the cascading problems now before the United States. And if you share our obsession, you can help us get started or follow along.
Presidential elections are a race – a marathon, as the exhausted candidate often says. They are national spectacles, not around the edges but at their core. Elections are comedies, too, a rolling entertainment. And so there has to be a place for horse race polls, game day coverage, personality journalism, political carnival, and even for front-page stories on the guy who cuts the candidate's hair.
But we think it will be a loss for the public, and the press, if no revision is made in the master narrative for election coverage, which treats politics as a strategic game in order to ask – endlessly – what it's going to take to win in 2012. That engine is by now exhausted. It cannot do the work we need the press to do if Americans are going to get the kind of debate they deserve. But what are the alternatives?
In 2008, the two of us teamed up with the Huffington Post to try to improve election coverage by broadening participation in it. We called that project OffTheBus. It relied on the public, people who were not political journalists, and thus not inside the campaign bubble. "Who's gonna win?" was not their typical starting point. More like: where and how does this campaign touch my life? They covered those connecting points from small towns to big cities, offered a look inside their local campaign HQs, analyzed campaign expenditure data, sifted through campaign material for trends and anomalies, and profiled almost all of the so-called "super delegates", who had a big role in the nomination battle that Barack Obama won. Just as Obama's campaign empowered the grassroots, OffTheBus "let the roots guide its coverage."
OffTheBus brought networking methods to campaign reporting and commentary. We eventually enlisted 12,000 people, partly on the strength of a simple idea: democracy is about participating, so let's extend that principle to the campaign news system and see if we can make it work. We learned that there's great potential in this kind journalism – imagine the expertise and observational powers of 12,000 pairs of eyes and ears – but also a long way to go. Fortunately, the Hufffington Post is going to continue with OffTheBus in 2012. We look forward to seeing what they do with it.
Meanwhile, we have another idea. We want to go right at the problem of an exhausted master narrative. It's time to attempt a replacement – or replacements. So that is what Guardian US and NYU's Studio 20 program in journalism are going to do in 2012, using some of what we learned from OffTheBus and also from the Guardian's own experiments in pro-am and crowdsourced journalism. The alternative to "who's going to win in the game of getting elected?" is, we think, a "citizens agenda" approach to campaign coverage. It starts with a question: what do voters want the candidates to be discussing as they compete with each other in 2012? If we can get enough people to answer to that question, we'll have an alternative to election coverage as usual.
The Guardian's over-arching commitment to an open and collaborative newsroom makes it a natural home for the citizens agenda. It recently unveiled guardiannews.com, announced its plans to report for a US audience, and has begun staffing up (We're looking for a social media editor and a community coordinator). Here's how Janine Gibson, editor-in-chief of Guardian US, puts it:
"Although the Guardian has had talented correspondents in the US for some time now and has covered many elections here, they have always been foreign correspondents, reporting back for a UK audience. Now we've launched in the US and are publishing to US readers, we wanted to make sure our coverage was distinctive and added something to the general noise and swirl of an election campaign. Our starting position was, 'We're new in town. How could we possibly pretend to know what the US electorate wants to hear from its prospective representatives?' Best, in that circumstance, to ask the question, we thought."
The citizens agenda is a simple concept, and our approach is fairly straightforward: we aim to identify and articulate the citizens agenda, and to help set up the Guardian for its general election coverage by experimenting with citizens agenda features and approaches. Studio 20 students will work alongside the Guardian's journalists in brainstorming, designing and managing features on guardiannews.com through early May 2012. Together, we will arrive at the picture of how people want journalists to cover the election through a number of traditional and non-traditional methods, including sampling science, internet polling, web forms, social media, old fashioned reporting, discussions and debates, experimental features, plus staff and user-generated content. Starting in late January, when students are back in session and the primaries are presumably winding down, we will launch our first features. Between February and May, we will iterate and edit our approach.
Working parallel to the Guardian's project will be local newsrooms doing essentially the same thing, but for statewide and local elections. The Media News and Journal Register companies, under the joint management of Digital First Media, plan to develop the citizens agenda approach in their own election coverage, collaborating with the Guardian on the best ways to discern what voters want the campaign to be about.
We hope that other local news organisations will want to join in as the experiment takes shape. The more that do, the better our chances for learning how to do it right.
"For any local news organisation to be successful down the road, it needs to engage its citizens in meaningful ways, and to me, this is a perfect example of how we can and should do that," said Jim Brady, editor-in-chief of Digital First Media.
"I think the partnership with the Guardian is a model for national-local media partnerships that I hope will continue to evolve. The Guardian will take on the huge national piece of the citizens agenda, and at Journal Register Company and MediaNews Group papers, we'll localise it. So, in every city or town where we have a news organisation, we'll be able to find out what citizens are most interested in discussing and try and get them the answers they need to make an informed decision when they show up to vote."
The initial goal of this kind of journalism is to expose the demand for news and views around problems the voters see as real and urgent. In other words, what do you want the candidates to be discussing as they compete for votes in 2012?
Or, what should this campaign be about? Social media and the two-way nature of the Internet make it possible to ask that question of many more people than you could reach in a poll, although polling is important for reliability.
The answers that come in form the basis for the citizens agenda. It won't be a single issue, of course, but a basket of top concerns broadly shared by respondents – six to ten, or perhaps as many as a dozen priorities that originate not with journalists or campaign managers, but with voters. Some may be different from the issues the operatives see as advantageous to their candidate, or maybe not. The point is that we won't know until we ask.
Once synthesised, the citizens agenda can be used as an alternative starting point for the Guardian's campaign journalism. When the candidates speak, their promises and agendas are mapped against the citizens agenda. Reporters assigned to cover the campaign can dig deep on the items that make up the citizen's agenda. In questioning the candidates, the Guardian will ask about things that flow from that agenda. Explainers should try to clarify and demystify the problems named in the citizens agenda.
What the voters want the candidates to be discussing is not a static thing, nor is it easy to determine. So we will have to keep working at it until we get it right, which is part of the reason the Guardian is collaborating with a journalism school. This is an experiment. Last spring, Studio 20 worked with ProPublica.org on how to create better explainers. That project will feed into this one.
The ultimate goal of a citizens agenda is to bring the candidates to it, so that what people want the candidates to be discussing is actually addressed. Campaign coverage gains a clear purpose: information and access that is useful to people in getting their priorities addressed.
That's a goal worth obsessing about. So, now it's your turn: how do you recommend we get started? Where do we look for inspiration? And what do you see as the campaigns' core issues? Please join us in the comments below or add #citizensagenda to your tweets.
***
42 comments, displaying
MimiStratton
8 December 2011 01:52PM
Have a central place where I can go to watch minute-to-minute results of local races. The AP has this data--be sure to include it in whatever you devise.
| Link RipThisJoint
8 December 2011 02:09PM
What do you want the candidates to be discussing as they compete for votes in 2012?
Who funds them. Full disclosure. Only after that will i be interested in what else they discuss.
Recommend (9)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link Bluthner
8 December 2011 02:10PM
Of course all the candidates are already doing this: gathering groups of voters and asking them what they want to hear about. Except they call it 'focus groups'.
Difference is, this focus group of yours will be self-selected. Which means the candidates will be less likely to pay attention to it. Because all any candidate cares about, at bottom, is what it is going to take to get elected.
Still, it's a fine idea. Not sure America would recognize, nor cope with, an elections fought on the issues rather than on personalities and trivia, but maybe you can teach an old dog a new trick or two. Good luck.
Recommend (1)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link mikedow
8 December 2011 02:16PM
Get the candidates to speak at something above the 'Dick & Jane' level of competency.
Recommend (2)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link mikedow
8 December 2011 02:58PM
Exclude Fox News from the equation. They've just been caught using Greek riot footage to fake it as Russian rioting.
Recommend (9)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link Dravazed
8 December 2011 02:59PM
Please address the unprecedented destruction of civil liberties in this country; just last week, the US Senate approved legislation that will allow US citizens here or abroad to be indefinitely detained in military custody if suspected of being "terrorists"--and there is language in that legislation that allows them to be tortured.
Democracy, anyone? Due process? Bill of Rights?
Real enough issues for you, Guardian?
Recommend (13)
Responses (2)
Report
| Link Bluthner
8 December 2011 03:04PM
Response to mikedow, 8 December 2011 02:58PM
Fox? I thought the article was discussing 'news media'.
Recommend (7)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link mattseaton
8 December 2011 03:14PM
Response to Dravazed, 8 December 2011 02:59PM
Hi Dravazed. Thanks for that prompt. I'm actually working on a piece specifically addressing that story this very morning. Watch this space (Comment is free America, I mean); I'll be posting it later today or tomorrow morning. Best, Matt
Recommend (2)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link rosemaryandthyme
8 December 2011 03:28PM
Definitely report on funding. Link to Project Vote Smart (www.votesmart.org), which has provided factual information on candidates (including voting records) for decades. Be prepared to do lots of fact-checking and challenging on the claims in political ads, as they seem to be more flagrantly dishonest than ever. If you find yourself interviewing misinformed voters, see if you can introduce facts into the discussion (Actually XYZ has shown that.... Would that change your view of...?). Link to archived articles on issues like economy, climate change, costs of health care, education, etc., and reputable sources like Krugman's blog, the Union of Concerned Scientists website, etc. Voters need good information, not just reports on their frustration with the lack of it.
Recommend (7)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link mikedow
8 December 2011 03:37PM
Response to mattseaton, 8 December 2011 03:14PM
Look into the 1033 Program, and the 1/2 billion dollars of military hardware dispersed to police forces in 2011.
Recommend (3)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link JayRosen
8 December 2011 03:44PM
Response to Bluthner, 8 December 2011 02:10PM
"Difference is, this focus group of yours will be self-selected."
Not quite accurate, in two ways.
First: We plan of using different methods to find out what people want the candidates to be discussing (which is a proxy question for what election coverage should focus on.) Some will be self-reports, as you said. But we also plan to have a polling firm conduct survey research with national samples on the same question, which is why we said in this post that sampling science will be one of our methods. Our belief is that each method of asking the question has advantages as well as problems, so by mixing them and using them all we will probably get a better result. That's the idea, anyway.
Second: Focus groups conducted by candidates are starting from a different place: what voters want in the next president, what might influence their vote, as well as what grabs their attention and moves their emotions. Our starting point is: what do you want the candidates to be talking about? What kind of discussion should they be having? We're not trying to pre-empt their choice by predicting it. But that's what focus group research wants. The difference might seem small to you. It seems subtle, but significant to me.
Thanks for well wishes, too.
Recommend (3)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link PhilLewis
8 December 2011 04:02PM
We applaud your goal and will be interested in how you assess the citizens' agenda. Our newspaper in Florida is attempting something similar. It is our own take on the many "visioning" exercises that have been conducted in our community only to end up on a shelf gathering dust. Our goal is to assess the citizens' agenda, articulate a dozen priorities then key our daily news coverage on progress being made -- or lack of progress -- by elected leaders, public institutions and the like. Our first step in this project will be to use old-fashioned reporting to update the citizens through a series of stories on the community's past, its present and where recent "visioning" exercises would seek to take us. Once that's done we too will try to determine the citizens' agenda through some of the methods you are considering. This project is not specifically keyed to our local election coverage, but it's no coincidence that we are launching it in an election year.
Recommend (1)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link mikedow
8 December 2011 04:10PM
Get the GOP to clearly define the Republican Purity Laws.
Recommend (8)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link Ursus1
8 December 2011 04:20PM
One issue which is rarely addressed but vital to the election process concerns the integrity (or lack thereof) of the electronic voting machines. It has been demonstrated time and time again that these machines in use throughout most of the U.S. are extremely flawed and easily hackable. There are many other questions related to this subject such as why the U.S. Govt. by contractual agreement is not allowed to have any oversight of the private electronic voting machine companies (including their tabulations). Wouldnt it be more logical for the voting machines to be under the exclusive control of the U.S. Govt. instead of private companies ? Furthermore, is there any reason why electronic voting machines can not produce a receipt for each voter in order to verify that their votes were correctly registered? If ATM's are capable of issuing receipts then it would not be much of a stretch for an electronic voting machine to provide the function.
If the electronic voting machines are as deeply flawed and vulnerable as numerous studies have confirmed and if these issues have gone uncorrected for many years then how can one have faith in the election process ?
Recommend (8)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link alert1
8 December 2011 04:23PM
What are the Republicans thinking, allowing a known terrorist supporter like Donald Trump to lead any political gathering is absurd. This Great Country rejected any ideas of allowing Momar Gadhafi from visiting this land after the awful Lockerbie crash (which is currently under investigation), and other atrocious acts that terrorist regime has committed.
However, Donald Trump greatfully invited the terrorist Momar Gadhafi to "pitch tents" on his property in defiance of what the People of the United States wanted...over protests of the People of the United States...Donald Trump allow the terrorist the opportunity to pitch a tent and then secretly made deals with him. This was protested by the People. Donald Trump should be ran out of business.
Further,Donald Trump is showing hard anger for the current a sitting President of the United States, in these hard times that is equivalent to adding destruction from within the Country Donald Trump does not support this country, Donald Trump supports self GREED, the only issues he has on his agenda is...land, money, and screwing the People of the USA. His anger for the President was magnified after the US supported the ousting of Momar Gadhafi, lets ask Trump if he lost any investments in Libya as a result of the USA action???
Recommend (0)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link GreenLake
8 December 2011 05:07PM
Not for nothing, but, wow, that article was hard to read. It's like something from an MBA text book.
Recommend (5)
Responses (4)
Report
| Link RobspierreRules
8 December 2011 05:26PM
Response to GreenLake, 8 December 2011 05:07PM
The article shows that. I think they know what they need. Check the links in the sentence "Studio 20 worked with ProPublica.org on how to create better explainers." Both good reads. Not sure that they will be able to do that in any kind of real time but "good luck."
Recommend (0)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link chiefwiley
8 December 2011 05:41PM
Response to GreenLake, 8 December 2011 05:07PM
I'm glad you caught that, too. It has that professorial air that they are going to do pretty much what they always do, only focus a little harder on improving their market share of the election news business (and using all new buzz words).
We've had one reporter at one meeting in four years, yet we are dealing with a $22 million annual budget and are working on billions in community development. They would rather watch the horse race that every campaign seems to be. We don't need a new wave of handicappers; we need people who know how and where the business of government takes place, and then actually show up to explain it to their readers.
Recommend (10)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link ICouldntPossiblySay
8 December 2011 07:34PM
I remember these guys. Anyone else remember Mayhill Fowler? She was given lots of great journalistic "advice", wasn't she? (And then she quit when she realized "Off the Bus" was always going to be "Off the Books" as far as payment went.) Sure you want to work with The Guardian instead of the Rupert Murdoch crew? Or are you planning to hire the Fake Sheik to keep readership up? Because I don't think tigers change their stripes.
Jay Rosen and Amanda Michel's view
Just so everyone knows where they're coming from. Full disclosure and all that.
Recommend (0)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link BradfordChild
8 December 2011 08:00PM
Jay, the key question is why the political system does not do what the voters want it to do. We all have our ideas as to why that happens: the corrupting influence of money, for example, but numerous reporters and political insiders including a senior Senate staffer have expressed bafflement to me about why Washington seems to be so disconnected.
Even where there's no entrenched lobby, Washington acts as though it is experiencing a different reality than the rest of the country. To some extent, that's true. The economy in the area is booming, thanks to DHS construction projects, the growth of lobbying, and so on. Also, thanks to insider trading, congressmen are making money where other investors are watching their savings disappear. But was there really an entrenched lobby against providing disaster relief to Vermont?
There has to be more to it than general corruption. I have heard speculation on everything from blackmail from the Murdoch empire on outward into deepest space, but no one seems to have any solid evidence to explain: why doesn't Washington respond to the voters?
We need to know. Otherwise, why vote?
Recommend (2)
Responses (2)
Report
| Link amandamichel
8 December 2011 08:10PM
Response to PhilLewis, 8 December 2011 04:02PM
Phil, would you mind sending me an email? We'd like to compare notes... amanda.michel@guardiannews.com
Recommend (0)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link RipThisJoint
8 December 2011 08:32PM
why doesn't Washington respond to the voters?
Because we don't have any money. Unlike lobbyists and corporate campaign donors. We're just the suckers that show up at the polls.
Recommend (2)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link LakerFan
8 December 2011 08:54PM
Oh god. The six fat old bald white fascists who own the US media will insure that the 'Lekshun Nooze' stays fat old bald white and fascist.
I coming over to The Guardian for all my election coverage.
Problem solved before even being posed.
Recommend (1)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link JayRosen
8 December 2011 09:26PM
Response to BradfordChild, 8 December 2011 08:00PM
I think, "Why does Washington seem so disconnected from the rest of the country?" is a good example of an issue that voters may care a great deal about but the campaign may never really surface. So ...thanks.
Recommend (1)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link kamichi
8 December 2011 10:56PM
Very much looking forward to this collaboration.
I assume voters who are at risk of being disenfranchised in this upcoming election (see: Ari Berman's great piece over the summer on the GOP war on voting - http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-gop-war-on-voting-20110830 - just one of a few examples) would love to find out more about voting rights advocacy and ways in which both Democrats and Republicans are going to try to ensure their ability to vote.
Recommend (0)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link sanda1scuptorNYC
9 December 2011 12:05AM
I lost my first comment, sigh. I remind you of Howard Zinn: the election is circus and voting is about 15 minutes, the politics is everything else all the time. But he put it better. Chomsky points out that U.S. elections are like selling toothpaste or soap, and Obama got an award from an advertising group for his 2008 campaign.
For issues of many who are invisible in the media, see BlackAgendaReport
http://www.blackagendareport.com and Not Dead Yet http://www.notdeadyet.org
I have never missed an election and if I'm lucky, I'll be 18@72 on Feb. 29, 2012. I'm homebound now with ME and vote by Absentee Ballot for the Homebound Disabled.
Recommend (1)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link sanda1scuptorNYC
9 December 2011 12:09AM
Response to BradfordChild, 8 December 2011 08:00PM
Noam Chomsky calls it "the democracy gap" - the polls show that the majority of people are more liberal in policy desires than the government and are ignored. Chomsky has a good website: http://www.chomsky.info
Recommend (1)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link sanda1scuptorNYC
9 December 2011 12:12AM
Response to Dravazed, 8 December 2011 02:59PM
I am pleased to see someone else make comment on line about this. Thanks.
Recommend (2)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link sanda1scuptorNYC
9 December 2011 12:23AM
P.S. I listened to many of Obama's speeches (online live) in 2008: he covered some issues and made promises - what promises did he keep besides escalating the war on Afghanistan (which I opposed from the start). Obama is good example of a candidate makes promises and then....? There's a good article by Bill Quigley on both BlackAgendaReport and Znet about how Obama seemed so good on constitutional rights and how he's done so poorly as president. Bill Quigley is a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights.
http://www.blackagendareport.com just posted there.
And http://www.ZCommunications.org/znet
Recommend (1)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link dmcampbell49
9 December 2011 01:27AM
Response to GreenLake, 8 December 2011 05:07PM
Well GreenLake, you must be accustomed to reading US newspapers. Other than a half-dozen, all coastal, US newspapers are geared to the vocabulary and reasoning capability of a twelve-year old. It seems to me that one of the main points of this project is to provide help provide adult reporting to thinking people.
Recommend (0)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link NisseNo
9 December 2011 10:44AM
Wish you all the best in this initiative! But while I think it is laudable to try to frame a citizen's agenda as articulated by the people themselves, I would also love to see you take a step back and question some of the assumptions that set the tone for the overall debate, such as: government is bad, tax increases are unthinkable, etc. I am an American now living in Scandinavia, where taxes are high, and while people do not exactly enjoy paying them, they do seem to understand that they get services from the government in return. In America, this connection is rarely if ever made - but why is that? Whose agenda does it serve to cast "Washington" as the villain? On a similar note, I would encourage you to do as much basic education and context-setting around the issues as possible. Too often, politics and policy debates in the US devolve to a lowest-common denominator level, where people then vote by emotion rather than thinking through the actual implications of an issue. Please show the big picture! We all need to get beyond our own narrow self-interest.
Recommend (3)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link smabry03
9 December 2011 11:52AM
I would love to see an information cloud as mentioned many times with many functions. Candidates' and parties' published platforms, positions and statements should be posted by various topic areas, listing candidates credentials and past performance to stated goals in elected positions by major topic, highlighting when candidate changes position and stated reason for the changes. Parties historical performance for stated positions, such as the ruse that Republicans promote economic growth, and campaign donation tracking, though the Supreme Court has made that virtually impossible. Include also a chat forum where recognized, published experts weigh in on proposed programs and solutions. Questions by visitors to experts and candidates should be collected and posted with answers, fully referenced with supplemental reading available from a wide variety of sources. Full disclosure of any financial or in-kind support is paramount. All wrapped in easy to interpret "big picture" entrance and drill down features, which should prove prescient in demonstrating where interests from users lie. The only way to get the overwhelming pervasive stink out of the US election process is to open the windows and shed some light on all the murky process which currently select "our elected officials". Thanks to the Guardian and Huffington Post for rising to meet the obvious need to rid US of the corrupting mafia-like influence of Murdoch/Fox/WSJ, Inc.
Recommend (0)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link KenBryson
9 December 2011 01:12PM
I agree with sanda1scuptorNYC. Noam Chomsky identified a fundamental issue in his book, Deterring Democracy. Police suppression of the Occupy . . . and other pro-democracy movements is just the latest example of an attitude towards popular movements Chomsky identifies 20 years ago.
Recommend (3)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link JayRosen
9 December 2011 03:13PM
Response to NisseNo, 9 December 2011 10:44AM
Your points are well taken. And they are certainly things that have been on our minds as we planned this project. Maybe we didn't emphasize enough that starting where citizens start doesn't mean ending where citizens end. A big part of the citizens agenda approach is to try to raise literacy around the issues that voters want the campaign to be about, to provide key facts and especially clear explanations, including the larger picture. Those are things journalists are supposed to be good at.
Recommend (1)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link jfiglio
9 December 2011 04:07PM
The dearth of depth in general American-based reporting is on display every day on everyone's cable system. Simply observe what matters and how it is reported by two wings of the same media organization: CNN and CNN International. There is a clear intent to (using a shopworn phrase) "dumb down" coverage for the one targeting a U.S. audience. So, this effort with the upcoming elections is most welcome. One area that could use some comparative analysis is the use of 30 and 60 second advertising in the respective campaigns and to what extent those ads both frustrate and distort the political dialogue. What is the intent of such advertising? Does it resonate and with whom? How does it divert the public's focus from substantive debate toward traditional marketing objectives like "branding"? (Forgetting the Supreme Court for the moment) would the American public tolerate controls on such methods in the interests of a better dialogue as the public does in Canada and the UK, for example? This effort on your part would meet with greater success if it could point out to the public how divergent the focus and interests of its media are from that preferred by the public at large. And, perhaps more importantly, why.
Recommend (1)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link dudemanguy
9 December 2011 05:50PM
The US political system has become too dysfunctional for serious issues to be addressed. The 1% has tightened its control of the system over the last 10 years, thanks in large part to a blatantly partisan supreme court majority. The citizens united ruling really was a devastating blow that might be unrecoverable, it makes change within the system close to impossible.
I personally cannot stomache US politics any more. There was a brief period toward the end of the Bush presidency when it looked like a backlash to Republican misrule might allow this country to break free from the stranglehold of the 1%, but I vastly underestimated how powerful they were, and how great their ability is to mobilize the dumbed down masses to do their bidding. The power of money is too great, not only can pick and choose the politicians you want and get them elected with it, but you can change popular opinion to suit your needs through media propaganda and misinformation.
The only articles I personally would be interested in reading on the election would be those highlighting this situation.
Recommend (2)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link GreenLake
9 December 2011 07:08PM
Response to dmcampbell49, 9 December 2011 01:27AM
Well, that's a relief.
I was worried that I found this piece spectacularly hard to get through because it was so poorly written. I'm glad to learn it's because I'm a child-like dummy.
In any event, it's good to know that providing "adult reporting to thinking people" doesn't involve anything as low-brow as an engaging prose style.
Recommend (3)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link notwavingbutdrowning
9 December 2011 08:08PM
Response to GreenLake, 8 December 2011 05:07PM
I think that GreenLake makes a valid and helpful point about the style in which Guardian reaches out to the public...
If, in this 'citizens agenda' project, the Guardian is going to include and involve people who are disenfranchised, or who don't usually take an interest in politics, or whose voices are not usually heard (and not just restrict the entire project to regular Guardian readers), then it might be useful when consulting the public, to use a variety of approaches and types of language that can attract and include as wide a range of the public as possible, and not just try to reach out to highly articulate Guardian readers.
I live in the UK, and I find that the national media do an appalling job of representing the voices of the disenfranchised, although the Guardian have done a first-rate job of investigating the recent UK riots.
So, when consulting the US public, I think it would be useful to also engage with citizens who don't usually get involved in politics, or who aren't usually heard by politicians, possibly by doing an investigation along the lines of what was carried out for the Guardian's UK riots investigation. i.e. Don't ask people simply to directly articulate their political views or desires, but ask probing questions to find out about people's lives, and to get under people's skin and find out what really affects their lives, and what would really help change their lives for the better.
People do not always know, and can not always articulate what they really want, as we all have to base our desires on the template of our current reality. So we limit our outlooks to what we can realistically achieve. So asking a simple question about what people want to see discussed, may not achieve very interesting or particularly insightful answers.
So can the Guardian find out what would REALLY make people's lives better? What do people REALLY want to see the politicians addressing and discussing? If the Guardian can do this, then it would be a real feat, and a really excellent service that you are providing. But to do this, the Guardian would need to find out about people's lives and find out what would make their lives better. This was done to a certain extent with the UK riots investigation, but that stopped short of examining what would improve people's lives.
The trouble with focus groups is that they are designed to make people think within certain parameters, and so they do not get under people's skin to the truth. They just give superficial feedback.
For example, if asked what I want politicians to address, I might say that I want it to be easier to find affordable housing. This, for me, is an important and pressing concern. But when this issue is looked at in more detail, it brings up many issues that I haven't articulated, or even thought about, such as: Low wages; The Minimum wage; Career opportunities; Education opportunities; Social security benefits; Housing privatization vs state ownership; Taxation rates for the wealthy and the poor; and ultimately, the issue of ownership of land, and whether it should be in state or private ownership.
So, can the Guardian find out what REALLY matters to US citizens, and articulate questions in such a way as to profoundly challenge the politicians and challenge all preconceptions about the nature of a national political debate?
Recommend (2)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link JayRosen
10 December 2011 04:17AM
Response to notwavingbutdrowning, 9 December 2011 08:08PM
Thanks. You make many points that will be crucial for this project.
Especially.... "People do not always know, and can not always articulate what they really want, as we all have to base our desires on the template of our current reality. So we limit our outlooks to what we can realistically achieve. So asking a simple question about what people want to see discussed, may not achieve very interesting or particularly insightful answers."
We're aware that we cannot get all the answers we need to, "what do voters want this campaign to be about?" by asking that question directly. As you say, the answers that do come in may not be very revealing. So we're going to have be more creative than that.
Recommend (0)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link ICouldntPossiblySay
10 December 2011 06:17AM
Response to smabry03, 9 December 2011 11:52AM
What you want is OnTheIssues.org for the Republican primary. Click on any name and you'll get the full history. I recommend starting with Mitt Romney to see when and how various positions changed
Recommend (0)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link DeltaFoxWhiskyMike
10 December 2011 01:52PM
Response to GreenLake, 9 December 2011 07:08PM
Nowhere in the article is there any real reference to the strong possibility that the authors might have political preferences or leanings of their own, or the additional possibility that they think that better "reporting" might cause the voters to alter their opinions. In nearly every such article, there is an undercurrent of the "What's the Matter With Kansas" concern among Democrats that the reason we are losing elections is that the voters are being deliberately misinformed.
Instead of actually engaging and listening to those unfortunate voters, given their taste for simple English and clearly stated, specific goals and intentions, we tend to decide for ourselves what is best for them.
Sometimes, however, the "superficial answer" says it all. Sometimes the politicians need to ignore the pundits and answer what the unwashed public is saying the quickest , the loudest, and the clearest.
Recommend (3)
Responses (1)
Report
| Link DeltaFoxWhiskyMike
10 December 2011 01:58PM
Response to DeltaFoxWhiskyMike, 10 December 2011 01:52PM
Sorry, but I misclicked and left off some italics:
the reason we are losing elections is that the voters are being deliberately misinformed.
I am not a Democrat, but both parties have this tendancy. We pay far too much attention to people who get paid to first complicate things, then simplify them for published or broadcast consumption. People will tell you what they want out of government any time and every time you ask.
Recommend (0)
Responses (0)
Report
| Link Comments on this page are now closed.
_______________
What do you think ?
Các anh chị nghĩ thế nào, có ý kiến phê bình gì qua bài viết "The citizens agenda: making election coverage more useful" từ "Series: US presidential election 2012: the citizens agenda" của guardian.co.uk, và 42 ý kiến phê bình từ "42 Comments" của đọc giả ?
Bài viết cách đây gần 1 tháng, xin đưa vào đây cho các anh chị chưa có dịp đọc, đọc qua cho biết để cùng tìm hiểu, thảo luận để chúng ta cùng học hỏi .
Chân thành cám ơn Quý Anh Chị ghé thăm "conbenho Nguyễn Hoài Trang Blog"
Xin được lắng nghe ý kiến chia sẻ của Quý Anh Chị trực tiếp tại Diễn Đàn Paltalk: 1Latdo Tapdoan Vietgian CSVN Phanquoc Bannuoc .
Kính chúc Sức Khỏe Quý Anh Chị .
conbenho
Tiểu Muội quantu
Nguyễn Hoài Trang
05012012
___________
CSVN là TỘI ÁC
Bao che, dung dưỡng TỘI ÁC là đồng lõa với TỘI ÁC
No comments:
Post a Comment