spinning and blogging
I have to say that I don’t read Iain Dale’s blog (although I have left a comment there) - and I’m sure he doesn’t read mine - so almost all the stuff I see about him is filtered through what others say and his appearences in the mainstream media. But I have an impression that he has a very clear view of what a political blog should be.
He’s been in the Observer this weekend. Here he is having a pop at Labour:
what is the Labour Party doing for bloggers this week? Virtually nothing. Labour understands only too well that their media operations cannot control blogging. They are offering all their members a blog, but these will be read only by other party members, and comments on them. Typical.
Of course, Iain, of course.
- Here’s some comments on Labour’s ‘official’ blog of the conference.
- Here’s Labour’s blog on the renewal of our party.
- Here are Labour’s podcasts.
- Here’s one of Labour’s RSS feed.
- Here’s some helpful stuff for Labour bloggers who are at conference this year.
But aside from the partisan point scoring - do you need a blog doctor? - lets look at the substance of what he’s arguing. Iain seems to be saying that the party that “gets” web 2:0 will have a massive electoral advantage.
We’ve heard this stuff before. Tim Ireland will say it to anyone who listens and I can recall all sorts of Americans getting very excited about what blogging would do to politics there a few years ago.
I’m sceptical.
I don’t think blogs are a magic bullet. I think they’re a neat way of personalising politics, art, design, or whatever you’re passionate about; but will they change the way that policy is formulated more than fisking has changed the amount bilge that the mainstream press pump out on a daily basis? Will they sway large numbers of people to vote one way or another? I don’t think so.
The Tories haven’t thought it through. They think it’s all about image.
I’m afraid Iain’s analysis strikes me as falling into the same trap.
I suspect that I’m raging against the dying of the light, but I’m not a fan of the model that he seems to represent - when was the last time you felt better about someone after hearing gossip about them? I think we’d be better off using a different template.
Filed under: Politics
You’re wrong. I do read your blog. Interesting post.
Ah well, there you go. Teach me to make assumptions.
Good post. In think the people who read and write blogs are a small group of politically engaged people, who have already made up their minds, and are talking to each other mainly to hone their arguments. Occasionally you come across something in a blog you wouldn’t have otherwise, but in general people are just re-hashing/circulating what’s in the press already. Of course circulating stuff is important, but not sure how big the audience is.
It reminds me of the anecdote about FDR’s 1932 election. A telephone poll was done that showed Hoover ahead by miles. When Roosevelt’s agent heard about it, he laughed out loud and said “the people who will be voting Roosevelt in their millions haven’t got telephones”.
We had a more recent example of this in the Indian elections. The ruling BJP intoxicated by the new IT phenomenon, campaigned by sending millions of text messages and e-mails to voters. But the Congress party toured the villages and made thousands of traditional speeches to people who didn’t own mobiles or computers - and won.
And Howard Dean’s group of bloggers were busily talking to and encouraging each other, convinced that they were America, only to find that they weren’t even representative of the Democratic party.
I’m not sure the people who will decide the next election spend much time reading blogs at all. I think they go online on the weekend to do their banking or shopping, but simply don’t have time (or the inclination) to read political blogs. They can only be reached via the BBC or door-to-door canvassing and leaflet dropping.
Yes, I think we’ll find that politics remains something that works most effectively from a broadcast medium, at least for the moment.
Are you going to admit that you read my blog yet Iain?
Couple of comments: The “official labour blogger” only switched on comments after there was a lot of negative publicity about the fact his blog didn’t have comments. It certainly didn’t back when it was first announced.
I’m building up to a longer post about this on my own blog, but what the “gossip” blogs are doing is popularising political blogging. The first wave of political blogs was a fairly elitist level of intellectual political blogging, which was only ever going to attract a small number of people. I suspect the populist wave of gossip blogs has been helped by us being in the dying days of the Blair government, when all the nasty sleaziness that long-term governing parties tend to build up comes to a head (qv Major-era Tories) - and there’s a healthy appetite for it amongst a throughly disenchanted and disappointed public. I’m sure of third wave of middle-brow political blogs will follow.
And lastly, that quote from Tony? He has no sense of irony at all, does he?
Hi Adam, I think you’re confusing the blog the guy runs here, with the one he’s doing about the conference. There are lots of good reasons (I believe) to have comments open, but its not for everyone.
“Elitist”, I’d say maybe, certainly more policy focused, and more in tune with the wider ‘sphere as I saw it then. Certainly nothing stays still and it would be weird/boring if we were all doing the same thing. And that wave of middlebrow stuff is there already, pinching the better bits of both. Take a look at The Daily for example.
As for what gossip blogs are doing; yes I guess they’re building an audience and tend to attract those with more contempt than good will towards politics and politicians. Whether that’s a positive thing will depend on your view about democracy, accountability and the importance or otherwise of political parties as a mechanism for governance. I think that gossip blogs would probably prosper at any point in the political cycle; people like to think they’re “in the know” whether that’s about politicians or celebrities. Whether political parties (or their affiliated bloggers) should encourage this format is a more open question.
From a personal point of view I’ve never been much of an advocate of negative campaigning, but I recognise it is effective. Gossip blogs seem to fall into this category so will/are used to sneak out the stuff you want to say about your opponents but daren’t do openly. I’ve made a similar point on your blog.
As for Blair; ironic, or not, it has the ring of truth. For those of us around the Labour Party in the period just before and after Blair became leader will recall how heated the internal debate was about the changes he and Gordon Brown were advocating. The challenges and battles he created weren’t just a PR exercise (although they were that as well). Whether Cameron has yet changed the Conservatives to the same extent remains to be seen.
I’m not confusing the two: i just didn’t think it was worth spelling out “in his own blog which was the only one available and linked at the time of the announcement, he doesn’t have comments switched on, and he only switched them on in the new…” in a comment, but clearly I’ll know better in future.
And you’re missing my point on the irony: nobody has done more in British politics to bring image to the forefront of voters’ minds than Blair, and to then criticise another party for following in his footsteps is hilarity-inspiring. Certainly it made me laugh nearly as much as the comment about his wife running off with the chap next door. Certainly, much as many more serious politicians would wish otherwise the three main selling points of New Labour in 1997 were “Not the Tories, not old-style Labour either and isn’t that Tony Blair a nice chap?”. I’m sure asking the public as a whole what the underlying politics of that manifesto were would produce a whole lot of ignorance…
The whole “Tories are all image and no policy” thing smacks of both wishful thinking - “the Tories aren’t going to challenge us on policies” - and revenge-led glee - “we can finally accuse them of what they’ve been accusing us of for the last decade”.
I imagine the truth will out once Blair has gone. No point in the Tories firing their cannons at a captain who is about to leap overboard already…
The chap next door joke was good.
Whether New Labour were just the things you mention is debateable. I suspect the promises we made around tax were just as important as some of the other stuff. But its difficult to tell.
Certainly, we’ll have to watch for making the same mistakes the Tories made when we were the ones with the fresh faced leader. No “Bambi” Cameron from me; but as you say the next period will tell what’s what.
Anyone who thinks that Blair was JUST about presentation hasn’t spent any time hanging around the Labour Party.
There are quite a few of us who wish he WAS more spin than substance. I don’t see any evidence that Cameron is prepared to take on his party in the way Blair did. Blair understood that The Labour Party had a fairly bizarre and inductive understanding of what the public wanted. Some of us always understood disappointment with the Tories as a full blooded endorsement of a transitional socialist programme.
I suspect that is what Mr T had in mind.
Good lord, I wasn’t suggesting that Blair was just about presentation - just that he’d brought it to a head, partially because of the need to present a whole new face for Labour after the disasterous previous attempt at goverening and the difficult period it had in the wilderness. He’s always been a spectacular orator, he’s held a party with some radical divisions together for over a decade and he has genuinely moved the mainstream of British politics into the centre ground.
These, of course, are largely the same tasks that Cameron faces. What will be interesting to see is if he’s as successful as Blair at doing it, and if he can remain distinctive while doing it.
And, Andrew, I wasn’t suggesting that that was all New Labour was - just that was about all the majority of the British public would remember from 1997.