Chapter 1. Introduction

Over the past 10 years, we have been working with civil society organisations (CSOs1 ) in Germany to experiment with a narrative change approach to find effective ways to engage sceptical middle audiences on migration and integration, start constructive conversations framed around social cohesion, and ultimately, tip the balance of public attitudes to get diversity and inclusion back on the mainstream policy agenda. This toolbox marks the culmination of that series of experiments and shares in detail the practice and lessons learned from the experience and outcomes.
 
To make the toolbox as practical and deep as possible, the focus is specifically on a successful social media pilot project called #KommMit run in 2023, targeting one segment of the so-called ‘movable middle’2 . The toolbox unpacks each key step in the development of this narrative change project from A to Z and lessons learned with the aim to:

practically support and inspire a broad range of CSOs and their supporters focused on advancing social cohesion in Germany to adopt a narrative change approach in their communications and advocacy work targeting the movable middle. More specifically, we hope this toolbox can be particularly useful for those wishing to tackle the increasing levels of Islamophobic attitudes in the middle.

 

To find out more about the toolbox and who is behind it, see Chapter 8. the About page.

 

1.1 Background, rationale & logic of the pilot

The #KommMit narrative change pilot project was developed by five members3 of the German nationwide CLAIM Allianz4 , with a further 10 network members contributing to the strategy development phase. The pilot was developed based on ICPA’s narrative change approach with mentoring and capacity building support from ICPA in The New Narratives Lab, in the framework of the RESET project. A total of 22 participants from 15 CLAIM Allianz members were engaged in developing and testing their own narrative change strategy targeting the movable middle, in support of the longer-term strategic communications goals of their network. Restless Communications5 supported the social media part of the pilot run by a coalition of three CLAIM members6 in April-May 2023.
 
At the initiation of the RESET project in 2020, CLAIM Allianz and ICPA formed a partnership as we both recognised the societal challenges and potential of narrative change responses. The research at the time showed that Islamophobic triggers were a key driver of strong anti-migrant narratives being steadily mainstreamed in Germany, which were also being used to serve a broader populist agenda, creating divisions within society7 . CLAIM network members from the Muslim community and their allies were very concerned by their first-hand experience of increasing cases of attacks, violence and hate speech online against the Muslim community in Germany8 . They were also frustrated that the extent of this problem was not recognised in society, especially in political circles. 
 
Some glimmers of hope and motivation for the network to try out a narrative change approach came from the promising attitude change results of the narrative change experiment ‘gemeinsam menschlich’ run by the German Muslim youth organisation, JUMA which was supported by ICPA. Another trigger was the emotionally warm response and ‘more in common' value appeals used by Jacinda Arden, the then Prime Minister of New Zealand after the Christchurch mosque attack in 2019. Witnessing the positive impact of this approach, CLAIM wanted to try out such an approach in Germany.
 
So, the core work of RESET was focused on supporting CLAIM members to lead and steer a new and more positive conversation to rebalance the public debate at scale and turn down anxiety on the debate on Muslims and Islam in society. This in turn, could then serve to open the political space and build the support needed for more inclusive and diversity-driven policy proposals to be seriously considered by a wide range of politicians and policymakers. This in turn, would serve to further the social cohesion goal we shared of more tolerance and respect for Muslims living in Germany and a downturn in instances of attacks on them.

 

1.2 Long-term strategic communications approach

To achieve this sustainable impact in shifting norms in the public debate, partners need to work at scale, embracing a movement perspective and committing to a strategic communications approach. This is a long-term strategy that moves beyond single or ad hoc interventions towards achieving “surround sound, volume and velocity”9 , with repeated interventions building presence in the public discourse, socialising narratives in communities and wider networks and, eventually, building the broad constituency needed to achieve the desired change of policy and behaviour.
 
With this longer-term strategic communication aim in mind, the #KommMit pilot was developed as the first step and a catalyst for broader action. Hence, the first aim was to test and prove that the value-based approach can work for CLAIM members, by positively shifting attitudes of those in the middle. Secondly, the objective from the pilot is that further members of CLAIM and other networks can adopt or adapt the #KommMit strategy and start to build the presence at scale needed to ‘change the weather’ of the public debate (see Chapter 7 for guidance on this). 
 
At the end of the RESET project and successful #KommMit pilot project, CLAIM is now equipped with comprehensive narrative change expertise to take this work forward independently. Towards this end, ICPA certified six people from the five CLAIM members who led the pilot as narrative change specialists. This team are now in the position to lead on future #KommMit work, as well as more broadly on the narrative change approach. See the Acknowledgements section [link] for details on the certified team (once this is agreed with team).


 
1.3 Approach & methods for testing & evaluating the pilot

As with all pilot projects, it is key to collect reliable and in-depth evaluation data. For the #KommMit pilot, we put down a solid empirical foundation by starting from an evidence base comprised of existing and commissioned research, and then tested all the way through at key milestones. For such a narrative change campaigning approach, the evaluation targets were informed by the targets of: 

  • Reach (How many of the target audience can be engaged?);
  • Response (How much do they engage and what is the sentiment of their response?)
  • Uptake (How much do important influencers begin to share and use the campaign narratives?)  

In the New Narratives Lab, we started from an understanding of public attitudes from the More in Common 2019 study10 and then expanded these insights to develop the RESET segments and also a frames map of the current debate. In targeting middle audiences that are often unfamiliar to CSOs, there is a risk around making assumptions in messaging that don’t resonate with such audiences, and can even lead to backfiring and inadvertently to hardening of attitudes. So, through the various stages of development, we conducted the following series of tests which provided the team with the evidence needed to have confidence we were going in a promising direction:

testing km

Figure 1: The stages of the message testing approach in #KommMit

Of course, as this was a pilot project with the key question of whether such an approach could work, we invested quite a lot at each stage of the testing. We are not assuming that most CSOs will do exactly the same, but a commitment to understanding what is working is very important and in the end, “any testing is better than no testing”11 . To understand more about the set of evaluation and testing methods used, see ICPA’s resource on testing methods. To see the in-depth evaluation design and results of the #KommMit pilot, see Chapter 3 and pilot overview blog.

 

 

1.4  Toolbox contents & intended users

The toolbox follows the basic principles of ICPA resources over many years and is designed to be accessible, engaging and practical (e.g. sample from Reframing Migration Narratives Toolkit). To increase accessibility, the toolbox is available as a downloadable PDF and also online in modular form in both German and English.
 
For those who wish to just know the basics of the pilot, e.g. what messaging was used or what stories worked, each of the chapters opens by presenting these key decisions and products from the pilot. Then we move on to explain the process and decision making that went into each phase of the process. In this second part of each chapter, we use illustrations from the #KommMit pilot throughout and share key resources from research to mapping tools to interview agendas. Lastly, there are reader focused checklists that ask key questions to help you get started on your own work for the specific step presented.
 
More specifically, the chapters in the toolbox are as follows:

  Title Focus
Chapter 2 What is narrative change and why adopt this approach?  The basic advocacy principles applied in the pilot
Chapter 3 Overview of the #KommMit pilot project  Key decisions and features of the pilot and the results 
Chapter 4 The pilot project strategy and messaging  Choosing the target audience, value appeals and messaging that leads the pilot
Chapter 5 The protagonists and stories  Developing the protagonist stories at the heart of the pilot
Chapter 6 The social media strategy  Choosing suitable platforms, getting the data needed, audience building, and content development
Chapter 7 Call to action  Key takeaways and advice on applying the lessons learned


 
 The toolbox is intended to support CSOs with different levels of narrative change experience and expertise, ranging from: those who have significant narrative change practice (for example those who attended the New Narratives Lab) and wish to apply the approach themselves or support others in doing such work; to those who are inexperienced but wish to learn from or apply the approach independently.
 
See Chapter 7 for guidance and ideas on how to use the toolbox, as well as in checklists dotted throughout the toolbox in each chapter.

 

<-- Toolbox index  |  Chapter 2 -->