Step 1: Finding a focus and opening

In this first step of the narrative change campaign planning process, the focus is on developing a campaign strategy by identifying a narrative focus and opening or opportunity that will engage your target middle audience.


Figure 1: 5-step narrative change campaign planning process

 

The assumptions going into this first step of the process are:

  • that you/your organisation or coalition have decided to develop a campaign to reach out and engage the middle segment(s) of the public in the migration debate; 
  • that you are looking for a way to effectively engage this audience in an emotionally smart manner.

The five elements of this campaign planning step are as follows:

 

 
Find a focus & opening
 
  Element Detail
1 Target middle segment(s) & their current frames Identify a specific sector of the middle to engage in the campaign and their current frames/positions in the debate
2 Positive value map Map out the positive values that the target audience sees themselves promoting or defending in their views/positions.
3 Narrative Space for your campaign Identify an overlap between the values of the target segment and the value and narrative space you are willing to message into. 
4 Opportunity or opening Choose an upcoming event, debate or opportunity that allow you to will reach and engage the target middle segment(s).
5 Feasible campaign objectives Develop a set of feasible objectives for your campaign

 

 

Taking each element in turn, start by understanding who the target middle are and their arguments, positions and values in the migration debate. With this foundation in place, next identify a messaging space and event or debate to connect to your target middle segment for the campaign that also is a good fit for your organisation or coalition. This is the key decision in coming up with a campaign strategy and the bridge to completing the first step by defining a set of campaign objectives.

A key orientation for this step is understanding the target audience for campaigns – the movable middle – so we open by describing this group before getting to the set of tasks entailed in the step.

 

Who are the movable middle?

The movable middle can be characterised as follows: they’re not that involved in the issue of migration, do have concerns around growing inequality and are susceptible to populist thinking and rhetoric. To flesh out these characteristics more and build a deeper understanding of the middle, the following quote is helpful: “Most people don’t think about most issues most of the time”1 . As we mentioned in Why a reframing approach, in many migration debates across Europe there is a relatively small number of people who are strong supporters or strong opponents of migration (often approximately 15% on both sides) and the larger approximately 60-70% proportion of the population, called the middle are those who have the following characteristics2 :

  • Don’t have a strong opinion either way on the issue
  • Are not that engaged or knowledgeable about the debate
  • Can hold positive views on migration if they have had exposure to migrant communities and have had good personal experiences with migrants
  • Can hold quite pragmatic views on the need for more migrants
  • Are anxious about their economic security/future and that of their children
  • Often talk about how their communities have lost in terms of employment, housing and political representation in the last 30-40 years
  • Are often nostalgic about some ‘golden age’ in the past
  • Worry that culture is changing too quickly and community bonds are weakening
  • Are influenced by the opinions of the mainstream media

 

In addition to ‘movable’, other adjectives commonly used to characterise this group are noted in the figure below, i.e. ‘anxious’, ‘conflicted’, 'exhausted' and even the ‘mushy middle’. More recently, British Future and Hope not Hate have called this group ‘balancers’3 , as they can tip the balance in this debate. ‘Anxious’ and 'exhausted' also implies the wish to have concerns resolved and such a situation has proved fertile ground for populists putting the blame for such legitimate worries on one issue: migration. Hence, there is also a need for progressives to better engage this segment. Our choice to focus on the adjective ‘movable’ speaks to the both the opportunity presented and the need to change the middle’s opinion on this issue. 

 

Figure 2: Common terms used for the middle segments

Anxious
Mushy
Conflicted
Movable
Exhausted

 Middle


In a message testing event we ran in June 2018 as part of the Narrative Change Lab, this potential for movement was very much evident in focus groups we conducted with the middle segments to test two campaigns in Germany: resonant messages that appealed to core values or brought out empathy in the group led quickly to a softening of sceptical positions expressed. As discussed in the introduction, the existence of such a large middle in society represents a potential that often remains untapped in current progressive public advocacy campaigns. In the research we draw on in our work, this pattern of a large movable middle is evident in many countries. For example, the middle is approximately 50-60% in both France4  and Germany5 :


Figure 3: France middle segments - Humanitarians, Economically Insecure and Left Behind 

Figure 4: Germany middle segments - Economic Pragmatists, Humanitarian Sceptics and Moderate Opponents

To gain a better understanding of the concerns of the movable middle, the many studies that have recently been conducted around themes of those who are “left behind”, “forgotten communities”6 or the so-called “white working class”7 are insightful. Open Society Foundations conducted a large scale study of these communities8 and the accompanying videos provide a good insight into these themes: 

 

  • How Inequality Affects White Working Class Communities in Europe

 

 

  • Voices from Manchester: Angela Mannion

 

 

<< Introduction - 1.1 >>