Make Poverty History: Political Communication in Action (book review)

Make Poverty History by Nicolas Sireau - book coverNicolas Sireau’s study of the Make Poverty History campaign follows the campaign through its creation and then year of existence in 2005. Sireau analyses a number of tensions in the campaign, in particular between those from a marketing and branding background versus those sceptical of such corporate processes and between those who took an insider or moderate approach to the campaign – seeking to win over political decision makers – and those who took a more radical or outsider line – more focused on wanting to change the system than to persuade those within it.

As a result, the book acts as a useful case study of many of the dilemmas faced by other campaigns, whether broad coalitions or driven by single organisations.

The book pre-dates the more recent controversies over the value of online petitions and email list building, where the balance between building up your data files and having a direct impact on the outside world is often controversial. (Getting people to sign an online petition can be a very effective way to gather email addresses, for example, but often the petition is a very weak tool for making decision makers change their mind.) Though the book therefore does not directly address this issue, it is not hard to extrapolate from the discussions in the book to their implications for this major current campaigning question.

The writing is a literary version of the Pompidou Centre, with all the structure and workings on public display. There are numerous sections detailed what he’s about to tell the reader, with other sections summarising what he’s just told the reader. It is an approach that is a little clunky and repetitive at times, but this is more than made up for by the consistent use of plain English. The book touches on many topics which after often discussed laced in obscure and unnecessary jargon and manages to do so without ever falling into that trap itself.

As the book is more of an academic tome than a popular publication, it comes with a price tag to match. The compensation is that it is contains many useful lessons in how to campaign successfully and lessons which can be fruitfully applied to Liberal Democrat campaigning – in particular the discussion about how to give people a belief that their actions really can help a campaign succeed.

You can buy Make Poverty History by Nicolas Sireau from Amazon.

Read more by .
This entry was posted in Books.
Advert

2 Comments

Post a Comment

Lib Dem Voice welcomes comments from everyone but we ask you to be polite, to be on topic and to be who you say you are. You can read our comments policy in full here. Please respect it and all readers of the site.

To have your photo next to your comment please signup your email address with Gravatar.

Your email is never published. Required fields are marked *

*
*
Please complete the name of this site, Liberal Democrat ...?

Advert

Recent Comments

  • Mick Taylor
    Mark Frankel is always 110% on the side of Netanyahu and the Israeli state, but his comments are not wholly wrong. I do feel angry that far too many people try ...
  • Steve Trevethan
    Might it be appropriate to promote whole nation-beneficial policies and their marketing, rather than concentrate on attacking other parties? Might it help to...
  • Ricky Treadwell
    Votes for all other parties will be up for grabs, we have to win anti-status quo voters from reform for example. To do this as can't just fire shots at unpop...
  • Christopher Haigh
    Coincidentally Tim Iredale on Politics North lad t Sunday devoted the whole programme to the way surviving coalfield communities of the South Yorkshire have bee...
  • Katie Wilson-Downie
    This is positive steps to fighting the real elephant in the room. Something that affects many but sadly we would believe it affects a minority, Such awful e...