The Bridge Just Beyond: Constructing Communications for Change

Makani Themba

This morning, I open the paper and find the issues I care about in lovely, transparent
detail. I understand who is doing what to whom. Who has the power and responsibility.
Why it matters. And how it affects me. It is neither all good news nor just bad news. It is
news that I can use. There is contact information, pictures, graphs and analysis that help
me make full use of what's in its pages.

I walk down to my local breakfast haunt looking forward to mixing it up with my

neighbors, and I am not disappointed. The joint is abuzz with conversation about our local
policymakers. Folk are talking across tables about what they'll be saying to their electeds
at the next council meeting and what they think about the proposed budget. Two friends
talk animatedly about a particularly sensitive profile they saw on television about the
social change sector. We agree that Channel 7 coverage of the social change beat is
usually better than Channel 5's. One friend argues emphatically, "The ethnic papers have
always done the better job. We need to increase their share of the Public Media Fund.
Independent media, too. They really are the best!"

We nod enthusiastically, sip our tea in contemplation. And then I wake up.

Media today is mostly as far from this as we can imagine. Yet, how it's structured and
what it conveys (with our help and urging) is critical to our social change efforts. How do
we know what's important? How do we know who is responsible? And whom (or what)
do we blame for the current conditions? All of these are fundamental issues in the
construction of social change efforts, issues largely framed in mass communications.

Voting is perhaps the most basic way in which many of us are involved in the political
process. Those of us who participate in this ritual often do so with some reservation. Are
the candidates really all that different? Do the ads tell us the truth about what this or that
proposition will do? We work through these questions by reading materials, talking
through our perceptions with friends and family, and often going by some simple gut
reaction to an ad, a photo, the look of a person during their seven seconds of fame in the
news.

It is scary how little substantive information we get to support the decisions we, the public,
are entrusted to make. If we had, instead, communications infrastructures and content that
actually supported and enabled our informed civic participation we would have a markedly
different civic life. Communications, of course, is not the entire problem, and it certainly
not the same as power, but it occupies an important position at the nexus of power, change
and access.

Communications that function to make power relations transparent and provide concrete
information on how to get involved are critical to organizing for change. All of the
successful movements in this country and elsewhere were able to paint clear pictures of

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.1)

what was wrong and how it could be different. Civil rights leveraged the grainy images of
state violence and abuse to convey that Blacks faced official racism that was unfair,
unwarranted -- and something could be done to change it. Building on the success of the
movement to end the Vietnam War struggles, the nuclear freeze movement contrasted
images of peace and stability with those of fear and destruction to reinforce what was at
stake. As a result, they inspired more "regular people" to intervene in foreign policy -- an
area that was mostly thought of as "off limits" to public voice, especially prior to Vietnam.

Constructing communications for change necessarily involves work on what we say and
convey. And we can always do a better job of crafting clearer, more effective messages.
However, we must also understand that our best messages are only as effective as the
venues we use to disseminate them. Structure and content matter. If we are serious about
constructing real communications for change, we have to also pay attention to issues like
media ownership, diversity, and bias in coverage because the media terrain is changing.

With less than a dozen companies owning most of the world's major media outlets, the role
of ethnic and alternative media in providing access to our messages is more important than
ever. After years of frustration with less than satisfactory coverage, a number of groups
are walking away from mainstream media and making their own. Groups like Oakland,
California based Third World Majority and the international stable of Independent Media
Centers are taking progressive stories direct to people over the Internet and in community
gatherings.

Independent media initiatives often help bring people together and remind us that there are
other like-minded folk that share our sense of outrage and our vision. They are a great
example of how the way we communicate can help build and sustain community.
Communications not only conveys ideas, it shapes our perception of our power or sense of
powerlessness. It can help build a sense of shared destiny or balkanize us into competing
factions. If independent media provides an example of the role of communications as
unifying force, communications on poverty provides a potent example of how the
dominant framing of the issue has been divisive.

Framing Poverty

Income is consistently a great predictor of support for initiatives to address poverty.

Traditionally, the higher one's income, the less likely one will be supportive, the lower
one's income, the more likely. However, this is changing. Support of anti-poverty
initiatives by lower income people has dropped, ranging from four to ten percentage points
in most polls (even in European polls), as part of a several-year trend in erosion of support.

Much of this drop may be explained by a coincidental drop in respondents' belief in the
systemic (versus individual) nature of poverty. It is no coincidence that welfare and other
similar social programs were catalyzed by the "Great Depression." The Depression taught
many the cruelties of the market and the millions with direct experience of its inadequacies
knew that poverty was more than individual failing. The American memory of the
Depression is fading and many of the people who lived through the Depression as adults

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.2)

have now passed on. There are fewer of us with an understanding of what makes people
poor, which is important as support for anti-poverty programs is highest among those who
have a structural or systemic understanding of poverty and the economy. Support also
goes up among the general population when there are certain economic "events" (i.e.,
awareness of inflation in the late 1970s and early 80s, local plant shutdowns, etc.) that
remind people of the vagaries of the market.

Where are we to go for an understanding of how the economy works? School? The news
media? News coverage of the economy is more like a sports event than the set of multi-
faceted systems in which we live and make our living. It is boiled down to winners and
losers, stocks and bonds, and occasional data pieces that rarely go beyond what happened
last month, much less five or even ten-year trends. Without a sense of the patterns, or any
context or explanation of the policies that shape who is poor and why, there is a vacuum of
analysis. And our opponents are ready to fill that vacuum with well-known stories of
individual striving and failed character.

This trend is exacerbated by efforts on the right and the left to frame economic interests as
moral issues. The right uses morality to get people to separate from their economic
interests. “Gay marriage” is used to trump concern about decent wages. People disconnect
from their class interests to create new alliances that are less threatening to our current
social structures. The left attempts to co-opt the right’s morality frame and “shift” it. We
say, “Well, if you care about morality then poverty is a moral issue.” We echo the
disconnection between poverty and systemic failing. We don’t help build solidarity or
deeper understanding of why there is poverty in the first place.

What the right understands is that, on the whole, most of us want to help others in need.
When we are comfortable with the "deservingness" of the recipients, our support increases
dramatically. For example, polls asking respondents if they would support efforts to "feed
the hungry" is much more likely to be greeted affirmatively than support for the food
stamp program. One connotes helping deserving human beings. The other, government
waste.

It is extremely seductive, then, to figure out how to make our issues "soft and cuddly."
Throw up pictures of adorable children, hard working moms trying to get by, etc., in hopes
that we can prove our constituents are deserving and worthy of support. We are afraid to
use our precious time at the mic with analysis and context. We think there is a
fundamental conflict between providing context and promulgating compassion.

Yet, compassion is more easily generated when we understand the "why" behind the
problem. Stories about the plant closing, messages that help us connect unequal school
funding to unequal employment, and help us connect the dots between policies and
outcomes help us convey more human and humane portraits of social problems.

Individualistic values (framed as individual responsibility) are strongly correlated with

opposition to anti-poverty initiatives. The stronger a person holds these values, the more
likely they are to oppose any public initiative to address poverty or other social issues. The

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.3)

truth is that it doesn't help for us to reinforce these "individual/victim blaming" frames
with triumphant individual stories of our own. We've got to be consistent in our telling of
the structural and institutional roots of these problems -- as a foundation for why we are
advocating institution-focused solutions.

Reframing is More Than Words

Often, we think of changing the frame as changing another’s mind or opinion and we are
taught to believe that the work of convincing is largely done through words. We endeavor
to think of the most clever, affective ways to communicate complicated ideas – one sound
bite at a time. However, frames are created over time by multiple venues and institutions
that help us make meaning.

School teaches us what is “fact” and what is considered important to know. We are
passed, failed, rewarded based on these priorities and we internalize not only the words but
the sum total of their meaning. Our faith institutions teach us what is truth and set
priorities in different and overlapping ways in relationship to school. Work provides
context and meaning regarding frames as well as literature, popular culture and other
places. As a result, we can not expect break through centuries of framing and association
with sound bites alone. A long term communications strategy must also include shifting
what is taught about our issues and examining the underlying beliefs that sustain the
negative frames over time. The chart below explores how these frames are created.

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.4)

The current issue, like for example, immigrant rights is not only shaped by today’s news
coverage. It is shaped by resource issues, our understanding of geography, economics
(especially how jobs are created and made available) and racial formation (who is the
“other”, who is dangerous, lazy, etc.) Reframing immigration will take work to shift
perception throughout the pyramid in order to make fundamental change. For example, in
addition to identifying break through messages, we will also need to build the popular
understanding of economics and geography so that more people understand how labor and
capital work in a global context.

Hope Works

There are many lessons from this last election cycle for communicators. One important
one is the power of communicating hope that something can be done. At Praxis, we have
long encouraged advocates to stop focusing their communications on restating problems
(why and what’s wrong) and shift toward solutions (what can be done and how).

Our issues may be on the side of the angels but not often on the side of corporate interests
and dollars. Therefore, we depend on public support and people power to move our
agenda. Having a base of support is a good thing, not only because it helps us win, but
because we are committed to democracy and principles that those most affected should
lead the work of articulating solutions to "the problem". Building this base requires
motivating people to act, to believe that they can make a difference. In fact, much of social
change communications is to allies and potential allies in hopes that they will join us and
join us more actively.

This work of moving people to action (especially those hardest hit) is getting increasingly
difficult. Demographic and economic trends make lasting relationships difficult and
therefore, trust is hard to build. Many people have become cynical about whether there is
anything much they can do. A concerted effort by the right to delegitimize social change
organizations and the independent sector in general has made it harder for the public to
trust us. People feel vulnerable and hurt when their nonprofit organizations go bad. And
they are hesitant to trust their hearts, their time and their dollars to groups in the wake of
increasing coverage of "bad" groups.

Government programs are faring even worse. The right's relentless attack on government
as a positive agent for change has resulted in deep erosion of support for social programs.
They pimp the sacred work ethic as well as national fears of "being taken advantage of" by
the undeserving poor to effectively smear even programs serving mothers and infants.
There is less and less hope that things can change. There is less and less hope that we can
change them and that this crisis in hope is driven by our decreasing hope and faith in
humanity -- especially human beings that look differently than we do.

Race, or more accurately racism, is driving a lot of our policy discussions these days. The
right is illustrating their story about social problems with images of black and brown
people. They work to reinforce stereotypes and help make us (including people of color)
more comfortable with the notion that "those people" and therefore "those problems" are

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.5)

beyond solution. After all, if the not so subtle message is that the problem is our culture
and if race and culture are interchangeable and therefore equally "fixed", what on earth can
be done?

A media content analysis by We Interrupt This Message confirmed these findings. The
analysis (done in 2000) uncovered a deep and profound schizophrenia in America
concerning race and equity. On one hand, fairness is an important value and anything that
is successfully framed as "unfair" will be met with significant public opposition. On the
other, whether conscious or not, this country has firmly connected race with human
potential. Much of the coverage of welfare and education are grounded in and shaped by
widely-held beliefs in white supremacy -- and the inferiority of people of color. Article
after article describes racial differences in achievement without referring to racism,
privilege, or bias as a possible explanation for these differences. The primary explanation
offered for these differences is the culture or capacity for each "racial group" to excel.

The two poles between belief in fairness and belief in racial inferiority mark off interesting
terrain for our work. We must successfully work the fairness frame and do a better job of
documenting impact and bias in institutional practice. And we must also work to help
people see across race to value all human beings as worthy of faith, hope and development.
Most people want to believe this but tend not to see the many experiences they have that
validate this belief. They surrender to the steady drum of hopelessness in the media and in
our personal conversations each day.

Building hope, then, is our primary task as change communicators.

But how do we communicate hope? It is not Polly Anna, pie in the sky language or great
oratory that inspires hope (although a stirring speech won't hurt). It is helping people
understand the nitty gritty details of what they can do to make a difference that's within
their means and imagining. There are two primary misconceptions that get in the way of
effectively communicating these details.

Misconception 1: Most people don’t know nearly as much as we do. Effective

communication begins with a clear understanding of how much the people we are talking
to know and the many non-traditional ways they know it. An effective message speaks to
people in their own idiom, their most familiar, even intimate way of speaking. It requires a
healthy respect and understanding of the incredible experience our “audience” brings to
bear. Knowing this requires that we listen at least twice as often as we speak.

Misconception 2: We must communicate more information on "the problem." The more

they see how bad it is, the more likely they are to act. People are rarely shocked into action.
Most of us are fairly jaded by now and have already assumed the worst. So it’s no surprise
that the media effects research confirms that it is practical information on what they can do
about an issue versus the severity of a problem that moves us. Not that we don't need to
communicate that our issue is a serious one -- we do. We've just got to make sure that we
don't leave it at that. Besides, oftentimes our audience already knows that the problem is
serious before we begin.

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.6)

Bottomline: Talking about the problem is much less important than offering
understandable solutions. Or put another way, concrete action is more important than
education though both are necessary.

In Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts (Yale University Press,
1990), James Scott examines over one thousand years of rebellion among the oppressed.
His research asserts the existence of what he describes as the hidden transcript; private
discourse among the marginalized that takes place out of the view of the dominant class.
This transcript, according to Scott, is comprised of the stories, actions, jokes, fantasies,
dreams, and plain speaking of the subordinated that are not “safe” to say to those in power.

This “transcript” unfolds in church repasts, on busses, in temples and hair salons and in our
own livingrooms. We can find it in the lyrics of hip-hop or scrawled on bathroom walls.
Although people are not talking about data and theory in the supermarket line, they often
already possess an awareness and analysis of the social issues that affect their lives. It’s
not that disfranchised communities don’t know about, for example, police brutality or poor
quality schools. It’s not even that these communities don’t know they are serious
problems. In fact, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that these are common topics in
conversations taking place away from the surveillance of those “outside” of these
communities. Therefore, what is key to motivating people to act is not giving them
information but validating their perceptions and conveying a sense that the change they
dare to imagine in these private spaces is achievable and desired by a great many others.

This “validation” occurs when an individual or group “breaks out” and publicly articulates
the hidden transcript. This moment of “unveiling” is crucial, as it gives previously isolated
groups a context and sense that a majority shares their beliefs. As Scott writes, “The
process, then, is more one of recognizing close relatives of one’s hidden transcript rather
than of filling essentially empty heads with novel ideas.”

Good messages are affective -- they touch us emotionally. They are effective -- they
convey what we need them to. And they connect with shared dreams and beliefs. They
surface the hidden transcript of our power and agency. They surface the possibilities and
promise of our coming together.

Too much of how we communicate for "change" is really little more than communicating
problems. We spend a great deal of time gathering the evidence and measuring the
dimensions of the issue and not nearly enough time thinking about what can be done and
how people can make a difference. Sure, there are those of us who do the important work
of crafting legislation but even there we often say, "Here's this really bad problem that this
law will fix so please write a letter to Washington to support it." The link between
problem and solution is not often clearly made. When we make the link, we get more
letters, which is a good thing. However, we also have to figure out ways of more deeply
engaging people in the act of making change beyond writing letters to a group of people
(policymakers) in which they often have little faith.

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.7)

Communicating the concrete "handle" or "what can be done" is critical as it helps those
who are normally outside the process understand what they can do to have more power
inside the process. It requires that our communication strategies be integrated into our
action strategies. And we have to know something about what we are doing about an issue
in order to engage others to join us.

Of course, providing concrete venues for involvement and effective, clear messaging is
only part of the challenge. People have to have faith in our ability to "pull it off" before
they will join us and, as explored previously, the right's attack on the public and
independent sectors have hurt our credibility in this regard. And it's not just in the news.
Virtually every media portrayal of activism in the context of organizations is fraught with
negative stereotypes. Organizers are often portrayed in film as shallow, insensitive and
ineffective and the only way real change happens is when we "go it alone." Even the
stories we tell each other as organizers are not much better. And this has got to change
because integral to effectively communicating for change is effectively communicating the
credibility of our institutions as viable change agents.

Blocking the Echo

All of these challenges point to the fundamental need for us to join forces and tackle these
mega communications challenges collaboratively. We need to reinforce and echo
messages that advance notions of shared humanity and destiny, encourage and support
community involvement, strengthen our faith in the public and independent sectors, and set
higher standards and higher expectations for the institutional actors in our lives.

Unfortunately, we don't often have complete control over our work and how we do it. We
must craft our efforts so that we can attract investors (most usually foundations), which
often engenders certain ways of working -- especially in these times of funding cuts. One
way funding restrictions can limit our ability to create echo across issues is the increasing
promulgation of categorical or issue-focused work.

META MESSAGES

Ours Theirs

IT’S THE SYSTEM - Poverty and other IT’S “SOME” PEOPLE - Poverty is the result
economic problems are systemic, not natural. of lack of initiative; individual failing.

WE ALL DESERVE GOOD - All human THOSE “OTHER” FOLK CAN’T HANDLE
beings are basically connected and deserve GOOD – And trying to do them good will only
the same things. hurt your good. Negative perceptions of the
“other”. Only a few people are worthy.

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.8)

GOVERN TOGETHER - Public/government ONLY “LEADERS” CAN GOVERN -
is a good place to handle social issues for the Government is ineffective. Collaboration is
common good and for public/institutional messy. Governance should go to the few
accountability. People can and should “leaders”.
govern together.

WE ARE PART OF THE WORLD – as global USA RULES – We tell others what to do and
citizens we are interconnected and when to do it and there’s nothing they can
responsible for each other. We have much to teach us.
learn from other nations.

Can Communications Do All That?

As fundamental as it is, communications is no panacea. It is not the silver bullet that will
take out our opposition. In fact, communications work that is not connected to an overall
strategy can actually hurt our efforts. Think of it as a mic. It simply amplifies what you
do. If you have dumb things to say, you still sound dumb, only louder. When part of a
coordinate strategy, it can be a powerful weapon in a comprehensive arsenal that includes
base building, policy change, research, and capacity building.

Building a body of effective communications for change will require more collaboration,
less categorical work and yes, more money. Not for more big-ticket research and mega
polls but for small scale listening projects, planning time and capacity building for those on
the frontlines to get what they need to grab and hold the mic as part of an overall effort to
hold the policy agenda. We have to be more rigorous in our efforts to evaluate our
communications for change. This will mean going beyond measuring coverage to assess
what, if anything, was actually changed. Are more people involved? Is there more hope
in the possibility of change? What are we conveying that expands the notion of what’s
possible?

This will, in turn, surface a new set of practices that will mean more investment in
strategies that reach and engage our constituents and less on press conferences and other
made for TV spectacle. For example, we might increase support for members in their
personal communication with friends and family by giving them talking points on how to
explain the issues to people in their lives and providing safe spaces to practice because we
understand that personal communication is critical to moving people into action. We will
have the tenacity to find what's working, what's not and what we are really learning out
there. And this work will engender learning communities that are non-competitive and
collaborative so that the sum of our work together will be greater than our individual
efforts.

Bertol Brecht once wrote, "Whoever wants to fight lies and ignorance today, whoever
wants to speak the truth must surmount at least five difficulties. (S)He must have the
courage to speak the truth when it is everywhere stifled; the intelligence to recognize it

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.9)

when it is everywhere hidden; the art to make it manageable like a weapon; the judgement
to choose who will know how to make it effective; and finally enough guile to make them
understand it." This is the potential and power of communication for social change. This
is the work we must do to make it happen. These are the standards to which we must hold
ourselves accountable if we are to realize our vision of a fair, just world.

Sometime in the future…

She walked across the stage so regal in her cap and gown that I hardly recognized her as
my once gangly granddaughter. In one hand was her diploma, the other her completed
voter registration form -- a requirement of graduation. She was ready to join the
community as a full adult. Her civic classes trained her well on the ins and outs of how
change is made. And she was ready to be a thorn in her representative's side. I smiled.
She is her mother's child.

I looked back over the years and sacrifices that brought us to this moment. The patient
organizing by so many that helped folk realize that they could make a difference. Through
these efforts came new laws and institutions designed to serve and engage us: schools that
taught young people to be active partners in their government; policies that guaranteed
equitable funding and social programs; and communities built for people to talk with one
another -- and with the new labor laws, there was actually time.

It was a long hard fight and those rightwingers gave us a real run before we finally moved
them out and put in some real democracy. Not that things are perfect. No way. But I can
see the difference everywhere and it gives me deep and abiding hope.

(Themba/The Bridge Beyond p.10)