As part of my Masters Thesis looking at the debate on climate change (you can see the results of my thesis here) I decided to delve into some George Lakoff. For some reason however I skipped over his eminent ‘Don’t Think of the Elephant’ (which I now need to read) and went straight to The Political Mind: Why You Can’t Understand 21st-Century American Politics with an 18th-Century Brain.
Lakoff, a progressive Democrat, and cognitive linguist is famous for his work in discussing how progressives can change the nature of the debate in the United States and defeat conservative framing. Lakoff is a big proponent of the communications idea of ‘framing’, looking at how we frame debates to ensure victory.
In The Political Mind Lakoff looks at the brain, and how progressives have failed to understand the brain in political campaigns. He argues that progressive are stuck in an old way of thinking:
“Progressives have accepted an old view of reason, dating back to the Enlightenment, namely that reason is conscious, literal, logical, universal, unemotional, disembodied, and serves self-interest. As the cognitive and brain sciences have been showing, this is a false view of reason.”
Looking at American politics, Lakoff blames neoliberals within the Democratic party for its weaknesses. Through using an old enlightenment mentality, he argues that these neoliberals think they can win elections through a mixture of citing ‘facts’ and offering programs that serve particular voters’ interests. When they inevitably lose, they then see this as a failure of the program they have provided and then argue that the party needs to move further to the right, where voters are.
The basic argument here is that people are not rational beings in their political decision making. People do not make their decisions based on facts or reason, but rather through emotional responses based on values and morals. There is a lot of evidence to back this claim up (that link again goes to my master thesis which summarises a lot of this debate).
And in doing so, Lakoff argues that conservatives have been much better at understanding the brain and therefore pursuing their agenda. As he argues (this in an interview on the issue):
They’ve (conservatives) been working at it for over three decades. They understand the importance of morally-based framing, the importance of language, the importance of repeating language, the importance of not using the opposition’s language, and the importance of an extensive communication system that operates daily everywhere, election or no election.
So what are we to do? If progressives are losing so heavily (as one could easily argue we are) how do we change this? Simple:
“To change minds, you must change brains. You must make unconscious politics conscious.”
We need to change people’s minds. Lakoff argues that conservatives have been much better at using brain science to effectively pursue their agenda. Conservatives have framed debates with their own values, forcing progressives to play on their turf. In doing so they have ‘conditioned’ our brains better. And now it is time for progressives to fight back. It is time we gain a better understanding of how the brain works (science Lakoff aims to explain extensively in the book – although there is criticism of his work) to frame our message.
Many could see this as inherently anti-democratic, manipulative and deceitful. William Saletan for example argues:
“His proposal to re-engineer our heads is neither democratic nor scientifically warranted. It defies public accountability, the very principle he purports to serve. It also underestimates our intelligence.”
It is certainly not an unreasonable view to come to. In many ways, The Political Mind reads as a way to use science to manipulate people to our own ends.
But, it is not what the piece does. And this is where the core of Lakoff’s argument comes in. Lakoff’s book is not just an argument about progressives can people’s change minds, but also about how we understand the debate. For too long progressives have ignored the very central role values and morals have played in political decision making. We treat politics as a debate about facts, and if we are to present the facts in a clear and concise manner, then we will eventually win the argument. Look at issues like climate change for example, and the dominance of the facts based approach to campaigns around it. Whilst it sounds ideal, it is unfortunately not the way our political minds work. Not only are most ‘facts’ subjective , with the idea of reality constructed through social conditions (in other words, what I understand to be true may be different to what you understand to be true) even when many agree on the ‘facts’, values continue to come into play. Our decision making is dominated by values, and it is therefore through values that we must debate.
And when we talk about values we are inherently talking about how our minds work. Research shows that we all hold a range of values in our minds, and that our decision making processes are often determined by which value is dominant at any particular time. Values are essential to how we understand politics, much more than arguments around facts.
Lakoff’s book therefore isn’t just a call for progressive to change our language, but to understand the role of values and cognitive framing in our minds. And that isn’t anti-democratic, but rather simply understanding how we all understand the world, and in turn how we can make persuasive arguments in doing so. That is the power of Lakoff’s book. It provides a new direction, and one progressives would be smart to listen to.
In the end that is the value of Lakoff’s book. The unfortunate thing however is that that discussion is often lost within the science of the piece. Whilst it is extremely valuable and worthy of discussion, the book often gets bogged down in confusing neuroscience that can make it difficult to understand. Getting out the essence of the argument therefore can be tough. Get through that however and you have a piece every progressive should read.