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This is what the social activists get taught at America's Public Media Centre.
Fight to win! The Public Media Centre's 10-point guide to social change.
1. Communicate values.
Effective advocacy communication is predicated upon the strong, clear assertion of basic values, moral authority and leadership.
2. Be oppositional.
American political discourse is fundamentally oppositional. People are more comfortable being against something than for something.
3. Target the undecided.
Most issues are decided by winning over the undecided. Typically, the percentage on one side of an issue is offset by a roughly equivalent percentage on the other. It is the undecided or conflicted percentage in the middle that determines the outcome.
4. Act like a winner.
More than anything else, Americans want to be on the winning side. The dominant factor influencing the undecided to choose one side or another is the perception that they're joining the winning side. So, for advocacy campaigns, acting like a winner -- projecting confidence, asserting the moral high ground, aggressively confronting the opposition -- is a prerequisite to winning.
5. Make enemies, not friends.
Identify the opposition and attack their motives. Point your finger at them and name names.
6. Empower your audience.
American mass culture is fundamentally alienating and disempowering. Most Americans don't feel they can make a difference or that they count, and they feel unqualified or unprepared to make important decisions about complex social questions. The key is to educate, empower, and motivate your target audiences.
7. Target opinion leaders.
Successful advocacy and social marketing campaigns, which generally have limited budgets, mainly use communication strategies based on social diffusion through opinion leaders, not on mass media. Effective social policy movements create substantive messages which empower, challenge, and target a few key audiences. These, in turn, influence larger constituencies.
8. Be a responsible extremist.
Responsible extremism sets the agenda. To move the media, you must communicate as responsible extremists, not as reasonable moderates.
9. Assert ongoing pressure.
Social consensus isn't permanent and must continually be asserted and defended. Social advocacy is an ongoing process that doesn't end with the passage of a law or resolution of a specific problem.
10. Be diverse.
In the same way that biological diversity is essential to planetary survival, strategic diversity is critical to successful social movements. Multiple, independent advocacy campaigns on a single issue should be encouraged, while centralized, monocultural efforts should be avoided.
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