PARADOX OF ELECTORAL-POLITICS
Emotional Electioneering Vs. Rational Governance
Don’t be perplexed if you find politicians who are otherwise perfectly reasonable begin making hyper-emotive appeals to your basal emotions during campaigning. You haven’t understood the paradox of electoral-politics then. Electioneering & governance are two phases in an electoral democracy. Electioneering is the means for politicians to achieve the end which is to come to power & govern as per their ideology. And it is by design that in the electioneering phase emotional attributes take center-stage whereas in the governance phase rational attributes come to the fore. Once you understand this basic electoral-politics paradox you will breathe easy, be less agitated, take all that is said during campaigning in your stride & rest assured that when campaigning ends all will be normal again!
https://www.storyboard18.com/quantum-brief/indian-elections-popular-campaigns-through-the-years-23475.htm
Differing timeline is the reason behind this paradox of electoral-politics. The hyper competitive electioneering phase must be completed in a super tight timeline of a few weeks where winning is crucial. Governance on the other hand is a job that is to be executed over an extended timeline of five years. Electioneering therefore is like a T20 cricket game where even the first ball must be hit beyond the park. Add to this reduced attention span of people which makes the timeline factor more challenging.
So, it’s a game of perception & judgement that is played over these two phases. In the short campaigning face appealing to emotion to create a desired perception is a low-risk high-return option over appealing to someone’s rational instinct & trying to evoke a judgement. Emotions are matters of heart, not necessarily logical & translate immediately into perceptions. Rationality is a matter of intellect, logical, feeds on data & gets processed over time to translates into a judgement. Hence during electioneering phase when time is at a premium, appealing to emotion gives better & faster return. Feeding rational data of achievements, explaining & then waiting for intellect to process, and come to a favorable judgement can be suicidal for the politician in this crucial phase.
Few other things work in favor of the emotional over rational in the short campaigning phase. Human emotions such as love, fear, hate, greed etc. are homogenous & universal. Homing in on one to build a message around it is easy. “Ab ki Baar Modi Sarkaar”, “Garibi Hatao”, “Sab ka Saath, Sab ka Vikas”, “Make America Great Again”, “Take Back Control” are examples of successful emotive campaigns. Human intellect though is not homogenous & different people can process identical data differently & come to different judgements. Hence rational campaigning has low success rate. Imagine a rational campaign on a roadworks data set like “Chattees Kilometer Har Din”. Can be interpreted differently & doesn’t even seem attractive !
Further, messaging based on emotional appeal has a built-in entry barrier. It cannot be copied & is very difficult for a rival party to take a contrarian position. For example, in case of “Garibi Hatao”, it is difficult to counter it with either “Amiri Hatao” or “Amiri Badhao”. Just doesn’t stick, doesn’t it? And the rival is cornered. One other advantage that an emotive appeal has over the rational is that it cannot be measured or quantified or compared & hence is beyond debate. A rational appeal on the other had is open to all three since it is the intellects job to analyze & judge. Example for instance is a emotional statement like “I love you”. Little to debate about this statement. But try answering “how much do you love me?” & you are in a quantification quandary. Get the drift? That’s why “Chaar Sau Paar” a message bordering on the rational is risky & therefore perhaps has been quickly & judiciously relegated to the backstage. Because a “number” always agitates the intellect & can fall prey to debate, interpretation & judgement. Similarly, “Caste Census” or “Wealth Distribution” have no hope. “Census”, “wealth”, “distribution” are all empirical & rational terms that appeal to the intellect and can be easily rationally debated & countered.
Seasoned politicians understand this paradox of electoral-politics. The short electioneering phase must be necessarily emotional, devoid of much logic but with the potential to create immediate perception. The long governance phase on the other hand must appeal to the rational giving empirical evidence of on ground achievements where people have time to experience, intellectually evaluate & judge.
Electoral politics is one of the most difficult combat-zone not meant for the faint hearted. Experienced politicians are consummate players who understand human psychology & this paradox. Everything they do, the how, the what & the why is by deliberate design. The act of balancing the rational with and the emotional is an art the best amongst them have mastered.
For those on the outside, there is no point just getting agitated. In fact, there is much to observe and learn. And even to enjoy in this dance of democracy. The masters are at play!
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