“Stand on Guard for Thee” – The Illusion of Brand Control and What it Means for Canada

A recent article in the Harvard Business Review has an interesting connection to the role we all can play in the ongoing international negotiations. The article is actually about corporations but the lessons learned apply equally to our country and its international reputation. The article explores how the internet is making it harder for companies to maintain their version of “brand meaning” or corporate identity.  As the author of The Illusion of Brand Control says:

In the era of blogs, discussion boards, Facebook, Twitter, and other Web 2.0 tools, virtually everyone can get online and talk about your company and its offerings. As a result, the amount of information your marketing and PR departments can generate is only a small percentage of the total volume of content on the Internet about your firm…

For example, I just typed “Hummer” into Google. The second result is the Wikipedia entry about the vehicle, and the fourth one is a site full of user-submitted photos that are not likely to please the brand’s owner.

We now have a playing field that is inherently more democratic. Google searches prioritize traffic not ownership. In other words if more people are interested in a watchdog site about a product as opposed to the products official site then it will show up higher in the google search results. This means that we all have a role to play in shaping the meaning given to all institutions. Furthermore Facebook and Twitter and YouTube have become the new town squares. This is where people are coming together and forming opinions. All of this ads up to us becoming increasingly able to not only communicate with each but even actively organize collective action. This has played a role in organizing international protests of the War in Iraq before it had even began as well as supporting the efforts of revolutionaries in Iran the so-called “twitter revolution” and now groups like www.350.org, or www.tcktcktck.org are using the net to organize the international movement for action on climate change.  Perhaps wikipedia is the ultimate example of the power of the internet, knowledge is power and this tool has made knowledge free, open accessible and even up for debate in the public sphere. Joe Trippi wrote a great book on the role all of this plays in political organizing called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. Some even say the internet played a fundamental role in organizing and promoting the election of the current president of the United States.

So Canada is (ironically) a lot like the hummer described in the article.  Canada’s international reputation is changing in the international community. When people around the world think about Canada what comes to mind? Snow? Friendly people with funny accents? Perhaps but increasingly as we move into the era of climate change people around the world are increasingly beginning to think about Canada as the home of the climate catastrophe known as the tar sands. Some are beginning to see us as the Saudi Arabia of the north not a friendly member of the international community. Because of the tar sands Canada is increasingly an obstacle to taking action on the most serious issue facing the international community today. For years Canada has been seen as a peace maker and major contributor to the success of international negotiations. But now increasingly Canada has been seen as a pariah. Take for example Canada being given the fossil award by international environmental coalition.  How has it come to be the country that championed strong international relief targets is now becoming a major obstacle to setting targets and taking meaningful action to address climate change which groups like Oxfam show that global warming is already disproportionately impacting the worlds poorest people. Naomi Klein did a great piece on this today on Democracy Now.

So where does that leave us nice Canadians? Well I think it leaves us in the drivers seat. This article points out that we have a tremendous amount of power through communicating with each other here and around the globe.  We have the opportunity to effect Canada’s brand meaning. Ultimately what is being said about Canada and how what is said is interpreted is up to us. It is up to us to “stand on gaurd for thee”. The questions is what are the “Canadian values” we are representing? I believe we should stand up for the Canadian values that made us the logical place for the underground railroad to lead to and for war resisters to find refuge in. Canadians care and they want to do the right thing. Its our job to make sure our fellow Canadians understand what a stain the tar sands have already become on our home and native land. True patriot love means helping our country live up to its potential and that means working with international community to do whats right.

This does not require an election… public opinion will ultimately push any government to representing the public will (although it does feel like there is an oil executive running the country at the moment).

We as Canadians have a choice. We can either go the misguided direction of blatant self interest or we could live up to our reputation as international leaders. It’s funny but some Canadians actually think that being a northern country somehow global warming will be good for us. Adbusters does a great job of capturing this idea in their new hoax tourism site, www.CanadianTourismFederation.ca. Even if this were true (and you don’t need to look much further then the pine beetle to begin to understand that ecosystems are far more complicated then that simple perspective) it would be horribly selfish. Even if the destabilization of the global climate systems didn’t severely impact us for a long time there is still plenty of evidence that it already is reeking havoc on the people of the southern hemisphere. How is it ethical to profit from something that we know has this effect? It is our job to make this choice clear for Canadians.

The business journals are catching on to the fact that elites have lost control over the very meanings attributed to the most powerful institutions. Now it is up to us to use the power that we have to show when Canada isn’t living up to the vision we all share and help all Canadians join in playing a positive role in the international community. We can stand on guard for the true Canada every day … the revolution is right at your fingertips. Lets get to work!

The Fallacy of Supply and Demand – Taking a Closer Look at the “Invisible Hand”

I just bought an interesting book on behavioral economics. Prof. Dan Ariely has a fantastic blog/ podcast called “Arming the Donkey” (we are the donkeys) which I have followed for a while and I finally got his book “Predictably Irrational”. Chapter 2 in particular caught my attention, “the Fallacy of Supply and Demand”. By conducting experiments into how purchasing decisions are made he pulls the fundamental assumptions of our economic system up by the roots.

I have always had an interest in work that examines the real life implications of our faith in the so called “invisible hand” of the market place that is at the core of free market theory. Adam Smiths market ideology had noble intent but this moral philosopher would have been disgusted by the injustice and ecological destruction that is rationalized by his theory. Smith wanted to produce ideal outcomes for society by using market mechanism to maximize the utility of limited resources.

Wikipedia summed up the “invisible hand” like this:

The theory of the Invisible Hand states that if each consumer is allowed to choose freely what to buy and each producer is allowed to choose freely what to sell and how to produce it, the market will settle on a product distribution and prices that are beneficial to all the individual members of a community, and hence to the community as a whole. The reason for this is that self-interest will drive actors to beneficial behavior. Efficient methods of production will be adopted in order to maximize profits. Low prices will be charged in order to maximize revenue through gain in market share by undercutting competitors. Investors will invest in those industries that are most urgently needed to maximize returns, and withdraw capital from those that are less efficient in creating value. Students will be guided to prepare for the most needed (and therefore most remunerative) careers. And all these effects will take place dynamically and automatically.

It also works as a balancing mechanism. For example, the inhabitants of a poor country will be willing to work very cheaply, so entrepreneurs can make great profits by building factories in poor countries. Because they increase the demand for labor, they will increase its price; further, because the new producers will also become consumers, local businesses will have to hire more people in order to provide for them the things that they want to consume. As this process continues, the labor prices will eventually rise to the point at which there is no advantage for the foreign countries doing business in the formerly poor country. Overall, this mechanism will cause the local economy to function on its own.

Now there is plenty of reason to challenge this theory without the help of behavioral economics. Many have highlighted the implications of concentrations of wealth and the dangers of so called “externalities” that are caused by market forces. For example this is Noam Chomsky’s take on all of this:

Throughout history, Adam Smith observed, we find the workings of “the vile maxim of the masters of mankind”: “All for ourselves, and nothing for other People.” He had few illusions about the consequences. The invisible hand, he wrote, will destroy the possibility of a decent human existence “unless government takes pains to prevent” this outcome, as must be assured in “every improved and civilized society.” It will destroy community, the environment and human values generally – and even the masters themselves, which is why the business classes have regularly called for state intervention to protect them from market forces. (…)^[1]

Ariely takes this critique to a whole new place by exploring “arbitrary coherence“. He shows that choices are more complex and the fundamental principles of free market theory based on the invisible hand are fundamentally flawed. The prices we are willing to pay have more to do with “anchoring” based on the initial price based decisions we make initially about a product (see the video below for more on this). To quote Ariely:

“It seems that instead of consumers willingness to pay influencing market prices, the causality is somewhat reversed and it is market prices themselves that influence consumer’s willingness to pay. What this means is that demand is not, in fact, a completely separate force then suply”

Furthermore Ariely goes on to highlight implications of his finding:

“Now, if we can’t accurately compute these pleasure values, but frequently follow arbitrary anchors instead, then it is not clear that the opportunity to trade is necessarily going to make us better off…. if anchors and memories of these anchors – but not prefference – determine our behavior, why would trading be hailed as the key to maximizing personal happiness (utility)”

I felt the need to share these ideas with you for a couple reasons. The first is that I just watched Micheal Moores new movie, Capitalism a Love Story. I felt like the film really missed the boat by not really making the case for the fallacy of supply and demand in and of itself.

What I did like about the film was the focus on the workers occupation of Chicago’s Windows and Doors Factory. This fascinating situation has a lot in common with the struggles in Argentina highlighted in Naomi Kleins film The Take. See my previous post on the Final Frontier of Democracy for more on this movement towards workers empowerment and workplace democracy. Unfortunately the implications of this movement was also not explored fully in Moore’s film.

I guess at the end of the day I wanted to post this not to critique capitalism but to highlight that it has never really existed as defined. Not only is supply and demand manipulated by those with a concentration of wealth (voting with your dollars means that some people have a lot more votes) but in fact the market mechanism doesn’t work they way Smith envisioned it.

On a practical level I want spark a dialogue on tactics for working towards change. As an environmental activist I am often frustrated by market based campaigns. Relying on our market choices to affect change assuming that supply and demand work they way Adam Smith intended. This piece adds further evidence that this strategy leaves much to be desired.

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Predictably Irrational

Review: When we make decisions we think we’re in control, making rational choices. But are we? Entertaining and surprising, Ariely unmasks the subtle but powerful tricks that our minds play on us.

Excerpted from Chapter 2 –The Fallacy of Supply and Demand

Responsibly Framing What is “Irresponsible”

There is an interesting contradiction between what our Minister of the Environment is saying about what is “irresponsible” and the physical realities of our planets carrying capacity. The need for leadership in addressing global warming is at or approaching a tipping point. Meanwhile Prentice is calling it “irresponsible” to take the action our best science tells us is necessary to address climate change.

In fact many argue that our best science dictates that we need to re-think the very idea of economic growth as we know it. Does the report Prentice critiques even go far enough? Professor Bill Rees the founder of the ecological footprint concept spells out realities the limitations to growth in this youtube video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evJuzFARDJk

I believe Prentice’s comments are utterly irresponsible and in fact dangerous. Calling Canada taking action on climate change “irresponsible” is such warped framing that it makes your head spin. Canada’s economy, if based around the expansion of the tar sands is making us a profiteer of the climate crisis. If the world is addicted to oil then do we really want to be profiting from feeding this addiction? Is that what we call responsible?

Finally why is Prentice our Environment Minister at all given that he seems more focused on opposing environmental action?

Perhaps Prentice should be Minister of the Tar Sands?

clipped from www.theglobeandmail.com A landmark report on the economic impact of meeting climate-change targets has run into a storm of opposition, with Western provinces calling it divisive and the federal government saying it would spell economic disaster. Federal Environment Minister Jim Prentice said there is no way Western Canadians could absorb the deep economic hit projected by the report’s environmentalist authors – the David Suzuki Foundation and the Pembina Institute. “The conclusions [the report] draws are irresponsible,” said Mr. Prentice in an interview with The Globe and Mail from Kingston, where he was meeting with provincial and territorial environment ministers. Specifically, he said Canadians will not accept the report’s advocacy of emission targets for 2020 that would reduce Canada’s gross domestic product by 3 per cent nationally and 12 per cent in Alberta from business-as-usual estimates.

The Final Frontier of Democracy

The democratization of the workplace could be perceived as the final frontier of democracy.

A new economic model is being created in Argentina and elsewhere. The reclamation of abandoned factories and other workplaces has lead to a radical new paradigm and possibly an era of self control.

Some environmentalists believe that greater democracy in the workplace would have positive impacts on the ability of companies to be aware of the needs and concerns of communities and the potential for the company to respond appropriately. and the limitations of un-needed management and ownership structures that concentrate wealth and waste resources.

The framing of Sin Patron…. “no boss” is very simple and the logic is speaking to many people. People are looking for solutions as our global economy collapses and we need to reinvent the ways we do everything. This book provides an important new way of looking at how to address the challenges we face. Argentina’s economy already collapsed… does this provide us a view of what might lay ahead for us?

The question we seem to be facing is do we make a graceful transition to a new economic model or do we make it even harder on ourselves.

clipped from www.democracynow.org MP3 Download More… SERGIO CIANCAGLINI: [translated] Today, the factories continue to operate, and better all the time. And also, there are new factories that are being recovered. And something else is also happening. Many organizations, many children of these factories, are being born with a horizontal work style, separate, completely autonomous of the government and political parties, creating a boss-less model and also new alternatives of cooperatives that are health cooperative projects, education, clothing, metalworking. Hundreds and hundreds of recovered factories and thousands and thousands of new projects, cooperative projects that are in solidarity, they’re also working with us. Lavaca is a cooperative. But, for example, they’re working with us on projects of psychiatric hospitals, and the doctors are discovering that the job, the work, helps to cure insanity. Fire the Boss: Naomi Klein & Avi Lewis on “The Worker Control Solution from Buenos Aires to Chicago”

The Ideas Behind a Political Movement

This book was the motivation behind some of the first green political parties world wide. There have been Small Party’s in Canada, German and elsewhere and these parties were founding members of the Global Greens.

It introduced the idea of appropriate scale of production and ecological limits.

This book was unique because Shumacher was a respected economist looking at structural environmental problems.

The framing is brilliant. “Small is beautiful”, the title says a lot… with a little.

clipped from en.wikipedia.org He faults conventional economic thinking for failing to consider the most appropriate scale for an activity, blasts notions that “growth is good,” and that “bigger is better,” and questions the appropriateness of using mass production in developing countries, promoting instead “production by the masses.” Schumacher was one of the first economists to question the appropriateness of using GNP to measure human well being, emphasizing that “the aim ought to be to obtain the maximum amount of well being with the minimum amount of consumption.” First published in 1973, Small Is Beautiful brought Schumacher’s critiques of Western economics to a wider audience during the 1973 energy crisis and emergence of globalization. The Times Literary Supplement ranked Small Is Beautiful among the 100 most influential books published since World War II.[2] A further edition with commentaries was published in 1999.[3]

Al Gore Shows the Earth as a Living System and the War to Frame What to Do About the Climate Crisis

Al Gore does a great job in this video of showing the ice caps in time lapse. He uses the metaphor of a beating heart. This might seem confusing given that ice is cold and global warming is melting these ice caps but the metaphor is appropriate. When we see the role the ice caps play in the global ecosystem we get a better understanding of what is at stake. Ultimately we need to be ecologically literate, which means seeing the interconnectedness of ecological systems.

The two different sets of ads Gore shows are interesting. First clean coal ad’s and then ads talking about green jobs.

This war to frame the solutions to climate change is vitally important. Gore does a great job of debunking the clean coal lobby and illustrating a different vision of more sensible solutions.

All i would ad to what Gore says is the need for a focus on creating a green economy that creates jobs for those with the lowest incomes both at home and abroad first and foremost. This is vitally important to creating the support for green jobs that is needed and ensuring that the changes made are equitable, ethical and can be socially sustainable.

The Green For All (www.greenforall.org) movement has done a great job of illustrating this perspective and the ILO has helped frame this discussion at the international level. Check out there report on decent work in a Post Carbon World here

www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/—ed_norm/—relconf/documents/meetingdocument/wcms_084890.pdf

clipped from www.ted.com At TED2009, Al Gore presents updated slides from around the globe to make the case that worrying climate trends are even worse than scientists predicted, and to make clear his stance on “clean coal.” Al Gore: Alarming new slides depict a worsening climate crisis Al Gore’s new thinking on the climate crisis Download this Talk Audio to desktop (MP3) Audio to iTunes (MP3) Video to desktop (Zipped MP4) Video to iTunes (MP4)

The Cost of Spin

For our democracy to function we need to do something about this.

clipped from thetyee.ca BC Gov’t ‘Spin Machine’ Costs Us How much? Seven times the budget for filling FOIs. Ten years ago, provincial Liberal leader Gordon Campbell told those attending a party fundraiser he would run “the most open and accountable government in Canada.” According to rough estimates provided by the Ministry of Labour and Citizens’ Services, the Campbell administration spent $3.3 million on freedom of information operating expenses during its first full fiscal year in office. But that’s not much money when compared with the amount of funding allocated to the Campbell administration’s public affairs bureau — the office that British Columbia Freedom of Information and Privacy Association executive director Darrel Evans calls the government’s “spin machine.” That spending is forecasted to have increased by 60.6 per cent in 2008/09 to $5.3 million.

Journalism is Under Attack

In North America advertising revenues drove the focus and framing of news for many years and more recently the collapse of the global economy is putting many papers out of business. Its tough to be a journalist these days.

Trying to report on a war underway is another matter all together. The kind of coverage we saw during the Vietnam war has all but disappeared and now even those who are brave enough to try to show the public what is going on on the ground are threatened not only by violence but also legal restrictions.

This a matter to be very concerned about.

Its one thing to spin the news and its another thing all together to suppress it.

Indy media is more important than ever these days.

clipped from news.bbc.co.uk Pressures muzzling Iraqi journalists Yet in the early days of the war Iraqi journalists often talked about their new-found freedom to report without restrictions – something they could never do under Saddam Hussein. Pressure from above Those who try to report on issues like corruption or security face particular pressure from the government, it says. “It is safer to walk around Baghdad with an AK-47 than with a camera,” says Iraqi journalist Youssef Ismail. On Sunday he joined dozens of his colleagues in a Baghdad hotel to mark World Press Freedom Day, but there was not much to celebrate. Since the fall of Saddam Hussein more journalists have died in Iraq than anywhere else in the world. An estimated 225 media workers have been killed over the last six years. To this day Iraqi journalists have to take enormous risks to get the news.

Do Opinions Matter in Human Rights Issues?

I am amazed that this is even an issue anymore in today’s world. Clearly it is still an issue in the United States and elsewhere. The question is why do we care about peoples opinions when peoples rights are on the line?

This is a human rights issue plain and simple. Folks opinions on the issue are just as irrelevant as people opinions about a woman’s right to vote.

If a Miss USA contestant had suggested that women should not have the right to vote would the coverage have been framed the same way? Probably not. What seems clear is that popular opinion dictates framing not human rights.

Perhaps I should not be surprised given that the Miss USA contest itself seems to be a hold out from a older world of gender roles.

clipped from news.bbc.co.uk Gay marriage row at Miss USA show The runner-up at the Miss USA beauty pageant says her outspoken opposition to gay marriage cost her first place in the competition. During the televised event, Carrie Prejean – Miss California – said she believed that “a marriage should be between a man and a woman”. “It did cost me my crown,” said Ms Prejean, after the competition. The remarks drew a mixture of booing and applause from the audience. Hilton said he had been “floored” by Ms Prejean’s answer, which, he said, “alienated millions of gay and lesbian Americans, their families and their supporters”. He told ABC News: “She lost it because of that question. She was definitely the front-runner before that.” Speaking after the show, which was broadcast on Sunday evening in the US, Ms Prejean said: “I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I said what I feel. I stated an opinion that was true to myself and that’s all I can do.”

Branding the News – The Age of Persuasion

Terry O’Reilly’s show does a great job of deconstructing public relations and marketing.

Check out this website for lots of great audio clips.

This particular episode takes a honest look at how the news becomes “the news”.

There is a lot more than could be said on this subject but perhaps posting this could start a dialogue.

clipped from www.cbc.ca Branding the News The Age of Persuasion Hosted by Terry O’Reilly Saturdays at 11:30 am on CBC Radio One Saturdays at 10:30 am ET, 7:30 am PT on Sirius Satellite 137 Broadcast date: December 18, 2008 (Originally broadcast February 2nd, 2008) News is big business. This week, Terry O’Reilly traces the origins of today’s news packaging. Here’s a headline you’ll never, ever see in your daily paper: “Nothing Happened”. Terry O’Reilly describes the ugly circle that drives modern newsgathering: how reporting takes money, how the need from money means attracting advertisers, how pleasing advertisers requires a vast audience, and how the need for a vast audience affects news content, and the way it’s presented. He explores the cult of personality that drives TV newscasts, and traces the history of newsgathering to a handful of distance runners in ancient Greece.