Some thoughts on narratives
Posted By Marc on September 16, 2009
I’ve been having an email discussion with my friend Drew about narratives for the past little while. One of the things that bothers me about the general topic, and by this I mean the military use and analysis of narratives, is that it is all to often focused at the wrong “levels”; in milspeak, it tends to be focused at the tactical (“Dring tea”) and operational levels while, in reality, it should be primarily focused at the strategic and grand strategic levels.
What are “narratives”?
Without getting into really technical terms, narratives are the myths and stories that people use to a) make sense of their lives, b) explain (“rationalize”) their current situations, and c) predict where they should be in the future. Narratives are also the stories we use to communicate politically (i.e. the contextual basis of a culture’s political rhetoric); if anyone wants to read a rather good analysis of current, popular (rhetoric) narratives surrounding the US/NATO mission in Afghanistan, my friend Max Forte has a rather devastating one here, here and here. It is a case of Art imitating Life imitating Art.
We are surrounded by narratives. Indeed, they are so pervasive that we are often in the same position of fish trying to describe water: it simply “is”, and we often don’t realize it.
Now, the crucial thing about narratives, at least when looked at in the political-military context, is that they are based on their appeal to an audience; and different audiences have different narratives. This gets me back to the function of narratives at the individual level as tools for sense making, explanation and prediction. If they are “working”, then they are practically invisible. It is only when they move, gradually or quickly, out of synch with our lived experience of reality that we start to become aware of them.
As the disjuncture between narratives and lived experience grows, we have several options:
- We can invert the narrative (e.g. Sex and the City vs. classic Harlequin Romances) so that it matches our current lived experience
- We can assign “blame” for a narrative “highjacking”; we still view the core narrative as “true and valid”, but it has been highjacked (Revitalization Movements use this)
- We can say “Sc%# this, I’m leaving” and adopt a totally different narrative (think Damascus Road type conversions or the Seeker phenomenon)
- We can also just “withdraw” from reality either into a psychosis or a catatonic state (i.e. we deny that the narrative has a disjuncture and live as if it didn’t).
Now, most people intuitively recognize that these are there options when a narrative fails (think about the concept of a “crisis of faith” in this context).
So what?
When it comes right down to it, the crucial point in selling any narrative – academic, marketing, military-political – is that it must have less of a disjuncture between the audiences’ lived reality and their current narratives.
Now, having said that, I want to point out that that does not mean that it has to be “logical”; it just has to make emotional and experiential “sense” to the audience. Back to Afghanistan for a moment, and if we look a little deeper at the narratives used on the Afghan audience (as opposed to those used to “sell” the mission to the home audience), one of the key ones is “security” and “good governance”. This, however, has some serious flaws with lived experience, a point make very nicely in a recent article by Joseph K. Goodwin in the New York Times (Sept. 15th, 2009, here):
The recurring complaint I heard from Afghans centered on the untenable encroachment of government corruption into their daily lives — the homeowner who has to pay a bribe to get connected to the sewage system, the defendant who tenders payment to a judge for a favorable verdict. People were so incensed with the current government’s misdeeds that I often heard the disturbing refrain: “If Karzai is re-elected, then I am going to join the Taliban.”
For me, the crucial statement is “the untenable encroachment of government corruption into their daily lives”. Notice that there isn’t a problem with “corruption” but, rather, the fact that it hits them in their daily lives. Goodwin goes on to note that
If there is any entity more reviled in Afghanistan than the Karzai government and coalition forces, it is the Taliban, so I never took these desperate exclamations to be literally true. But these outbursts reveal a disgust with the current government so pronounced it cannot be dismissed. And the international community’s reluctance to fight corruption head-on has inextricably linked it with the despised administration. As we continue to give unequivocal support to a crooked government, our credibility is greatly diminished and the difficulty of our mission greatly increased.
There is a lot to think about in this. In particular, it really begs the question of “What is the mission in Afghanistan”? According to President Obama, the Afghan mission is
Afghanistan: The President’s new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan will ensure that all elements of national power are engaged and integrated in an effort to defeat al Qaeda to prevent attacks on the homeland and on our Allies and partners. We are asking our friends and allies to join us with a renewed commitment. We also will regularly assess the progress of our efforts and those of the governments of Afghanistan and Pakistan through clear measurements to ensure ongoing informed accountability.
This may be the “strategy”, but what is the narrative? How will it happen? What is the “vision” for Afghanistan? Will the narrative be co-constructed, or will it be imposed (which, BTW, often fails badly)? Over the next few months, we will see how this plays out in the US (our – Canada’s – mission in Afghanistan will end in 2011 unless something radically happens to alter that).
Let me return to the “So what”? In many ways, it is simple: you have to match your story with your actions, and both of those have to be seen as being matched by your audience.
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You run at a whole different OODA loop. Great stuff!
Thanks, Bismark. This is one of the areas that has really bothered me about a lot of the “research” that is going on – we aren’t looking at it properly.
That’s a pretty good distillation of narrative construction, negotiation, and experience, I think. What’s fun about Western cultural studies is that we almost always look at narrative construction and imposition externally, reified as some sort of hulking ideological mass that is either enabling or oppressing (e.g. the tyranny of Neoliberalism and the New Economy – whatever the hell that actually is). It’s unfortunate (although humorous) that policy makers – i.e. narrative architects – rarely think about the actual internal experience and subsequent adaptation of the narratives they put forth. Hence, the eventual dumbfounding of these people when things don’t go quite according to plan.
Thanks, Greg. Yeah, I know what you mean about the lack of reflexivity amongst policy makers. There is something truly amazing about the ability of people to construct structures (narrative, legal, etc.) that they would not, under any circumstances, want to live in!
Very interesting article Marc. I am curious if you have any ideas for what narrative ought to be developed given your point that, “the crucial point in selling any narrative – academic, marketing, military-political – is that it must have less of a disjuncture between the audiences’ lived reality and their current narratives,” knowing that the discussion is focused on the Afghan audience.
Of course then there is also the issue of who delivers the narrative, which is often tied up with how it is delivered. In a country with such low levels of literacy and such a dispersed population with limited communications infrastructure…who/what are the carriers of the narrative?
Finally, off topic a bit…if in 2011 our prime minister is either Harper or Ignatieff, I really do not see them withdrawing from Afghanistan. The pressure from the US, and NATO, seems to be very strong. I hope I will be proven wrong.
Hi Max,
Some very good questions. To my mind, the crucial components of the narrative need to be increasing personal security (i.e. freedom of movement, etc.), Afghan governance, and local governance. The only way that I can see this actually operating is if fairly strong pressure is brought to bear on the current government to both allow for and encourage local governance solutions, specifically including negotiating with the Taliban or, more specifically, local kin groups that are operating under the broader Taliban banner. I would also strongly encourage the use of local shuras as a way of highlighting central government focused, but locally practiced, corruption that interferes with individuals lives.
I think the issue of literacy is a bit of a red herring. Have you ever read Walter Ong on Orality and Literacy? He has some observations there that show how we could help the Afghans to construct a narrative that works. Partly, it would have to be through primary oral means such a song, poetry and story. At the same time, primary orality is being extended via cell phone usage, so that could be a channel as well along with radio, CDs / DVDs, etc. Personally, I don’t view the channels to be as problematic as the constantly shifting, and often culturally irrelevant, messages.
On us (Canada) finishing in 2011, I’m honestly not sure. The CF are close to the strain point when it comes to equipment (e.g. the new equipment purchases won’t start showing up until 2011). OTOH, there is still a fairly high moral for the “mission”, and there is still a fairly high national support level for it. Personally, I am increasingly concerned about what I have called “mission creep on steroids”. I feel that there are some very serious questions as to what the mission actually is, as well as how it is being conducted.
I must admit that I am feeling slightly more positive about the Afghanistan mission now that it is back centre stage. For too long, it languished as an “also fought”, and that led to way too many problems. I can’t see either Harper or Ignatieff getting a continuance through unless there is a very serious discussion about what the mission actually is, and a set of specific milestones. If that is forthcoming, however, then I think there is a possibility, although I would be loath to give any probabilities on it, that we would extend our mission there.
Marc,
Good stuff. This was what I was continually trying to beat into the heads of my unit (lower and higher echelons) when I was an Information Operations planner. A series of unrelated, possibly contradictory talking points that the populations cannot put together and make sense of are useless. There must be a narrative that is believable, jibes with reality, and is reinforced by our actions, rhetoric, words, and inactions. And that narrative must not be explicitly told. Our job is to provide them with the information and indicators that will result in them understanding the narrative on their own. Unfortunately, this requires a very sophisticated degree of cultural familiarity, access to conduits that people obtain their information from, and the ability to react quickly to unforeseen changes along the way.
Hi Schmedlap,
Thanks. Let me pick up on one point you made that I think is central to the actual deployment of a narrative: “that narrative must not be explicitly told. Our job is to provide them with the information and indicators that will result in them understanding the narrative on their own.”
I was trying to get at this a bit when I was talking about “co-creation” of narratives. I would argue that certain components of the narrative must be explicitly told to your audience. Which ones, however, will vary from audience to audience. I can see I’m going to have to write up a longer piece on this but, basically, the selection criteria for what is told should be at the lived experience level and the philosophical or grand strategic level. At the same time, you also need to allow for co-interpretations of movements between event spaces. Hmmm, sounding overly academic….
Try this: let’s say that you overtly state that you are in a village trying to gain support for the HN gov’t. At the same time, the lived experience of that government is that it is corrupt beyond acceptable parameters. If you set up an ombudsman style local institution for bringing corruption to light and using US/NATO influence to get someone either arrested, charged or moved, then you will be perceived as having actually helped the locals with a key security issue – predation by gov’t “bandits”. This will shift some of the perceptions of why you are there into a more positive light.