Last weekend, I had a revelation. Somewhat worryingly, it happened between the ending of an episode of The Family Guy and before the start of Doomsday Preppers. I’m not sure whether that says more about the world at large or just my viewing habits, but it’s probably a cause for concern either way. In any case, the revelation was that ice hockey may be the greatest sport in the world. After watching just a couple of minutes of the Blackhawks versus Avalanches game, I was hooked. I’d love to tell you that it was the speed and skill that lured me in. Yes, they were all part of the appeal, but let’s be honest: it’s all about the violence.
Australian politics is a lot like a game of ice hockey. It can be brutal, it can seem chaotic and, while the objective is simply to win the game, the audience is really just hanging on the next bone crunching body-check ... and if that check takes someone out of the game, all the better. We pump our firsts and bay for more.
Question Time in the NHL
Now, I don’t subscribe to the theory of a long-gone “golden age” of politics, when an informed and considered populace voted for well-intentioned candidates on matters of substance. Politics has always been about conflict, it has always been personal and it has rarely, if ever, been about altruism. Even in the “good ole days” – you know the ones before we gave the vote to women, poor people and those dark skinned chaps. While the nature of public discourse may have changed since democracy became more, well, democratic, the fact is that more people are engaged, at some level, by the political game than ever before. Today’s political consumers might only connect with politics at what some might deem to be a superficial level (having been encouraged by those leading public discourse to connect in such a superficial way), but they are demanding creatures nonetheless. The political consumer is a creature that has been trained by marketers, the media and even governments to expect that its expectations will be fulfilled, now. It is an animal that does not submit to rule.
This represents a major challenge to any politician or party that still believes that winning an election actually provides a “mandate”. Like much of the symbolism of parliament, the notion of mandate is now little more than a cute antiquity. Today, politics exists within a frame of permission to govern, rather than mandate. Permission is a dynamic concept, ever changing over time. The concepts, policies and people it is attached to can reverse, resolve and reconfigure in days. Permission is temporary and requires constant tending. In the age of immediacy, the lumbering years-long mandate has simply been out evolved. Winning an election no longer represents the successful achievement of a political objective. It is the beginning, the entry ticket, to a contest with the electorate to sustain permission.
This fickle-nature of permission is not necessarily a bad thing. It does not in itself necessitate, as some might suggest, poll-driven politics. Rather, it requires governments to demonstrate genuine leadership. That is, a government cannot only concern itself with the development and implementation of policy, but, quite rightly, it must also bring people with it. It must inspire and motivate voters to come on and stay on the journey. A different kind of communication from government is required. It starts with the selling of a vision or, at least, a single galvanising narrative. Governments that don’t clearly stand for something relevant, meaningful and easily articulated cannot sustain our permission, because no-one can be inspired to follow no direction when what we want is to be part of a story we believe in. People will even make sacrifices for the right story. But a story is an organic process – it feeds off its audience and the second it stops being told, the instant it stops evolving and moving forward, or in the moment in contradicts itself, it dies.
Much of the criticism of Victoria’s now former Premier, Ted Baillieu, was around his failure to sell the government’s message. Baillieu was betrayed not by his party, but by his faith is a mandate. He wrongly believed he could quietly play a long-game – working away in the background with little engagement of the community in his agenda. Some may say this is noble, others might point an intrinsic arrogance. The result was the same: in the face of mounting issues – economic, social and political – the unconvinced community simply took away from Big Ted its permission to govern. The Victorian Liberal Party recognised this and had to act, in the hope that while permission had clearly been detached from Big Ted that maybe it was still applied to the party. Only time will tell whether they were too late or not, but the signs aren’t good...
Permission must be continually earned and re-earned, and is done so through good leadership. The principles that define successful leadership is other aspects of life apply. From the “dry” features of planning and the ability to make good decisions, to the human elements of communication, consistency in narrative, behaviour and people, and compassion – recognising that at the centre of it all are not “agendas”, but people. When it comes to maintaining the trust and belief of people, politicians are now only just realising what sports people – whether they be hockey players, footballers or cricketers – have known all along: you’re only as good as your last game ... [fades to static]
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