SURVEILLANCE of consumers’ habits and interests. Analysis of individuals’ data by powerful multinational corporations. Manipulation of domestic government policy, and of the electorate, by those companies, or even by shadowy figures acting for Russian intelligence. Targeted advertising with subliminal messages. Brainwashing.
That’s public discourse now, if you believe the increasingly hysterical stories – meaning not just news articles, but paranoid or outright mendacious accounts – about politicians, “mainstream” or social media; any or all of them the villain of the piece, depending on what suits you.
It’s neither news, nor even new. Most of the first paragraph’s issues have been around as long as gossip or politics; but all were the primary concerns of 60 years ago, when two of the most successful books published were Vance Packard’s sensational, fanciful exposé of the advertising industry, The Hidden Persuaders (1957), and Richard Condon’s even more sensational and fanciful political thriller The Manchurian Candidate (1959).
The two men were almost exact contemporaries (born 1914 and 1915 respectively, and both dying in 1996) and shared a concern that the public was being cynically steered by sinister forces. It’s a concern now voiced by sizeable sections of the media and political classes, particularly if, to their fury and astonishment, they’ve found themselves on the losing side of a referendum in the past few years.
Since it’s unthinkable that their correct, indeed incontestable, political opinions should have been rejected by democratic means, there must be someone to blame. It’s indelicate and politically counter-productive to say that the public are morons who shouldn’t be allowed to vote, though a surprising number of referendum losers clearly think that. So voters must have been misled (though that’s just another way of saying they’re too stupid to assess the claims, and so their votes shouldn’t count).
And because, these days, your opponents’ arguments can’t just be a reasonable difference of opinion, or even mistaken, but must be deliberate falsehoods motivated by wickedness and malice for their own sake, what can you blame?
Step forward, targeted advertising. The department-store entrepreneur John Wanamaker, a pioneer of merchandising, was said to have claimed: “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” But he died in 1922; by Packard’s time, advertising was already highly targeted. One ad man in his book predicted correctly that the man who “drives a Studebaker, smokes Old Golds, uses cream-based hair oil [and] an electric shaver” would own a Parker 51, rather than some other fountain pen.
Facebook and other internet platforms may have made it easier, and more accurate, to zoom in on people receptive to a sales pitch (which is, after all, what a political campaign is). Those companies may have access to huge amounts of data about us, but then so do supermarket loyalty card schemes. Anyone who fails to grasp that a benefit with no obvious cost to the consumer means that the consumer is the product doesn’t understand the digital age. Indeed, it was well-known years earlier: it’s why over-50s life cover is advertised on daytime TV, ads for highly competitive brands like ketchup and chocolate feature on primetime soaps, and luxury cars are promoted during blockbuster films.
Companies like Cambridge Analytica, or think-tanks, or political campaigns or parties may be snake-oil salesmen, or effective purveyors of such information, though it seems unlikely that they’re both at once. Even if it were both, it would hardly make them Franz Mesmer or Derren Brown, any more than the undoubted and illegal attempts by Russia to spread misinformation guarantees the creation of some kind of Manchurian electorate.
Criminal attempts to misuse data, or break electoral rules, should be investigated and, if well founded, prosecuted. But most such claims so far have been feeble; the courts recently concluded that trying to sue Boris Johnson for “lying in public office”, and prosecuting a Vote Leave activist for a minor technical infringement were risible abuses of process, and threw them out.
Political campaigns naturally present their arguments in the best light; the Pollyanna claims of Leave were no more “lies” than the doomsday predictions of Remain. It’s as silly to complain that the independence referendum’s Project Fear somehow hypnotised the public as it would be to argue that Alex Salmond should be sued for having based his optimistic figures on an oil price four or five times higher than it turned out to be.
These are political messages that should be challenged by political means. The correct rebuttal to the (technically accurate, but misleading) claim that the EU costs £350 million a week is not to maintain those saying so are a criminal conspiracy, but to show voters the sums and arguments against. Anything else is as silly as suing Carlsberg for claiming they produce “the best lager in the world”.
It’s equally daft to think that if your opponents find a more successful system of identifying possible supporters, and messages to which they are receptive, than traditional doorstep canvassing or billboards, it makes digital advertising Svengali-style brainwashing. You could just accept that people are capable of choosing how to vote, and accept the results.
Read more: LibDems’ window of opportunity closes in three months
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