New Forms of Politics:

A Crisis of Leadership?

Thibault Muzergues

#CCPC2, Barcelona, April 3 2014

A few words about me…

And what I do at IRI…

Leadership rules

Times and geography

Leadership rules

Times and geography

Typical qualities of a leader

In today’s societies

Inspiration

Strength

Action

Competence

Proximity

A crisis of leadership?

The role of the economic crisis

The role of politicians

Scandals

Lack of authority

Lack of results

Elections vs.

Governance

What if WE were also the culprits?

Changes in society

The end of ideology

and the rise of individualism

The end of ideology

and the rise of skepticism

The Internet and the Web 2.0 have

fundamentally changed politics

The positive impact of social media

But also a negative impact

- A more frequent and (sometimes) uncontrolled communication

- A spiral of “news making art all price” due to the new 24 hours

news cycle

- Images > text = appearance > content = emotions > reason

- The triumph of negativity

- More personal, more radical types of politics emerge

Are these changes and difficulties

irreversible?

It may be a question of cycles

Lifecycle A – the electoral model

?Liberty

Individual freedom

End of Cold War

“Third Way”

Multicult./relativism

“End of History”

Freedom/Reform

Security

Fight against terror

???

Auste

rity

Lifecycle B – the economic model

1890s-1920s

1930s-1970s

1980s-2008

2008-?

?

Conclusion

• The West’s current crisis of leadership has many (some profound, some

contingent) causes: politicians, economic situation, society and the “end of

ideology” are mostly to “blame”

• However, the current “spiral” of lack of leadership is not irreversible: it is part

of a cycle, and that cycle can be broken if society collectively chooses to do

so.

• This is one of the keys: as democracy advances, leadership also rests on

society being ready to be led (usually through a conscious choice: no

Roosevelt without the 1929 aftermath, no Reagan without the Iran hostage

crisis)

• Closed societies confronted to this type of challenge tend to do less well

when faced with leadership crises todays: think about the Arab Spring or

Maidan

Thank you very much!

For more on campaigning (and campaigns):

http://tmuzergues.wordpress.com

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tmuzergues@iri.org