It’s an Affirmation Nation

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Political leadership does not require changing the minds of people who do not agree with you; rather it requires affirming people in the beliefs they already hold, thus encouraging them to act on those beliefs.

I discovered the power of affirmation by accident, a long time ago, and it has made a profound difference in the way I regard people and politics ever since. Allow me to tell you the story.

Once upon a time my family and I moved to a new county. We lived in the county seat in a cramped rental condo while I built our new home in the country. It was a busy time, but, news junkie that I have ever been, I never missed an edition of the local weekly newspaper. And right away, I was dismayed by what I saw.

Week after week there were stories about a developer’s plan to build hundreds of McMansions in and next to the country seat — enough to double the population of the town virtually overnight. One week he would appear before a fawning Chamber of Commerce, the next he would be feted by a solicitous Ruritan Club, then he would be in a school, touting the age of prosperity his development would bring to all.

I simmered for about three weeks, then could take no more. I wrote a letter to the editor of the newspaper, asking why no one was mentioning, in these public celebrations, any of the many downsides to such a massive expansion of the town;

• where was the water to come from for these thousands of new residents, and where was the capacity to treat the resulting sewage?
• how were the county’s police, firefighters and rescue squads going to deal with the sudden expansion of need for their services?
• where were the hundreds of new school students going to be housed, and who was going to teach them? 
• what would be the consequences for traffic, and road wear and tear, in the vicinity of all these new houses?
• and who was going to pay for the necessary expansions and preparations, since they would have to be in place long before the first newcomers started paying taxes?

I didn’t think about the consequences of publishing such a letter, a newcomer criticizing an obviously popular proposal, until I had dropped it in the mail. Then I began to have visions of torchlight parades escorting me out of town on a fence rail.

The morning the paper was published with my letter in it, my phone rang at 8 AM. The caller asked if I was the author of the letter. Somewhat fearfully, I admitted it.

“I am a member of the county board of supervisors,” he said, as my anxiety soared, “and I just wanted to call and say thank you.” 

Wait, what? It didn’t register for a moment. He went on. “Everything you said badly needed to be said, but nobody wanted to be first. Now we can have a real debate about this monstrosity. So thank you.”  

The next edition of the paper had several more letters expanding on, and adding to, the points I had made. In another week, a citizens’ action committee had organized dozens of people to oppose the development. The argument was loud, boisterous, and lasted for years.

Let’s be clear on what happened there. My letter did not inform anyone of things they did not know. It did not convert people who backed the development into fervent opponents. Nothing of the kind happened. What happened was the scores of people who all along had been dubious about the impact of the development had held their tongues, out of shyness, uncertainty, feelings of being outnumbered, maybe even fear of retribution. The chief significance of what I wrote in the letter was that I was not struck by lightning, nor made a pariah, for saying it.

Ever since then, whenever I have expressed an opinion, whether privately, or on social media, or more formally in published essays or broadcasts, my intention has not been to change anyone’s mind. Rather, I hold up my opinion to comfort and encourage people who already agree with it but who are uncertain about acting on it or speaking up about it.

I confirmed a long time ago that this principle applies to the practice of politics. Contrary to popular belief, effective political activity does not consist of trying to change peoples’ minds, but involves reaching out to and affirming the people who are predisposed to support your candidate or your ideas. 

Affirmation works for evil as well as good. It is as easy to affirm and encourage the racists and misogynists and the violent and the authoritarians among us as it is to affirm anyone else. What we need to remember is that affirmation does not create these people, or convert them, or increase their number, it simply calls forth the people that were always there.   

So did we stop that long-ago development? No, but we sure slowed it down. What the developer intended to do in a year or so took him nearly 20, making it much easier for the locality to absorb its effects.