Lib MP has said Morrison hopes to make the fires his ‘Tampa moment’. Apart from the horrendous thought he’s enjoying using #AustraliaBurns to build his political capital 😳, he’s wrong that this crisis will build his political legitimacy. Instead, it will destroy it. A thread👇🏻
I noticed @latingle used example of damage Bush did to his presidency during Hurricane Katrina as example of a similar leadership failure, because Bush stayed on holidays as the crisis unfolded. This has been described as the beggining of the end for Bush:
usnews.com/news/the-repor…
usnews.com/news/the-repor…
I’ve read a study of this situation from perspective of political narratives and it suggested Bush lost control of the media narrative because he wasn’t present. This was juxtaposed against the Iraq War coverage, where he managed the narrative closely to create his own reality.
These researchers describe a fairly scary theory of how media coverage develops, which is evident in my results too - political leaders can create their own reality when news media accepts their version of events and therefore frame their coverage through this perspective.
Bush is described as effectively managing news coverage of the Iraq War through his decisive decision to go to war to rid the world of dangerous chemical weapons. This of course was a lie, but media didn’t check at the time because the story sounded legit - came from President!
There’s not room here to explain how my theories of news narratives are different but suffice to say, coverage of Hurricane Katrina was negative for Bush not because he didn’t manage the news well, but because he lost his political legitimacy through his failure to manage crisis.
This is a key point. Too often commentators and some scholars treat political narratives just as a comms strategy. I’m sure Scotty from Marketing is making the same mistake. Fact is, narratives come from action and your words then need to be genuinely linked to that action.
Morrison has no solid foundation for a strong bushfire crisis narrative because he has no legitimacy in his action in relation to bushfires. No preparation. No climate change action. Went on holiday. Hasn’t acted quickly or taken responsibility. Action missing, legitimacy missing
Also crucial to understanding link between legitimacy and a strong political narrative is my finding that once legitimacy is gone, it’s near impossible to win back. Once Bush was seen as illegitimate in his response to Hurricane Katrina, he lost ALL legitimacy as a president.
Same thing happened to John Howard. I was old enough to remember the shift in the political landscape when tens of thousands marched against the Iraq War and Howard called us a ‘mob’. That was the first nail in his legitimacy coffin - particularly when the lies were discovered.
Second and final nail was Workchoices. This policy was such an overreach, even some conservative media criticised Howard’s IR agenda as too much too fast. This policy was framed as evidence Howard needed to go for the sake of Australia’s way of life. Legitimacy gone. Howard gone.
Other studies back up these theories of importance of political legitimacy in strong narratives. Vietnam War has been described as undermining America’s national identify because it broke their war narrative which is based on their capitalist, democratic and Christian superiority
For Morrison, his loss of legitimacy is based on his downplaying of bushfire crisis due to climate denial. This is where his leadership failures are worst. Like dominoes, once legitimacy falls over, everything the leader does after that is ridiculed, not credible, they’re gone.
For more insights into Morrison’s loss of legitimacy, with further details about why his failure of empathy due to him downplaying climate change has destroyed him, you can go down this rabbit hole:
You can also read more about why Morrison’s ideology makes it impossible for him to take meaningful climate action - which means importantly even if he is replaced, any other Liberal PM will face same legitimacy deficit:
To finish, Morrison is not going to be able to use the #AustraliaBurns crisis to build his political legitimacy because instead, it will destroy it. He’s finished. End.
@threadreaderapp unroll please kind sir/madame
Another post script - helpful tweep made me aware of this by @fbongiornoanu which links with above☝🏻
