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Readers Respond: Authenticity and Presidential Candidates
I want to respond to a number of interesting comments from readers about my last blog on authenticity and presidential candidates. It hit a nerve and for good reason: the rash of challenges we face today – from the war in Iraq to the Katrina aftermath to immigration – call for leaders people trust. Authenticity sits at the heart of this challenge.
One reader wrote me:
This is one of the very few times when I’m not certain you’re on target. Krugman, if I understood him, was talking mostly about the news media and about the phony, superficial way that ‘authenticity’ is determined by the columnists, commentators, and talking heads of our time. And how they get bamboozled by image makers or fall into group think about the most nonsensical things while missing the big picture.
Yes, I agree, Krugman is upset about how political reporting is done and the extent to which reporters, as you say, get bamboozled and fail to see candidates for who they are as opposed to who they pass themselves off for. In a way, he is calling for deeper and more rigorous political reporting. I’m all for that! Improving such reporting is something I’ve worked on for years – with Washington bureaus, small and major metro newspapers, public television and radio, new media sources, journalism schools, and others. But the task is big.
A second reader commented about Krugman’s urging voters to look at a candidate’s motives behind their policy proposals, and not authenticity. This individual wrote:
Regarding the Paul Krugman article, why can’t one be both authentic AND have an interest in motives? Certainly each is equally valid when it comes to choosing a presidential candidate?
Well said. In fact, my basic problem with Krugman’s op-ed is the very essence of his piece. To me, he seems to dismiss authenticity as a useful lens for thinking about presidential candidates, as if the only real gauge is a candidate’s policy proposals.
I spent much of the 1990s working on how Americans think about and engage with issues of political conduct and their aspirations on such topics. With support from the Pew Charitable Trusts we developed a deep, three-year citizen engagement process that resulted in the Harwood Barometer for Political Conduct, which focuses on the conduct citizens seek from political leaders, news media, and even themselves. The barometer has been used in scores of communities, classrooms, organizations, and news media. (You can go here to see and use the barometer.)
When you look at the barometer you’ll see that Americans want to judge candidates using a mix of factors, one of which is “policy proposals” (e.g., does the candidate offer a vision for what they want to achieve and why – without overblown promises – and put the tough issues and trade-offs on the table). Indeed, over the course of a campaign, over the course of daily life, people are in an ongoing search to piece together their own “whole story” about a candidate and leader. There is no simple answer.
But one clear and consistent thread that does run throughout all the barometer’s factors is a desire among citizens to take the measure of a candidate’s authenticity (as well as authority and accountability – the other two touchstones of the 3A’s). Not only is this the case when it comes to gauging candidate conduct, but you’ll also find it at play when citizens gauge their own conduct and that of the news media.
Next, there’s the point raised by another reader, who said in reference to how I defined authenticity last week, “I think authenticity comes from the inside out, which is not apparent to me in the way you define it.”
Even though I may have implied it, I only wish I had been that clear. What I have found over the past 20 years is that for individuals to be authentic they must first make the choice to step forward to examine and account for their own words and deeds. This is no easy task for anyone who engages in public life today, with so many competing forces pulling and tugging at someone. No doubt, the result is for some people try to take the easy route, or the short cut, and attempt to “manufacture” authenticity. But the good news is that over time authenticity cannot be faked.
In a way, Krugman makes the argument that the notion of authenticity is being appropriated or misused by reporters and possibly others in the political realm – at times being “dumbed down.” But I wonder, then, if our response should be to turn away from using authenticity as a touchstone in our public lives?
For me, the answer is clear: now is not the time to step back and give in, but to make our case for something more real.
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Authenticity and Our Presidential Candidates
What does “authenticity” mean in the current presidential race and for that matter in public life in general? Not much, according to Paul Krugman in his scathing op-ed column, Authentic? Never Mind, in yesterday’s New York Times. Too bad he’s wrong.
Krugman rips those who would argue that authenticity has a place in today’s public discourse. People, he says, should instead use as a gauge the policy proposals a leader puts forth and the motives behind those offerings. It’s the only real way to judge a candidate.
But authenticity is central to how we see and judge presidential candidates, presidents themselves, public innovators, and how others in public life conduct themselves. Authenticity goes hand in hand with two other “A’s” I often write and speak about – namely, authority and accountability.
I’m especially interested in how the 3A’s can inform and guide our own words and deeds, rather than to use them in judging others. Far too much time is spent in our society on pointing fingers at one another and placing blame; not nearly enough time is spent on looking in the mirror to change our own ways and on leading by example.
But Krugman’s argument smacks of throwing the baby out with the bath water. He says too many people use notions of authenticity to “put down politicians they don’t like or praise politicians they like, with no relationship to what the politicians actually say or do.” Further, he implies that there’s no definition of authenticity worth talking about or applying.
Let’s take his first point. I’ve long said that much of our public life and politics is based on attempts to manufacture authenticity. That’s wrong. Oftentimes there doesn’t seem to be much daylight between some politicians and snake oil salesmen. False authenticity wreaks havoc on people’s trust in leaders and produces a corrosive effect on our body politic.
Yet that doesn’t mean that people shouldn’t – or can’t effectively – use authenticity as a lens for thinking about presidential candidates or any other facet of public life and politics. To the contrary, authenticity is at the core of what people are yearning to find in public life and politics. People are tired of not having their reality reflected in the public square and, worse, having their reality distorted by those who seek to curry favor and win votes.
So, what does authenticity mean for me? Try this:
• Being Authentic means that your words and actions reflect the reality of people’s lives.
• Being Authentic means that you see and treat people in a human way, not as objects to be manipulated.
• Being Authentic means seeking to understand the wholeness of a situation – capturing the different perspectives, ambiguity, and tensions that exist. What you say rings true.
• Being Authentic means genuinely listening to people in an ongoing way – and not through gimmicks and by windrow dressing.
• Being Authentic means you reflect people’s lives and the community in which you work.
• Being Authentic means that people believe you have their best interests at heart, even when you disagree with them. You exercise a sense of affection for the community.
I urge Paul Krugman to use this lens when listening to and watching the presidential candidates, not to mention others in public life and politics. When he does he’ll see, yes, people can determine if someone is authentic. And, no, it probably doesn’t make much sense to come to snap decisions about that; usually such determinations are made over time, as each of us take the measure of an individual.
So, what about you? Watch the candidates for yourself, use the bullets I laid out here, and you’ll see what I mean. Honestly.
P.S. Last week in The Harwood Public Innovator, our weekly e-letter, we provided useful information on the 3A’s, which you can get by clicking here.
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Additional Note: If you are not a New York Times subscriber and could not link to Paul Krugman's op-ed column above, you can read it at the blog, Economist's View.
(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. The Harwood Institute has no affiliation whatsoever with the blog, Economist's View, the originator of this article nor is The Harwood Institute endorsed or sponsored by the blog, Economist's View or the originator.)
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The Skidmore Challenge
This past week I spent an amazing three days at my 25th college reunion. (I know I’m getting old.) At the same time I have been reading David Halberstam’s bestseller, The Best and the Brightest. What do these two things have to do with each other? Everything!
While at Skidmore College I gave a talk about the conditions of public life and politics. During the Q&A, my fellow graduates focused a great deal on how so many of us are now overwhelmed by the avalanche of unfiltered news, a lack of trust in political leaders and the belief that few good ones are on the horizon, and a nagging worry about how change can be created when so many of us are focused inwardly on our own needs.
Meanwhile, The Best and the Brightest is a story of a group of people who believed that they knew answers to the tough questions of their day. But the tale reminds us that no one individual, or group of self-selected individuals, has a lock on the vision or the knowledge necessary for moving society forward. Indeed, the book brilliantly reveals the sheer hubris that can take hold of people when they lose sight of what is required to create change, especially change that accounts for and reflects people’s reality and their aspirations.
Which leads me back to my talk in Palamountain Hall at Skidmore College.
You see, we are trying to navigate our lives in a time when so many aspects of our society are up for grabs and being reshaped. The newspaper industry that so many of us grew up with is in a free fall and may not exist in the years ahead. The ways in which we communicate on cell phones and via the Internet have altered how gather information and relate to one another. The spread of a consumer mindset into virtually every facet of our lives – especially our public lives – has titled the balance of society inward, away from notions of the public good.
The discussion that people wanted to have at Skidmore was that we are living in the midst of a major societal transformation. That’s not news, obviously. But because we are only a portion of the way through the transformation, we often experience tremendous dissonance in our lives, can feel incredibly unsettled, and are concerned about what’s next on the horizon. That is important.
But, still, what does this have to do with The Best and the Brightest?
Well, my point is this: we cannot expect a new, select group of leaders, however much we trust them, to get us through this transformation. No one individual or group knows exactly what it will take to move ahead; even more to the point, what is required, in large part, is that we generate new pockets of innovation and change that will create new pathways forward. Indeed, what people yearn for today is a sense of possibility that we can discover such pathways – whether on challenges such as health care and public schools to re-connecting people and growing new public leaders and civic-minded organizations.
I told my fellow Skidmore grads that their communities, and this country, are waiting for them to step forward and help lead the way to create these new pathways. Indeed, the work of change must often start at the local level, where people can come together, build new relationships and solutions, and innovate (and, yes, fail from time-to-time, and learn). It is these pockets of change that will help us to cultivate the necessary conditions to support larger, more systemic efforts.
The notion that some small collection of best and the brightest people will lead the way forward fails to take into account history and how so much innovation and change has occurred in our nation. Look back over time and it is clear that so many efforts were initially led by small groups of like-minded people who were willing to initiate change.
Like other Americans, my Skidmore friends are hungry for a new way forward.