Martin Kirk, Oxfam GB www.charitycomms.org.uk/events

1. Social Marketing Conference:
Changing Behaviour Through
Communications
30 November 2011
www.charitycomms.org.uk
www.twitter.com/CharityComms
www.facebook.com/CharityComms

2. Frames & global development
A different perspective on
public opinion and engagement
Martin Kirk, Oxfam

3. Opinion polls are a very poor measure
of what the public really think
There’s no guarantee that you are really
saying what you assume you are saying

4. A critical half of the
story I can’t tell
you about today

5. The problem for international
development NGOs
Losing public debate on global social justice
Multiple, longitudinal measures
Public “uninterested and uninformed”
Media, NGOs, companies, government all in same
place
We can’t get away from statements like:
“nothings changed since Live Aid”
“aid is just wasted on corruption”

6. Frames
Chunks of factual and procedural knowledge
Shape attitudes and responses
Informed by values

7. Frames
Surface frames: words and meanings
e.g. Tax relief
Deep frames: worldviews
e.g. Moral order

8. ? ? ? ?
Moral order

9. aid development charity campaigns
Moral order

10. Conclusion on Oxfam GB 2010
Comms
“Seen through the ‘Frames and Values’ lens, the
language of Oxfam communications often
promotes frames and values you are trying to
move away from
However, your comms do show – in places – ‘how it can
be otherwise’”

11. Oxfam UK and the Moral Order
Simplification: especially binary oppositions, imperatives, assertions
and war metaphors
Assumptions: about supporters, prospective supporters & local partners
Agency: subtle suggestions about who does what, to whom, which
disempower supporters and local people
11

12. Subtle suggestion
12

13. Less subtle suggestion
‘We’ = active
“…we help poor communities affected Climate change = active
by climate change”
BUT
“…we should join together to help our
global neighbours”
‘Communities’, ‘global neighbours’
= not active
13

14. The four horsemen of belief
1 Mass poverty is inevitable
2 The problem is with the people who are poor
3 People are poor for ‘natural’ and moral reasons
4 Charity is (good) enough

15. Three uncomfortable truths
1 Despite ourselves, NGOs are telling an old, predictable story,
and are pretty comfortable with it
‘Old’ charity
Starving African babies (usually in black and white)
Distance and difference
Grandiose hope over reason
2 Government and the media are in the same
boat
3 We are blind to some very important
unintended consequences

16. Four bad habits
1 We assume far more than we know; we are more slave than
master of our language
2 We fixate on what people think and ignore the why
3 We don’t know what a credible long term vision for engaging
the public looks like
4 We confuse policy prescriptions for campaigns

17. Five new habits?
Take a whole organisation/whole sector perspective. Collaborate.
Study your language. Use experts. Standardise e.g. discourse analysis (looks at
why)
Prioritise credibility
Evolve communications, campaigning & fundraising models in one direction:
deeper engagement models
more conversation
less turnover
Revisit models of change. Together.

18. Opinion polls are a very poor measure
of what the public really think
There’s no guarantee that you are really
saying what you assume you are saying

19. www.valuesandframes.org
www.oxfam.org.uk/grow