Influence for Good or Bad

Several years ago I read a book that keeps coming back to me. It’s Influencer: The Power to Change Anything, by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, David Maxfield, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler. I’ve read others by them: Crucial Conversations, and Change Anything, which I reread just a couple of months ago. With the best of intentions, they look as ways to bring about change in self and in organizations and societies. The authors together are a consulting group called VitalSmarts, and they reference a research lab on change (with more information at ChangeAnything.com).

There are a couple of case examples that have stuck with me. One was how a village in Nigeria went about annihilating the Guinea worm parasite. People who had lived with this painful pestilence had to learn to change many things: filter their water, keep infected people away from the water supply, and confront their neighbors to do the same—until the worm could be eradicated completely. Another case was dealing with the fight against AIDS in South Africa. Part of the problem was that violence, including sexual violence, against women was socially acceptable. The problem solvers developed a TV program that appealed to male and female viewers, and featured an abused wife. She was a likable character. The husband was also generally likable, very much like the viewers. But then they viewed the abuse and talked about it. As the character came to recognize the wrongness of his behavior, the viewers recognized it as well. The story is more complex than I can retell here, but social pressure influenced society to reduce the domestic violence.

The authors simultaneously use six areas of influence (more than I can ever keep in mind all at the same time). Graphically, it’s summarized in this 2x3 chart.

 

Influencer, p. 78

 

I’ve wondered how we can use these ideas for the repair of civilization. I’m convinced such repair can be done, if the right people go about it the right way. The authors have convinced me it’s possible, but I don’t personally have the answers—yet.

But this week I thought of their process in a totally difference context. Breitbart came up with C-SPAN video from 1995 of Eric Holder revealing a long-term plan to influence society. Holder says it this way:

What we need to do is change the way in which people think about guns, especially young people, and make it something that's not cool, that it's not acceptable, it's not hip to carry a gun anymore, in the way in which we changed our attitudes about cigarettes.

Using advertising, media, including Hollywood, and local and federal government, his intention was a public campaign “to really brainwash people into thinking about guns in a vastly different way.” So, this past month, looking at the illogical attacks on law-abiding gun owners, as if they (we) and not insane outlaws are the perpetrators of violence, is more than a little disturbing. Could Holder et al. actually change society to come to believe the second amendment is evil? If they actually use the six areas of influence, yes they could.

On the other hand, if we use influence techniques for good, they will fail.

The second amendment is not the only issue being influenced by people in the wrong who nevertheless understand how to move public opinion. So what we need are people in the right to come to understand how to move public opinion northward toward civilization.