by Steven R. Corman A presentation by John Hagel, Chairman of Deloitte, at the recent SXSW conference has been getting a lot of play in the blogosphere. In it, Hagel advocates differentiating story from narrative. While he is right to draw the distinction and gets some of the differences right, he misses some key features of narratives that explain why they can be so persuasive. In his presentation, Hagel notes the power of stories for [...] Read more »
NATO Strategic Comm and Narrative in Afghanistan
by Steven R. Corman I am currently in Izmir, Turkey attending the 5th NATO SHAPE Conference on Strategic Communication. Narrative has been an important theme at the conference. Gen. John Allen, commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, addressed the topic in his keynote. A panel (on which I presented) was devoted to it as well. Both dealt with issues of considerable interest, namely how NATO and ISAF would handle strategic communication [...] Read more »
Corman speaks at 5th NATO SHAPE Strategic Communication Conference in Izmir, Turkey
CSC Director Steve Corman addressed the 5th NATO SHAPE Strategic Communication conference on June 21st in Izmir, Turhey. The conference gathered over 140 practitioners from NATO member countries. The conference featured a keynote address by Gen. John Allen, commander of ISAF in Afghanistan. Narrative was a prominent theme at the conference, and Corman was invited to share insights from the CSC’s work on narrative applied both to NATO and extremist groups. He discussed narrative problems [...] Read more »
Why Story is Not Narrative
By Jeffry R. Halverson I’ll admit that I slip sometimes in everyday conversation and use the word “story” as a synonym for “narrative.” A lot of people do it. But I should know better. There’s an important difference between the two. For the average conversation the difference doesn’t really matter much. However, when it comes to strategic communication and understanding the role of narrative in messaging strategies, it’s a distinction that has to be made. [...] Read more »
Seeing the Syrian Conflict through Narrative
By Jeffry R. Halverson Unlike the protests of the Arab Spring in Tunisia and Egypt, the campaigns underway against the Assad regime in Syria have a distinctly sectarian character. The Assad regime is dominated by the Alawites, a little-known esoteric Shi‘ite sect. However, the majority of Syria’s population is Sunni Muslim (approx. 75%). And caught in the middle of the conflict are Syria’s Christians (10% of the pop.), Druze, Twelver Shi‘ites, and others, including a [...] Read more »
With bin Laden Dead Let’s Kill the Binary Narrative
by Scott Ruston As details pour in regarding this past weekend’s daring raid in which U.S. Navy SEALs killed elusive al-Qaeda leader and world’s most wanted terrorist Osama Bin Laden, the exact details of the events keep changing slightly. The New York Times titled an article covering a recent revision to the sequence of events and details about the operation as “White House Corrects Bin Laden Narrative”. I would argue, however, the “Bin Laden Narrative” [...] Read more »