Communication with an Influence

The art of environmental activism demands a high level of strategic communication, one in which those who are attempting to persuade others to believe the way they do must use specific tactics to not only draw attention to an issue, but convince others to have the same passion. As discussed in lecture, strategic communication is using the skill of communication to inform, persuade, or influence a selected audience in order to achieve a specific outcome. Understanding strategic communication is an essential tool as an environmental activist and through extensive consideration; different activist groups can build effective campaigns to help their cause.

Greenpeace, a globally recognized environmental activist group commonly uses ‘‘shock value’’ to bring attention to issues they see as important. Although some may not agree with the way Greenpeace attempts to rally people around and issue, they use strategic communication to reach a broad audience through their outrageous campaigns.

The following is a less violent video created by Greenpeace which uses a mock police investigation as a way to draw attention to David Koch, the Vice President of Koch Industries and oil billionaire.

In this video, Greenpeace uses a much less violent approach to get their message across. They strategically target multiple groups with this commercial, explaining who David Koch is (an oil billionaire who funds environmental and historical exhibits and uses those to tell the public that drilling for oil is not harmful to the environment.)

Greenpeace creates it’s own opportunities to communicate their cause in the video and their use of repetition on the issue of David Koch’s attempts to cover his damage to the environment engraves a strong message in the viewer’s mind about Koch Industries. The goal of this video is to make the public aware of the issue at hand and because of this mild approach, it is much more likely to be shown to a wide variety of people.

Although the audience most likely cannot stop Koch Industries from continuing to drill for oil, Greenpeace exposes areas outside of the oil industry where David Koch is involved. It is effective because after watching the commercial, anyone can be left more informed than they were before. This video is refreshing to view because it is a peaceful demonstration of Greenpeace giving knowledge to the public about how misleading Koch Industries’ mission is and can motivate people to seek the truth.

By: Karissa Bodnar

The Private-Public Problems of Polluting People

Since the awareness of pollution entered the main stream media, activists have tried their best to find ways to grab the public’s attention and make an impact. However, there is a continuous battle between public problems (problems that affect most everyone or damage or threaten a public good) and private problems (problems that effect a select few and damage or threaten a private good) and their role in the Public Sphere. Jugen Habermas defines the Public Sphere as ‘a realm of our social life in which something approaching public opinion can be formed.’ Basically, Habermas is saying that private people come together to discuss common concerns of public issues.

Today there are so many different concerns and such a large variety of audiences that it is hard to deliberate for the common good. However, Greenpeace continues to draw attention to pollution problems around the world and widen the Public Sphere. Commercial media has been an effective way to bring up public issues, such as energy efficient light bulbs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQJd2DNLl28&NR=1

In the commercial above, Greenpeace uses a clever and funny way to get the publics attention about how to save energy. This is a public problem because the world does not have an endless supply of clean energy resources, especially not enough to keep up with the United States energy usage. This is a Problem that affects everyone who uses electricity… that means you reading this right now! However, there are some debates about what problems are public and which are private.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukoMEB_Wzbk&feature=related

In this commercial, also by Greenpeace, the topic of pollution from manufacturing and discarding videogame systems is brought up. Some may argue that this is a public problem because the waste from these systems goes into the environment compromising it for all those who live in our earth’s environment. On the other hand, many would argue that this is a private problem because like Hays states, ‘it depends on the parties involved.’ This is like hunting for dear that is on your own property. If it is on your land, it is yours to do with what you want. In the same nature, if a game system is in ones home, it is up the owners what to do with it and how to get rid of the machine if broken or finished serving its purpose.

By: Megan Dalgleish