George Lakoff's book Don't Think of an Elephant! is a clear and concise explanation of exactly what is going on in the political life of our country. Every page of his book is filled with information that explains how those interested in core American ideals (such as human values, care of the environment, fiscal responsibility for the good of all and honesty in government) have been overwhelmed and defeated by skillful maneuvering backed by scientific research funded by big money interests. His book is a thoughtful exposé of facts and common sense and includes his view of what we need to do in order to participate effectively in shaping the policies that govern our lives domestically and internationally. Lakoff's bottom line advice for responding effectively to conservative framing is, show respect, respond by reframing, think and talk at the level of values, say what you believe.

The key to the importance of what Lakoff has to say is his clarity regarding framing. We all have been conditioned by our childhood environment and by the larger world to accept certain frames of reference. Thus, it is possible to gain our compliance (as in getting our vote) by eliciting the desired frame. According to Lakoff, large numbers of us have two especially relevant frames within our psyches when it comes to politics, operating as a kind of on-off system like a computer--when one of the frames has been elicited (by emotionally active key words or buzz words--information which disagrees with that frame becomes invisible to us or "bounces off." This explains why large numbers of people are now voting against their own best interests and why certain of our friends seem impervious to facts that to us are self-evident and pressing.

Lakoff shows that the frame involved in the political debate as it has been set up by conservatives is the strict father frame which is a model based on hierarchal authority enforced by strict discipline and threat of punishment (as in a fundamentalist viewpoint). In the strict father frame, the world is seen as a dangerous and difficult place and in order for the father to protect the family, obedience is required of everyone (including the mother). You must learn early to show worthiness by being successful and if you are not, then you don't deserve anything, even basic services (never mind that this worldview sets things up so that opportunity to be successful is reserved for those who are already successful, and their families).

He goes on to say that the frame in alignment with progressive, liberal, independent or human values thinking is the nurturant parent worldview. The nurturant model is gender neutral and based on responsibility and empathy. In the nurturant model, we want ourselves and everyone else to have--in addition to protection--freedom, opportunity, prosperity, fairness, justice, open two-way communication, honesty and integrity in government, tolerance, a healthy environment, and opportunity to be of service in a community which looks after the common good.

Frances Moore Lappé, author of several books including: Diet for a Small Planet, Hope's Edge, You Have the Power and The Quickening of America, while admiring Lakoff's clarifying vision as "insightful and right on target," believes we need to move beyond a parent/child model for politics and governance. She sees two dangers in relying on reframing alone for getting the progressive viewpoint out to the public effectively:

1) By believing that we are all playing on a democratic playing field, we will miss the fact that the Radical Right plays by entirely different rules. Lappé credits former right-wing insider David Brock's book Blinded by the Right with alerting her to the mean-spirited, ends-justify-the-means, go-to-any-lengths-to-defeat-the-enemy mindset, which she calls "chilling." As an example, she cites the final episode of Bill Moyers' on NOW in which he interviews Richard Viguerie, a founding father of the modern conservative movement and author of, America's Right Turn: How Conservatives Used New and Alternative Media to Take Power. On the program, speaking about the vicious pre-election attacks on Kerry, Viguerie states, "...We're NOT gonna play, Bill, by the liberal establishment's rules. They say this is acceptable and this is not acceptable. Those days are gone and gone forever." And David Horowitz, who writes in his pamphlet, The Art of Political War (distributed to Republican Senators by Tom DeLay), "Politics is war conducted by other means. In political warfare you do not fight just to prevail in an argument, but to destroy the enemy's fighting ability. In political wars, the aggressor usually prevails."

2) Lakoff's "nurturant parent" model for progressives will be perceived as an inadequate "soft mother" counterpart to "strict father." Lappé believes it is time for progressives to grow up and her article is entitled, "Who's Your Daddy? - Beyond Lakoff's strict Father vs. Nurturant Parent, a Strong Community Manifesto." She believes we need to move beyond nuclear family metaphors and beyond hierarchy, which any parent-centered frame must be.

Lappé sees three big shifts underway:

First, the communications/technology revolution is allowing us to experience ourselves as one planet.

Second, the ecological revolution is teaching us that there is no single action, isolated and contained; all actions have ripples, that the world is co-created through complex networks, no one of which is dominant.

Third, is a "revolution in human dignity." That recently we have awakened to see not only that "regular" citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that the changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are now too big to yield to directives from on high.

Lappé sees the desire to break with parentism in favor of fellowship and a hunger for healthy, strong community as palpable, with citizens everywhere becoming involved in decisions affecting their futures, creating better outcomes for all. She gives examples of the Linux system, part of the open software movement, rapidly gaining ground all over the world; Catholic parishioners in Boston "sitting in" their churches to keep them from being closed; the community-food-security movement, with Farmer's Markets, community-support-agriculture, restaurant-farmer alliances, and fair trade purchasing. All emphasize self-responsibility in community and are rejections of top-down, centralized solutions.

Lappé advances a new frame, called "Strong Community." She believes progressives cannot fall back on nurturing themes because we must get tough in several ways. The Radical Right must be held accountable for its anti-democratic outrages. We must effectively show how our security is threatened, not secured, by today's strict-father "protectors"-- how the ideology in Washington has under-funded our first responders, leaving us dreadfully underprotected, has made our health care dependent on giant drug companies and has left us with 15,000 highly vulnerable private chemical plants in charge of their own security. We must also show that society is weak and vulnerable when divided, rich against poor, white against black, Evangelicals against other faiths.

A "strong communities" frame could mean that we stop talking about "environment," which non-progressives hear as a "soft" distraction in war time, and frame ecological challenges as "threats to safe air and water and food." Stop talking about reforming criminal justice and talk about "results-based crime prevention." Stop talking about poverty and alleviating it, which conservatives call "do gooding" and talk about "fair chance communities." Lappé says, "Let's reframe the entire conversation to one that begins with a definition of citizens as responsible grown-ups, not helpless children."

In The Tao of Democracy, author Tom Atlee describes a "spectrum of politics." He says that when talking about Power Politics, George Lakoff's family metaphors are clarifying and useful. When talking about Cooperative Politics, where people see their self-interest in broad terms that tie them to others, Attlee sees Lappé's metaphor of Strong Communities extremely useful. In Holistic Politics, the realm of calling forth the wisdom of the whole for the benefit of the whole, he sees framings that clarify the values and trade-offs associated with many different approaches--the "whole picture approach"-- as most useful.

For more information about the whole picture approach go to: www.colorado.edu/conflict/peace/problem/framing.htm and www.thataway.org/resources/practice/issues.html. To find more about Cooperative Politics, go to cointelligence.org.

We refer you also to a thoughtful (and passionate) article on framing called What's in a Name? Everything by Michael David Green published on February 8, 2005 at CommonDreams.org.