Translated material
Elections of the Governor of the Novgorod Region: Four Mitin Team mistakes
On October 14, 2012, the election of the governor will be held in Veliky Novgorod. I note the fact that the elections are “pilot” - on how the process passes and will depend in the future the entire institution of the election of Russian governors.
The election struggle is already in full swing, sometimes taking completely bizarre forms. In this article I will try to look at what is happening in the region with the gaze of the PR specialist.
Having analyzed the situation, we can say that non-professionals are guided by the governor’s election campaign-obviously, some kind of old generation official who strives to meet the rapidly changing trends in politics and PR technologies-but elementaryly understanding neither the first nor second matter. There are already so many errors that the acting Governor S.G. Mitin will already be difficult to re -elect for a second term.
Rather, not quite so. To re-elect-it will most likely be re-elected, taking into account the capabilities of the administrative machine-but the image of the governor will be finally trampled due to the clumsy PR campaign. In fact, the region risks getting an illegitimate leader.
So, I will dwell on the most important flaws made by the team of the acting Governor in preparation for the elections:
Problem No. 1: Mending Technical Candidates, Image Blow
There is such a thing in political science as a “spoiler” or a technical candidate. The task of the “spoiler” is to present the illusion of choice, or delay a certain number of votes from other candidates, but more often the “spoiler” performs dirty work on “Black PR”. The whole farce of the Novgorod governor’s elections that no serious politician claimed, at least an equal to a mitin in his position.
Municipal filters, in fact, cut off the candidate from the Communist Party of the Communist Party of the Communist Party of the Communist Party of the Communist Party of the Communist Party of Efimov, did not get to the elections and "reference" Alexei Afanasyev. Those. In fact, the municipalities, dependent on the administration, simply did not provide the number of signatures necessary for the nomination of opposition candidates.
Compete S.G. Mitin gathers with such “serious” candidates as the head of the “House of Youth” 25 years old Georgy Kobzev and former mayor of Malaya Vishera Nikolai Zakharov. It should be mentioned about Zakharov that he lost his duties and was removed from the post of mayor of Malaya Visher with a scandal. Nice from the point of view of human qualities Zakharov turned out to be an inexperienced manager.
Thus, in the elections of the acting The governor plans to compete exclusively with fake characters. The problem of this decision lies in the fact that the administration creates a negative image - the governor who refused to competition, no one will take seriously.
The image of Mitin is already complicated by the “Fighting” that is not overcome by the stereotype. The governor, as with the appointment in 2007, remains a “Varangian”, with whom neither the people nor the elite connected their future, and now he is rapidly degrading, taking negative features.
Problem No. 2: Rough pressure on the opposition
For obvious reasons, the opposition - and in particular the Communists - did not arrange such a situation when the governor’s team, through the use of municipal filters, actually usurped the elections. Active activities began to search for output, publication in famous publications, consultations in Moscow at the highest level.
As a response, the governor's team used the law enforcement press. The prosecutor’s office submitted an application for the alleged facts of “pressure” by the Communist Party. How can the Communist Party can crush the actual power levers of pressure - it is not clear to me.
The episode is the second. A statement of the candidate from the Communist Party of the Communist Party of the Communist Party of the Communist Party of the Communist Party - Vadim Beriashvili - a request was submitted with a request to attract a young man under the article 282.
The reason was the post posted by Vadim Briashvili in his personal blog more than 3 months ago-in it Vadim with caustic sarcasm laughs at the senator from the Novgorod region Mr. Krivitsky. According to the income declaration that Krivitsky submitted to the tax authorities - last year he earned less than 10 tr. per month, while living in Moscow. Vadim Beriashvili suggested starting the collection of money in favor of the poverty of the Novgorod senator living on the verge of poverty. There was no reaction - and there will be a Moscow official to respond to an entry on the blog of Novgorod ...
But after three months from the date of publication, they filed a statement containing completely absurd accusations to Vadim. Beriashvili himself believes that the senator was knocked out by none other than Mr. Kostyukov-the vice-governor, a person who is attributed to the organization of the governor's election campaign, where, it seems, a bet on multi-level conflicts is made as a key strategy.
The author of the lawsuit did not take into account one thing: we live in the information era. Instead of the expected result - to force Vadim Briashvili to shut up - in response, the modern Ostapa Bender received wide publicity. The opposition’s entry about the lawsuit filed against him fell into the top of the main topics of LJ, was published by a number of leading regional media. As a result, the result was absolutely opposite to the expected one - Mr. Kostyukov (or who was there to file a lawsuit there?) Only spoiled the reputation to the senator. Another clear puncture.
Problem No. 3: incorrectly organized PR campaign
After the December protests, officials learned that in addition to television and newspapers, there are, it turns out, also social networks. And if there is, it means that you must also work in them. The problem is that there was no one to work - just few people in the city can do it properly.
There is such a thing - correction of the vector of perception of information. In fact, properly commenting on a particular article, you can achieve a favorable perception of content for yourself. However, the administration chose to limit myself to banal trolling. The hired trolls comment on all the significant Internet resources of the region, but they do it so clumsy-that instead of benefit, only harm is obtained. Firstly, the trolls are easily read-not only a PR man, but even a simple user easily distinguishes the engaged nature of the messages they leave. Instead of conducting a discussion with opponents - the staff is engaged in frank rudeness, setting up against themselves and the administration of Novgorodians. The spectacle is sad.
The second puncture is the invitation of the blogger http://fima-psuchopadt.livejournal.com/
According to the plan of PR geniuses from the administration, Fima was supposed to portray the “leader of the opinions”, who could persuade the entire Novgorod blogosphere to support the administration. And then a puncture.
Having my blog for about two years, I only recently found out that such a blogger in principle is. Yes, the blog is quite promoted, 170 place (taking into account the wraps) in the ranking, 11,000 freeds - of which, however, a significant part of the both and offfer (purchased friends). Yes, and the blogger Fima himself is an extremely strange and shocking person, which is only worth his status: “If the corpse is circled with colored crayons, then the atmosphere of the holiday is created!”
In any case, on the status of a universal leader of opinions - what, for example, is a blogger of another (Rustem Adagamov) http://drugoi.livejournal.com/ - Fima does not pull in any way. I just state the fact.
Another inconsistency is Fima a resident of the city on the Neva, that is, it has nothing to do with the great Novgorod. A few Novgorod bloggers (from 700 to 2-3 thousand with a total of a total) were frankly offended that instead of an invitation to work, they were invited by the Varangian. Discussion at the “Smart People forum” http://forumnov.com/index.php?showtopic=3447981 - a popular regional site - demonstrated the whole skeptical attitude of the public to Fim and in general - an attempt by the governor to build relations with bloggers.
But the key problem is the underdevelopment of the Novgorod blogosphere. The vast majority of bloggers have 50-100 friends each, bloggers of thousands are rare. The record holder is the blog of Nikolai Podsokorsky http://podosokorskiy.livejournal.com/ with 4000 subscribers. To Rustem from its 70,000. Everyone is far like the stars. In general, there is a feeling of complete unprofessionalism from the governor's team: budgets for PR are allocated, money is spent - but the effect is zero, if not with a minus sign. The visiting PR people will show officials what a blog is, maybe they will even teach something-but all costs will eventually go into the sand. Officials need to work - and not portray popular bloggers. Otherwise, problems will begin on the main activity, due to the lack of time.
Problem No. 4: The split inside the local political elite
Another factor that should be mentioned is about is the lack of consensus inside the elite. For five years of governorship S.G. Mitin never managed to build trusting relations with representatives of the city elite.
It can be stated that the split may well occur at the level of the mayor-governor. Firstly, the mayor of Yuri Bobryshev is Novgorod. He understands well, apparently that when accepting the “rules of the game” aggregated by the Governor’s team - he, in fact, puts an end to his future political career. Suppose the Governor will leave another five -year plan elected with the scandal - but then he will be forced to retire, you can’t deceive the age. What will the next governor do? Most likely, the first step will be an attempt to get rid of unpopular local officials, thus, distant from the negative image of the predecessor. It is clear that neither Bobryshev nor other Novgorod elitarians will please such a prospect.
The very possibility of the split of the elites most clearly designated itself during the meeting of the governor with key representatives of the Novgorod elite, where the latter wanted to receive a clear answer from S.G. Mitin about the principles of building further relations. The governor did not give a clear answer.
Thus, the local elite readily accept Putin’s initiative to return the governor’s elections, seeing in this, first of all, the opportunity to strengthen his position - however, participation in the “contract match” completely discrediting the very idea of the governor’s election does not correspond to their interests.
So, here are the four main mistakes of the governor's team. I’ll try to predict the result of the “elections”: Mitin is elected to the post of governor, with a recordly low explicit of voters. Officials, members of their families, forced by state employees and workers from factories vote. There is no competition. The image of the governor has been crushed, the people perceive Mitin with something between Yeltsin "working with documents" and the late Brezhnev, they are laughing quietly. The governor’s team saws the budgets allocated for PR, everyone is happy, the blogger FIMA is also, of course.
Only the Novgorodians are dissatisfied - whom the local authorities deprived the right to choose and believes for idiots who will vote in a “contract match” in which the result is known in advance.
August 10, 2012