A British Social Attitudes poll published in June 2024 showed that 45 percent of the UK population would ‘almost never’ trust British governments, of any party, to place the needs of the nation above the needs of their own party. 79% also believe that the present system of government could be improved ‘quite a lot’ or a ‘great deal’, a number matching the previous record low. 

The most poignant, and personal, of the findings though, might be that 58% claim they would ‘almost never’ trust politicians to tell the truth when backed into a ‘tight corner’. With around 49% of the global population eligible to vote in an election in 2024, it is the year of the campaign trail; a spectacle which lays bare the theatre of politics.

Nothing is left unsaid, either to bolster one’s own credibility, or tarnish another’s, and every opportunity is taken to increase visibility; to be seen with the public, in workplaces, schools, hospitals, to be seen laughing, touching and connecting with ‘ordinary people’. 

But with trust in politics and politicians so low in the UK as well as in other comparable democracies, it is as if the very systems of government we live under in the Western world, and have grown apathetic and cynical towards, are under review this time around. 

What are in doubt today are not just the economic and military policies but also the political institutions inherited from the past. Is political democracy, as it exists today, a viable form of government for the industrialized countries of Europe, North America, and Asia?
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In recent years, acute observers on all three continents have seen a bleak future for democratic government
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The image which recurs in these and other statements is one of the disintegration of civil order, the breakdown of social discipline, the debility of leaders, and the alienation of citizens.
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This pessimism about the future of democracy has coincided with a parallel pessimism about the future of economic conditions.

The above extracts are taken from the 1975 Trilateral Commission report titled, The Crisis of Democracy, written in response to a sense of increasing ungovernability in the three member regions of Japan, Europe and North America. The parallels between the issues raised and the concerns of the current day point to the cyclical nature of politics, the ebbs and flows of a system which tends to swing back and forth between left and right, and the crescendo of distrust, apathy and even panic which occurs at the top of each swing.

In 1975, this panic may have been the result of rapid social change following the civil rights movements and the fear of annihilation brought on by the Cold War. Parallels can be drawn between this period and our current backdrop of political polarisation coupled with the fear of annihilation not only by the conflicts raging in Europe and the Middle East but by the death throes of the planet itself as we witness increasingly extreme weather events, the images of which are reminiscent of biblical end times. 

However, there is an additional ingredient this time around; an incomprehensibly vast and polluted information ecosystem algorithmically tuned to obsess and provoke its users on an individually bespoke basis and siloing individuals into parallel realities.

In Alberto O. Hirschman’s 1991 book, The Rhetoric of Reaction he outlines some of the key rhetorical strategies used by political reactionaries to push back against progressive change. His perversity thesis describes a line of argumentation which suggests that the progressive policy at hand is likely to have unintended, detrimental consequences. Similarly, his jeopardy thesis is one which predicts unintended consequences, but in the form unacceptable costs, and the risk of reversing, (jeopardising), other cherished policies or systems. 

Whilst it is clearly pragmatic to try to gauge the consequences of any change, these rhetorical strategies also allow political opponents to forecast the dystopian future proposed by their adversary, and contrast it with their own utopian vision.

Understanding the mental life of a particular society involves constructing an inventory of the collective representations which the different social groups in the society, as well as the society as a whole, have held over a long period of time.
- Hall, 1983, p.57.

Tapping into what Hall describes as the ‘collective representations’ of a society, politicians decide which representations from their inventory are likely to be as appealing to their core audience as possible whilst avoiding alienating potential swing voters. However, considering the stratified, bespoke nature of the contemporary information ecosystem, these representations are becoming more difficult to predict, more diverse, and as a result, less tolerant to the one-size-fits-all approach which political campaigns, by necessity, have to take. 

Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being, or a substance. It is the generation by models of a real without origin or reality: a hyperreal.
- Baudrillard, 1981, p.1.

Baudrillard’s concept of the hyperreal is instinctively known. Both the deconstructionist left and the accelerationist right are conscious of the theatrical nature of party politics. The Punch and Judy show of political debates and interviews, fought with venom, repeats the uncannily familiar rhetoric we are used to hearing. 

These events, or rather pseudo-events, whilst long-established in terms of style, contribute to the contemporary post-truth era we live in. Lyotard argued that the ‘production of proof’, or truth, is ‘only part of the argumentation process designed to win agreement’, and that ‘performativity – that is the best input/output equation’ takes priority in a post-modern society where the goal is not ‘to find truth, but to augment power’. 
- Lyotard, 1979, p.46.

The resurgence of the far-right, both in Europe and the US suggests that the grand-narrative, the search for a fundamental truth, is making a comeback, with a decidedly conspiratorial and contrarian flavour. These narratives, or truths, are tailored algorithmically to allow individuals to find their tribe and to exist in tailored, virtual realities.

There is less incentive than ever to adhere to a consensus vision of reality. Yet this is still, necessarily, at the core of political messaging.

The following is a visual journey through the performance of political campaigning using animation, appropriated and manipulated imagery from the 2024 UK general election.