Brand Command: Canadian Politics and Democracy in the Age of Message Control

Alex Marland

maalis 2016 · UBC Press

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The pursuit of political power is strategic as never before. Ministers, MPs, and candidates parrot the same catchphrases. The public service has become politicized. And decision making is increasingly centralized in the Prime Minister’s Office. What is happening to our democracy? In this persuasive book, Alex argues that political parties and government are beholden to the same marketing principles used by the world’s largest corporations. Called branding, the strategy demands repetition of spoken, written, and visual messages, predetermined by the leader’s inner circle. Marland warns that public sector branding is an unstoppable force that will persist no matter who is in power. It also creates serious problems for parliamentary democracy that must be confronted. This book will fascinate anyone who is interested in how Ottawa works and where Canadian politics is headed.

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Alex Marland is a leading researcher of political communication and marketing in Canada and an associate professor of political science and an associate dean of arts at Memorial University of Newfoundland. He has worked in the communications division of a federal government department, held a public opinion analysis position with a major polling firm, and been employed as a research manager with public relations and advertising agencies. He later held director of communications positions with several departments in the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador public service. He is the co-editor of the UBC Press series “Communication, Strategy, and Politics” (with Thierry Giasson) and was the lead editor of Political Marketing in Canada (2012) and Political Communication in Canada: Meet the Press and Tweet the Rest (2014), and of the open access project Canadian Election Analysis 2015: Communication, Strategy, and Democracy (2015).