Campaign Posters – Purposes and impact

‘Pick it up’ campaign poster.

This poster serves multiple purposes and has various impacts, including:‘To bring about national change’ – One of the main purposes is to bring about change, as with any campaign poster. In this particular example, it’s intended on creating change on a national scale throughout the UK, and isn’t selectively targeting one specific region. By getting the whole nation to work against the issue, the poster has the impact of making the nation a generally safer place for young children.‘To change attitudes’ – This applies particularly to this image due to the fact that people often dismiss the issue of dog littering despite knowing that the issue exists. This poster aims to change the way people perceive the issue, and by using the shock factor of small child and a large fine, it can make people rethink their attitudes. This ties in closely with ‘providing people information’, as it informs people of what can actually happen when they don’t clean after their dog. The fact that it states ‘children will put anything in their mouths’ is giving factual evidence which helps to consolidate this.‘To campaign’ – Like with any campaign poster, all the purposes tie in together to create the overall purpose of creating a campaign and stand against something. With this poster, the overall campaign purpose is to highlight the fact that the way we are treating the issue is inadequate and there needs to be a change.

Techniques used to create attention in this poster:

• As mentioned in the previous slide, the usage of the direct fact ‘children will eat anything in their mouth’ is intended on creating shock value, and this technique is intensified by the choice of all caps letters used for the quote. This isn’t the only time the poster adopts bold facts in order to grab attention, as the same technique is repeated again with the quote about the price of a fine for ‘dog fouling’.

• Other than through text, the poster adopts the technique of actually simulating and image of an infant eating ‘dog foul’. This technique is intended on putting the situation into perspective for potential dog ‘foulers’, and making people really see how ‘foul’ the situation can become (which ties in nicely with the purpose of changing attitudes and raising awareness). On top of all this, the ‘pick it up’ command is used in order to create a sense of fear amongst ‘dog foulers’. By using a direct command rather than asking politely, the campaigners are creating a sense of anger and disgust at the situation, which in turn causes people to react more positively to the campaign. Having said this, I don’t think that the poster has a primary aim of scaring people about the fact that they might get in trouble, but takes a more liberal stance and aims to make people aware of the facts and figures.

Evidence of Impact:• A 2009 article from The Guardian is great proof that campaigns

like the one above are having a noticeable positive impact on the issue. In terms of actually bringing about change, this campaign has really managed to hit the nail on the head, with The Guardian quoting the statistics of ‘Nationwide, dog fouling is said to be down 40% to 50% since 2003. So, many dog owners are responsible. But many are not. And now some local councils, having - to general approval - already outlawed dogs from children's play areas, are proposing an outright ban from designated areas like parks and beaches.’ Along with this, the poster successfully manages to provide information to people about the issue (which is a given due to the fact that it directly displays the information in quick and to the point text).

‘When did he stop treating you like a princess?’This poster intends on serving multiple purposes and has various impacts, including: Bringing about global change. In this case the creator of the campaign has set out to reach a global audience due to the fact that domestic violence is not only an issue on a local or national scale, but is a worldwide one. Evidence to support this is highlighted in internet campaign groups such as ‘The Global Partnership To End Violence Against Women’ and the UN global campaign against domestic violence. Furthermore, this poster aims to raise awareness and change attitudes as domestic violence is an issue that is very much either kept a secret or hidden from the outside world, this poster plays on the idea of a Disney princess (an iconic figure) with a black eye; something most people would respond to. This use of shock value adds visual impact to the image to raise awareness to those who have not been subjected to domestic violence themselves. Finally, this poster also builds a relationship with it’s subject, as many people have little or no understanding of domestic violence this poster impacts those who would consider ‘Disney princesses’ as a subject widely spoke about. This makes the issue of domestic violence easier to understand and interpret and thus people may build a relationship with the campaign.

Techniques used to create attention in this poster:

• There isn’t a great deal to analyse on this poster in terms of techniques used. It goes for an eye catching and to the point drawing of a presumably beaten up Cinderella. The relevance of the fact that it’s a drawing of Cinderella who’s been beaten up, works in many ways similarly to how celebrity endorsement does. Having the familiar face is an invaluable technique as it allows the viewers of the poster to instantly relate (due to how universal Disney characters are). Another noticeable technique is the sort of play on words with the double meaning in the title of the poster ‘When did he stop treating you like a princess?’. Both of these techniques essentially work together in order to create an association between Disney princess’s and domestic abuse, thus reinforcing the idea that anyone can be a victim.

Evidence of Impact• Although not decreasing levels of domestic violence, the

campaign rose awareness on social media such as facebook and twitter with celebrities such as Nicole Kidman supporting the cause. Due to this virality over various social media platforms, the poster has successfully had great impact on ‘raising awareness’ and ‘building relationships with subjects’. Despite this, the campaign hasn’t really managed to achieve it’s primary aim of brining about global change. This can be proved by the fact that domestic violence is still on the rise, as 1 in 4 women will experience domestic violence at some point in their lives. These figures are backed up by websites such as safehorizon.org and savelives.org

‘Not quite Labour’

This is one of the many satirical takes on David Cameron’s ‘year for change’ poster in which he essentially originally claimed that he could ‘fix’ the British economy. This poster begs to differ, and essentially laughs at the idea of David Cameron actually having any significant influence on the economy. There are several purposes to the poster (which was created using a ‘create my David Cameron poster’ website, and what sets this apart from other campaigns is that it doesn’t take itself particularly seriously. Some of the purposes include:To challenge dominant representations and agendas: Presumably, one of the poster’s primary aims is to challenge the way Cameron presents himself as a person, and the Conservative party in general. By pointing out that things might be slightly different to how he is presented over the internet and TV, the creator aims to challenge these beliefs and representations.To infiltrate mainstream media: The purpose of the website andybarefoot.com/politics/cameron.php, as well as the initial graffiti pieces, have the intention of accessing mainstream media via national news channels etc. due to the media coverage that often comes hand in hand with political propaganda. The reason for aiming to infiltrate the media in this way, is because the media holds a great deal of influence on the general public, thus essentially allowing these satirical campaigns to gain access to the public eye via TV, newspapers etc.To change voting behavior: It goes without saying that one of the purposes of this string of satirical posters is to change the voting behavior of the general public. This ties in with my previous point about infiltrating the mainstream media in order to gain public exposure. The more mainstream media exposure, the more political influence you’ll have, and I think that on top of the entertaining and humorous nature of this poster is the underlying effort to stopping people from voting for the Tories.

Techniques used to create attention in this poster:

• As mentioned in the previous slide, the poster relies heavily on satire and sarcasm in order to entertain it’s audience. People in general find a great deal of likeability in things that make them laugh, rather than things that don’t make them laugh. For this reason, the use of satire is a great technique which instantly helps to build a connection between the audience and the poster, thus making people more inclined to actually want to get behind the cause. On the other hand, you could argue that this technique is slightly counter productive due to the fact that a lot of the time, if something’s not taking itself particularly seriously (in this case the poster due to it’s heavily satirical nature), then it can become harder for other people to take it seriously.

• Other than it’s mockery of the Tory agenda, this poster doesn’t really use much in the way of techniques, but the fact that it visually replicates the orignal poster adds further comical value. It also means that anyone who sees the poster will instantly know that it is of a political nature, making those who are interested in political affairs more likely to take a moment out of their day to stop and read it. This is particularly relevant due to the fact that a large image of Cameron’s face is plastered on the front, thus creating a visual association between the poster and politics.

Original PosterThis is the original poster, set up by the Tories in the run up to the 2015 general election in order to try and gain the general public’s vote.

Evidence of impact• Unfortunately, these anti-tory posters didn’t actually manage to achieve a massive amount.

These statistics taken from Wikipedia, show that the conservatives actually managed to gain an extra 24 seats through the 2015 general election, and remain in complete control of the country with a majority vote. Using this data, I can conclude the fact that campaign hasn’t really achieved it’s aim of changing voting behavior. Having said this, it would be unfair to dismiss the campaign due to this, as you have to compensate for the fact that you can’t expect one campaign to simply completely rearrange the outcome of a general election. What I mean by this is that although the campaign hasn’t changed the overall outcome, it may well have influenced voter’s behavior. In this way, I see it as being partially successful.

• In terms of managing to infiltrate the mainstream media, although this particular poster didn’t achieve much attention from the media, the campaign as a collective effort did. One example of a mainstream national scale newspaper and website which featured an article about the campaign was ‘The Independent’, who branded ‘Cameron’s airbrushed appearance’ as a ‘leftist warning’ to the public about the potential dangers of a conservative government. This, amongst other similar articles, proves how the collection of posters have really managed to infiltrate the mainstream media.

Statistics from a Wikipedia page demonstrating the fact that the posters haven’t had much of a significant political influence, as the conservatives grow ever more powerful.

http://i100.independent.co.uk/article/labour-appropriates-fiveyearold-meme-in-election-poster-campaign--xJ9sZsjHqe

An article from ‘The Independent’ demonstrating the campaign's success in infiltrating the mainstream media.