According to Ganz's guide to public narrative:
Narrative is not talking “about” values; rather narrative embodies and communicates values.
Ganz, who helped guide Obama to electoral success, locates three crucial aspects of public narrative:
[it]requires telling a new public story, or adapting an old one: a story of self, a story of us, and a story of now. A story of self communicates the values that are calling you to act. A story of us communicates values shared by those whom you hope to motivate to act. And a story of now communicates the urgent challenge to those values that demands action now.
Ganz talks about these public narratives as having plots, morals, characters, and settings: they tell a story we can participate in with our senses.
To apply that to a Donald Trump populist story about preventing illegal immigrants from entering America, you would have to create a scenario that people can see, hear, feel, and so on. The first element would be to get inside the head and heart of Donald Trump. This would be the story of self: What values and life experiences does Trump have that makes him morally object to illegal immigrants? Does he believe, for example, in fair play, and does it seem unfair to him for people to "jump the line" by coming here illegally while people going through a legal process have to wait? Does he see these illegal aliens as taking jobs from citizens who need them? Does this raise his compassion towards those who are already here? Does he identify with legal immigrants, as his wife is an immigrant, but not illegal immigrants? Does he, having lived a long life, remember a time when America was much greater and had fewer illegal aliens? What did this greater America look like? Was everything newer, brighter, and more prosperous? How could you describe this?
The second element would be the story of us: Do we share the values that Trump expresses? Are we a country of people who champion fair play and not jumping the line? Have we worked hard to get what we have, so we object to people taking it illegally? Do we appreciate our own stories of hardworking immigrant parents, grandparents and great-grandparents who made it here legally? Could you tell such a story? What could the life of a citizen who has lost a job to an illegal alien look like, sound like, smell like? Could this person have become an opioid addict from a feeling of hopelessness? Could he be living in a falling apart house, surviving on a small disability check?
The third element in this populist narrative is the story of now. Here, a leader like Trump would appeal to common people about the need to act now. Why would it be vital to act now? Is it because this problem has been left unaddressed for too long? Is it because our country can not regain its lost greatness if we do not start taking care of the people who are here legally first and stopping the flow of illegals?
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