Narrative & Strategic Communications
Narrative & Strategic Communications

Author(s): Scott Ruston
Subject(s): International relations/trade, Politics and communication, Theory of Communication, Geopolitics, Rhetoric
Published by: NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence
Keywords: Strategic communications; information environment; communication campaigns; rhetoric; geopolitics;
Summary/Abstract: Strategic communicators need concepts, methods and tools to both analyse the information environment in which they work and in order to craft communication campaigns that will resonate with audiences and accomplish organizational objectives. One of the most powerful rhetorical and analytic devices for these purposes is narrative. Narrative is so central to human understanding and decision making that communication theorist Walter Fisher proposed that humans should be called homo narrans or ‘storytelling man’ rather than homo sapiens (‘thinking man’). He argues, in part, that human decisions and behaviours are driven more by narrative logic and that rational logic while it still applies to human thinking is subordinate to narrative logic. Couple this assertion of fundamental human nature with a consideration of the presence of ‘narrative’ in reporting on any political contest or analysis of geopolitical conflict.

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