Why New Zealand’s cannabis vote failed
The New Zealand cannabis vote failed because it didn’t persuade enough undecided voters to vote yes. At 50.7% to 48.4% it got agonizingly close. There are a couple of important lessons going forward for those who will (and should) continue to campaign for reform.
I’m not a cannabis user but voted yes because the arguments for reform are overwhelming. Cannabis is readily available and widely used. A yes vote would have resulted in less harm.
I suspected the yes vote would come close but fail because the yes campaign appeared disjointed and lacked a clear strategy to win. They need an honest reflection on why they failed in order to make changes going forward.
And frankly, there should never have been a referendum. Referendum are mostly a terrible way to decide legislation. As Helen Clark said today:
This is an outsider perspective based solely on what I was seeing and hearing through media. This blog won’t cover all the positive things from the yes campaign. You don’t get 48.4% without doing a lot of things right. Yes campaigners should feel proud of their hard-work and what they achieved.
Persistence is important
The first voluntary euthanasia legislation was put to a vote in Parliament in 1995 (25 years ago) and failed 61 votes to 29 votes. A second attempt was made in 2003 and failed 60 votes to 58 votes. A third attempt by Maryan Street in 2012 didn’t progress. The legislative attempts failed despite most public polls consistently showing strong support for voluntary euthanasia. Advocates like Lesley Martin, Sean Davison and Lecretia Seales (and MP David Seymore, Michael Laws and Peter Brown) should be acknowledged for their work. This was a 25+ year campaign. That persistence was worth it. The referendum passing 65.1% to 33.7% and voluntary euthanasia will be legal in New Zealand.
Don’t give up on reforming New Zealand’s drug laws.
Understand who you are seeking to persuade
It’s important to understand who you are trying to persuade when designing a campaign. In the case of the cannabis vote I suspect 40% of people were going to vote yes regardless of what the campaigns did and 40% of people were going to vote no regardless of what the campaigns did. I don’t have access to any polling but my hunch is the locked-in vote would be in that ballpark. The other 20% would be made up of roughly 10% who were unsure and open to persuasion and another 10% who were probably going to vote a particular way, but open to persuasion. It is that 20% who the yes campaign should have been speaking to. Every piece of communication should have been designed to persuade those people.
The campaign could have done polling to identify who these 20% of people were. Their demographics, beliefs, the people they listen to and are influenced by. Focus groups of that audience could then explore campaign slogans, message, arguments, and potential spokespeople.
Too much of the yes campaign was speaking to the 40% of people who wouldn’t change their vote regardless of what the campaigns did.
Have a single campaign structure and strategy
I saw at least two different campaign slogans and different and competing material. The messages and messengers were confusing. It was not clear who was running the yes campaign and whether there was a coherent structure and strategy. That is something that must be fixed going forward. Spending time at the start of the campaign getting the campaign structure, strategy, theory of change and decision-making agreed is the most important ingredient to a campaign winning.
The campaign slogan should target your 20% audience
The first slogan I saw was “Vote Yes: We do.” I’ve mentioned that slogan to a variety of people and they all think that slogan must relate to a marriage equality campaign somewhere in the world. I’m still confused about what the slogan is supposed to mean. We do smoke cannabis? Or we do vote yes? Or we do support reform?
The second slogan I saw was “Vote Yes: On Our Terms.” This one sounds like a campaign for Brexit or Scottish Independence. Who is the “our” in this slogan, and what are the terms? It requires too much of people who don’t pay much attention to politics and detailed arguments.
Your slogan and message should excite your core supporters, but it must be persuasive to the undecided people you are seeking to persuade. The campaign could have have polled and conducted focus groups on some slogans with undecided voters. I would have testing something like “Vote Yes: Reduce Harm from Cannabis.”
The messenger is the message
The person or people presenting your message can be more important than the message itself. It’s important to carefully choose who will deliver the message to voters. In the 1998 California general election, the Indian gambling proposition had the out-of-state Las Vegas casinos fighting it while the proponents used Native Americans to promote it. The casinos lost. In the campaigns I ran in New Zealand to get Council’s to reduce pokie machines our most powerful voice was people directly impacted by gambling harm.
Campaigns have to carefully consider their messenger, and use one who evokes an emotion or a positive feeling with the specific voters you’re trying to influence.
During the yes campaign I saw a lot of prominent left-wing people speaking in favour of reform. Chlöe Swarbrick was probably the most prominent. She was an intelligent and powerful advocate for a yes vote. But was she a persuasive advocate for the 20% of undecided and persuadable people?
I’m not suggesting advocates don’t speak up. Thoughtful advocates like Swarbrick help provide arguments and rationale that others can share with persuadable voters. But what other prominent voices might have made a difference and spoken more persuasively to the 20%? Is there a Jenny Shipley, Jim Bolger, or Katherine Rich who could be a prominent conservative voice for reform?
Multiple paths to reform
The final lesson is that there are multiple paths to reform. We needed Civil Unions as a stepping stone to Marriage Equality. Voluntary Euthanasia couldn’t get through via parliament alone but required a referendum. Paid parental leave started out at 12 weeks in 2001 before being extended to 13 weeks, 14 weeks, 22 weeks and now 26 weeks.
The strong rationale for drug law reform still exists. There are various ways to advance it. One possible path is incremental change during this term of government, working through regulation and legislation to make sensible changes to drug law. But there are other pathways. Whoever unites to take the reform campaign forward should settle on a pathway and develop a clear campaign strategy and theory of change.
