Time to lead with clarity

- A message needs to survive through many layers. The need to speak with clarity is a leadership responsibility, Vienna´s deputy Mayor Bettina Emmerling said last week at the newly founded Political Communication Summit. 

In a time when trust is falling, public debate is harsher, manipulation from abroad is fierce and artificial intelligence decides what is seen and heard, clarity of communication is essential. Especially so in politics.

Approximately 600 public communicators from more than 30 countries, last week met in the Austrian capital. They belonged to a spectrum of political and ideological backgrounds, mostly from centre-left to centre-right, as well as NGOs working in the sphere of politics. They´re Christian Democrats, Conservative, Greens and Liberals. Their common ground: a passion for democracy and a desire to revitalize the way citizens are seen, heard and engaged. 

We´re in the grand Vienna City Hall. For the first time, Partisan - the organizers of the since 2025 annual Political Tech Summit in Berlin, invite participants from around Europe and the world to discuss and connect around this goal. There´s a certain above average hipness to the crowd – the combination of sneakers and suits is not uncommon. Add some colourful skirts and blouses, and the creative twist to the 600 attendants is crispy clear. The historic surroundings of the mesmerizing City Hall draw invisible lines from how democracy has evolved – till today, and what it will take to renew its ways of working for the common good of Europe´s citizens.

Trust built closer to voters in local politics

What then can politicians – or their PR-team do, when the noise is loud and trust in them is low?

- The obvious answer is to speak more. But that´s not the right answer. Clarity is a leadership responsibility. And what politicians do must match what they say, Bettina Emmerling said in her summit opening message, presenting the summit´s key theme. Like the Summit Founder, Josef Lentsch, Emmerling represent the liberal party NEOS, co-established in 2012 by Lentsch and others, to boost the liberal stance in Austrian politics.

According to Emmerling, it is in local politics, closest to the citizens, clarity is most needed and where trust in politics most effectively can be built. In her opinion, it is crucial to be open about challenges and decisions made in the halls of power, be transparent on these decisions so that they can be monitored, and not the least: Let people influence the decisions that touch their daily lives.

- Local governments experience higher levels of trust than the national government. This trust is strengthened when people feel that their opinion matters. Participation is not just a democratic principle, but the strongest driver in our democracies, Emmerling said, and continued by asking: How do we create this meaningful ability to influence?

One example of hers was the annual children and youth parliament held in Vienna.

- Democracy is not something young people or citizens suddenly understand, but it is learned through experience. We must give young people the opportunity to participate. When citizens become co-creators instead of passive citizens, trust grows. As local politicians, we must offer the confidence that politics work, Emmerling said.

This is especially relevant because cities increasingly becoming laboratories of innovation for practical solutions in politics. Across many countries, local leaders become national leaders. One obvious and recent example is that of Andy Burnham, current prime minister of the United Kingdom but until recently Mayor of greater Manchester.

The evolving role of media as shaping the information space

- Trust is not shaped by speeches, but by experiences, René Moerland said in his keynote address to the participants. He is the new CEO of Rapporteur (formerly known as Euractiv, a Brussels news organization, competing especially with Politico Europe).

- We all have doubts about what we do and what we contribute. Is our actual job as journalists still indispensable? What do we know? One train of thought: What if we will have a solved world in the future, due to the growth of AI. In this kind of world, we will miss problems to fix. Challenges. Disagreements. You would miss the conversations with those who do not agree with you. That which essentially is democracy. This is the space of disagreement: Where different convictions meet. The space of different ideas, Moerland said.

In his view, the media is not the only gatekeepers in the democratic discussions any longer. What the media can still do though, is to facilitate meaningful conversation. Scrutinize ideas. To give sense to the space we are in as societies. It is not about building trust, per se. Trust is earned – by someone. The role of the media, in his opinion, is to put ideas to the test.

- The most important thing in a democracy is to build support by being challenged. The question is: Do you get the challenge you need to make sure we´re all together in decision making? Every citizen is co-responsible for the rules of the common spaces in our societies. If one party takes control of the common space, this space would be devoid of meaning. This is where I see the role of media. We in the Rapporteur think we need media on the European level who take policy making deeply serious. I don´t pretend we own the truth. We ´re there to allow different perspectives. As media, we have the role as mediators in the common space, Moerland said.

Not surprisingly, he thought it important to support legacy media. According to him, it is best done by subscribing to media that challenges you, and not read media representing one familiar angle only.

- As legacy media, we cannot tell the young generation that we have always been there, it is not enough. You must be out there – move with the questions the audience asks now. How do we make sense of our reality collectively these days? In a tech-savvy AI-driven environment? How do we build community? That´s the challenge for media to be a part of, Moerland said.

Voters have lost contact with politics

- Maybe we have been so much involved in the governments over the past decades, that people no longer see what we do and not do and have other expectations. Good communication is not only to communicate the great successes we are able to achieve. My party tends to do this. The question is how to balance sharing both our successes and our failures.

One of the participants at the conference is Jürgen Sauter. He works for Deutsche Bahn and is involved in local politics in Frankfurt as a social democrat.

- The populist parties don´t have to deliver. We (in the Social Democratic Party) need to seek consensus and compromises and that is a difficult business, Sauter thinks.  

- Do we as voters have the wrong expectations when it comes to politics?

- Quite a lot of people have lost contacts with politics. During elections they don´t read the newspapers. Quite a lot of people look for information in social media channels. You hardly find news from the city centre and local politics in Frankfurt in the mainstream media – only from the national, state, level. So, it is difficult to reach the people and for them to get in touch, Sauter thinks.

- 30-40 years ago, we had one million party members and the Christian Democratic Party (CDU) had close to the same. Everyone knew someone who was in the party and could reach us through that. That is all gone. The social democratic party now has 300.000 members, and CDU has 300.000 members (including those of the Christian Social Union in Bavaria), which is a lot fewer than 30-40 years ago, Sauter says.

Algorithms looks for ways to polarize. Whoever gains the reach, gains the votes.

Yet, politics is built on compromise, not lies. So Heiko Kretschmer said, in his summary of the conference in Vienna. He is a strategic communication analyst and long-time politician with the Social Democratic Party in Germany.

- First of all: This means unpredictability in the time to come. Every decision taken today for the future is unpredictable. We are facing a historic crisis in public political campaigning. In five years, we either live in a world where opportunism secure influence on political decisions, where AI-agents are running their backstage lobbyism, OR we help politicians lead in a more complex world. Therefore: There is one speech which gives me hope. The one Andy Burnham (Prime Minister of the United Kingdom) held last week. I hope – in ten years – we will recognize it as a turning point. In it, he regains the initiative[KM1]  from the populists: We are taking back control. The whole society, the political world included, have currently lost control to media, and populism, which does not serve the complexity of political decisions well, Kretschmer said.  

As Bettina Mayerling also pointed out, we must strengthen – and give back power – to local politicians. Whenever more can be decided locally, people feel they can shape their own neighbourhoods.

- If you want to win the war for democracy, we need economic strength. We should connect the voices of democracy and create new media. There are for example hundreds of successful influencers and we should connect them. Let us welcome them as our new media. The rules will be made by those who create community. Let us be numbered among them, Kretschmer said.

I left the mesmerizing Vienna City Hall feeling hopeful. Liberal democracy may be hard pressed, from all angles. But there are still quite a lot of people fervently and passionately interested in not only keeping it functioning the way it has but renewing it – and keeping the essence of freedom, citizen influence and responsibility and trust, intact. May we succeed in that mission.