Social Media and Politics Crafting Political Storytelling with Qualitative Methods and AI, with Frank A. Spring
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Nov 16, 2025 Frank A. Spring, founding partner at Altum Insight, delves into the transformative power of storytelling in politics. He reveals how qualitative methods and AI-moderated interviews uncover citizens' personal narratives about democracy. Discussing the Montana Democracy Project, he identifies key narratives that shape political identities. Spring emphasizes the ethical responsibilities of storytelling and how cultural context influences narratives. He also explores how political candidates should align their personal and community stories for effective communication.
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Repair, Not Just Protection
- Many Montanans saw democratic decline starting decades earlier and favored a populist 'big money' narrative.
- Voters preferred a fixer who would 'repair' democracy rather than rhetoric about 'protecting' it.
Start Stories In The Right Place
- Build narratives by filling specific psychological 'boxes' so stories avoid novelty penalties.
- Start stories where audiences expect to begin to prevent immediate rejection of unfamiliar context.
Run Asynchronous Digital Ethnography
- Use asynchronous digital ethnography to collect deep, candid individual interviews over days.
- Break interviews into short daily tasks and video logs to yield hours of rich qualitative material.