Covid-19 and government crisis communication
Facing this unprecedented global pandemic, the French government has had to constantly adapt due to an uncertain evolution of events. Government crisis communication presents important issues in a context where disinformation and conspiracy reign. The executive must therefore takes strategic decisions to appear legitimate in the management of this health crisis and restore confidence to a population increasingly suspicious towards the actions taken by the French state.
Communicating in the political world is a complicated exercise, faced with this health crisis, it is essential for government communication to succeed in convincing public opinion of the importance of the stakes and the means deployed by Jean Castex and the entire executive to fight it. Crisis communication is important because it has a direct influence on the turn of events, if properly exercised it can stir up or end an instable situation.
Politicians have the duty to inform the population, communication teams are at their disposal to find and employ strategies and effective means of communication because their goal is to convey various messages while informing and reassuring the citizens. It is about transmitting the official word of the vision of the political leaders to them.
The government has been the target of many criticisms on the one hand from the opposition and on the other hand from public opinion for errors it made in its communication strategy, especially at the start of the health crisis to hide the shortage of masks and the mismanagement of the state that it was useless to wear them. The more the communication is shifted compared to reality, the more the desired effect is removed since it increases the mistrust of the citizens towards institutions. Throughout 2020, in order to slow the pandemic, government communication focused mainly on respect with health measures by using a register of fear like for instance when the President Macron uses the term « war » in his speech and the guilt of citizens regarding their behavior in the face of the crisis.
According to a Yougov survey carried out in February 2021, 85% of French people find that the government’s hesitations on managing the health crisis add to a climate of anxiety. The management of this crisis is a source of reflection. Indeed many citizens think that the State should have privileged a positive communication rather than using an anxiety-inducing register and putting in place a targeted communication strategy rather than universal. By taking into account public opinion and reducing the uncertainty related to the pandemic context, the government has decided to communicate more effectively with the sharing of more regular data and to try out new formats.
Recently, the political class called on influenceurs to bring up the subject of health crisis to young people. Indeed, they no longer consume traditional media and are not very receptive to political communication. According to a study from Médiamétrie published in 2019, 38% of online videos are watched by the 15–24 age group so therefore the idea is to take advantage of the popularity of its public figures on the web and reach out to young people thanks to through non-traditional means. Gabriel Attal, government spokesperson has carried out several communication operations particularly through digital, he was invited on the Instagram account of Marie Lopez aka Enjoy Phoenix to answer her questions about the Covid-19 in front of 8, 000 people and was also on Ludovic B’s Youtube channel where we can see a typical day of his work in immersion like a report.
Enjoy Phoenix on the left
Gabriel Attal on the right
Government crisis communication has therefore been confronted with many challenges in this period of a global pandemic. She had to review her communication strategies several times to make the messages more effective and find new means of communication, in particular through the use of digital channels to target her communication and counter the attention deficit.
