指鹿为马，颠倒黑白是非

In recent years there has been heightened concern about the blatantdisregard of ‘the facts’ by political leaders, whose partisan interests prevailover any considerations of objective analysis. It is often observed thatpoliticians tend to reject evidence that contradicts their prior attitudes,regardless of whether they are populist leaders who articulate identity-based rhetoric or more accommodating politicians who are willing todiscuss issues more openly. The scholarly research literature on ‘motivatedreasoning’ has widely documented this phenomenon of biased cognition.Its specific application to the study of political debates has confirmedthat inserting ‘more evidence’ into policy discussion does not moderatepartisan bias of political actors (Baekgaard et al., 2019). Similar findingsemerged in experimental research when citizens were asked to interpretkey facts—the patterns of significance, attribution and blame were closelytied to partisanship (Bisgaard, 2019).

Successful democratic leaders seek to influence the content of policyagendas in particular ways, highlighting some issues and avoiding orminimising others. In doing so, they seek to influence public opinion,and they also seek to define the matters on which their own performancewill be judged. In addition to limiting and prioritising the policy agenda,leaders are very concerned to avoid blame (Hood, 2002, 2011). Onecommon tactic is to deflect responsibility for many of the issues raised inmedia debates, for example by arguing that the issue is really the respon-sibility of individuals, families, community groups, business investors, oranother level of government. Leaders are also concerned to claim creditfor positive outcomes on other related matters including the work ofpartners or delegates.

看了心里发凉！人类社会这样，或许我不应该呆在这！