Surveys & PR: Waiving the Magic Wand

Surveys as traditional tools for political campaigns have been around since the Cory Aquino administration. SWS surveys came to light after a series of surveys show someone leading prior to the elections and the founder claimed to have "predicted" that person's victory. SWS came into the forefront of things when it "accurately" predicted the poll victory of Joseph Estrada (this is still disputable). It did not, however, foretold of his early ouster.

When numerous questions against surveys cropped up, especially against the "integrity" of these SWS surveys, many of which were "commissioned", up came Pulse Asia of my former professor Felipe Miranda. Pepe Miranda is one of the country's leading political analysts. He is a political science professor of the University of the Philippines-Diliman. He partnered with other political heavyweights and created the survey research group.

So now, people know of just two survey groups---Pulse and SWS. In recent months, their surveys show the same ratings, except for Villar, Aquino and Estrada, they show that Gordon gets a consistent 1% "approval" or " trust" ratings and his partner, Bayani Fernando is a consistent " number 1", meaning 1%.

Gibo's ratings were worst than these two former administration allies---negative 0.80%. Then, it slowly turned to about 1-2% in recent Pulse and SWS surveys. Now, another outfit, called "The Center" reportedly got results indicating that Gibo's ratings are now double digits. And that is, shortly after that Harapan debates over at ANC. Wow.

Two things---when PR guys drop their pants and use the pure discipline of marketing research to back up their rah-rah sisboomba campaigns for their clients, surveys tend to magically turn into a wand. Yes, a wand, a very dangerous one.

When PR guys create survey groups, and these survey groups magically churn up data to support whoever commissioned them for PR work, not research, they waive the survey like a wand and presto! Their clients immediately turn from "dismal" to "winnable".

And when surveys are used and manipulated for unjust ends, research gets a very bad reputation. Instead of being in the service of the electorate, research and surveys are now being transformed into PR tools.

I do not dispute however, that Noynoy's ratings are "slowing down" and "going south" (if that what "stationary dive" means) since that essentially is the law of the universe--everything "heavy" must come down. Statistics always follow a historical trend, since it depends much on previous actions and preferences.

Yet, prematurely announcing it seemed more of PR rather than a credible survey. That it was announced in an untimely manner shows that the survey was a manipulated one and not credible at all. How in the world can you process 1,200 respondents in one week, granting that indeed, you pooled these respondents together and processed their responses? That's possible if you just have one question. But, how can the "Center" came up with assumptions that are more qualitative than quantitative. It does not make any sense.

It makes sense though if PR firms or guys involved in Public Relations wave the magic wand.