The New (Old) Trudeau in 2019: The Challenges and Potential for Branding Prime Ministers in Government

Abstract

This chapter explores the branding of Prime Ministers and Justin Trudeau’s re-branding. It presents a theoretical framework, discusses challenges to maintaining the 2015 brand in government, and assesses the 2019 New (Old) Trudeau campaign brand. It shows the 2019 brand was very future-oriented and aspirational, but also weak in honesty, leadership and credibility. The chapter provides insight into the challenges of branding all Prime Ministers in government, and makes recommendations for Trudeau’s second term such as branding economy-friendly climate action policies and moving from ‘Justin’ to ‘Team Trudeau.’ The chapter suggests future research needs to explore managing political brands in government and explore policy branding especially to overcome the divide between environmental and economic policies.

Thank you to Cliff Van der Linden for providing Vote Compass 2019 data on the leadership and top issues. I would also like to acknowledge The University of Auckland’s funding for research assistants and their contributions: Salma Malik who collected 2015–9 sources and help characterize the 2015 promised brand, summer scholar Nicole Fletcher who collected and conducted initial analysis of 2019 campaign sources and Northern scholar Claire Boeckermann who conducted initial analysis of 2016–19 sources.