#Resource Common Cause: The Case for Working with Our Cultural Values by Tom Crompton argues that social and environmental change depends not only on the arguments we make but on the values our messages activate. Drawing on psychological research—especially the work of Tim Kasser—the report suggests that people tend to organise their motivations around two broad clusters of values: intrinsic and extrinsic. These clusters do not operate independently; activating one tends to strengthen it while suppressing the other. ### Intrinsic and extrinsic value systems #### Intrinsic values Intrinsic values relate to things that are meaningful in themselves. Examples include: - community and belonging - care for others - social justice - connection with nature - personal growth - creativity People who prioritise intrinsic values are more likely to support environmental protection, cooperation, and equality. #### Extrinsic values Extrinsic values focus on external rewards or recognition. Examples include: - wealth and financial success - social status - prestige and image - power or influence When these values are emphasised, research suggests people tend to show lower concern for collective wellbeing and environmental protection. Crompton’s central claim is that these two clusters behave somewhat like a psychological see-saw: strengthening one tends to weaken the other. ### Why messaging matters Because values can be activated by framing, the way issues are communicated matters enormously. For example, an environmental campaign might say: “Save energy and reduce your bills.” Although this may work in the short term, it frames environmental action in terms of financial self-interest, reinforcing extrinsic values. According to the Common Cause argument, messages that instead appeal to intrinsic values—such as care for nature, responsibility to others, or fairness between generations—help strengthen the motivations that support long-term social and environmental action. Thus the report suggests that campaigns should be designed not only to change behaviour but also to strengthen intrinsic values culturally. ### The tension with advertising Here a deeper tension appears. Much of modern advertising operates by activating extrinsic motivations: - status - desirability - social comparison - image and prestige In other words, the mechanisms that make advertising effective in selling products can simultaneously reinforce the value system associated with consumerism and competition. This creates a structural dilemma: - The techniques that grab attention and drive consumption activate extrinsic values. - Yet long-term social and environmental change may require strengthening intrinsic values instead. For campaigners or organisations trying to influence culture, this raises a difficult question: can persuasive communication avoid reinforcing the value systems that create the problem? ### Punished by Rewards This tension connects with [[Punished by Rewards]] by Alfie Kohn. Kohn’s argument is that external rewards undermine intrinsic motivation. When behaviour is encouraged through incentives—money, prizes, praise, or status—the internal reasons for doing the activity can weaken. For example: - Children rewarded for drawing may become less interested in drawing for its own sake. - Workers offered incentives may focus on the reward rather than the value of the work. In psychological terms, the reward shifts motivation from intrinsic to extrinsic. This insight reinforces the concern raised in Common Cause. If social campaigns rely on incentives—saving money, gaining prestige, winning rewards—they may achieve short-term behavioural changes while weakening the deeper motivations needed for lasting cultural change. ### Cultural implications Taken together, these ideas suggest that cultural messaging is never neutral. Every message subtly strengthens certain values while weakening others. If a culture constantly activates extrinsic values—through advertising, media imagery, and competitive status signals—it may gradually make intrinsic motivations such as care, cooperation, and environmental responsibility harder to sustain. From this perspective, the challenge is not simply persuading people about particular issues but shaping the value landscape in which persuasion occurs. For anyone working in communication, art, campaigning, or advertising, the question becomes less “What argument will work?” and more: **“What values does this message cultivate?”** --- === Our social identity is shaped by values which psychologists classify as either extrinsic or intrinsic. Extrinsic values concern status and self-advancement. People with a strong set of extrinsic values fixate on how others see them. They cherish financial success, image and fame. Intrinsic values concern relationships with friends, family and community, and self-acceptance. Those who have a strong set of intrinsic values are not dependent on praise or rewards from other people. They have beliefs which transcend their self-interest. Few people are all-extrinsic or all-intrinsic. Our social identity is formed by a mixture of values. But psychological tests in nearly seventy countries show that values cluster together in remarkably consistent patterns. Those who strongly value financial success, for example, have less empathy, stronger manipulative tendencies, a stronger attraction to hierarchy and inequality, stronger prejudices towards strangers and less concern about human rights and the environment. Those who have a strong sense of self-acceptance have more empathy and a greater concern about human rights, social justice and the environment. These values suppress each other: the stronger someone's extrinsic aspirations, the weaker his or her intrinsic goals. We are not born with our values. They are shaped by the social environment around us. By changing our perception of what is normal and acceptable, politics alters our minds as much as our circumstances. Free, universal health provision, for example, tends to reinforce intrinsic values. Shutting the poor out of health care normalises inequality, reinforcing extrinsic values. The sharp rightward shift which began with Margaret Thatcher and persisted under Blair and Brown, all of whose governments emphasised the virtues of competition, the market and financial success, has changed our values. The British Social Attitudes survey, for example, shows a sharp fall over this period in public support for policies which redistribute wealth and opportunity? This shift has been reinforced by advertising and the media. The media's fascination with power politics; its rich lists; its catalogues of the hundred most powerful, influen-tial, intelligent or beautiful people; its obsessive promotion of celebrity, fashion, fast cars, expensive holidays: all these inculcate extrinsic values. By generating feelings of insecurity and inadequacy - which means reducing self-acceptance - they also suppress intrinsic goals. Advertisers, who employ large numbers of psychologists, are well aware of this. Crompton quotes Guy Murphy, global planning director for the marketing company JWT. Marketers, Murphy says, should see themselves as trying to manipulate culture; being social engineers, not brand managers; manipulating cultural forces, not brand impressions'.? The more they foster extrinsic values, the easier it is to sell their products. Rightwing politicians have also, instinctively, understood the importance of values in changing the political map. Margaret Thatcher famously remarked that, Economics are the method; the object is to change the heart and soul." Conservatives in the United States generally avoid debating facts and figures. Instead they frame issues in ways that both appeal to and reinforce extrinsic values. Every year, through mechanisms that are rarely visible and seldom discussed, the space in which progressive ideas can flourish shrinks a little more. The progressive response to this trend has been disastrous.