From Campaigning to Convening
The pressure to publish in bulk is being replaced by a pressure to be actively present.
Brett Kobie is Chief Strategy Officer at Bump, working on strategy in EU public affairs.
Disclosure
Brett Kobie is Chief Strategy Officer at Bump. The views expressed in this article are the author's own.
What it covers
Why the EU bubble’s comms operating model is shifting from bulk publishing to presence and convening.
Who it is for
Communications and public affairs teams rethinking their operating model beyond always-on social.
When to use it
When bulk content is losing value and you need to decide where to actually show up and convene.
Key takeaway
The shift is from campaigning to convening, with a renewed focus on the policy micro-communities that shape the details.
In brief
- The pressure to publish in bulk is being replaced by a pressure to be actively present.
- Always-on Twitter was the default comms operating system; it collapsed while defensive campaigning peaked, and bulk content lost value fast as Generative AI made volume cheap.
- Under VDL II the battlefield moved to policy detail — implying a shift from campaigning to convening around policy micro-communities.
From Campaigning to Convening
In the EU bubble, one could point to a quiet disruption: the pressure to publish in bulk is being replaced by a pressure to be actively present. In the mid-2010s, always-on Twitter became the default comms operating system. For many, social media was comms, full stop. It worked for a while because policymakers, journalists, and advocacy pros were all in the same place, and visibility felt like participation.
Then the Green Deal era pushed many organisations into visible (and cautious) defensive campaigning, trying to regain ground in fights they often felt they couldn’t win. While that was happening, Twitter as we knew it collapsed in the background. Now, under VDL II, the centre of gravity has shifted again: the regulatory mood has softened in many sectors, the battlefield has moved from public defence to policy detail, and bulk content has lost value fast, especially with Generative AI making volume cheap.
The implication is simple: a shift campaigning to convening, with a renewed focus on the policy micro-communities (see trend #3) that still shape the details. Is this actually a new era or just the EU bubble returning to form with a layer of unhelpful noise scraped off… who can say?