In Case of Attack

25-million funky little leaflets were delivered to UK households during August by the British Government. The leaflets, and the envelope they were delivered in, featured a vaguely techno-looking graphic device that looks as if it might have been designed for a night-club flyer in 1985. Picking up the envelope, you half-expect it to be a public-health warning about the dangers of Ecstasy.

In fact, this 22-page, A5-landscape document is the UK Government’s attempt to advise the nation’s citizenry about what to do in case of an ‘emergency’. The tenor of the document is friendly–almost casual. The title, ‘Preparing for emergencies–What you need to know’, appears in VAG Rounded (you can tell when someone’s trying to be friendly in print–they use a sans serif font with rounded characters). The Government explains its intentions thus: ‘This summer we are sending an information booklet . . . to every home in the UK. It gives practical common sense advice on what to do in an emergency–for example, a fire, terrorist attack or natural disaster.’

 

Ah, ‘terrorist attacks’. So that’s what it’s about. But the government is falling over backwards not to alarm us.

The document has no pictures: there are no balaclava-helmeted terrorists, no gas masks, no cold-war mushroom clouds, or any of the imagery traditionally associated with government warnings of immanent disaster. In fact, so keen is the government not to spread panic, we are given a carefully manicured document where graphic design and cautiously modulated prose are used to invoke only the mildest sense of alertness. The government has also funded a stylish TV commercial to tell us about the leaflets. The commercial is arty and moodily atmospheric. It makes the point that there are signs everywhere warning us of everyday dangers: fire extinguisher signs and the like. We are calmly requested to look out for the government’s brochure, which is really no more alarming than a fire-extinguisher sign. The spot makes effective use of Steve Reich-type music to emphasis its simple message.

The brochure itself is agreeably non-threatening. The front cover features six circles with thick black outlines butted up to each other. Each circle contains a symbol (one circle contains the UK emergency telephone number), and each symbol sits on a pleasant, easy-on-the eye colour. The ‘techno’ graphic devise is a step-by-step procedural code (not that many people will bother to work it out), but its real purpose, you suspect, is to serve as a sort of visual mnemonic: a ‘brand-mark’ for the government’s vigilance in the ‘war on terror’.

The page layouts and internal typography deploy techniques commonly used in advertising and retail promotions: lots of text in panels with rounded corners; a mix of font weights and sizes; extensive use of italics; headlines in lowercase with key words picked out in colour. The effect is bitty and indicative of a concern that the document won’t be read unless everything is put into low-attention-span-friendly, bite-sized chunks.

I said there were no pictures. Not true. There are some tiny black and white portraits of important people: amongst others, we see the Chief Executive of the Emergency Planning Society; the Chief Medical Officer, and the Head of MI5 (the UK’s ‘security service’). They all look reassuringly normal. The sort of people you might pass on your way to work. Not a mad-dog General amongst them.

In the event of an attack we are advised to 'Go In, Stay In, Tune In'. This phrase, a clumsier version of Timothy Leary’s 1960s mantra of psychedelic subversion (‘Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out’), was developed by the National Steering Committee on Warning and Informing the Public. ‘It is the key message for people who are not in the immediate location of an attack and therefore not under the direct instruction of the emergency services,’ explains the agency.

Designers who advocate radicalism and the avoidance of formulaic design can hardly complain about the ‘look’ of this small document. It is required to be accessible to a population of nearly 60 million Britons (foreign language editions are available, as is a Braille version) and it is required not to exacerbate a climate of general paranoia and widespread concern about the threat of a terrorist attack. It achieves these goals with a light and unpredictable touch.

And yet, because of a willingness to utilise design and communication techniques more suited to advertising, the result is hardly an authoritative piece of communication. If ever a document was crying out for a Modernist aesthetic (rationale and truthful), it is this slim pamphlet. Of course, Modernist design has long since become ‘just another style’, and if the booklet had been designed in the austere Modernist manner it would doubtless have attracted criticism from non-designers who tend to view Modernist design as ‘boring’.

It raises the question: what is the correct response from the contemporary designer to this sort of task? Clarity and legibility are high priorities; but so too are integrity and plain-speaking. Strange therefore that the UK Government, its advisors and its uncredited designers should have turned for inspiration to advertising, 1980s rave culture and an American 1960s psychedelic prophet.