THIS IS AN EXPANDED VERSION OF JACK MAYCOCK’S PIECE IN PR WEEK
The most talked-about mayoral election in generations has come to a close: Zohran Mamdani, who polled at just 9% in the Democratic primary in January, will be the next mayor of New York.
It can’t be overstated how exceptional it is for a self-declared “democratic socialist” to win in the hub of 20th-century capitalism. New York might be more socially liberal than other parts of the US, but make no mistake: it’s no egalitarian utopia.
So how did a 34-year-old Muslim democratic socialist go from political outsider to mayor of the richest city in the world? And can it be replicated, and what can progressive leaders across civil society take from this? Here are five lessons from one of the best political campaigns of the 21st century.
1. Spell out the problem again and again and…
For any outsider candidate, the electorate needs to understand the reason for your candidacy – and fast.
Mamdani knew this. He centred his entire campaign on affordability, painting a picture of a city whose own population can no longer afford to live there. From day one of the campaign until the election was called late on Tuesday night, Mamdani pressed home the issue of affordability with incredible discipline. Even if you only heard him speak for five minutes of his whole campaign, you’d walk away knowing his priority was to make America’s most expensive city affordable.
Mamdani proved that building a memorable narrative is simple if you know your audience, the challenges they face, and what signals will mobilise the movements critical to your success. Without these core elements, building a narrative that speaks to their lived reality is an almost impossible task.
2. Culture wins hearts and changes minds
There are countless examples of political leaders – from Ed Davey to Nigel Farage – engaging with culture in a transactional way, pursuing relevance by jumping on social media trends or associating with celebrities they think young people admire. However in practice these offer no social value.
Mamdani was different. For him, engaging with culture wasn’t a box to check, but a way for the city to get to know him and unify around a progressive platform. He saw New York as the melting pot it is: a mix of ages, ethnicities, and lived experiences that for too long have been undervalued and underrepresented by an out-of-touch political establishment. From speaking to Haitian voters at the Bayo Tour to releasing videos in Urdu, Hindi, Spanish, Bengali, Arabic, and Luganda, he used culture to connect with communities across New York and bind them together around his campaign.
And his cultural strategy wasn’t just aimed at young people. Mamdani saw the power of culture to bring in older generations too. He visited influential New York natives like the RZA, who he won over backstage at a Wu-Tang concert with an alternative vision for his Brooklyn neighbourhood of Brownsville.
3. Take risks. What’s the worst that could happen?
When you’re a progressive candidate, every institutional advantage sits with your opponents: the media may smear you or ignore you, establishment figures may not back you or your organisation, and donors might spend their money hand over fist to oppose your ideas. It’s enough to make progressives throw the towel in before they even get started.
But in reality, it’s a gift. It gives you the freedom to do and say things a career politician could only dream of, liberated from the relentless pressure to conform to the status quo. The more willing you are to take risks, the more fearlessly you can speak, creating genuine excitement amongst disillusioned communities and transforming them from disengaged citizens into an army of campaigners.
Mamdani took strategic risks throughout his campaign. He was the only mayoral candidate in the television debate not to pledge to visit Israel for his first overseas trip. He was unapologetic in his commitment to shifting the tax burden to wealthier neighbourhoods. He publicly antagonised Donald Trump. Mamdani left it all out there, and it paid off. Rage from the MAGA movement gave him notoriety, while liberal media pearl-clutching cemented his positioning as the political outsider (a good place to be these days) – and both gave him a ton of free media coverage along the way.
4. Incremental change isn’t worth getting out of bed for
An Ipsos survey earlier this year found that in 29 of the 31 countries surveyed, the majority agreed that the “economy is rigged to advantage the rich and powerful.” In 23, they went as far as to say, “society is broken.”
In that context, it doesn’t make sense to position yourself in favour of anything other than radical change. Yes, it needs to feel achievable, but proposing incremental change no longer cuts it in a world where living standards in many countries are sliding for the first time in generations.
Everyone hates the status quo: you can see it in the numbers, hear it on the street, and read it online. While people fear politics deemed to be at the extremes — especially amid rising polarization and political violence — in failing societies, there is inevitably going to be central space for solutions that may have been deemed “radical” in 2000.
Mamdani championed that sentiment, standing on a platform of economic redistribution aimed at balancing the scales. Showing exactly how and why he was different from archetypal establishment figures like Andrew Cuomo was part and parcel of why he won.
5. There’s only one Zohran Mamdani
Make no mistake, Mamdani was an exceptional candidate: young, articulate, charismatic, able to build rapport instantly, witty in a non-confrontational way – the kinds of qualities that shine in lively social events and grassroots campaigning. But exceptional political talents are exactly that: the exception. Not everyone can be Zohran Mamdani.
The lesson here isn’t that everyone should be Zohran Mamdani, but that Mamdani leaned into his personal strengths. Others are finding ways to engage their electorate in different but no less authentic ways. Take the UK Green Party’s Zack Polanski: he’s quick on his feet, speaks plainly, and possesses a self-deprecating charm. For Polanski, debating his positions on TV is his arena. While he and Mamdani are undoubtedly both talented enough to employ the others’ strategy, they don’t, and the reason is simple: they leverage their main strengths.
Now that Mamdani’s won, the reality of how he governs will dictate his legacy. But his meteoric rise shows us that clarity, courage, and cultural fluency can still beat the odds – if you hold your nerve.
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