Примеры
- election narrative:
"What we might instead see in South Carolina is a better-than-expected showing for John Edwards, possibly even a win, throwing the whole election narrative into freefall"
http://atlantisonline.smfforfree2.com/index.php?action=print...
- post-election narrative:
"...a post-election narrative aimed at delegitimizing a Barack Obama presidency by claiming he won fraudulently"
http://www.texasbabyboom.com/
- narrative strategy:
"Drew Westen identifies the biggest problem for President Obama and Congress: the lack of a political narrative strategy.
The Tea Party has an uncompromising narrative strategy with distinct victims and villains, which enables Tea Partiers to cast themselves as heroes who will save yesterday’s America from today.
Where is the political narrative strategy of the Democratic Party, or of moderate Republicans? Barack Obama is unwilling to identify a villain, without whom he has nothing to triumph over. Moderate Republicans face a similar challenge"
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/11/opinion/obama-as-a-hope-an...

Что получится, если подставить в перевод каждого из этих фрагментов слово "идея"?
Или "посыл" (слово, точный смысл которого неизвестен, ибо его определения нет ни в одном словаре)?

Определение "narrative" из Political Philosophy Dictionary (наиболее полезное для понимания смысла "narrative" в контексте):
"narrative is a form of meaning making that organizes human experience into meaningful episodes, functioning as a lens through which the apparently independent and disconnected elements of existence are seen as related parts of a whole... narratives need to be told by someone to someone – if not, it is not a narrative"
http://www2.stetson.edu/~gmaris/polphiltq3.htm


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Note added at 2 дн15 час (2011-08-14 00:14:45 GMT) Post-grading
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Также полезно для перевода "narrative" сравнить вышеприведенное определение со следующим отрывком (о выборах в Канаде):
"Public opinion polling fell far short of the function it could have performed in the 2011 election. This election could have offered the opportunity for Canadians to grapple with the issues that matter to us, to explore the ways that government might address those issues, and then to choose which party most represents our concerns and our preferences for action. For the election to have fulfilled that promise required that the media—which create the election narrative or "What the election is about"—cover issues of importance to the electorate. Public opinion research can be an effective, powerful way for the electorate to contribute to the narrative of the campaign by allowing the public to define the issues of importance and thus requiring that parties respond as to how those issues might be resolved. It didn't happen. Instead, public opinion research turned the election into just another sporting event during the NHL playoffs. Public opinion research didn't just allow that dynamic, it created it. The election turned from what do we want government to do to who is going to win the game. By focusing solely on vote intention and impressions of the leaders, it limited the electorate's input to the grand narrative to who they liked and didn't like."
http://www.irpp.org/media/op-eds/2011-07-11.pdf