In the previous chapter, you will recall, I proposed a theoretical model for understanding the nature of media events like the “Trial of the Century.” A diagram of the model (see figure 9, chapter 1) graphically depicted six discrete factors – political projects, O.J. narratives, intertextual memory, individual decoding, social network discussions, and negotiated decoding – that interact with one another in ways that periodically lead to galvanizing foci of public interest and investment. This chapter zeroes in on the first of these factors, political projects, and the role it played in the O.J. Simpson double murder case.

Politics, of course, literally refers to the gaining, using, and losing of power. And if we understand power as the ability – either through coercion or consent – to get people to act against their will, or as simply occupying a structural location that facilitates deriving benefit from the actions of others, then we get that much closer to comprehending the social significance of political projects. Inspired by Michael Omi and Howard Winant's (1986, 1994) work on “racial projects,” I understand “political projects” to be discourses that are (re)activated in order to simultaneously offer a common-sense explanation for political dynamics and to privilege certain political interests above others so that power might be redistributed (or its current distribution reinforced).