The key is that culture, being an artefact can be changed. It will change anyway so its up to us to change it into something better – that is with more utility.
If we do change the culture it will have an impact on our behaviours, so if we shape structures that increase involvement, cooperation and collaboration we do have a chance to create virtuous circles leading to further improvement.
This is not a wild idea; the government discovered nudge and set up a unit to use it, which it promptly privatised though in a somewhat less ideological way than usual, retaining an interest The governments adoption of nudge This whole operation is dedicated to the (benign?) manipulation of behaviour.
Many businesses try to set up learning cultures where best practice is shared and experience is reviewed. The Chartered Institute for Professional Development (CIPD) being one example
Of course not all government or corporate manipulation of behaviour is benign and in in some cases it perpetuates top down do it too you, nanny knows best attitudes. In business it may be highly consultative but in the end management is not democratic and can have its way. It has been argued that the difference between professed consultative approaches and the reality of corporate power can cause cognitive dissonance in managers who are forced to maintain both contradictory points of view Anthony
The politics of hope would put the design of the political economy first - through participation, open institutions and collaborative decision making, on the understanding that behaviour will follow.
Clearly there will be limits to how far this can take us, it would be foolish to claim that crime will be eliminated. There are some aspects of human nature that we will find it difficult to rein in. Similarly, even if the new vision is widely accepted, the raw entrenched power behind the status quo can be expected to fight back; in so called democracies this will be by the full range of dark arts and negative politics (which turn so many people off). In less fortunate places this may descend into brute force; an emblematic example of this for the left being the overthrow of President Allende in Chile but we can think of Hungary in 1956 and Czeckoslovakia in 1956 and 1968 and many, many more examples. The practical politics of hope develops ways of dealing with and using power.