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CHAPTER SEVEN: POLITICAL COMMUNICATION

7.1 Democracy as a form of communication. The transmission model and its limits (pp.121-2).

 

7.2 The development of the media from writing to the internet. Mass literacy as a function, achievement and affirmation of the modern state. The introduction of broadcasting (including radio) (pp. 122-4).

 

7.3 Contemporary trends: commercialization, fragmentation, globalization and interaction. Combined impact is to reduce politician’s access to the mass electorate. The debate over the political impact of the internet (pp. 124-8).

 

7.4. The media in liberal democracies. The media as the house within which we live our political lives. Reinforcement, agenda-setting, framing and priming. The game between politicians and journalists: a political mixture of shared and competing goals. Spin doctors. Comparing the impact of newspapers and television (pp. 128-34).

 

7.5. Public opinion: what the public thinks or the considered judgement of the community on a common issue?The limits of its impact, especially on detail. Public lacks knowledge and can evade trade-offs. Measuring public opinion: opinion polls, sample surveys, deliberative opinion polls (citizens’ juries) and focus groups (pp. 134-7).

 

7.6. Techniques used to limit the media in authoritarian states. Justifications offered by rulers: to limit squabbling so as to maintain national harmony and facilitate development. Communism as an experiment in media impact. Extensive propaganda and agitation but limited effects, at least on the attitudes of the mass population (pp. 137-9).

 

7.7. Limits of media independence in illiberal democracies: ownership as a political resource; lack of a professional, news-gathering tradition; some intimidation and therefore self-censorship; leader’s skill with the media, especially television (pp. 139-40).