Values a d poli ideas ake up a la ge pa t of a politi al pa t s a di g effo ts. Without e e uti e
power, oppositions are even more dependent on ideas, values and symbols. The process of deciding what ideas and when they are released helps parties in government and opposition set out their credentials and colours in the narrative the party wants to tell about its capacity to govern. But the devil is in the detail, or rather, the policy detail. Parties can present broad appeals that harness fuzzy principles and values, or at another extreme, present comprehensive manifestos, backed up by detailed economic modelling. Deciding what the balance should be is the key communication task for political parties.
Just as the organisation of political parties have changed over time so too has the relationship between political actors, citizens and the media. Julianne Schultz has described how the Australian press went from diligently reporting the words of important men to a more critical posture that
e t ha d i ha d ith the i dust s p ofessio alisation.198 In the late twentieth century political
193
No to , Maki g “e se of Oppositio , .
194
Ward and Stewart, Politics One, 253, 255.
195Joh so , Oppositio i the B itish Politi al “ ste , –
98.
196
Uh , Pa lia e ta Oppositio al Leade ship , .
197
Ibid., 70.
198Julia e “ hultz, The P ess , i
The Media & Communications in Australia, ed. Stuart Cunningham and Graeme Turner (Crows Nest, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 2002), 113.
53
scientists have increasingly discussed the mediatisation of politics .199 Mediatisation is a phenomena of ode it a d glo alisatio and the companion to other trends in society such as
individualisation, secularisation and economisation to name a few.200
As a term, mediatisation is not settled on specific definition, but rather, it is a cloud of common
o epts a d a s of u de sta di g edia s i pa t o politi al o u i atio . What is ag eed is
that mediatisation is a process.201 This process is it not unidirectional and it relies on media becoming, first, an independent institution within society, and then, a pervasive force facilitating both political and cultural communication. Put another way, mediatisation is interested in the empirical study of how politics has changed because of two factors. First, how has politics changed
as the edia has e o e itize s p i a sou e of information about politics. Second, how has media pervasiveness impacted on the behaviour of political actors when seeking to communicate
ith ote s. I the lite atu e this is ofte ope atio alised as edia logi gai i g the uppe ha d o e politi al logi . I ill dis uss edia a d politi al logi fu the elo , ut fi st it is i po ta t to
explore the concept of mediatisation in greater depth.
Disagreements about mediatisation focus on operationalising the concept for empirical study rather than its definition. Winfried Schultz, sought to emphasize the relationship between media and social change drawing attention to four processes: first, the way media extends human communication; second, the way media can partially or completely substitute existing social interactions and change their character; third, a alga atio o the a the li es et ee edia a ti ities lu , e ge a d
i gle ith e e da life a d; fi all , a o odatio o the ealit that edia th ough its e e iste e i du es so ial ha ge .202 Additionally, Blumler and Kavanagh have emphasised temporal
change, conceptualising mediatisation into three phases.203 Each age is defined by technological change and advancement, which also broadly align with the way political scientists conceptualise the evolution of political parties as mass, catch-all, and today, cartelised parties. Blu le a d Ka a gah s first age was the period where media, were for the most part, dependent on political actors. The
199
Fo so e e a ples see Gia piet o Mazzole i, Media Logi a d Pa t Logi i Ca paig Co e age: The Italia Ge e al Ele tio of , European Journal of Communication 2, no. 1 (1987): 81–103; Kees Brants and
Philip a P aag, “ig s of Media Logi : Half a Ce tu of Politi al Co u i atio i the Nethe la ds , Javnost - The Public , o. ; Ha s Mathias Keppli ge , ‘e ip o al Effe ts: To a d a Theory of Mass Media
Effe ts o De isio Make s , The Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics 12, no. 2 (2007): 3–23.
200“tig Hja a d, The Mediatizatio of “o iet A Theo of the Media as Age ts of “o ial a d Cultu al Cha ge ,
Nordicom Review , o. : ; Ja G. Blu le a d De is Ka a agh, The Thi d Age of Politi al Co u i atio : I flue es a d Featu es , Political Communication 16, no. 3 (1999): 210.
201Ni k Could a d A d eas Hepp, Co eptualizi g Mediatizatio : Co te ts, T aditio s, A gu e ts ,
Communication Theory 23, no. 3 (2013): 197.
202Wi f ied “ hulz, ‘e o st u ti g Mediatizatio as a A al ti al Co ept ,
European Journal of Communication 19, no. 1 (1 March 2004): 88–89.
203Blu le a d Ka a agh, The Thi d Age of Politi al Co u i atio , –
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second saw the emergence of the media as an increasingly independent institution, which saw parties increasingly focus their energies on producing content suitable for the media. The third age, which is emerging around us, the media has become all-pervasive.
To date political scientists have sought to develop further the concepts driving mediatisation —
a el , edia logi a d politi al logi . Media logi , fi st defi ed Altheide and Snow, was described as:
A form of communication; the process through which media present and transmit information. Elements of this form include the various media and the formats used by these media. Format consists, in part, of how material is organized, the style in which it is presented, the focus or emphasis on particular characteristics of behaviour, and the grammar of media communication. Format becomes a framework or a perspective that is used to present as well as interpret phenomena.204
Political logic on the other hand is a term poorly defined by the literature and centres on policy dimensions, governance questions or put simply the idea of governing well and for the common good. In general, mediatisation is seen as a negative development for democracy, for example Mazzoleni and Schultz even go so far as to define mediatisatio as the p o le ati o o ita ts o
o se ue es of the de elop e t of ode ass edia.205 The emphasis on media logic has
generally meant that political logic is instead understood loosely as the inverse of media logic , and therefore, a less pejorative term.
Drawing on Blumler and Kavangah, Strömbäck argued that mediatisation should focus on the power relations between political and media actors and how they had evolved over time.206 He argued that the relationship between political and media actors can be divided into four phases, which were not
e essa il te po al as Blu le a d Ka a agh s th ee ages, ut athe fo used o the ala e of
power between actors. I his fi st t o phases, politi al a to s a d politi al logi dominate media actors behaviour, though critically in phase two, media actors are increasingly asserting their independence from political actors.207 In these first two phases, personal interactions are still important and may even be the dominant source of information about politics for citizens. In phases
204
David Altheide and Robert Snow, Media Logic (Beverly Hills, Calif: Sage Publications, 1979), 10.
205
Gianpietro Mazzoleni and Winfried Schultz, Mediatizatio of Politi s: A Challe ge fo De o a ? ,
Political Communication 16, no. 3 (1999): 249.
206Jespe “t ö ä k, Fou Phases of Mediatizatio : A A al sis of the Mediatizatio of Politi s ,
The International Journal of Press/Politics 13, no. 3 (2008): 228–46.
207
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three and four, it is the media that increasingly has the upper hand.208 In response to this shift in power, political actors increasingly adapt their behaviour to the needs of the edia o edia s
logi .209 The critical distinction between phase three and four as conceptualised by Strömbäck is
that politi al a to s etai i po ta t politi al logi o side atio s a out espo si le go e a e in the third phase, which by the final phase they have largely abandoned and instead have adopted and internalised media logic as part of their everyday response to political events .210 In this way, we can
see h Me e ould a gue that the edia olo ise politi s .211 This fourth phase of mediatisation is synonymous with permanent campaigning, professionalised politics and an emphasis on public relations.212 Critically, scholars are at pains to note that mediatisation is not a unidirectional process
— in fact, it ebbs and flows across time and it is not uniform across all of society.
The most recent literature has honed in on the meaning of media and political logics. As
Marcinkowski has recently suggested, mediatisation is not the product of history, nor is it simply a
p o ess effe ti g politi s, athe it is eated as a esult of the deep st u tu e of [a] fu tio all
diffe e tiated “o iet .213 That is, Macinkowski sees media logic as ultimately a means to gain publicity in a world where information is voluminous and so specialised it has profoundly affected
politi al a to s atte pts to gai atte tio :
The mediatisation of politics is nothing else but the reaction to an essential deficiency within the political system: the typical deficit of attention given to politics in modern society, in which growing parts of the potential public turn away from politics and towards other attractions. Politics counters this threat to its own foundations of legitimation with affection towards that functional area which is, like no other area, able to bundle public attention: the media.214
Landerer is also critical of the way that media logic and political logic are used and has sought to create a more nuanced definition of mediatisation which lends itself more readily to
operationalisation.215 Instead of media and political logic, Landerer suggests, normative logic and market logic which encompass both media and political actors. For media actors, market logic is the 208 Ibid., 237–41. 209 Ibid., 239. 210 Ibid., 240. 211
Thomas Meyer and Lewis P. Hinchman, Media Democracy: How the Media Colonize Politics (Cambridge, UK:
Polit P ess ; Malde , MA : Bla k ell, .
212
“t ö ä k, Fou Phases of Mediatizatio , .
213F a k Ma i ko ski, Mediatisatio of Politi s: ‘efle tio s o the “tate of The Co ept ,
Javnost - The Public
21, no. 2 (2014): 18.
214
Ibid.
215Ni o La de e , ‘ethi ki g the Logi s: A Co eptual F a e o k fo the Mediatizatio of Politi s ,
56
a is hi h audie e-o ie ted a d o e ial o e s go ern and dominate news production. On the other hand, normative logic is informed by the concept of the public good: the media as the fourth estate acts as scrutineer-in-chief of powerful interests.216 For political actors market logic is defined by office seeking behaviours as opposed to normative logics governed by the public good and responsible government and opposition.217
La de e s o eptio is useful e ause it d a s ou atte tio to the ultiple a d o peti g
tensions at play when parties craft policy and construct narratives. Different policy actors will conceive of these processes in different ways and it is these competitive tensions which explain why mediatisation is not a unidirectional process. That is, local conditions, skills sets, fashions and norms, in conjunction with the ambitions and the persuasiveness or dominance of key political actors will all effect how the particular alchemy between media and political logic, and the emphasis on either market or normative logics at any one time. Put another way, politicians react to their environment
a d e pe i e t to dete i e hat the a ket a ea — or more put more cynically still — what is effective and what they can get away with.
Accordingly, researchers are increasingly interested in the role of media in shaping the behaviour of political actors and its impact on the practice of democracy. Previous research has largely focused on the most visible aspect of this process, including changes to how media organisations cover politics and how political actors have adapted their public communication techniques.218 Less is known about how parties actually negotiate the changing media circumstances over time. Strömbäck and Van Aelst have begun attempting to theorise these processes, arguing that parties adapt to media environments to suit their own goals which are multifaceted.219 Thus, in the electoral contest, parties want to maximise votes, but in their own internal party management, they seek to minimise media exposure.220 This thesis is an empirical study of these processes at the party level. It will argue that during the 1980s, there was growing awareness of the need to adapt to media processes, but 216 Ibid., 245. 217 Ibid., 247. 218
For examples see Brants and van Praag, “ig s of Media Logi ; Ch istia El elu d-Præstekær, David Nicolas
Hop a , a d As jø “o e Nø gaa d, Does Mediatizatio Cha ge MP-Media Interaction and MP Attitudes
to a d the Media? E ide e f o a Lo gitudi al “tud of Da ish MPs , The International Journal of Press/Politics 16, no. 3 (2011): 382– ; Bo Lau se a d Chia a Vale ti i, Mediatizatio a d Go e e t
Co u i atio P ess Wo k i the Eu opea Pa lia e t , The International Journal of Press/Politics 20, no. 1 (1 January 2015): 26–44; Mela ie Magi , “hades of Mediatizatio Co po e ts of Media Logi i Ge a a d Austrian Elite Newspapers (1949– , The International Journal of Press/Politics 20, no. 4 (2015): 415–37; Andreu Casero-‘ipollés, ‘a ó A. Fee st a, a d “i o To e , Old a d New Media Logics in an Electoral Campaign The Case of Podemos and the Two-Wa “t eet Mediatizatio of Politi s , The International Journal of Press/Politics, forthcoming 2016, 1–20.
219“t ö ä k a d Aelst, Wh Politi al Pa ties Adapt to the Media E plo i g the Fou th Di e sio of
Mediatizatio , .
220
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that the process was not uniform or even readily apparent to actors. However, by the post-2007 opposition period, the opposition was highly attuned to media processes to the point where they neglected the requirements of political logic, such as developing a comprehensive plan for government.