Page 71 - An Introduction to Political Communication Fifth Edition

Intro to Politics Communication (5th edn)-p.qxp 9/2/11 10:55 Page 50

POLITICS IN THE AGE OF MEDIATION
‘tabloid’ journalism, with its focus on issues ‘not normally associated with
the public sphere, such as sex scandals, human interest, and bizarre crime
stories’ (1992, p. 22).
‘Quality’ journalism, in the words of one observer, produces information
‘required for the smooth operation of the public sphere and of governmental
party politics. It is a generalised knowledge of policy – of broad social events
and movements that is distanced from the materiality of everyday life’
(Fiske, 1992, p. 49). By contrast, argues Sparks, the popular press ‘offers an
immediate explanatory framework [of social and political reality] in terms
of individual and personal causes and responses’ (1992, p. 22). This
fragmentation and trivialisation of complex social reality, he claims, tends to
undermine the audience’s ability to make sense of events, and hence to think
and act rationally.
Until recently, tabloid journalism was associated with the press. Now, of
course, it occupies an increasing proportion of television output in Britain.
Even ‘serious’ current affairs programmes, such as Panorama, have been
accused of simplifying and sensationalising complex events, concentrating
overwhelmingly on the dramatic consequences of the social processes investi-
gated, rather than on their causes and possible resolutions. Such journalism,
it is argued by critics, is fundamentally apolitical. For Josef Gripsund, it
encourages ‘alienation, silence and non-participation’ in the political process
(1992, p. 94), and is ‘part of a tendency to distract the public from matters of
principle by offering voyeuristic pseudo-insights into individual matters’.
Panorama interviews with the late Princess of Wales in 1996, and convicted
child-killer Louise Woodward in 1998, exemplify this alleged voyeurism. In
the first case, the whole world watched as Diana revealed her marital
unhappiness and (as she eloquently claimed in the interview) her mistreatment
at the hands of the Windsors. In the Louise Woodward interview, investigative
journalism into the rights and wrongs of her conviction in an American court
was avoided in favour of giving her the opportunity to declare her innocence
and victimhood. In both cases, the critics would maintain, personalities were
elevated over issues and the audience encouraged to peep into others’ private
torments, to the overall detriment of public debate.
This rather pessimistic account of the media’s role in degrading and
undermining democratic political culture is rejected by others, such as John
Fiske and John Hartley, who argue that popular journalism is frequently
subversive, even if it does not intend to be. We will examine the political bias
of the tabloids shortly. Here we note Fiske’s argument that even conservative
(whether with a capital ‘C’ or not) media have, as a result of their com-
mercial position, a deep interest in maximising audiences. To do so often
involves drawing them in with stories which are by no means pro-
establishment, such as the aforementioned exposure of David Mellor’s extra-
marital affair. More recent and equally ‘threatening’ stories, from the point
of view of the British ruling elite, included the wave of sex scandals which

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