Page 46 - An Introduction to Political Communication Second Edition

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THE EFFECTS OF POLITICAL
COMMUNICATION

As with all categories of media output there are a wide variety of
approaches which one can take to the ‘effects issue’ in political
communication, none of which produces easy answers to the question,
‘does it work?’ For the sake of clarity, this chapter approaches the
effects issue from three broad perspectives.
Firstly, we shall consider the extent to which the purposeful
communicative behaviour of political actors, such as political
advertising and conference speeches, can influence the attitudes and
behaviour of the intended audience. Effects of this type can be
examined at the micro-level of the individual consumer of the
message, or at the macro-level, when individual responses to political
communication are aggregated together in the form of public opinion
polls and other indices of collective political will.
Secondly, we shall examine how the political process of democratic
societies—their procedures and practices—has been affected by the
growing importance within them of mass communication.
And thirdly, we shall consider the systemic impact of the rise of
political communication on advanced capitalist societies such as
Britain.
Political communication, as already noted, is largely mediated
communication, transmitted through the print and electronic
media. The media alter the message, in their roles as reporters of
and commentators on it. They are, therefore, as we noted in
Chapter 1, political actors in their own right. Chapter 4 considers
the effects of media coverage of politics, as discussed in the vast
volume of research which has been conducted into the subject
over many years.
Before considering any of these different types of effect, a few
words on the difficulties associated with the ‘effects issue’ in general
are appropriate.

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