Page 89 - An Introduction to Political Communication Second Edition
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AN INTRODUCTION TO POLITICAL COMMUNICATION
objectivity are thus reinforced by the technical constraints imposed
by the newsgathering process.
Conversely, those political actors which lack sophisticated public
relations machinery, and which are not a part of the established
institutions of mainstream political discourse, will tend to be neither
especially credible to the journalists nor particularly convenient as
news sources. In Chapter 8 we will discuss how many non-
establishment (and indeed anti-establishment) organisations have
learnt to combat these ‘biasing’ features of media production with a
variety of alternative public relations strategies. Although the
resources required for media manipulation (if I may use that term
without implying disapproval) are unequally distributed throughout
society, it is possible, as we shall see, for the PR ‘poor’ to compensate
to some extent with skill and entrepreneurship.
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