Page 96 - An Introduction to Political Communication Second Edition

THE MEDIA AS POLITICAL ACTORS

with an informed assessment. Typically, the form includes an appeal
for action at its conclusion. As Nimmo and Combs put it, the ‘column
is a stylistic dramatisation not only of the subject or issue at hand
but also of the pundit’s rightful status to speak on it authoritatively’
(Nimmo and Combs, 1992, p.12)
The issue selected for such treatment need not be ‘objectively’ the
most important, as judged by the media as a whole at any given
time. Hugo Young’s column may, for example, reflect the left-of-
centre character of the Guardian’s editorial and readership by
focussing on what might, to a Telegraph reader, seem a rather obscure
point about the Labour Party’s leadership election rules. The political
columnist, having authority, also has licence to go against the ‘pack’
referred to in the previous chapter.
Columns are not devoted only to politics, as denned in the narrow
sense of party political affairs, but to political issues in general. Quality
newspapers will have economics columnists, social affairs columnists
and columnists dealing with ‘women’s issues’. While these categories
of journalist may not move in the same high circles of political power
as Hugo Young, Alan Watkins, and the like, their role as political
actors is the same: to make sense of complex reality for a lay-audience;
to identify important issues, assess the arguments involved in them,
and relay advice to the politicians with responsibility for taking
decisions. These columnists, too, will use politicians as sources,
confidential or otherwise, for what is written.
Some columnists are themselves former politicians, or individuals
who have been closely involved in the political process, such as
Margaret Thatcher’s press secretary in the 1980s, Bernard Ingham,
who went on to work for the Daily Express. The Guardian has
employed the services of Roy Hattersley, although he writes less
frequently on politics than he does on a variety of idiosyncratic ‘little
England’ themes. Ken Livingstone has written for the Sun (one of
the rare examples, as is Martin Jacques’s employment by the Sunday
Times) of a columnist not reflecting the newspaper’s broad editorial
stance. 4
Livingstone’s column for the Sun was a reflection of his
popularity, founded on the controversial image of ‘loony leftism’
which the Sun itself played a major role in constructing. It illustrates
an important feature of the press column: it can be a very popular
journalistic form. In the tabloids particularly, to quote Nimmo and
Combs, ‘punditry has become a form of entertainment, both shaping
and adjusting to popular expectations regarding how to keep up
with and understand “what’s happening”’ (Ibid., p.41). The

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