Page 219 - An Introduction to Political Communication Third Edition

COMMUNICATING POLITICS

unorthodox views on AIDS and other issues. In 2001 it was
reported that South Africa was ‘embracing spin doctors in an
attempt to improve its flagging overseas image’. PR companies
‘have been told to offer leading British political and media
celebrities free holidays, free flights to South Africa, and free hotels
if they will return to the UK and write favourably about the new
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South Africa’. Even after the retirement of Nelson Mandela, South
Africa retained vast reserves of international good will, and the task
of PR companies contracted to ‘sell’ the country abroad was
nowhere near as challenging as with Zimbabwe. The governments
of both countries clearly understood, however, that professional
communication techniques could be of value to their international
reputations.

INTERNATIONAL CONFLICT AND
POLITICAL COMMUNICATION

The Cold War was so termed because, thankfully, it did not involve
direct military confrontation between the Western powers and
the Soviet Union. However, many ‘proxy’ wars were fought in the
post-Second World War period, in which allies of East and West
respectively were pitted against each other. In the Angolan civil
war, for example, the Marxist government was supported for
many years by the Cuban and Soviet governments, who provided
diplomatic and military assistance. The Angolan government’s
opponents, UNITA, were, on the other hand, funded by apartheid
South Africa and a rather murky coalition of Western intelligence
and military bodies. Wars in the horn of Africa, central America and
South-East Asia were also fought, with Western and Soviet involve-
ment as ‘sponsors’. In addition to these proxy wars, in which
the superpowers (and their respective allies, like Britain, France,
Czechoslovakia, and East Germany) more or less openly stood
behind their favoured factions, many military conflicts were
provoked by the fear, real or otherwise, of the other’s advance into
jealously guarded spheres of influence. The Reagan administration’s
support for the Contras in Nicaragua and its endorsement of death
squad activities in Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala and elsewhere,
was justified with reference to alleged Soviet ‘subversion’ of the
region, directly or through its Cuban communist and Nicaraguan
Sandinista allies. Grenada was invaded in 1983 on the grounds that
American citizens on the island were at risk from Cubans. In this

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