Page 66 - Comparing Political Communication Theories, Cases, and Challenge

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DavidL.Swanson

must be the least advanced topic dealt with in this volume [of approaches
to the study of political communication].” By 1992, they were able to
survey with some satisfaction the accomplishments of a growing num-
ber of comparative studies, even as they still felt it necessary to argue to
researchers that comparative studies were needed and could produce re-
sults that are uniquely interesting and valuable (Blumler and Gurevitch
1992).
Throughout the 1990s, the number of explicitly comparative stud-
ies and nationally focused studies with comparative dimensions grew
steadily (e.g., Semetko et al. 1991; Butler and Ranney 1992; Kaid and
Holtz-Bacha 1995; Maarek 1995; Scammell 1995; LeDuc et al. 1996;
Negrine 1996; Swanson and Mancini 1996b; Åsard and Bennett 1997;
Mayhew 1997; Swanson 1999). There began to emerge from many of
these studies something similar to a conventional fin de si`ecle view of
transnational trends in political communication. Not all scholars of po-
litical communication accept this view, of course, but many do, and even
the dissenters use the conventional view as a starting point for their own
analyses (e.g., Negrine and Papathanassopoulos 1996).
According to the conventional view, modern political communica-
tion is shaped by some transnational trends that have led to structurally
similar but by no means identical consequences in each country, and es-
pecially in countries that have advanced media systems. The underlying
process is one of adaptation, where national institutions and practices
shape in locally appropriate ways the manner in which transnational
trends become manifest in each country. National studies reveal, among
other things, how the practices of political communication always reflect
particular political cultures, institutions, actors, histories, and circum-
stances. The contribution of comparative studies is to reveal transna-
tional trends and similarities that become evident when we step back
from the uniqueness of political communication in each country in or-
der to take a broader view.

Secular Politics
Oneofthetrendsthatcomparativestudieshavenotedinmanydemoc-
racies is the secularization of politics. Across many of the older democ-
racies and for various reasons that are well documented in both national
and comparative studies, the relationship between voters and political
parties over the last few decades has become less a relationship based
on identity and long-term commitment and more a relationship based
on persuasion in which voters, lacking enduring political convictions,

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