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8

Political Communication and

Professionalisation in Greece

Stylianos Papathanassopoulos

This chapter attempts to examine the professionalisation of communication thesis by
looking at contemporary Greek politics. It argues that, in the age of modernisation or
the Americanisation of politics (Swanson 1992; 1993; 1997; Mancini & Swanson, 1996),
the similarities across media and political systems and practices are not, in practice,
becoming greater than their differences and that, although there are transnational
similarities in the issues involved, each national system still differs in many respects.The
same applies to the so-called professionalisation of politics and communication
practices, since media and politics reflect the differences between political systems,
political philosophies, cultural traits and economic conditions. It argues that in Greece
institutions of government and politics show the critical relationship that defines
national systems of political communication. The Greek experience shows that the
‘spreading’ professional model of political communication is too generalised and does
not correspond entirely to the practice and theory manifest in other countries like Political Communication and Professionalisation in Greece
Greece.

THE CHANGING MEDIA AND POLITICS ENVIRONMENT
Greece has been undergoing a series of social transformations, which are creating a
new socio-economic framework. These changes are most obvious in the relationship
between politics and the mass media, and more particularly in the field of political
communication. In the aftermath of the deregulation and privatisation of the television
sector, television has become a significant, if not indispensable, medium for political
parties and politicians in their efforts to communicate with the public. The
‘modernisation’ of the Greek media took place in the late 1980s with the deregulation 127