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26 | THE PROFESSIONALISM OF POLITICAL COMMUNICATION

The significance of these comments becomes very apparent when we consider recent,
and future, studies of ‘the media and elections’. Recent studies fall into a common
pattern of outlining contextual backgrounds and they then usually make references to
innovations in electioneering practices in political communication, such as the
sophisticated use of opinion polls, the use of focus groups, the use of the web, and so
on. But what precisely do these studies tell us? What different insights do they bring to
the study of political communication? What new findings do they present?

It would be far too negative to suggest that such studies tell us nothing new. Each
election study undoubtedly brings forward something that is new but one could argue
that there is a danger that the focus on the contemporary has clouded our ability to
place the new within a longer historical narrative of continual change. Furthermore,
that in the era of globalisation, ‘Americanisation’ and modernisation, there are
connections and overlaps that are better understood as a part of a more overarching
whole, so that one needs to develop a deeper understanding of what each of these
developments – singly and collectively – signifies, and also of how they fit with one
another.

The fundamental task, then, is to develop a way of comprehending contemporary
change as part and parcel of a longer term process in which political parties – and
governments, corporations, and individuals – continually respond to change, and the
need for change, in the ways in which they organise themselves and seek to
communicate with their constituencies, be they voters or citizens. One of the ways in
which we can begin to comprehend this process is by offering a common point of
focus, a common theme, which can connect what are seemingly very different
experiences in political communication. That theme is the professionalisation of
The Professionalisation of Political Communication
political communication.
WHAT DO WE MEAN BY PROFESSIONALISATION?
We use the idea of professionalisation as an entry point into the analysis of change in
political communication practices and as a way of engaging in a more historically
informed and more detailed investigation of the underlying causes of change and the
ways in which such change is conceived and explained.

The professionalisation of political communication suggests:

a process of adaptation to, and as such a necessary consequence of, changes in the
political system on the one side and the media system on the other and in the
relationship of the two systems. These changes follow from the modernisation of
society, which is a development that is still going on and will take place in similar
political systems sooner or later. Professionalisation in this sense is a general and
not culture-bound concept. Its actual appearance and the degree of
professionalisation in a given country are however dependent on a country’s
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