Policy mediation
As political communication is referred to in the Communication Studies a mostly one-way communication, in which actors of the political system Political communicate content. In a representative democracy, political communication serves in particular to bring current political actions closer to the population and thus to achieve an implicit legitimation of these actions. In contrast to civic education , the goal here is mostly to convince the addressee of their own point of view.
Forms of policy communication
Personally
The importance of personal communication between political actors and addressees in policy communication is very situation-dependent. While it enables personalized and therefore significantly more effective delivery of content, its limited range is a disadvantage.
A study by the Bertelsmann Foundation attributed deficits in the German government's communication to the inadequate involvement of the political parties and parliament. Such a lack of personal communication leads to the fact that both MPs and the party base only find out about measures in the mass media. This development is held responsible for increasing dissatisfaction with democracy.
In traditional media
Daily newspapers and television are the most important channels for political communication today, while radio stations play a lesser role. However, an exact distribution of roles cannot generally be recognized. While in Austria, for example, the high-circulation Kronen Zeitung is said to have a high influence on the formation of political opinion, the political scientists Ulrich Sarcinelli and Jens Tenscher assume that television is extremely important.
In new media
With the increasing success of social networks on the Internet, their use for the publication of political content was also tested. Barack Obama's presidential election campaign in 2008 attracted particular attention, and its extensive use of new media contributed significantly to the election victory. This strategy was also imitated by German politicians, but was mostly unsuccessful.
New media combine the characteristics of traditional media and personal communication of politics by enabling direct feedback from individual citizens despite their wide reach. The politician Peter Altmaier emphasizes that "forms of communication and addressing citizens [become possible] that were previously unthinkable."
The LiquidFeedback software pursues an even more extensive approach . a. used by several pirate parties . The software enables users to comment on political content, propose their own alternatives and thus support the search for consensus. Internet politicians from other parties also see this bidirectional way of communicating politics as an opportunity to “further develop democracy”, but warn at the same time that they cannot completely replace traditional political action.
Scientific research
Linguistic mechanisms of political communication are examined in political linguistics .
A content-related and strategic-analytical consideration takes place in the context of political sociology .
literature
- Ulrich Sarcinelli (Ed.): Political communication and democracy in the media society . Contributions to the culture of political communication. Federal Agency for Civic Education, Bonn 1998, ISBN 3-89331-313-3 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Center for Applied Political Research at the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich : Communicating Reforms ( Memento of the original from July 10, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. September 26, 2007, accessed November 21, 2011
- ↑ Federal Agency for Civic Education: Political quota bringer: End of radio silence January 12, 2004, accessed on November 11, 2011
- ↑ APA Mediawatch: Election campaign on and off the journalistic boulevard: Editorial policy communication in the National Council election campaign 2008. Accessed on November 21, 2011
- ↑ Ulrich Sarcinelli, Jens Tescher: Political flickering and nothing else? Television as a medium of symbolic politics and political talk shows. In: Walter Klingler, Gunnar Roters & Oliver Z (Eds.): Television research in Germany. Topics - Actors - Methods . Nomos, Baden-Baden 1998, ISBN 3-7890-4920-4 , p. 303-318 ( online (PDF, 300KB) ). Online (PDF, 300KB) ( Memento of the original from July 22, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. “As a consequence, election campaigns in the television age are less and less characterized by the formerly classic direct forms of election campaigns (for example public events, election stands and advertising campaigns), but more and more by the indirect, one-sided and televised addressing of parties and politicians to a spatially separate one , abstract and dispersed audience. ” Online (PDF, 300KB) ( Memento of the original from July 22, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ David Carr, How Obama Tapped Into Social Networks' Power In: New York Times, November 9, 2008, accessed November 11, 2011
- ↑ Die Welt: The Obama strategy does not work for us September 22, 2009, accessed on November 11, 2011
- ↑ Peter Altmaier: My new life among pirates. In: FAZ. October 13, 2011, accessed November 21, 2011 .
- ↑ Dare to be more democratic on the Internet. In: heise.de. August 5, 2010, accessed November 21, 2011 .
