Silke Adam

Personalization of Politics A Critical Review and Agenda for Research

In this chapter we develop an agenda for future research on the personalization of politics. To do so, we clarify the propositions of the personalization hypothesis, critically discuss the normative standard on which most studies base their evaluation of personalization, and systematically summarize empirical research findings. We show that the condemnation of personalization is based on a trivial logic and on a maximalist definition of democracy. The review of empirical studies leads us to question the assumption that personalization has steadily increased in all areas of politics. Finally, our normative considerations help us develop new research questions on how personalized politics affects democracy. Moreover, this review also makes clear that another weakness of today’s empirical research on the personalization of politics lies in methodological problems and a lack of analysis of the impacts of systemic and contextual variables. Consequently, we suggest methodological pathways and possible explanatory factors for the study of personalization.

The contribution of the press to Europeanization of public debates A comparative study of issue salience and conflict lines of European integration

In our study we seek to understand how national political contexts and different media formats constrain the role of the press in contributing to a Europeanization of national public spheres. To single out the explicit role of different newspapers in seven Western European countries we systematically compare their commentating about European integration. The role of the press is analyzed with respect to the visibility of European issues and actors and to the synchronization of conflict lines across Europe. The results show that the further a country is integrated into the European Union, the less parochial is its press and the stronger it takes part in a common European debate. Compared to these political settings the influence of specific press formats seems to play a secondary role.

National parties as politicizers of EU integration? Party campaign communication in the run-up to the 2009 European Parliament election

In this article we seek to understand whether, how and under what conditions political parties publicly articulate matters of European integration and encourage contestation over Europe. Based on a content analysis of parties’ televised advertising spots during the 2009 European Parliament (EP) election campaign in six countries (Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, the United Kingdom), we find evidence that European Union (EU) issues and actors are more prominent on the campaign agenda in countries with many Eurosceptic parties. Eurosceptic and non-Eurosceptic parties co-orient themselves towards each other in their EU articulation. Finally, contestation over Europe exists in the realm of identity politics: right-wing fringe parties (and in some countries also mainstream parties) characterize the EU as a threat to national sovereignty and identity, whereas left-wing mobilization against the EU on economic matters is hardly visible. Regarding the two politicization dimensions — EU articulation and contestation — we show that party campaigns cannot be described as purely second-order national contests any more. Instead, the strategic party mobilization model seems to better characterize the 2009 EP campaigns.

Massenmedien als politische Akteure

Massenmedien nehmen im politischen Prozess zwei Rollen wahr. Sie vermitteln die Anliegen und Meinungen politischer und gesellschaftlicher Akteure. Daruber hinaus werden sie selbst zu politischen Akteuren, wenn sie durch ihre Berichterstattung und Kommentierung den politischen Prozess beeinflussen. Ziel dieses Bandes ist es, diese duale Rolle zu analysieren. Die Beitrage diskutieren die Frage, unter welchen Bedingungen und mit welchen Folgen Massenmedien zu politischen Akteuren werden.

Die Akteursperspektive in der politischen Kommunikationsforschung — Fragestellungen, Forschungsparadigmen und Problemlagen

Im Jahre 1996 wurden in „PS Political Science and Politics“, der American Political Science Association, die Papiere eines Symposiums zum Thema „Medien und Politik“ publiziert. Unter den Beitragen dieses Heftes befindet sich ein Aufsatz von (1996) mit dem Titel „Die Massenmedien als politische Akteure“. Benjamin Page verweist darin auf einen eigenartigen Umstand: Politische Beobachter und Laien wurden ganz selbstverstandlich davon ausgehen, dass die Massenmedien versuchen, Politik zu beeinflussen. Man wisse doch, dass die New York Times sich fur diese Positionen stark mache und das Wallstreet Journal jene Haltungen vertrete. Und doch, schrieb Page, wurden die meisten Kommunikationswissenschaftler den Gedanken eines politischen Einflusses der Medien strikt von der Hand weisen. Diese Diskrepanz zwischen der Wahrnehmung der Laien und den Einsichten und Forschungsagenden der Wissenschaftler ist keine US-amerikanische Besonderheit. Es fallt auch fur Deutschland nicht schwer, eine Vielzahl von Beispielen zu finden, in denen die Medien politisch wurden. Erinnern wir uns nicht mehr, dass die BILD-Zeitung vehement gegen den Euro schrieb und dass die FAZ gegen die Rechtschreibreform aufbegehrte? Aber genauso wie in den USA fiel es sowohl der Kommunikationswissenschaft als auch der Politikwissenschaft in Deutschland lange Zeit schwer, die laienhafte Beobachtung, dass die Medien eine zutiefst politische Rolle ausuben und dabei in die Rolle eines politischen Akteurs schlupfen, in ein nachhaltiges Forschungsprogramm umzumunzen.

The impact of identity and economic cues on citizens’ EU support: An experimental study on the effects of party communication in the run-up to the 2009 European Parliament elections

In this article we seek to understand whether national parties have an impact on citizens’ EU support by publicly cueing Europe as a risk to or as an opportunity for the economy or identity. In order to answer this question, we have conducted a cross-country survey experiment (covering Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden) relying on real-world stimuli from party campaign communication in the run-up to the 2009 European Parliament elections. By introducing this new methodology to cueing research we show substantial evidence for cueing effects even when thoroughly controlling for nuisance variables drawn from EU research as well as country contexts. We find support for the general cueing hypothesis in experimental groups that were exposed to negative economic messages while in two other groups partisanship works as a relevant moderator of the effects of persuasive messages. These findings are explained by distinguishing between consensual and conflicting issues and show in what circumstances campaign messages might reach beyond the particular partisan base.

Strategies of pro-European parties in the face of a Eurosceptic challenge

We ask how pro-European parties communicate in the face of a Eurosceptic challenge and how this affects the politicization of European Union integration within a country. We draw on a quantitative content analysis of parties’ press releases issued in the run-up to the 2014 European Parliament elections in seven countries. Our results show that pro-European parties as such put Europe on the agenda, debate issues similar to those voiced by Eurosceptics and defend their pro-European positions: yet, they do so to varying degrees and with major exceptions. It is pro-European catch-all parties with strong internal dissent that silence Europe and choose blurring or adoption strategies. Consequently, the politicization of European integration varies among countries, thereby high topic visibility is accompanied by low levels of party conflict.

A changing climate of skepticism: The factors shaping climate change coverage in the US press.

Skepticism toward climate change has a long tradition in the United States. We focus on mass media as the conveyors of the image of climate change and ask: Is climate change skepticism still a characteristic of US print media coverage? If so, to what degree and in what form? And which factors might pave the way for skeptics entering mass media debates? We conducted a quantitative content analysis of US print media during one year (1 June 2012 to 31 May 2013). Our results show that the debate has changed: fundamental forms of climate change skepticism (such as denial of anthropogenic causes) have been abandoned in the coverage, being replaced by more subtle forms (such as the goal to avoid binding regulations). We find no evidence for the norm of journalistic balance, nor do our data support the idea that it is the conservative press that boosts skepticism.

The Critical Linkage between Online and Offline Media: An Approach to Researching the Conditions of Issue Spill-Over

Abstract In this article we argue that it is pressing to study the “hybrid media system” at the intersection of online and offline communication and its potential for agenda building. The topic is relevant because it is argued that the internet offers new opportunities of public influence for challengers without access to political decision making. Except for single case studies, little is known about the conditions under which these actors succeed. Informed by the research on agenda building we tackle with the mechanisms of online-offline media agenda building and the conditions under which challengers succeed to produce issue spill-over into conventional mass media. We develop a theoretical framework for investigating the linkage between online communication and traditional mass media and discuss how our model translates into empirical research. We conclude that the nature of online networks is critical for spill-over, but also the issue itself and the structure of the political system.

Applying LDA Topic Modeling in Communication Research: Toward a Valid and Reliable Methodology

ABSTRACT Latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA) topic models are increasingly being used in communication research. Yet, questions regarding reliability and validity of the approach have received little attention thus far. In applying LDA to textual data, researchers need to tackle at least four major challenges that affect these criteria: (a) appropriate pre-processing of the text collection; (b) adequate selection of model parameters, including the number of topics to be generated; (c) evaluation of the model’s reliability; and (d) the process of validly interpreting the resulting topics. We review the research literature dealing with these questions and propose a methodology that approaches these challenges. Our overall goal is to make LDA topic modeling more accessible to communication researchers and to ensure compliance with disciplinary standards. Consequently, we develop a brief hands-on user guide for applying LDA topic modeling. We demonstrate the value of our approach with empirical data from an ongoing research project.