6.4.3.1 Media Influence on Politics
Media influence is necessary to democracy: informing the population, modifying opinions and affecting politicians’ decision-making.
The media include the press, television and radio. They are sometimes referred to as the Fourth Estate: a term which “refers to the watchdog role of the press, one that is important to a functioning democracy.” The value of a democracy is that people can choose how they are governed (6.3.2), but they can only make meaningful choices if they are properly informed. “In the United States, the term fourth estate is sometimes used to place the press alongside the three branches of government: legislative, executive and judicial.”
Keeping people informed
People’s political choices are influenced by their understanding of current events, locally, nationally and globally. Those who are actively interested are likely to turn to the media to understand what is happening. Others might rely on their friends and family to tell them, so they are getting their news at second hand, but the original sources are likely to be the media.
Affecting people’s views
Media organisations can select what news they wish to report and can slant their interpretations to suit whatever narrative they want. They also carry advertisements, which are necessarily brief, and which may be negative. Many people receive all their news through a limited number of channels which reflect their political viewpoint – so everything they read and hear reinforces their existing views.
Media influence in American politics has been widely commented on. Nancy LeTourneau’s Washington Monthly article, GOP Leadership Has Been Ejected From the Epistemic Bubble, recalled that David Frum, a former speechwriter for George W Bush, had argued that the right-wing media were in danger of dominating the Republican Party’s narrative without being under the control of its leadership. And Ronald Dworkin, in his book Is Democracy Possible Here?, characterised media domination as a threat to America’s entire political system.
A Guardian article in 2016, Revenge of the tabloids, commented on how the media can affect people’s views on important topics:
“when Britain voted to leave the EU, against the predictions of most broadsheet commentators. It was an outcome for which the tabloids had campaigned doggedly for decades, but never more intensely – or with less factual scrupulousness – than this spring and summer, when the front pages of the Sun, Mail and Express bellowed for Brexit, talking up Britain’s prospects afterwards, in deafening unison, day after day. Two days before the referendum, the Sun gave over its first 10 pages to pro-Brexit coverage.”.
Media influence on elections
Although people’s views can be altered by the media, the impact on elections is much less clear. The Sun newspaper claimed to have brought about a last-minute change of public opinion in the 1992 election, when the Conservative victory was contrary to the findings of opinion polls. A BBC News Online report, The Sun’s election predictions, included the following quotation:
“The Sun spent all of the 1980s and a large portion of the 1990s attacking Labour.
Its criticism was particularly vitriolic about the former Labour leader Neil Kinnock who it constantly attacked while pouring praise on the then prime minister Margaret Thatcher.
In 1992, when John Major was running against Mr Kinnock, the Sun’s front page on the day of the poll proclaimed: “if Labour wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights”.
The next day, in typically self-congratulatory form, it claimed it was “The Sun wot won it” for the Tories.”
Peter Kellner, though, wrote an article in Prospect magazine, Media power: a myth, which challenged the paper’s view of events on that occasion. He quoted a study which had concluded:
“The question is, did they cast their vote because their newspaper told them to, or did they choose the paper that matched their outlook? The evidence is overwhelmingly the latter.”
“…Neither the Sun nor any other of the pro-Conservative tabloid newspapers were responsible for John Major’s unexpected victory.”
“…The pattern of vote switching during the campaign amongst readers of the Sun or any other ex-Tory newspaper proved to be much like that of those who did not read a newspaper at all.”
Kellner’s evidence shows that the media did not affect public opinion by persuading them to switch allegiance. Many people only attend to media that reinforces their views.
Affecting politicians’ decisions
Politicians are very concerned about how they are portrayed in the media – because their popularity is affected. The Labour government under Tony Blair was very attentive to the press, and to the Sun newspaper in particular. An Economist article, The fourth estate gets nasty, referred to “Mr Blair’s almost frenzied courtship of newspaper executives”. Some politicians are clearly trying to grab headlines when they make decisions – as with some legislation for example (5.4.1).
Media influence on governance
The media have an impact on the relationship between politicians and the population. Although they do not persuade people to switch allegiance, they can strengthen support for parties that people have already chosen – which increases political polarisation (6.3.2.8). They are not neutral conduits of information. The following sub-sections explore different aspects of this lack of neutrality.
This page is intended to form part of Edition 4 of the Patterns of Power series of books. An archived copy of it is held at https://www.patternsofpower.org/edition04/6431a.htm.