Aim: The aim of this study is to describe which messages and by which rhetorical means were communicated in political TV-advertisement in Finland and Sweden. The study also aims to analyze how the rhetorical choices were influenced by the political and social context in these countries. Material: Two TV-commercials from the latest parliamentary elections in each country were chosen. The leading left-wing and right-wing parties were chosen from each country. Theoretical perspective: This study is based on theories on political parties’ vote maximization and the development of the modern electoral campaign. Methodology: The method used in this study is rhetorical analysis. Results: All commercials had similar themes and were characterized by a low level of conflict. This is related to the common Nordic context in the two countries. At the same time, there were three major differences between the two countries. First, the two Swedish ads were much more alike than the two Finnish ads. This could be related to the differences in the party systems. Second, the use of argumentation based on ethos was more important in Finland, which relates to the personal voting method. Third, the Finnish ads were to a greater extent based on language, which relates to the history and culture of the country.

Did the mass media report in a different way about the real estate tax before the Swedish national election 2006 than they did after the election? If there were differences, what could be the cause? This study aims to answer these questions by using a quantitative analysis of articles about the real estate tax published in the Dagens Nyheter (DN), the biggest morning daily.   The summer before the election, the ‘Alliance’, (the non-socialist coalition, launched an election promise to abolish the real estate tax. Instead they planned to introduce a low community charge.The Alliance won the election and formed a government to implement their election promise.   The analysis was made on all the published articles in DN that covered the real estate tax issue. In total there were 43 such articles. These where all published between the launch of the campaign promise until the electionday and a month before the proposal was launched 19/9 2007, until the proposal was implemented in 2008.   The study results in three interesting conclusions. After the election, when the election promise was about to become political reality, DN reported more negatively about this specific issue. The genre of the articles varied heavily before and after the election. Before the election more news articles where published than after the election and the letters-to-the-editor about the real estate tax were published almost only before the election. This study also treats the intresting phenomenon that the Alliance, before the election, had the power to define their election promise but after the election they seem to have lost this power and instead the real estate tax question was defined by the media. The Alliance claimed that they would  ”abolish the real estate tax and introduce a low community charge” and DN used this definition in their newspaper. After the election, DN reported about the election as a new real estate tax, which is a very different thing.

In 2010 Swedish political parties used commercials broadcasted on TV for the first time in order to gain votes in a general election. In connection with the election the parties were criticized for not succeeding to formulate a story to the voters that conveyed how they wanted to change Sweden. In this paper I use central concepts from rhetoric, storytelling, postmodernism and psychology to formulate three demands each on the narrator, the story and its reception. Using the resulting image of what distinguishes a good narrator, a good story and a good reception as a starting point, I investigate to what extent the critique was justified. My findings indicate that the degree to which the commercials fulfill these demands vary greatly. Two flaws that I find are that the parties lacked credibility and were reluctant to state which groups in society would stand to lose from their policies. Another finding is that the stories provided by the parties were disturbed by other stories about the parties and the subjects their commercials covered. Based on these conclusions I formulate a set of questions that parties and others can use to test the potential of a story. / 2010 använde svenska partier för första gången reklamfilmer i TV för att vinna röster i ett riksdagsval. I samband med valrörelsen fick partierna kritik för att de inte lyckades förmedla en berättelse till väljarna om hur de ville förändra Sverige. I den här uppsatsen undersöker jag vilka förutsättningar partiernas valfilmer hade att förmedla en sådan berättelse till väljarna. Jag använder centrala begrepp inom retorik, storytelling, postmodernism och psykologi för att formulera tre krav vardera på berättaren, berättelsen och mottagandet. Med utgångspunkt i den resulterande bilden av vad som utmärker en bra berättare, en bra berättelse och ett bra mottagande undersöker jag i vilken utsträckning kritiken var befogad vad gäller filmerna. Jag finner stora skillnader mellan filmerna när det gäller hur väl de motsvarar kraven. Två punkter där flera av filmerna inte motsvarar kraven är att partierna brast i trovärdighet och att de inte ville tala om vilka grupper i samhället som skulle förlora på deras politik. Jag finner också att de berättelser partierna förde fram i filmerna stördes av andra berättelser om partierna och de frågor filmerna handlade om. Utifrån dessa slutsatser formulerar jag ett antal frågor som partier och andra kan använda för att testa en berättelses potential.

Regarding presidential responsiveness and leadership, this study addresses two questions: Does the president respond to the public? Does the president lead the public? Unlike prior research, this study tries to answer these questions by focusing on the news media intervening in the relationship between the president and the public. Rather than positing a direct relationship between them, this study points out that information flows between the president and the public through the news media, which affect the president and the public. The public receives daily political information including presidential messages from the news media. Also, presidents recognize public sentiments from news stories. Accordingly, this study examines the potentially multidirectional relationships between the three actors from 1958 to 2004 in the United States. This study estimates the reciprocal relationships between the three actors by using Vector Autoregression (VAR) and Moving Average Response (MAR) simulations. Analyzing the three actors' issue stances, this study reveals that the news media significantly influence the public and the president. However, the direct relationship between the president and the public is negligible. Furthermore, the empirical findings demonstrate that presidential responsiveness is more likely to be observed when the news media report news stories consonant with past public opinion changes.

This dissertation explores how institutional settings regulating the media and campaigns affect voter participation. The broader question is what types of political communication systems are likely to produce the most engaged and participatory citizens as well as equal participation. Assuming that political participation is affected by its underlying costs and benefits, I hypothesize that political communication systems that lower information costs for voters have higher turnout levels and reduce upper class bias. Political communication systems are measured by media systems, access to paid TV advertising, and campaign finance laws. In the country-level turnout models, investigating seventy-four electoral democracies, I find that public broadcasting systems increase voter turnout, while changing the effect of paid advertising. Public broadcasting systems that allow paid TV advertising have a higher turnout levels than those that ban paid advertising. Conversely, paid advertising in private broadcasting systems have a negative marginal effect on voter turnout. On the other hand, campaign finance laws that allow more money to enter election campaigns increase voter participation. So campaign contribution and spending limits depress turnout and public finance increases it. The hierarchical models in Chapter 6 show that political communication systems also change the relationship between individual socioeconomic status and voter participation. Generally political communication environment that lower information costs for voters reduces socioeconomic bias for voters. Public broadcasting systems, access to paid TV ads, and free TV time, thus, mitigate the effect of education on voting. Additional investigation also shows that the age gap between voters and nonvoters is conditioned by different types of political communication systems. Both partisan press and public direct funding promote younger citizens’ participation, thus decreasing the generation gap. In contrast, campaign contribution/expenditure limits enlarge such gap. Broadcasting systems also affect the effect of age on voting. Because older people spend more time watching television than younger ones, the type of broadcasting system has a disproportionately larger impact on older citizens. / text

In the past years the usage and growth of social media has increased, through the increase in popularity, growth and use, social media has become an all the more important arena. Politicians need to communicate with the public, where the public is, in order to be elected and right now a large amount of the public is on social media. This research studies how four of the largest political parties in Sweden, Socialdemokraterna, Moderaterna, Sverigedemokraterna and Miljöpartiet, together with an upcoming party Feministiskt initiativ, used social media in the governmental election in Sweden 2014. In order to study how these political parties used social media, the posts made on Facebook and Twitter were selected. The posts were selected from the two weeks leading up to the election. The posts on Twitter had a higher quantitity and were studied through a quantitative content analysis; while the posts on Facebook included richer text and were studied through a qualitative content analysis. The choice to include both a quantitative and a qualitative content analysis were made to give a richer result with a more including picture. The result showed that there is not one universal media logic used by the parties on the posts posted on Facebook and Twitter, however the elements used were the same, but in different extent. One of the parties, Miljöpartiet, had a consequent media logic of all of the selected post made by them on Facebook. On social media political parties become gatekeepers themselves, without relying on journalists to bring forth their ideals, election issues, and topics of importance. On social media the political parties decide what to publish and how to publish it. The political parties frame the topics to benefit themselves and argue for why their approach is the right choice and why the viewer of the post should vote for them.

This study examines the effect of motivation on political selective exposure and selective perception using an online experiment. Studies have found that though people have a preference for like-minded political information over counter-attitudinal information, they do not avoid counter-attitudinal political information altogether (Garrett, 2009; Garrett, Carnahan, & Lynch, 2011; Stroud, 2008). This study examines under what conditions people are likely to expose themselves to more like-minded information than counter-attitudinal information and under what conditions people are likely to seek out more counter-attitudinal information than like-minded information. Based on the theory of motivated reasoning and Hart et al. (2009)'s model, I proposed a model that explained selective exposure and selective perception based on motivation. Defense motivation, the motivation to hold attitude-consistent cognitions with one's original attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors, was predicted to increase selective exposure and selective perception. Accuracy motivation, the motivation to arrive at the correct conclusion, was predicted to reduce selective exposure and selective perception. Finally, information utility motivation, the motivation to choose information that has the highest utility, was predicted to reduce selective exposure when counter-attitudinal information was equally useful as attitude-consistent information, but increase selective exposure when attitude-consistent information was more useful than counter-attitudinal information. In both cases, it was predicted that the selective perception pattern would not be changed. The study also tested the additive effect of the three motivations and examined which motivation can override other motivations in determining selective exposure and selective perception. Results showed that accuracy motivation was effective in reducing selective exposure for both strong partisans and those who were not strong partisans. Accuracy motivation can override defense motivation in affecting selective exposure. Information utility alone, defense motivation alone, and the combination of the three motivations produced mixed results. Accuracy motivation was effective in reducing selective perception for those who were not strong partisans. The link between selective exposure and selective perception was not found.

This study focused on how local politicians in Kalmar perceive journalists and their intertwined relationship. We based our study on the theoretical understanding of today’s media-centric democratic society. The ‘adversary model’ offered an understanding of the intricate relations between politicians and journalists. The relationship builds on constant trade where both parties are dependent on each other. Politicians exchange information to gain attention in the media. Journalists needs politicians as important sources of information and have the power to control the exposure that politicians get in the public eye. This study was researched and conducted through qualitative interviews with local politicians. We found that experienced politicians have developed an understanding for journalistic work and that it is important to have a good relationship to reach out to their constituency. This professional relationship has to be kept at arm’s length as it otherwise risks to become too muddled. We learned that politicians are well aware of the need to adapt to media conditions – there were, however, examples of breakdowns in this precarious relationship. The politicians in our study delivered several examples of how media adaptation is managed, e g how press conferences are scheduled according to media deadlines and are held at suitable locations so that photographers can get good pictures. Trust appeared to be the crucial condition for a rewarding relationship. Every politician in our study agreed that it is all a question of trust.

Marketingo teorija iki XX a. 8-to dešimtmečio nagrinėjo pelno siekiančių kompanijų veiklą. Tačiau vėliau buvo pastebėta, jog valstybinės ir viešos įstaigos, taip pat žmonės, susiduria su panašiomis problemomis, kurias padeda spręsti marketingas. Nuo XX a. antros pusės politinės partijos bei politikai politinėje komunikacijoje nevengia naudoti marketingo elementų. Lietuvos politika skaičiuoja vos 23 metus, kuomet yra galima laisvai vykdyti rinkimines kampanijas ir taip pritraukti visuomenės balsų. Marketingo apraiškos Lietuvos politinėje komunikacijoje ligi šiol lieka neištirtas laukas. Politinės komunikacijos tyrėjai pastebi, jog tokie marketingo elementai, kaip strategijų rašymas, apklausos, focus grupės, segmentacija, tikslinių grupių išskyrimas, pozicionavimas, partijos ženklo-brand‘o vertės kūrimas (brandingas), profesionalizmas, viešųjų ryšių akcijos ir kt., yra nemaža dalis viso politinės komunikacijos proceso dalis. Šiame darbe yra analizuojama vienos Lietuvos politinės partijos, „Sąjunga Taip“, politinė komunikacija 2012 m. Seimo rinkimų rinkiminės kampanijos metu. Analizuojant šios partijos politinę komunikaciją yra ieškoma taikomų marketingo elementų. Marketingo elementai politinėje komunikacijoje dar kitaip yra vadinami politiniu marketingu. Šiame darbe analizuojant marketingo, komunikacijos ir politinės komunikacijos sampratas yra pristatomas politinis marketingas. Tiriant „Sąjungos Taip“ politinę komunikaciją, buvo svarbu suprasti visą 2012 m. Seimo rinkimų... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Marketing theory until the twentieth century eighth decade investigated activities of business profit companies. Nevertheless later it was discovered that state and public institutions, as well as people, are facing similar problems, which can be solved using marketing. From the second half of the twentieth century political parties and politicians do not avoid using marketing elements in communication. Lithuanian policy counts only 23 years of existence, when it is possible freely conduct election campaigns, this way attracting votes. Marketing manifestations in Lithuanian political communication have so far stayed an unexplored field. Political communication researchers note that a big part of all political process consists of such marketing elements as: writing strategies, surveys, focus groups, segmentation, target groups, positioning, branding, professionalism, public relations, promotions, and etc. This work is the analysis of political communication in 2012 done by a Lithuanian political party, the” Sąjunga Taip“during the period of the parliamentary elections campaign. In the analysis of this party political communication the elements of marketing have been searched for. Marketing elements in political communication are also called political marketing. In this paper, the analysis of political marketing, communication, and political communication concepts are being presented. While analyzing the "Sąjunga Taip" political communication, it was important to understand... [to full text]

L’objectif de ce mémoire est double. D’une part, il vise à proposer un cadre d’analyse novateur permettant d’étendre le modèle du marketing politique, traditionnellement limité au cas des partis politiques, en l’appliquant aux stratégies de recrutement (en amont) et de lobbying (en aval) des groupes d’intérêt. D’autre part, il a pour but de donner un nouveau souffle à l’étude des groupes d’intérêt en tant que sous-champ de la science politique en situant leur action dans une perspective dynamique et stratégique. De façon plus spécifique, cette recherche vise à évaluer, à l’aide de deux hypothèses, le degré de déploiement global de l’approche marketing chez les groupes d’intérêt au Québec et à comparer son niveau de pénétration spécifique au sein des différentes organisations. La première hypothèse avance que le degré de déploiement global du marketing politique auprès des groupes d’intérêt québécois s’avère relativement faible en raison d’un certain nombre de facteurs contextuels qui ont historiquement limité son intégration au sein de leurs stratégies de recrutement et de lobbying. La seconde hypothèse affirme pour sa part que le niveau de pénétration spécifique de l’approche marketing est limité à certaines organisations et varie en fonction de certains facteurs qui peuvent s’avérer contradictoires. Les données recueillies lors d’entrevues menées auprès de douze des principaux groupes d’intérêt actifs à l’échelle du Québec tendent à confirmer les deux hypothèses. / The goal of this paper is twofold. On the one hand, it aims to offer an innovative analytical framework for extending the model of political marketing, traditionally limited to the case of political parties, by applying it to the recruitment (upstream) ad lobbying (downstream) strategies of interest groups. On the other hand, it aims to give new impetus to the study of interest groups as a subfield of political science by placing their actions in a dynamic and strategic perspective. In more specific terms, this research aims to assess, with two hypotheses, the overall level of deployment of the marketing approach among interest groups in Quebec and compare its specific level of penetration within the various organizations. The first hypothesis argues that the degree of penetration of global marketing policy with interest groups in Quebec is relatively low due to a number of contextual factors that have historically limited its integration within their recruitment strategies and lobbying. The second hypothesis assumes for his part that the level of deployment of specific marketing approach is limited to certain organizations and varies depending on certain factors which may be contradictory. The data gathered during interviews with twelve key interest groups active throughout the Quebec tend to confirm the two hypotheses. / Fonds québécois de recherche sur la société et la culture