The intersection of virtual and physical spaces at the heart of contemporary political protests is a pivotal element in new practices of activism. In this new and global ecology of dissent and activism, different forces, stakeholders, and spaces, once defiantly discordant, come together to define the increasingly malleable nature and terms of participatory politics and the performance of democracy. This book explores the emerging sites, aesthetics and politics of contemporary dissent as a critical attempt to foreground their mediation and negotiation in an era of neoliberal globalization. Contemporary forms of media activism occupy deeply ambivalent spaces, which Ardizzoni analyzes using the lens of what she calls "matrix activism." Rather than confining the analysis to a single platform, a single technology, or a single social actor, matrix activism allows us to explain the hybrid nature of new forms of dissent and resistance, as they are located at the intersection of alternative and mainstream, non-profit and corporate, individual and social, production and consumption, online and offline.

The links between distinctive political regimes and media systems are undeniable. As Siebert, Peterson and Schramm wrote (1956: 1) 60 years ago: 'the press always takes on the form and coloration of the social and political structures within which it operates'. Nevertheless, today's world and politics are completely different from the bipolar era that inspired the ground breaking Four Theories of the Press. What are the main changes and continuities that have driven the study of politics and the media in the last decades? How to approach this interaction in the light of the challenges that democracy is facing or the continuing technological revolution that at times hampers the media? This provocative book explores the main premises that have guided the study of politics and the media in the last decades. In so doing, it gives the reader key analytical tools to question the sustainability of past categorizations that no longer match up with current developments of both, political regimes and the media. In searching for clarification about current discrepancies between democracies and media's distinctive structures or purposes, Four Theories of the Press: 60 Years and Counting puts forward an alternative premise: the political-media complex.

This book examines the disruptive nature of Trump news - both the news his administration makes and the coverage of it - related to dominant paradigms and ideologies of U.S. journalism. By relying on conceptualizations of media memory and "othering" through news coverage that enhances socio-conservative positions on issues such as immigration, the book positions this moment in a time of contestation. Contributors ranging from scholars, professionals, and media critics operate in unison to analyze today's interconnected challenges to traditional practices within media spheres posed by Trump news. The outcomes should resonate with citizens who rely on journalism for civic engagement and who are active in social change

The study of news and news practice is rich in examinations of what journalists owe to society. However, this book looks at what journalists can expect from society: what roles ownership structures, colleagues, governments and audiences should play so journalists can do their jobs well - and safely. What Journalists Are Owed draws on a variety of research perspectives - legal and ethical analysis, surveys, interviews and content analysis - in different national settings to look at how those relationships among stakeholders are developing in a time of rapid and often unsettling chance to the political and economic environments that surround journalism. Journalism can be a risky business. This book opens some discussions on those risks can be described and mitigated. There's no shortage of writing about what journalists owe society - but if society wants journalism done well, what does it owe journalists in return? This volume opens a discussion on the cultural, legal-system and professional agreements that societies should provide so journalists can do their jobs in increasingly hostile political environments. This book was originally published as a special issue of Journalism Studies.

Intelligence services, businesses and governments use a sinister methodology called an influence campaign to sway the core values of their own countries and others around the globe. This method is used by many different types of world governments (including the U.S.) and can pervade many different sectors of public life. Even seemingly powerful politicians are impacted by influence campaigns. While influence campaigns differ from political campaigns or corporate advertising, they share similar characteristics. Both influence behavior by manipulating beliefs to produce an outcome favorable to the campaign goal. This book explains the mechanisms of influence campaigns and how they affect policy making, often in surprising ways. Chapters detail examples of influence campaigns waged by various governments throughout the years and suggest how the public consciousness should deal with these strategies. As targets of these campaigns, citizens must understand how our leaders use them for their own benefit.

From the emergence of digital protest as part of the Zapatista rebellion, to the use of disturbance tactics against governments and commercial institutions, there is no doubt that digital technology and networks have become the standard features of 21st century social mobilisation. Yet, little is known about the historical and socio-cultural developments that have transformed the virtual sphere into a key site of political confrontation. This book provides a critical analysis of the developments of digital direct action since the 1990s. It examines the praxis of electronic protest by focussing on the discourses and narratives provided by the activists and artists involved. The study covers the work of activist groups, including Critical Art Ensemble, Electronic Disturbance Theater and the electrohippies, as well as Anonymous, and proposes a new analytical framework centred on the performative and aesthetic features of contemporary digital activism.

During the last two decades Spain has undergone an unprecedented transformation from being a country of emigrants to receiving a significant number of migrants from all around the world. This book focuses on the analysis of documentaries and fiction films representing migrants in Spain in the first decade of the twenty-first century. Guillen Marin explores the ways in which migrant and non-migrant filmmakers reframe the urban and rural space to create opportunities for a free, although contested, exchange between marginal voices and mainstream Spanish society. She analyzes the extent to which the films challenge forms of exclusion and represent ethnicity in a space that includes some and excludes others.

This book studies the current paradox within the voting literature on campaign contributions and legislative voting behavior. Specifically, while journalists and observers believe that the contributions significantly influence congressional votes, empirical evidence compiled by political scientists has generally failed to identify a systematic linkage between the two. At the same time, the amount of money contributed by interest groups is increasing and polls indicate that the public is becoming more cynical about the process.

This Handbook provides the most comprehensive overview of the role of electoral advertising on television and new forms of advertising in countries from all parts of the world currently available. Thematic chapters address advertising effects, negative ads, the perspective of practitioners and gender role. Country chapters summarize research on issues including political and electoral systems; history of ads; the content of ads; reception and effects of ads; regulation of political advertising on television and the Internet; financing political advertising; and prospects for the future. The Handbook confirms that candidates spend the major part of their campaign budget on television advertising. The US enjoys a special situation with almost no restrictions on electoral advertising whereas other countries have regulation for the time, amount and sometimes even the content of electoral advertising or they do not allow television advertising at all. The role that television advertising plays in elections is dependent on the political, the electoral and the media context and can generally be regarded as a reflection of the political culture of a country. The Internet is relatively unregulated and is the channel of the future for political advertising in many countries

A poll as recently as 2000 revealed that a third of the population thinks "there are general characteristics about women that make them less qualified to serve as president." As the public and the media rely on long-held stereotypes, female candidates must focus even harder on the way they want to define their own image through traditional mass media, such as television, and new forms, such as the internet. "Gender and Candidate Communication "digs deep into the campaigns of the last decade sifting through thousands of ads, websites, and newspaper articles to find out how successful candidates have been in breaking down these gender stereotypes. Among their findings are that female candidates dress more formally, smile more, act "tougher" when they can, and prefer scare tactics to aggressive attack ads.
"Gender and Candidate" "Communication" also presents the most comprehensive, systematic method yet for identifying and understanding self-presentation strategies on the web. The internet may be the medium of the future, but Bystrom has found that coverage on the web tends to draw even more heavily on old stereotypes. No close observer of campaigns, gender, or the internet will be able to ignore their findings.

Gender, Heteronormativity and the American Presidency places notions of gender at the center of its analysis of presidential campaign communications. Over the decades, an investment in gendered representations of would-be leaders has changed little, in spite of the second- and third-wave feminist movements. Modern candidates have worked vigorously to demonstrate "compensatory heterosexuality," an unquestionable normative identity that seeks to overcome challenges to their masculinity or femininity. The book draws from a wide range of archived media material, including televised films and advertisements, public debates and speeches, and candidate autobiographies. From the domestic ideals promoted by Eisenhower in the 1950s, right through to the explicit and divisive rhetoric associated with the Clinton/Trump race in 2016; intersectional content and discourse analysis reveals how each presidential candidate used his or her campaign to position themselves as a defender of traditional gender roles, and furthermore, how this investment in "appropriate" gender behaviour was made manifest in both international and domestic policy choices. This book represents a significant and timely contribution to the study of political communication. While communication during presidential elections is a well-established research field, Aidan Smith's book is the first to apply a gendered lens over such an extended historical period and across the political spectrum.

How does a re-election campaign affect the way a President makes policy? How does already being in the White House affect the way a candidate campaigns? Presidents as Candidates compares eight re-election campaigns from Eisenhower to Clinton, identifying all the differences and similarities. With the 2004 campaign to unset George W. Bush already underway, this book will be an essential part of any politico's electoral library.

Prominent media scholars have argued that the dissemination of propaganda is an important function of the news media. Yet, despite public controversies about 'fake news' and 'misinformation', there has been very little discussion on techniques of propaganda. Building on critical theory, most notably Herman and Chomsky's Propaganda Model, Florian Zollmann's pioneering study brings propaganda back to the forefront of the debate. On the basis of a forensic examination of 1,911 newspaper articles, Zollmann investigates US, UK and German media reporting of the military operations in Kosovo, Iraq, Libya, Syria and Egypt. The book demonstrates how 'humanitarian intervention' and 'R2P' are only evoked in the news media if so called 'enemy' countries of Western states are the perpetrators of human rights violations. Zollmann's work evidences that the news media plays a crucial propaganda role in facilitating a selective process of shaming during the build-up towards military interventions. This process has led to an erosion of internationally agreed norms of non-intervention, as enshrined in the UN Charter.

Communication defines political representation. At the core of the representational relationship lies the interaction between principal and agent; the quality of this relationship is predicated upon the accessibility of effective channels of communication between the constituent and representative. Over the past decade, congressional websites have become the primary way constituents communicate with their members and a prominent place for members to communicate with constituents. Yet, as we move toward the third decade of the 21st century, little work has systematically analyzed this forum as a distinct representational space. In this book, Jocelyn Evans and Jessica Hayden offer a fresh, timely, and mixed-methods approach for understanding how the emergence of virtual offices has changed the representational relationship between constituents and members of Congress. Utilizing strong theoretical foundations, a broad historical perspective, elite interviews, and rich original datasets, Evans and Hayden present evidence that virtual offices operate as a distinct representational space, and they demonstrate that their use has resulted in unprecedented and ill-understood changes in representational behavior. Congressional Communication in the Digital Age contributes to the scholarship on representation theory and its application to the contemporary Congress. It is valuable reading for students and researchers interested in American politics, political communication, and legislative politics.

This book offers a regional analysis of the impact of fake news - misinformation, malinformation and disinformation - on electoral democracy and freedom of expression in Southeast Asia, which has taken place in the middle of a global health pandemic. The book maps the impact of social media and the internet on democracy in the members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations that have already been in the throes of democratic regression for some time. Including an analysis of countries that do not have national elections, the chapters provide detailed information on the extent of internet and social media penetration in each country, the laws that are deployed to reel in its political potential for critics and demonstrate the impact on democracy or the prospects for democracy. Collectively, contributors note that disinformation is a serious problem in the region that negatively impacts elections and how governments' attempts to deal with the phenomenon inevitably lead to the targeting of dissenting voices and opposition as anti-state fake news. The deleterious impact on democracy and freedom of expression, facilitated by a citizenry that is prone to manipulation of facts, appears to be the standard modus operandi in the regional authoritarian complex. This book is the first to undertake a regional analysis of disinformation in Southeast Asia and is a significant contribution to the literature on democracy, elections and disinformation. It will be of interest to researchers in the fields of Political Science and Asian Politics, in particular Southeast Asian Politics.

In order to better understand how the world viewed the US 2016 presidential election, the issues that mattered around the world, and how nations made sense of how their media systems constructed presentations of the presidential election, Robert S. Hinck, Skye C. Cooley, and Randolph Kluver examine global news narratives during the campaign and immediately afterwards. Analyzing 1,578 news stories from 62 sources within three regional media ecologies in China, Russia, and the Middle East, Hinck, Cooley, and Kluver demonstrate how the US election was incorporated into narrative constructions of the global order. They establish that the narratives told about the US election through national and regional media provide insights into how foreign nations construct US democracy, and reflect local understandings regarding the issues, and impacts, of US policy towards those nations. Avoiding jargon-laden prose, Global Media and Strategic Narratives of Contested Democracy is as accessible as it is wide-ranging. Its empirical detail will expand readers' understanding of soft power as narrative articulations of foreign nation's policies, values, and beliefs within localized media systems. Communication/media studies students, as well as political scientists whose studies includes media and global politics, will welcome its publication.

Google is synonymous with searching, but in this innovative new research volume, Micky Lee explores how the Alphabet Corporation, now the parent company of Google, is more than just a search engine. Using a political economic approach, Lee draws on the concept of networks to investigate the growth of this key media player. The establishment of the parent company, Alphabet, shows the company is expanding to other industries from equity investment to self-driving cars. This book first examines this history of expansion, before delving into the economic, political, and cultural profiles of the corporation. Lee ultimately finds that what makes Google powerful is not one genius idea, but rather networks of people, places, and capital. Alphabet: The Becoming of Google is a compelling dive into the sometimes inscrutable world of Google, ideal for students, scholars, and researchers interested in the fields of digital media studies, the politics and economies of online media, and the history of the internet.

In early 1944, with the outcome of World War II by no means certain, many in the United States felt that FDR, as wartime Commander-in-Chief, was an indispensable part of prosecuting the war to a victorious conclusion. Yet although only 62, Roosevelt was mortally ill with congestive heart disease - a fact that was carefully shielded from the American public prior to the election of 1944. In a media environment where we get more details about politicians' health than we sometimes prefer, it is hard to imagine how a paper as authoriative as The New York Times could describe FDR's death as "sudden and unexpected" on its front page. Dr. Hugh Evans looks at the issue of Roosevelt's health not only from a medical ethics perspective, but also with a keen eye for the political and media considerations that led to the decision to run and not disclose the extent of Roosevelt's illness.

This volume analyses the narration of the social through music and the seismographic function of music to detect social problems and envision alternatives. Beyond state-driven attempts to link musical production to the official narrative of the nation, mass musical movements emerged during the 20th century that provided countercultural and alternative narratives of the prevailing social context. The Americas contain numerous examples of the strong connection between music and politics; Woody Guthrie's "This Land is Your Land" envisioned a socialist transformation of the U.S., the Chilean Nueva Cancion created a narrative and affective frame for the recognition of popular culture as a central element of the cultural politics of the Chilean way to socialism, and Reggae emerged as a response to British colonialism, drawing inspiration and guidance from the pan-Africanist visions of Marcus Garvey. Providing a significant contribution to the study of music and politics/social movements from an inter-American perspective, this book will appeal to students and scholars of U.S. and Latin American Cultural Studies, Transnational Studies, History and Political Studies, Area Studies, and Music Studies. For additional information, please see the authors' Sonic Politics webpage: https://www.uni-bielefeld.de/cias/sonicpolitics/index.html

Campaign Finance Reform and the Future of the Democratic Party offers a new interpretation of the dynamics of the American political system. Focusing on the decline of the Democratic Party, Schneider explains how campaign finance reform would help Democrats to reverse the decades-long decline in their voter base by funding popular programs. The constant chase for campaign cash has forced Democratic politicians to concentrate on the needs of myriad special interest groups, scattering their attention across a number small issues of limited interest to most citizens. Schneider argues that this keeps them from uniting behind the kinds of broad, widely supported progressive plans that have always energized the Democratic base and won over support from middle and working class voters.

First published in 1999, this study will examine the nature of the difficulties in the UK, Belgium and Ireland and the accompanying need for parliamentary communication, setting that parliament within an institutional, historical and political EU context and examining its ability to mobilise popular support through the use of mass media.

Substantially revised throughout, the third edition of Political Marketing continues to offer students the most comprehensive introduction to this rapidly growing field. It provides an accessible but in-depth guide to what political marketing is and how it is used in practice and encourages reflection on how it should be used in the future. New Features and benefits of the third edition: Fully updated throughout with new research on emerging practices in the field and ethical implications such as the use of big data, authenticity and the limitations of voters as consumers in light of Brexit; A new employability section on political marketing in the workplace; Extensive pedagogical features including new peer-reviewed case studies, democratic debates, and fully updated practitioner perspectives, best practice guides, and class discussion points and assessments. Led by a leading expert in the field and including contributions from other key academics in the field, this textbook is essential reading for all students of political marketing, parties and elections, and comparative politics.

This book reviews the research on campaigns and elections and investigates the effects of campaigning in referendums, drawing on panel survey data, media content data, focus groups, and interviews with journalists and campaign managers. The authors argue that the media coverage not only influences public perceptions of the campaign, the referendum issue and the party leaders, but that, in a close race, it also shapes the voting and the political future of the incumbent party.
The first study to investigate the dynamics and effects of a referendum campaign on politicians, media and citizens, this innovative volume will be of interest to students and researchers of political communication.

Studies of election campaigns have shown an increased employment of websites, weblog tools, email, and social media by political campaigners, as well as the use of similar platforms by citizens to find information, communicate about elections or engage more generally in political issues. This comprehensive volume explores the ways in which social media is used on the one hand as a campaigning tool, and on the other, by local citizens. It aims to develop a more holistic and Eurocentric research agenda by capturing both supply and demand practices at the European level. The authors employ both single and multination case studies, furthering debates on how political actors and voters embrace the new information and communication environment, in what ways, and for what purposes. The book offers new perspectives on social media campaigning within European democracies, thereby contributing to a more global and comprehensive understanding of how campaigning is affected, and might be enhanced, by developing an interactive digital strategy. This book will be of great interest to students of both politics and media studies. It was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Information Technology & Politics.

The 2008 elections were by any standard historic. The nation elected its first African American president, and the Republicans nominated their first female candidate for vice president. More money was raised and spent on federal contests than in any election in U.S. history. Barack Obama raised a record-setting $745 million for his campaign and federal candidates, party committees, and interest groups also raised and spent record-setting amounts. Moreover, the way money was raised by some candidates and party committees has the potential to transform American politics for years to come.

The latest installment in a series that dates back half a century, "Financing the 2008 Election" is the definitive analysis of how campaign finance and spending shaped the historic presidential and congressional races of 2008. It explains why these records were set and what it means for the future of U.S. politics. David Magleby and Anthony Corrado have assembled a team of experts who join them in exploring the financing of the 2008 presidential and congressional elections. They provide insights into the political parties and interest groups that made campaign finance history and summarize important legal and regulatory changes that affected these elections.

Contributors: Allan Cigler (University of Kansas), Stephanie Perry Curtis (Brigham Young University), John C. Green (Bliss Institute at the University of Akron), Paul S. Herrnson (University of Maryland), Diana Kingsbury (Bliss Institute at the University of Akron), Thomas E. Mann (Brookings Institution).