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Communication in the European Elections: The Case of British Broadcasting*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Jay G. Blumler
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Extract

THE POLITICAL GAINS EXPECTED FROM HOLDING DIRECT ELECtions to the European Parliament were bound to depend on the nature and extent of mass communication. Information flows released during the campaign in the various Community countries, and how they were received by electoral audiences, would determine, for example, whether: European awareness would spread beyond the confines of cosmopolitan élites into the ranks of mass publics; the legitimacy of the Euro ean Parliament would be strengthened by enhancing its visibility, intelligibility and relevance in the eyes of European citizens; and whether the seeds of a European-level body of public opinion would begin to sprout and flourish. As Emdio Colombo once put it, ‘The elections to the European Parliament by direct universal suffrage provide an opportunity of bringing the debate on Europe into the public forum and of enlisting the active support of the man in the street for the construction of Europe.’

Type
Articles
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 14 , Issue 4 , 01 October 1979 , pp. 508 - 530
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1979

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References

1 Pryce, R., ‘Legitimacy and European Integration: The Role of Information’, paper presented to the Xth Congress of the International Political Science Association, Edinburgh, 1976 Google Scholar.

2 Directorate‐General for Research and Documentation, Elections to the European Parliament by Direct Universal Suffrage, Luxembourg, 1969.

3 Milbrath, Lester W., Political Participation, Rand McNally, Chicago, 1965 Google Scholar.

4 Blumler, Jay G. and McLeod, Jack M., ‘Communication and Voter Turnout in Britain’, in Leggatt, Timothy (ed.), Sociological Theory and Survey Research, Sage, London, 1974 Google Scholar.

5 Herman, Valentine and Lodge, Juliet, The European Parliament and the European Community, London, Macmillan, 1978, p. 137 Google Scholar.

6 Inglehart, Ronald, ‘Long Term Trends in Mass Support for European Unification’, Government and Opposition, Vol. 12, 1977, pp. 150–177 Google Scholar.

7 Janowitz, Morris, The Community Press in an Urban Setting, The Free Press, Glencoe, 1952 Google Scholar.

8 Blumler, Jay G., Cayrol, Roland and Thoveron, Gabriel, La Television Fait‐Elle L’Election?, Presses de Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques, Paris, 1978 Google Scholar.

9 Briggs, Asa, ‘Word and Image: Changing Patterns of Communications’, Daedalus, Vol. 108, 1979, pp. 133–149 Google Scholar.

10 Survey conducted by Social Surveys (Gallup Poll) Ltd. on behalf of International Institute of Communications, June 1979.

11 For further development of this point see the following section of this article.

12 In the BBC, at least, it also appears that differences over the coverage deserts of the European election were more marked among radio than television journalists.

13 Robinson, Michael, ‘Future Television News Research: Beyond Edward Jay Epstein’, in Adams, William and Schreibman, Fay (eds.), Television Network News: Issues in Content Research, George Washington University, Washington, D. C., 1978 Google Scholar.

14 Cited in Blumler, Jay G., Gurevitch, Michael and Ives, Julian, The Challenge of Election Broadcasting, Leeds University Press, Leeds, 1978, p. 25 Google Scholar.

15 One broadcaster approached after the European elections mentioned poor attendance by print journalists at party press conferences on three separate occasions during the interview.

16 Gallup survey, op. cit.

17 Herman and Lodge, p. 112.

18 I am indebted to my colleague, Mr. A. D. Fox, for clarifying the significance of this point.

19 Asa Briggs, op. cit.

20 Asa Briggs, ibid.

21 Angell, Robert Cooley, ‘Social Integration’, International Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences, Macmillan, New York, 1968, Vol. 7, pp. 380–386 Google Scholar.

22 Ibid.

23 Ibid.