Mediatised power transformation of governmental journalism

in Berlin an interface of political communication

XXXV. Sunbelt Conference, Brighton, GB, 23.28.06.2015
Research field:
an interface of political communication

Theoretical docking:
relational, attributive & transformative

Empirical model:

Political spokesmen provide informal briefings, think

tanks and further ways to exchange information,
building up a professional network to straddle
this communication interface and constructing
somewhat abstract ways to mark, foster or hinder
communication in Berlins political landscape,
where public policies have to be mediated to their
audiences by organisationally embedded journalists
to their audiences.

In most of the works on journalism, power is close

to what journalists do, although most of these
accounts do not focus on the dynamics of actorpower relations. Recently, Imbusch (2012) brought
some accounts together and Altmeppen (2007)
made the effort to differentiate several power
dimensions.

The empirical model covers several political key

events in the autumn of 2015. It follows Saldaas
(2013) idea of a two-phases qualitative content
analysis (1a & 1b) combining deductive and
inductive code families as well as interviewing
between the coding phases (2). While the function
of the first run is primarily to filter e.g. for significant
frame elements like attributions or responsibilities
at the sentence, paragraph and document level,
the second coding enriches the outcome with the
evaluation of the actors and further relational
aspects. Finally, research findings benefit from
visualization via an actor-centered network plan (3).

Comprehensive but nevertheless coloured

first-hand information is collected by means of the
official press releases and press conferences as well
as other official documents of the ministries and
the government. Information of various sources is
processed into journalistic media text output (written
or spoken textual content).
At this interface of dynamic actors multiple mediation
processes are in progress (Saracinelli 2011) and
set the stage for a power game with complex
communication settings (Couldry 2008; Hepp 2013).

spokes
(wo)men

official
dokuments

Figuration can be coined the missing link in

between individual (micro) and societal (macro)
level. The idea originates in the work of Norbert
Elias (1991), Sofsky & Paris (1994) took it up
and Hepp & Hasebrink (2013) added a level of
transmediality to describe actors attributes and
their actions within communicative figurations.
Finally, mediatisation is a concept to grasp the
dialectic influence between media-communicative
and socio-cultural change (Meyen 2009; Hepp
2013). Mediatisation is one of the metaprocesses of
transformation, like globalisation, commercialisation
or individualisation.

journalists

media text
output

Figure 1: explanatory spin between the four kinds of

actors and documents

key events & multi-method design

1a

1b

QCA:
actors
attributions
semantic relations
decisions
process reference
topics

QCA:
resources
power practices
frames
figuration reference
document relations

Interviews:
actors feedbackon the
last weeks based on
inductive knowledge,
topic evaluation,
narrative examples

Ego-centered
network plans:
various types of actors,
framing, figurations,
power practices

Figure 2: empirical path per key event

Expected Results

Setup of the most important power practices and strategies in ego-centered network plans
Comparison of personal and intersubjective view from journalists and political spokesmen on everyday power practices
(what I do, what happens to others, what journalists say, what politi cians do etc.)
Comparison of power-related strategic and media framing suitable for understanding interactions (problematization of power-related framing)
Possible starting point of generalizing quantitative works on the subject (comparison of power at various European countries political
communication interfaces)
Ideas on how this communication interface could be structured in a more effective, service-oriented manner

Bibliography:
Altmeppen, Klaus-Dieter (2007): Journalismus und Macht: Ein Systematisierungs- und Analyseentwurf.
In: Altmeppen, Klaus-Dieter; Hanitzsch, Thomas; Schlter, Carsten (Eds.): Journalismustheorie: Next Generation.
Soziologische Grundlegung und theoretische Innovation. VS, pp. 421-447.

Imbusch, Peter (Ed.) (2012): Macht und Herrschaft. Sozialwissenschaftliche Theorien und Konzeptionen.
2nd Ed., Springer VS.

Couldry, Nick (2008): Mediatization or Mediation? Alternative Understandings of the Emergent Space of
Digital Storytelling. New Media & Society, Vol. 10, No. 3, pp. 373-91.

Saldaa, Johnny (2013): The Coding Manual for Qualitative Researches. 2nd Ed., Sage.

Elias, Norbert (1991): Die Gesellschaft der Individuen. Suhrkamp.

Hepp, Andreas (2013): Cultures of Mediatization. Polity Press.
Hepp, Andreas; Hasebrink, Uwe (4/2013): Human Interaction and Communicative Figurations. The Transformation
of Mediatized Cultures and Societies. Working Paper No. 2, ZeMKI, Bremen.

Keep in contact
For more information on this project:
tobias.staehler@srh-hochschule-berlin.de

Meyen, Thomas (2009): Medialisierung. In: MuK, Vol. 57 No. 1.

Saracinelli, Ulrich (2011): Politische Kommunikation in Deutschland. Medien und Politikvermittlung im demokratischen
System. 3rd Ed., VS.
Sofsky, Wolfgang; Paris, Rainer (1994): Figurationen sozialer Macht. Autoritt, Stellvertretung, Koalition. Suhrkamp.