USE OF THE PRINT MEDIA

Use of Print Media During the 2009 European Elections

DECLARATION

Writing this thesis has been very demanding, challenging and time-consuming, but also remarkable, informative and above all fun. Nevertheless, it feels great to have finally completed my bachelor's or master's thesis and I am now looking forward to a nice relaxing period for recovering. It has been both advantages and drawbacks with the limited amount of earlier research conducted within this area, even though I faced serious troubles but sometimes the advantages of this research luckily were in my favor and have made this research both challenging and interesting.

I would like to thank my supervisor -------, professor at -------University, who has been great in guiding my through this thesis, helping me through the difficulties I faced during the entire process and motivated me to work hard. Furthermore, I would like to thank all my friends, for their contributions by sharing their perceptions and opinions with me. Above all I would like to thank my family and teachers that provided me with valuable and constructive criticism.

ABSTRACT

Due to an increasing interdependence between mass communication and political processes, the role of media in political campaigns generated much debate. In this paper, we will try to establish the strengths and the weakness of the print media in campaigns. This will help to understand the effect the print media has on campaign advertising. Finally, personalization appears as an important strategy of news selection, focusing on a small number of prominent actors.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would take this opportunity to thank my research supervisor, family and friends for their support and guidance without which this research would not have been possible.

TABLE OF CONTENT

DECLARATION2

ABSTRACT3

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT4

BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY6

1.0 Introduction6

1.1Context of the European Union Elections7

1.2 The process of the elections8

1.3 Purpose of Study8

1.4 Aim and Objectives8

CHAPTER : II10

POLITICAL ADVERTISING IN NEWSPAPERS10

2.0 Introduction10

2.2 Case study15

2.3 History of Voting16

2.5 Class De-alignment & Patterns of Voting Behaviour18

METHODOLOGY21

3.0 Validity22

3.1 Limitation22

CHAPTER: IV23

DISCUSSION AND RESULTS23

CONCLUSION26

Recommendations29

REFERENCES30

CHAPTER:I

BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

1.0 Introduction

Political parties use campaigns to discuss their ideas and issue that the general public face and how they intend to address these issues. Therefore the medium that they use becomes very important. This is because they have to compete amongst other parties, convince the public many of whom might not be interested in politics and others who may have no trust with the politicians. There are different ways that parties have used to reach out to these groups of people. They have used both the print and the electronic media. My work will look at how the print media has been used as an advertising and promotion tool in politics. To achieve this i will look at how the conservatives and the labour party used the print media to campaign during the 2009 European politics. The reason why I have looked at advertising in politics is because millions of pounds (Bignell, 1997, p34) go into advertising and campaigning especially during elections. Parties must therefore use the most efficient method to reach the ...