Normative Analysis of Political Communication
- LAST MODIFIED: 25 September 2018
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199756841-0215
- LAST MODIFIED: 25 September 2018
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199756841-0215
Introduction
Political communication researchers who want to understand the empirical possibilities of democratic political communication need to engage in normative analysis. Normative analysis of political communication, in the sense used in this article, refers to research that explicitly connects empirical (or “positivist”) inquiry into communication phenomena as they are with normative inquiry into communication phenomena as they ought to be. Such connections have always been made in political communication scholarship, but researchers in the early 21st century have become increasingly aware of the need for systematic procedures to connect the empirical and the normative sides of political communication. Any sound normative analysis of political communication must rest on three components: a set of well-developed criteria against which to judge the quality of political communication, plausible procedures for putting them to use in empirical research, and empirical data relevant to these criteria generated by such research. The body of work devoted to an integrated view of the development of criteria in normative theory, the procedures for employing them in empirical research, and their application in empirical studies is not itself well integrated. This article includes relevant contributions from diverse literatures ranging from classic works to contemporary applications of normative analysis. In doing so, it presents normative analyses of the way in which both journalism (colloquially known as “the media”) and ordinary citizens communicate about politics and public affairs. Together, the collected literature illustrates the way in which normative analysis, rather than being intrinsically normative in a political sense, enables a structured two-way exchange between the normative theory and empirical study of political communication in any given society.
General Overviews
Given that the body of literature on strictly normative analysis is scattered, it is surprising that the discussion of how normative and empirical research could benefit each other to produce critical empirical research was present at the onset of the behavioral revolution in communication research. In the first half of the 20th century, Lazarsfeld 1941 explained the necessity and ways of combining critical and empirical research. It is a useful starting point for considering the possibilities of such a combination in normative analysis. Gerbner 1958 is a similar early and surprisingly ecumenical statement that continues to be instructive in its presentation of an empirical communication model informed by insights of critical theory; it also is a call for more of such empirical-normative integration. Beyond these early forerunners, contemporaneous overviews of the role of normativity in communication research are also available. Karmasin, et al. 2013 is wide in scope and illustrates the varied ways in which communication research is, and should be, related to normative questions, be it through the particular foci of its subdisciplines or the nature of its objects.
Gerbner, George. 1958. On content analysis and critical research in mass communication. Audio-Visual Communication Review 6:85–108.
DOI: 10.1007/BF02766931
In this programmatic statement, Gerbner describes how content analysis may be used in critical social research and points out how normative thinking can and should inform the creation of empirical research questions, hypotheses, and models of communication.
Karmasin, Matthias, Matthias Rath, and Barbara Thomaß, ed. 2013. Normativität in der Kommunikationswissenschaft. Wiesbaden, Germany: Springer VS.
English title: Normativity in communication studies. This volume showcases the multiple ways in which normative aspects pervade communication and communication scholarship. Part 1 discusses normative concerns connected to different types and consequences of communication; Part 2, distinct normative perspectives of communication subdisciplines; and Part 3, the relevance of normativity in various areas of contemporary communication research.
Lazarsfeld, Paul F. 1941. Remarks on administrative and critical communications research. Studies in Philosophy and Social Science 9:2–16.
In a surprisingly ecumenical fashion, a pioneer of behavioral-positivist political communication research explains the uses of normative theory for empirical (“administrative”) research and outlines procedures for conducting critical research. Lazarsfeld presents a case for the greater integration of critical and empirical work that is highly relevant in the early 21st century.
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Article
- Activist Media
- Adherence and Communication
- Adolescence and the Media
- Advertisements, Televised Political
- Advertising
- Advertising, Children and
- Advertising, International
- Agenda Setting
- Annenberg, Walter H.
- Applied Communication Research Methods
- Argumentation
- Attitude-Behavior Consistency
- Audience Fragmentation
- Audience Studies
- Bakhtin, Mikhail
- Bandwagon Effect
- Baudrillard, Jean
- Blockchain and Communication
- Bourdieu, Pierre
- Brand Equity
- British and Irish Magazine, History of the
- Broadcasting, Public Service
- Castells, Manuel
- Celebrity and Public Persona
- Censorship
- Civic Duty
- Civil Rights Movement and the Media, The
- CNN
- Codes and Cultural Discourse Analysis
- Cognitive Dissonance
- Collective Memory, Communication and
- Comedic News
- Communication Apprehension
- Communication Campaigns
- Communication, Definitions and Concepts of
- Communication History
- Communication Law
- Communication Management
- Communication Networks
- Communication, Philosophy of
- Community Attachment
- Community Structure Approach
- Computer-Mediated Communication
- Content Analysis
- Corporate Social Responsibility and Communication
- Crisis Communication
- Critical and Cultural Studies
- Cross-tools and Cross-media Effects
- Cultivation
- Cultural and Creative Industries
- Cultural Imperialism Theories
- Cultural Mapping
- Cultural Persuadables
- Cyberpolitics
- 3D Media
- Death, Dying, and Communication
- Debates, Televised
- Deliberation
- Developmental Communication
- Diffusion of Innovations
- Digital Divide
- Digital Intimacies
- Digital Literacy
- Diplomacy, Public
- Distributed Work, Comunication and
- Documentary and Communication
- E-democracy/E-participation
- E-Government
- Elaboration Likelihood Model
- Embedded Coverage
- Entertainment
- Entertainment-Education
- Environmental Communication
- Ethnography of Communication
- Experiments
- Family Communication
- Federal Communications Commission
- Feminist and Queer Game Studies
- Feminist Theory
- Focus Groups
- Food Studies and Communication
- Freedom of the Press
- Gatekeeping
- Gender and the Media
- Global Englishes
- Global Media, History of
- Global Media Organizations
- Glocalization
- Goffman, Erving
- Habermas, Jürgen
- Habituation and Communication
- Health Communication
- Hegemony
- Hermeneutic Communication Studies
- Heuristics
- Homelessness and Communication
- Hook-Up and Dating Apps
- Hostile Media Effect
- Identification with Media Characters
- Identity, Cultural
- Image Repair Theory
- Implicit Measurement
- Impression Management
- Indexing
- Infographics
- Information and Communication Technology for Development
- Information Management
- Information Overload
- Information Processing
- Infotainment
- Innis, Harold
- Instructional Communication
- Integrated Marketing Communications
- Interactivity
- Intercultural Capital
- Intercultural Communication
- Intercultural Conflict Mediation
- Intergenerational Communication
- Intergroup Communication
- International Communications
- Interpersonal Communication
- Interpretation/Reception
- Journalism
- Journalism, Alternative
- Journalism and Trauma
- Journalism, Citizen
- Journalism, Citizen, History of
- Journalism Ethics
- Journalism, Interpretive
- Journalism, Peace
- Journalism, Tabloid
- Knowledge Gap
- Mass Communication
- McLuhan, Marshall
- Media Activism
- Media Aesthetics
- Media and Time
- Media Bias
- Media Convergence
- Media Credibility
- Media Dependency
- Media Ecology
- Media Economics
- Media Economics, Theories of
- Media, Educational
- Media Effects
- Media Ethics
- Media Events
- Media Exposure Measurement
- Media, Gays and Lesbians in the
- Media Literacy
- Media Logic
- Media Management
- Media Policy and Governance
- Media Regulation
- Media, Social
- Media Sociology
- Media Systems Theory
- Merton, Robert K.
- Message Characteristics and Persuasion
- Mobile Communication Studies
- Muckraking
- Multimodal Discourse Analysis, Approaches to
- Multinational Organizations, Communication and Culture in
- Murdoch, Rupert
- Narrative
- Narrative Engagement
- Narrative Persuasion
- News Framing
- NGOs, Communication and
- Online Campaigning
- Open Access
- Organizational Change and Organizational Change Communicat...
- Organizational Communication
- Organizational Communication, Aging and
- Parasocial Theory in Communication
- Participation, Civic/Political
- Peacebuilding and Communication
- Perceived Realism
- Persuasion and Social Influence
- Persuasion, Resisting
- Photojournalism
- Political Advertising
- Political Communication, Normative Analysis of
- Political Economy
- Political Knowledge
- Political Marketing
- Political Scandals
- Political Socialization
- Polls, Opinion
- Priming
- Product Placement
- Propaganda
- Proxemics
- Public Opinion
- Public Relations
- Public Sphere
- Queer Intercultural Communication
- Queer Migration and Digital Media
- Radio Studies
- Reality Television
- Reasoned Action Frameworks
- Religion and the Media
- Reporting, Investigative
- Rhetoric and Communication
- Rhetoric, Religious
- Risk Communication
- Rumor and Communication
- Schramm, Wilbur
- Science Communication
- Scripps, E. W.
- Selective Exposure
- Semiotics
- Sense-Making/Sensemaking
- Sesame Street
- Sex in the Media
- Small-Group Communication
- Social Capital
- Social Change
- Social Cognition
- Social Construction
- Social Identity Theory and Communication
- Social Interaction
- Social Movements
- Social Network Analysis
- Social Protest
- Sports Communication
- Stereotypes
- Strategic Communication
- Surveillance and Communication
- Symbolic Interactionism in Communication
- Tabloidization
- Telecommunications History/Policy
- Television
- Television, Cable
- Textual Analysis and Communication
- Third Culture Kids
- Third-Person Effect
- Time Warner
- Transgender Media Studies
- Transmedia Storytelling
- Two-Step Flow
- Uses and Gratifications
- Video
- Video Deficit
- Video Games and Communication
- Violence in the Media
- Virtual Reality and Communication
- Visual Communication
- Web 2.0
- Web Archiving
- Webcare
- Whistleblowing
- WikiLeaks
- Youth and Media