Introduction
The use of media has been on the rise over the last couple of years. Technology has been one of the main factors that have led to increased media usage (O’Shaughnessy and Stadler, 2002). The term media generally refers to the modern means of communication. Media systems could be radios, TVs, magazines, the internet, and mobile phones among others. Media is changing fast owing to technological advancements.
This has led to changes in the definition of the term media. However, the bottom line is that the media helps to reach a wide audience and that it mostly uses electronic devices or any other technological device. Media links the person sending the message to the person receiving that message. It is important to note that media today has also become a source of knowledge, as well as entertainment source for many people.
Politicians want to communicate to as many people as they can, especially when they are seeking for elective positions. It is difficult to go around a whole nation seeking for votes. Therefore, media is the most effective method that politicians can use to reach a large number of people (McNair, 2004).
Media and politics usually go hand in hand. Politics will always require media. The media has the ability to expose politicians to a large audience, and this is crucial in winning elections. Similarly, when politicians want to pass a given message to the public, the most efficient way is through the media. Very many people listen to radio, watch TV and read newspapers, thus most people are able to get the messages.
Politicians call for news conferences to pass their messages to the public. Despite the fact that the media has been helpful to both the politicians and the crowds, there have been debates over the negative impacts of media.
This has accelerated as the development of digital media continues to advance with increased technology (McNair, 2004). This essay focuses on the increased arguments for strong media effects as digital media continues to rise.
Historical situation
Media has a long history that dates back to as early as the 16th century. It was during this time that the Gutenberg printing press produced information in books and newspapers. The press company distributed the publications to many people, making information widely available.
This advanced in the 18th century when new technologies started evolving. With industrial revolution, there was the development of technology in all sectors, including in communication media. New methods of printing were established to enable mass distribution of information. At the same time, information could be spread faster and more efficiently.
This was facilitated by the increased population in urban centres and increased complexities in the lives of people. As the societies became more complicated, the need for more advanced means of communication increased. Industrial revolution also facilitated social changes, as well as new lifestyles. People needed more entertainment and more reliable sources of information (Schultz, 2004).
Further advancements continued in the 19th and the 20th centuries. More precisely, the 20th century was characterized by numerous technological advancements. This was a major factor why the communication systems advanced significantly during this century. The inventions were associated with numerous effects on the lives of people.
It is around the same time that politics also became more advanced and the significance of politics increased due to its relation with national economies and the importance of the economy to the citizens. The need for democracy in the political scene also increased. Media is seen as the main vehicle that facilitates democracy. Through the media, citizens can communicate their thoughts and criticize or support a given political view.
For instance, in the 1700s media played a central role in the American quest for multi- party democracy. Among the people who wrote towards this advocacy include Thomas Paine, an author who wrote a book titled “Common Sense”. The 20th century saw the media change and impact the lives of human beings.
Since then, the development of computers and digital media has continued to change the face of mass media. The spread of information has become more effective and efficient. This efficiency has made politicians turn to using media more than ever before in their campaigns and in attempts to attain public attention.
The media enables politicians reach a large crowd at a relatively low cost. Today, it is difficult for any high profile politician to achieve their objectives without the help of the media. Politicians participate in one-on-one interviews where they are able to sell their policies to the crowds. A politician will address critical issues that can get votes for him during an interview (Baran, Baran and Davis, 2012).
On the other hand, the media personnel like covering political stories. For instance, media personnel are usually very happy to get a chance to interview a politician. Such interviews are given a considerable amount of air time in national TVs. They are also covered widely in the newspapers.
Since many people are interested in knowing what is happening in the political scene, it turns out that there is a large audience watching the interviews and buying newspapers. This is usually a benefit to the media houses since they can get more income as a result of political coverage.
The main emphasis of political history is on the decisions and the ideas of national leaders, as well as organizational leaders. It is about the powers possessed by national leaders and elites in the society. Political history has been unravelling in different ways in the period that mankind has stayed on earth. Things keep on changing as the lifestyles of the citizenry change and changes in technology continue.
The history can be traced back to the medieval era, as well as the renaissance era. This was followed by the enlightenment era when political systems advanced and democratic systems became complex. This coincided with the era of industrialization, a period when media changed significantly (Metzger and Flanagin, 2008).
The range of effects theories
Media is a topic that has attracted a lot of interest from various individuals and groups. Further, media politics have attracted even more interest due to the effect that it has on the lives of individuals. There is a wide range of theorists who are highly diverse and have contributed towards the topic. In addition, there have been contributions towards political theories and explanations on how politics and media are related.
Among the theorists who have made these contributions include Matthew Anorld, Friedrich Nietzsche, and T. S. Eliot who have contributed towards the media theory, and John Stuart Mill as well as Alexis de Tocqueville’s contributions towards political theories. After founding these theories, other academicians continued to add to the theories and developed new theories as well (McCullagh, 2002).
An academician known as Marshall McLuhan referred to media theory as a science since it has the ability to explain realities from a particular angle, the same way sciences does. Some of the theories are discussed below:
Mass media is very influential in the society. However, it is usually criticized since it is one sided. Mass media tends to follow and adhere to the interests of the people who are dominant in the society. This is explained in the Marxist theory. According to Marx, there are two opposing forces in the media, namely the economic base and the superstructure.
The economic base in a given society is the one that determines most things within that society. These include the political consciousness as well as the social consciousness of the society. It follows that the most successful politicians are usually among the richest people in the society. According to the classical Marxist theory, whatever is reported in the media is influenced by the economic base within the society.
It is the class of the wealthy and the elite who manipulate the media. Politicians being among the wealthiest have the ability to control whatever is reported in the media (Craig, 2003). Media houses have today become more about business organizations whose revenues are determined, to a great extent, by politicians.
The media fails to recognize diversity and only tends to focus on the issues of the rich in the society. In this case, economics refers to reductionist of diversity. Media lacks social consciousness.
Accumulation theory is one of the most commonly used theories. It argues that a message does not have a big impact on the receiver. However, the impact should be consistent. The sender of the message should persist in order to make a significant impact on the receiver. The small impact that the message will have will eventually add up to become significant in the society, as well as the nation.
This is a theory that should be used by politicians and in media politics. The aim of a politician is to get as many votes as one can. Therefore, politicians need to keep the message recurring in the memories of citizens in order to influence them to vote. The message is communicated for a prolonged period of time when the media starts to pass a certain message to the public.
The citizens, in turn, become aware of that message since they come across it many times. In the process, they respond to the message positively.
The fact that the media has to make a significant impact on the society over time is positive and could also be negative in some situations. For instance, this theory can lead to the wrong use of the media if the media is communicating messages that could be harmful to the society (Nesbitt-Larking, 2007).
Media dependency theory is also a theory that can be applied in political media. Many people, especially in the urban areas, are highly dependent on media information. In fact, their decisions are usually influenced by the information they get from the media (Mulder, 2004). They can, therefore, make the right decisions or wrong decisions depending on the information they get.
This is a theory that politicians can take advantage of to influence voters’ decisions. For instance, it is very common to have opinion polls in an electioneering period in any country. These polls have a very significant influence on the decisions that voters will make at the end. People are likely to vote for the candidate who is seen to be leading the polls for a long time and with a big margin. Politicians can use this advantage negatively.
They can manipulate media personalities so that they can present the polls in a manner that favours them. It is a common feature to have polls being interpreted the wrong way and influencing the wrong decisions. There are a lot of technicalities that are involved in coming up with those polls. However, not many people understand such techniques as sampling errors.
There are also differences in the methodologies that different analyst use to come up with their poll results. Polls end up having a negative impact on many people as a result of these misunderstandings. Most people’s decisions are influenced and they might end up voting for the wrong person.
This is one of the criticisms that have been associated with media politics. Media politics might lead to wrong leaders being elected (Stone, 2002).
People can acquire certain behaviours through observing the way others behave. Similarly, people can observe the media and acquire new modes of behaviours. This acquisition is explained by the modelling theory. In such cases, an individual usually identifies with a certain personnel in the media who behaves in a manner that they are interested.
They then get positive reinforcement from those media houses and try to behave like them (Greenwald and Bernt, 2000). Politicians are usually very influential people in the society. They can exert their influence through the media. Media is actually the main way through which politicians reach the people. People can, therefore, acquire new behaviours from the way they behave in the media.
People will encounter politicians in the media during their campaign as they make advertisements or as they are being interviewed. They might also encounter the politicians during rallies that are relayed through the media. People identify with such politicians in that they wish that they could be like the politicians. In turn, they start behaving like the politicians.
If the person encounters a situation that is similar to the one the politician is in, they end up behaving in the same way they saw the politician behave. Politicians can, therefore, influence people negatively or positively through the media (Rozell, 2003).
The current media environment
Today media has advanced significantly from the way it used to be many years ago. As mentioned earlier in this article, technology has been the major reason why the media has changed this much. The effectiveness and efficiency of the media have improved. Media systems have also changed greatly.
It is important to note that as the media advances, its usage has also changed and its influence on the people who rely on it for information has increased. The society is becoming more complex. The population has grown and the environment has generally changed.
This is one of the factors that have led to the need for more information. It has, therefore, facilitated a change in the way people get access to that information (Payton and Kvasny, 2012).
The traditional media platforms were made up of radios, TVs, newspapers and magazines. Most of the media studies have tended to focus more on these media and ignored the modern media, which is the World Wide Web (WWW) or the internet. Today, people have wide access to the internet. At the same time, people widely use the WWW to get information (Flanagin and Metzger, 2001).
As a result, politics have also changed the media in that it recognizes internet as a major way of reaching out to the people in the society (Errington and Miragliotta, 2011). Politicians use the internet to communicate their messages to the people. This way, they are able to reach a large audience. Media has strong effects on the society. It has the ability to influence the way people behave and the way they make their decisions.
Politicians use the media to popularize themselves and convince people to vote for them or support their ideologies. Politics is an institution that has become very common and many people are now interested in it. There are more people who are seeking for elective positions in many nations across the world. In addition, the population today has continued to grow.
It has also become more educated and, therefore, people have the ability to view issues from different perspectives before making their final decisions. This makes it difficult for the politicians to access every individual and convince them or deliver their messages. The media is the only effective method politicians can use to reach large audiences.
The media platforms, on the other hand, have become business institutions that are out to maximize their wealth. This is one of the criticisms that the media is facing today. For this reason, media is being controlled by the wealthy people in the society. Media addresses the interests of the elite and fails to focus on the needs of the less wealthy.
Political candidates who have money make adverts on national televisions and radios. Adverts are the major sources of income for media houses. Such adverts are likely to be given more air play as long as the politicians have paid for them. Their messages will accumulate in the people and eventually make an impact that will change people’s decisions and change the society (Flanagin and Metzger, 2001).
Today, the society has become more complex compared to the way it was in some years back. The information range needed by the people has also increased as a result of this complexity. People need to know about the events that are taking place in different geographical areas.
With increased globalization, the media needs to cover different parts of the world due to the integration of the economy and political institutions. Therefore, the media has to work over long geographical distances in order to cover all the events happening. This is a great challenge to the media. However, with technology it is possible to cover a wide area and deliver information regarding those areas.
Conclusion
Media connects the sender of a message to the receiver. Politicians use the media to link with the citizens and sell their policies and ideologies in order to get votes. In most societies, politicians represent the wealthy and the elite classes. These people have the ability to control the media. As a result, the media focuses more on their interests and tends to ignore the people in the lower classes.
The ability of the politicians to use the media makes them influential. Many people depend on the media for information and making decisions. The political dominance of the media, therefore, influences people towards the will of the politicians.
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