TELEVISION AS CULTIVATOR OF POLITICAL MODERATION

TELEVISION AS CULTIVATOR OF POLITICAL MODERATION

Before leaving the topic of politics and media, let us examine the argument of one group of researchers who believe that television, in a very general sense, shapes our political attitudes and perceived reality about politics in some subtle ways. Using cultivation theory, Gerbner, Gross, Morgan, and Signorielli (1982, 1984, 1986) examined the relationship between television viewing in general and political attitudes. Using data gathered for several years in the late 1970s and early 1980s by the National Opinion Research Center in their General Social Surveys (NORC/GSS), Gerbner et al. (1984) looked at the correlation of the amount of TV viewing (and other media use) and political self-designation on a liberal-moderate-conservative dimension.

Politics: Using News and Advertising to Win Elections 256

BOX 8.5

TELEVISION AND IDEOLOGY: BRAZILIAN CASE STUDY

Does television serve to indoctrinate or perpetuate political and social ideologies? The answer is a complex one with no easily generalizable answer. A case study of the Brazilian “telenovela” (soap opera) is an instructive example. In developing countries television is typically controlled largely by the economic elites, often with close political ties to right-wing ideologies. This was true in military-ruled Brazil in the 1970s, when the huge Globo communications network thrived and rose to become the world’s fourth largest TV network of the time, after the big three in the United States. Globo came to be acclaimed for its high- quality programming, which was exported to dozens of countries around the world. The most popular shows, both domestically and for export, were the telenovelas, which typically aired for an hour 6 nights a week for a period of several months. Somewhat like a very long mini-series, they had a fixed ending, after which they were replaced by another novela.

During the 1980s, however, the content of some of the novelas came to reflect some politically left themes. For example, Isaura the Slave was set in colonial Brazil and strongly condemned racism and slavery. Main, Woman showed the struggles of a divorced woman and had a strong feminist message. Roque Santeiro told of a small town controlled by political bosses who stopped at nothing to maintain power. Wheel of Fire told of a business executive who repented of past corruption. It featured characters who were torturers, rulers, and guerrillas during the years of military rule (1964–1985). Formerly shunning television as a tool of the capitalist elites, leftist artists like Roque Santeiro’s author Dias Gomes, a self-described Marxist, later realized the potential of television, particularly through a large and powerful corporation like TV Globo, to reach far more people than theater, films, or print media could ever hope to. At the same time, Globo’s corporate executives began realizing the immense profitability of television programs that deal with some of these progressive themes (Bacchetta, 1987).

In the years since, Globo has continued to dominate Brazilian TV, selling 80% of the nation’s television ad time in the seventh largest advertising market in the world (Amaral & Guimarães, 1994). In addition, its programs are exported worldwide and many of the nation’s newspapers are part of its communications empire.

257 A Cognitive Psychology of Mass Communication

Frequent TV viewers were most likely to label themselves as moderate politically, whereas frequent newspaper readers labeled themselves conservative and heavy radio listeners labeled themselves liberal This relationship was quite consistent within various demographic subgroups, especially so for the conservatives and the moderates. Among light viewers, there was consistently greater difference of opinion between liberals and conservatives on several different specific issues than there was between the liberal and conservative heavy viewers. Gerbner et al. (1982,1984,1986, 2002) argued that television, with its mass market appeal, avoids extreme positions that might offend people and thus by default it cultivates middle- of-the-road perspectives.

Nor is this cultivation limited to North American culture, although the specific effects may differ in different places. Morgan and Shanahan (1991, 1995) found that Argentine adolescents who were heavy TV viewers were more likely to agree that people should submit to authority, approve of limits on freedom of speech, and believe that poor people are to blame for their own poverty In a country having recently come through a repressive military dictatorship, it appears that television “cultivates views that provide legitimacy to authoritarian political practices” (Morgan & Shanahan, 1991, p. 101). See also Morgan (1989, 1990) for other applications of cultivation theory to international settings. For an interesting comparison of the 1988 presidential elections in France and the United States, see the readings in Kaid, Gerstle, and Sanders (1991). For a comparison of effects of political advertising in France, Germany, and Poland, see Cwalina, et al. (2000).

Television may interact with political ideology in other ways to subtly support or undercut existing structures in a society. The social and commercial realities of television may sometimes produce politically strange bedfellows, see Box 8.5 for an interesting example.