Exploration on The Sun and Daily Mirror reports of a month before the 2019 general election.

(Max 750 words)

Module Tutor

John Steel

This case study will address how The Sun and Daily Mirror portrayed two candidates between 1^st November 2019 and 11^th December 2019, assessing the horse-race coverage before the British 2019 General Election. To establish how and whether the tabloids endorsement had a bearing during the campaign, quality and quantity research methods will be used to analyze the performance of two red-top tabloid newspapers.

Parties/candidates must gain a good reputation, which is based on credible promise and records so that they can promote to the potential voters. (Scammel,1999) The defenders for personalized politics may claim that those portrayals of candidates could guide the voters to make their decisions correctly, and helped the politicians gain a good reputation.

However, Robert Bellah argued that ‘a politics of personality is replacing a politics of reputation’ by explaining the differences between reputation and charisma portrayals. She suggested, ‘the charisma of the party leaders may be almost entirely a product of media exposure’ Bellah(, 1986). While Margaret Scammel (1999) also points out the vital role of the press during the modern political campaign, which she described as ‘entwined inextricably.’

Scammel (1999) highlighted ‘the difficulties of establishing reputation are multiplied in the teeth of a consistently hostile press.’ The Sun uses words ‘toxic’ and ‘the most dangerous chicken’ to describe Corbyn (The Sun, 2019), whereas Daily Mirror granted Johnson ‘the worst PM’ title in September (Daily Mirror, 2019).

Under the fierce partisanship of newspapers in British, whether The Sun and Daily Mirror obligated the role before the election–helping the public understand the policy and invisible complexity of the nation(Bellah,1999)?  Or they put their central attention to discuss PM’s personalities?

Those issues will be examined by combing the research of  UK Election Analysis 2019: Media, Voters and the Campaign, and the explanation of the concept from Lauri Karvonen(2012), Janet Takens(2013),  Margaret Bellah(1986) and Scammel(1999).

In order to evaluate the subject accurately and adequately, this study will mainly focus on two newspaper institutions that have different partisanship. While according to the statistics, Daily Mirror and The Sun have the most reliable labor and conservative partisanship, respectively as well as the highest circulation among the other five newspaper institutions (Wring& Deacon,2019).

To analyze whether personalism is rising during the elections, it is essential to define the term ‘personality politics’. As Nicholas Walliman(2011) mentioned, ‘Concept should be clearly defined so that they can be understood in the same way by everyone.’ This study will first elaborate on the term based on the definition given by Lauri Karvonen(2012) and Janet Takens(2013). Following by discussed the view of ‘British election, coverages is becoming more presidential.’

2. To what extent British media coverage during the election has become more characterized by reference to leaders’ personal qualities.

This study will analyze two tabloids’ tone and descriptive languages when reporting Johnson and Corbn to exemplify whether and how The Sun and Daily Mirror utilized ‘personality politics’ in their coverages before the election.

2. Main body:  I will structure my main body on three main parts: Presidential campaign coverage& fierce partisanship of the press(horse-race coverages), Personalised coverage & reputation winning, the credibility of the media.

Before the exploration of two newspaper tabloids, it is essential to illustrate the general environment and the role of the press. Thus I will first elaborate on how campaign coverages are being affected by US presidentialism as well as the reason behind the increasing number of horse-race coverages—following by distinguishing the differences between personalized blankets and reputation by referring to Margaret Bellah’s book. And the analysis of two tabloids coverages before the campaign.

3. Conclusion

– Primary sources:  The printed copies of The Sun and Daily Mirror, from 31^st October 2019 to 11^th December 2019, which can be found on the British Library and their news websites. It will be used to analyze how press coverage is diverse political perspectives using ‘personality politics’ to shape public opinion.

– Secondary sources: Academic research and literature review will be used to explain the historical context, ideological theories, and fundamental issues behind the scene. It can be accessed through Star Plus and Google Scholar. The relevant academic research I would like to refer to is UK Election Analysis 2019: Media, Voters, and Campaign.

2. Lilleker, D., Tenscher, J., and Štetka, V. (2015) Towards Hypermedia Campaigning? Perceptions of New Media’s Importance for Campaigning by Party Strategists in Comparative Perspective. Information, Communication & Society, 18 (7), 747-765.

3. Cowley, P., and Kavanagh, D. (2018) The British General Election of 2017. Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan.

4. Takens, J, Wouter van A., van Hoof, A. and Kleinnijenhuis, J. (2013) Media Logic in Election Campaign Coverage. European Journal of Communication, 28 (3), 279-280.

5. Gibson, R. and A. Rommele (2001) A Party-Centered Theory of Professional Campaigning. International Journal of Press/Politics, 6 (4), 31–43.

6. Cottle, S. (2008) Reporting Demonstrations. Media, Culture & Society, 30 (6), 853-872

7. Lengauer, G., & Winder, G. (2013). (De)personalization of campaign communication: Individualization and hierarchization in party press releases and media coverage in the 2008 Austrian parliamentary election campaign, Communications, 38(1), 13-39.

8. Kahn, K. &Kenny, P. (2002). “The Slant of the News: How Editorial Endorsements Influence Campaign Coverage and Citizens’ Views of Candidates,” American Political Science Review. Cambridge University Press, 96(2), pp. 381–394. Doi: 10.1017/S0003055402000230

9. Scammell, M. (1999). Political Marketing: Lessons for Political Science, Political Studies, 47(4), pp. 729-730. doi: 10.1111/1467-9248.00228.

10. Karvonen L (2010). The Personalization of Politics: A Study of Parliamentary Democracies. Colchester: ECPR Press.

11. Wring, D. & Deacon, D(2019). The final verdict: patterns of press partisanship(From: UK Election Analysis 2019: Media, Voters and the Campaign). The Centre for Comparative Politics and Media Research. Bournermouth University. pp. 104

12. Walliman, N., 2011. Research methods [electronic resource], London: Routledge. pp. 67

13. Swanson, D.L. and Mancini, P. eds., 1996. Politics, media, and modern democracy: An international study of innovations in electoral campaigning and their consequences. Greenwood Publishing Group.

14.  The Sun(2019), “Toxic Jeremy Corbyn Portrayal of Boris Johnson as ‘hard right’ is a self-serving lie—it’s clear he’s learnt nothing”. 30^th December 2019, Available at: https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/opinion/10637684/jeremy-corbyns-portrayal-of-boris-johnson/

15. The Sun(2019), “ Corbyn Clucks Up Brexit: Boris Johnson brands Jeremy Corbyn a ‘chicken’ for blocking a snap General Election and making ‘the mother of all U-turns”. 4^th September, 2019, Available at: https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/9865623/corbyn-most-dangerous-chicken-britain/

16. Bellah, R.N., 1986. The Meaning of Reputation in American Society. California Law Review, 74(3), pp.743–751