Spin doctoring in Portugal: A study of professional sources of information operating in the...

+

Spin doctoring in Portugal. A study of professional sources of information operating in the Portuguese Parliament. Vasco Ribeiro University of Porto, Portugal

Vasco Ribeiro / Universidade do Porto

+

!

Motivation

Media Relations

‘spin’ ‘spinning’

‘spin doctor’ ‘spin control’

‘public relations’

‘strategic communication’

‘comunication consultancy’

‘marketeers’

‘propaganda’

‘propaganda’ ‘public opinion’

‘communication’

‘spin doctoring’ ‘persuasion’

‘electoral campaign’

image consultants

‘dark side’

‘sophistication of professional sources

Political press officers


+ Questions


•  What is spin doctoring?

•  Is there spin doctoring in Portugal and in

Parliament?

•  How do spin doctors operate?

•  Do they work with the same techniques as a

traditional press officer?

+ Object study


Political press officers

Journalists/political editors Politicians

+ Methodology

n Semi-structured elite interviews (32 interviews, 26 recorded hours)

n  Including two former Prime Ministers, all of the Parliament’s political advisors, two former advisors of the President of Portugal and several political journalists and editors.

n Press content analysis (572 press clippings between 2003 and 2012)

n  Selected from a search of the words “spin”, “spin doctor” and “spin doctoring” performed at four different software clipping data bases.


+ Spin Doctoring? We all know that:

n  On 21st October 1984, the New York Times political columnist William Safire, used the term spin doctor for the first time.

However:

n  James Reston had already used the verb ‘to spin’ in political journalistic texts in the 50’s and 60’s.

n  Ivy Lee had already proclaimed himself as the ‘doctor of publicity’.

n  ‘Spin a yarn’ in archaic English means to mislead and manipulate


+ What is a ‘Spin doctor’ in Portugal?

n “they usually give speeches, come up with ideas, channel messages...” (Pedro Salgueiro, CDS-PP press advisor)

n “it boils down to ‘sweeten the pill’ about whatever we are selling. To wrap it up and sell it in a more positive way..” (Pedro Sales, BE press advisor)

n “…it is about working the political message in the sense of creating figures of speech and images (…) to have a very short and clear message that people can apprehend quickly”. (Luís Bernardo, PS press advisor)

The respondents’ definitions:


+

n  “Message hyper-simplification” (Teodora Cardoso, former Bank of Portugal Governor)

n  “Journalistic-political co-production” (Manuel Maria Carrilho, former Minister of Culture)

n  “Few ideas, lots of slogans and, above all, a lot of posing” (Pacheco Pereira, popular pundit)


What is ‘Spin doctoring’ in Portugal?

The respondents’ definitions:

+

n “With the advent of private TV’s” (José Sócrates, former Prime-Minister).

n “It happens in the early 90’s, as a consequence of the media outbreak” (Manuel Maria Carrilho, former minister)


When do ‘Spin doctors’ appear in Portugal?

+ Why do ‘Spin doctors’ appear in Portugal?

n “...journalism is an absolutely lazy activity because there is no reading and decoding work. That’s why propaganda prevails” (Flor Pedroso, Antena 1 political editor)

n “It is almost a mill journalism. It is all minced and tasting the same” (São José Almeida, Público political editor)


+

+

Results


+

How spin doctors operates in Portugal?

1. In Government 2. In Parliament


+

1) The Spin doctors’ operating model in Government

Hess, 1984; Blumler, 1990; Maltese, 1992; Villafañe, 1993; Sumpter & Tankard, 1994; Jones, 1995; Routledge, 1995; McNair, 1995; Negrine, 1996, 2002; Battes, 1997; Kurtz, 1998; Gaber, 1999, 2000, 2007; Loomis (2000); Manning, 2001; Campbell, 2002; Seymour-Ure, 2003; Esser, 2005; Davis, 2002; Brown, 2003; Franklin, 2003; Fritz et al., 2004; Foster, 2005; Schlesinger, 2006; Fidalgo, 2007; Miller & Dinan, 2008; Franklin & al, 2009; Pearson, 2009; Serrano, 2010; among others.


+

The great objectives

Main Tasks

Pre-conditions

Main Techniques

1) The Spin doctors’ operating model in Government:


+

The great objectives

•  Defining and running the media agenda •  Build a political personality •  Win Elections •  Keeping Power •  Permanent Campaign



+

Pre-conditions

•  Deep knowledge of the working fields •  Deep knowledge of the news editors •  Social media and buzz skills •  Proximity with the politician •  To have a lobbying network •  Being discreet and working behind the scenes •  Enormous budget •  Press monitoring (‘big brother’)



+

Main Tasks

•  Find the message •  Speechwriting •  Image management •  Plant Leak

•  ‘Ego leak’ •  ‘Goodwill leak’ •  ‘Policy leak’ •  ‘Animus leak’ •  ‘Trial-balloon leak’ •  ‘Whistle-blower’

•  Scandal management •  Political manipulation of the

governmental machine

•  Pre and post-televised political debates

•  Organise Congresses •  Go for the individualisation of

the message •  Look for the ‘big picture’ or

‘photo-opportunity’.



+

Main Techniques

•  Marketing •  Opinion polls, focus groups

and other analytical tools. •  Social networks and buzz

media •  Use confidentiality in your

favour •  Negative campaigning •  Unaccountability of Truth •  ‘Para-truth’ and ‘over-

promising’ •  Select priorities responding to

information requests •  Proximity to a group of

journalists (‘White Commonwealth’ ou ‘True Blues’)

•  Background meetings •  Firebreaking •  ‘Pre-empting’ •  ‘Kite-flying’ •  Raising or lowering

expectations •  ‘Milking a story’ •  ‘Throwing out the bodies’ •  Bullying and intimidation



+

How do Spin doctors’ operate (or not) in Portuguese Parliament?


+ 2) Spin doctors in Parliament:

Small Parties or Opposition Parties

Left Block

Communist Party

Popular Party

Socialist Party

Social Democrat Party

Big Parties or Power Parties


+

Left Block

Communist Party

Popular Party


They SPIN…a little!

Socialist Party



They don’t SPIN

2) Spin doctors in Parliament:


+

Left Block

Communist Party

Popular Party


They try to spin from where they

have more resources and staff:

Parliament.

Socialist Party



They make spin doctoring from the Government or, when in opposition, from the parties’ headquarters.


Why?


+

However, is there spin doctoring in Parliament?

n  “There is good spin doctoring in Parliament, mostly done by politicians. Not by the Parliamentary press officers, no... I do not see it, I do not feel it on a daily basis; I mean, I do not see the rule” (David Dinis, Sol director)

n  “...spin doctors need to control, to tame or withhold the information and in Parliament there is free movement of journalists” (João Pedro Henriques, DN political editor)


2) Spin doctors in Parliament :

+

n  They describe the parliamentarian journalistic activity as an “open field” (João Pedro Henriques, DN parliament correspondent ) or as a “transparent space” (Nuno Simas, Lusa parliament correspondent).

n  It is easy to approach politicians and talk to them openly or on the background and easily obtain their personal cell phone numbers.

n  “...it is hard to make that “mistake”. It happens, but the parliamentarian journalist is usually experienced and able to filter a lot of information and some of it is duly discarded. There, in Parliament, everything is very much in the open. That is one of its assets” (Nuno Simas, Lusa parliament correspondent).



+

n  This freedom of movement is unheard of in the Houses of Parliament (United Kingdom) (that confines the journalists to the lobby), in Spain, or even in the European Parliament.

n  “If there is, and there has already been, a scuffle in the European Parliament, no one outside is going to be able to watch it because they simply censor the images” (João Pedro Henriques, DN parliament correspondent).



+

+

Concluding remarks


+ Concluding remarks

What is spin doctoring?

n  Spin doctoring is the positive projection to the public space of a given subject or action, through the most sophisticated and updated manipulation and persuasion techniques.

n  Spin doctoring is not a job, nor an activity that derives from an academic background.



What is spin doctoring?

n  Spin doctoring is not a new phenomenon. We can even consider it the as the millennium propaganda enriched with the most modern, efficient and, sometimes, expensive communication techniques.

n  Spin doctoring is an euphemism for propaganda like some other terms: ‘Packaging politics’ (Jamieson, 1994; Franklin, 1994) ‘Americanisation of politics’ (Schoenbach, 1996), ‘Modernization of politics’ (Asp & Esaiasson, 1996), ‘Political Public Relations’ (Kiousis & Strömbäck, 2010), among others.

n  In the end, one can say that spin doctoring is an old concept (such as spin a yarn and ballyhoo art) that has been the object of several re-brandings, of which spin is just the most recent and sophisticated one.



Is there spin doctoring in Portugal and in Parliament?

n  Yes, but in Parliament the utmost spin doctor is the politician.

n  Portuguese spin doctors work in Government.

n  The five Parliament’s press officers are mostly traditional public relations. They only distribute press releases and call for press meetings.



How do spin doctors operate?

n  We can describe the Portuguese spin doctors’ actions through behaviour organised in a matrix composed of the great objectives, pre-conditions, main tasks and main techniques.

n  But we can find a lot of these behaviours described in old books of publicity, politics and journalism. For instance: Polloc, 1907; Creel, 1920; Brown, 1921; Lippmann, 1922; Boyd, 1924; Lee, 1925; Silas, 1927; Bernays, 1927; Lasswell, 1927; Kelly, 1956; Packard, 1957; Boorstin, 1961; Theis, 1968; Tunstall, 1970, 1974; Bloom, 1972; Sigal, 1973; Blumler, 1981; among thers.



Do they work with the same techniques as a traditional press officer?

n  I really could not reach a definitive conclusion.

n  But some respondents showed signs that the techniques of spin doctoring are no longer restricted to the world of politics and governance and are definitely serving businesses and organisations.

n  I would dare to say that now we have a new and fashioned definition for Public Relations :


Corporate spin doctoring

+ +It´s not just spin. It’s the construction of meaning. (Bates, 1997: 249)

Thank you

[email protected]


Spin doctoring in Portugal: A study of professional sources of information operating in the...

Documents

Transcript of Spin doctoring in Portugal: A study of professional sources of information operating in the...