The Ambiguity of Public Cynicism in Democracy

2016

Why do people often hate politics? Are politicians just selfish, unethical? Is the political system malfunctioning? Are the media structurally focused on bad news about politics? Or are people at large just too lazy or disinterested to participate in politics and make it work, and is being a cynic and doing nothing but criticisize an easier way of political involvement? Briefly, there are no simple yes or no answers to these questions. Actually, the yes‟s or no‟s often depend on multiple explanatory variables e.g demographic and cultural ones. All of those questions are connected to each other and if there is any cynicism, each of them has a relatively strong role in explaining it. But what is cynicism? We will start but discovering the term. Later, in this paper we will try to understand political cynicism in Turkey. When there is something wrong with politics, politicians or the political system, there is also a media-induced snowball effect which might trigger bigger problems, no...

CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES OF THE MODERN RISK SOCIETY: SOCIO-CULTURAL, ECONOMIC AND LEGAL ASPECTS, 2021

Most modern challenges facing society are shaped by the political elite and the transience of political processes that drive its actions. Political realities daily challenge full-fledged development of modern society. Political pragmatism which is reflected in the nature of political decisions made by the elite, increasingly goes beyond what is permissible and turns into political cynicism. Of course transience of political cynicism’s spread cannot be called the 21st century’s phenomenon.

Journal of Humanities and Islamic Strategic Studies, 2022

The current research aims to explore the nature of social cynicism in a sample of government departments in the Karbala governorate and to know the reasons for social cynicism and its increase in recent times due to the deprivation of several groups in society as well as the failure to meet the desires of citizens, and the lack of credibility by government institutions, which was considered as a primary motive for social cynicism Also, the fluctuation of wealth among social and political circles, which makes their view of this life sarcastic and the violation of the psychological contract by organizations towards citizens. The conceptual content of the research was adopted to highlight the most important concepts of social cynicism and to identify the main causes of social cynicism.

This study, mostly through a critical review, aims to give the description of the accountability in political communication, how it works and how it helps the addressees of the political campaigns to understand and control the politicians. While doing this it will also examine if accountability can help to structure a democratic public participation and control. Benefitting from mostly theoretical and critical debates regarding political public relations and political communication, this article aims (a) to give insights of the ways political elites use to communicate with the voters (b) how they deal with accountability, (c) to learn their methods of propaganda, (d) and how they structure their personal images. The theoretical background at the end suggests that the politicians, particularly in the Turkish context, may sometimes apply artificial (unnatural) communication methods, exaggeration and desire sensational narrative in the media to keep the charisma of the leader and that the accountability and democratic perspective is something to be ignored if the support is increasing. Öz Bu çalışma, daha çok eleştirel bir yaklaşımla, siyasal iletişimde hesap verebilirliğin tanımını vermeyi, nasıl işlediğini anlatmayı ve siyasal kampanyaların muhatabı olan seçmenlerin siyasilerin sorumluluğundan ne anladığını ve onu politikacıları kontrol için nasıl kullanmaları gerektiğini anlatmaya çalışmaktadır. Bunu yaparken, hesap verebilirliğin demokratik toplumsal katılımı ve kontrolü inşa edip edemeyeceğini de analiz edecektir. Siyasal halkla ilişkiler ve siyasal iletişime dair teorik tartışmalardan da faydalanarak, (a) siyasilerin seçmenle iletişim kurma yolları hakkında ipuçları, (b) izlenebilirliği ne denli dikkate aldıkları, (c) propaganda yöntemleri ve (d) kişisel imajlarını nasıl oluşturdukları incelenmiştir. Literatür analizlerinin verdiği sonuçlar; özellikle Türkiye bağlamında, liderin karizmasını devam ettirmek için *

Journal of Communication, 2013

Previous research suggests that the news media's reporting about politics in terms of strategy fosters political cynicism. The question remains, however, what individual and contextual factors facilitate or inhibit this effect. In this study, we draw on a unique multimethod and comparative cross-country design, combining a media content analysis (N = 48,892) with a 2-wave panel survey conducted in 21 countries (N = 22,791) during the 2009 European Parliamentary elections. Our findings show that citizens who are less aware of the election campaign become more cynical. Furthermore, strategy news has an effect on cynicism in countries in which quality of governance is higher. Overall, our study provides the first comprehensive overview over the conditional impact of election news on political cynicism in comparative perspective.

2014

This study examines the propaganda from point of view of positive effects in actual social life dominated by democracy. People have to deal with propaganda in ordinary life: it happens through advertising, propaganda occurs in political speeches, in TV shows, even in the news… With the development of means of communication and especially of mass media, propaganda has become inseparable from the contemporary mass culture. Some sociologists state that the tendencies of propagating particular lifestyles and models of behavior have a negative impact on the society; on the other hand, propaganda can be used for positive purposes: for example, for spreading healthy lifestyle, anti-smoking and anti-drugs campaigns, anti-discrimination ideas etc.

2016

The paper that we propose aims a constructivist analysis about persuasive effects that media can cause in the public space by interpreting and reconstructing of the social events. The analysis is based on a triangular grille, where the structural, communicational and interactional dimensions contribute to illustrate the ways in which media facilitate the formation of social representations, creating certain types of behaviour and determining specific actions. Moreover talk about a media representation of certain events that generate criteria to assess situations, determine judgments to be applied to these events and contribute to create collective action. The applied part of the paper aims to analyse the social context in which had held the fall of Ponta Government, on November 4, 2015, in the context in which a few days had gone from the drama which happened in the Club "Colectiv", on October 30, 2015. The analysis focuses on the effects of framing and those of priming on the means of mass communication have produced by the coverage of events related to this collective drama.

Media in the last two centuries, and especially with the development of science and technology have evolved enough and rightly today not coincidentally are also being considered as the fourth power state, for which freely can say that is presented as the work controler of the three powers of the state. The role of media is great for all societies, regardless of whether they are democratic or not, but rightly is emphasized the role (importance) of the media in democratic societies. So from this, it can be stated that the media are a very important element of the social democratic system and one of the main factors in the development of information society. It is understandable that without this important element, society (especially modern and democraticone), would be deprived of the most important instruments that influence the development of all areas of their lives. While, on the other hand the political system would be without an arm, or without its most important part, which dir...

Through the use of experimental methods, this study examines the claim that strategic news engenders political cynicism. First, it builds upon previous theory by conceptualizing and measuring political cynicism at both issue-specific and global levels. Second, the contingency of framing effects is a contested but crucial area of the framing paradigm and deserves greater attention in strategic framing studies. The study therefore examines this in detail by testing a number of individual characteristics for their moderating effects. The author found that relative to issue-based coverage, strategic news frames increased issue-specific political cynicism, but this effect was only evident for those who were less politically engaged and knowledgeable. The effects of the strategy frame on more global measures of political cynicism were minimal. The findings are discussed in the light of ongoing debates about framing effects and the media’s role in democratic engagement.