ABSTRACT

In one sense, the impact of mass media on politics is nothing new. Television played a role in American domestic and foreign policy on several occasions in the 1960s and 1970s, for instance, most notably during the JFK assassination, the Vietnam War and the Iran hostage crisis. What is new, arguably, is the growth of internet and advanced satellite communications and perhaps the degree of impact the media exerts. The 1960 presidential election debate between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy—where those who viewed the debate on television adjudged JFK the winner, while those who heard it on the radio thought it was a draw—is often seen as a turning point in American politics. Today, the instantaneous nature of TV and computer images that has accompanied these means that global news networks like CNN are able to transmit pictures around the world in real time. Images of “Tank Man” and Tiananmen Square in China in June 1989, and of the visually spectacular U.S. attacks on Baghdad during the Persian Gulf War in January 1991, are often said to have defined the mission of CNN as a news agency and made it a key player in the media business. The mass media also has the potential to “frame” domestic issues like the debate over the Affordable Care Act (commonly known as “Obamacare”) as a “success” or a “failure.”