ABSTRACT
It is inconceivable to imagine pol itics without the medium of television. Our first glimpses of actors in the political arena are essentially derived from this visual medium: the men – and increasingly, women – in suits sitting on green benches in the House of Commons and arguing is a particularly potent image of what politics has come to signify in this day and age. But a mere half-century before, the medium of television had not yet had any impact on the conduct or organisation of politics. In fact, in the immediate post-war period, it was the press and, to a lesser extent, radio which were the channels of political communication. Neither provided the simultaneity or created the mass audience of the kind that television was to bring about, and bring about so rapidly! In 1950 only 10% of households had television. By 1959 the figure had climbed to 75%, reaching 90% by 1966 (Butler and Stokes, 1971: 269). More critically, television had moved rapidly to centre-stage for political communication. According to Butler and Stokes, by 1964 – less than a decade after commercial television began – ‘fully 65 per cent of those who followed the [election] campaign at all said that they had relied on television, and only 28 per cent that they had relied more on the press’ (1971: 270).
