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Hanitzsch, T., & Esser, F. (2012). Challenges and Perspectives of Comparative Communication Inquiry. In F. Esser & T. Hanitzsch (Eds.), Handbook of Comparative Communication Research. London: Routledge, 501-516.
Abstract
The concluding chapter offers a discussion of major challenges to comparative communication research, as well as their conceptual, epistemological, methodological and practical implications. Among the conceptual challenges is the centrality of theory and danger of Western bias, while epistemological challenges are discussed with reference to the threat of theoretical universalism and transnational diffusion. Methodological challenges include the potential presence of autocorrelation, the multilevel structure of communication phenomena, problems of systematic case selection, functional equivalence, as well as the trade-off between qualitative and quantitative approaches. The chapter concludes with offering directions for future research.
... For the purpose of explaining international variation and similarities in public relations, for example, Sriramesh and Verčič (2003) proposed a framework of three factors that comprise further variables: the infrastructure of a country (including the political system, the level of economic development, the legal environment, and the role of activism in a country); the media environment (including media control, media outreach, and media access); and culture (referring to societal culture and corporate culture). In the broader field of comparative communication research (Hanitzsch & Esser, 2012), frameworks such as political communication systems, communication cultures, media systems, media markets, media cultures, or journalism cultures were mentioned as being valuable explanatory constructs that can guide theory‐driven comparative research. In most studies related to crisis communication , however, context factors are used in a more explorative way to interpret differences on a post‐hoc basis. ...
Although much work is yet needed to arrive at a theoretically and empirically valid integrative approach to international risk and crisis communication, this handbook has been conceptualized to offer a broad and comparative perspective on different dimensions of risk and crisis communication that, so far, have been dealt with in rather fragmented scientific communities around the world. This fragmentation resulted in rather isolated discussions of disciplinary approaches, the lack of comparison of different risk and crisis types, and a missing consideration of cross-national as well as cross-cultural context factors. This chapter explores the significance of international risk and crisis communication and describes main categories of research in this field. Finally, the rationale, structure, and main goals of the handbook are introduced.
Societal problems and political competences have transnationalized in recent years (see Knill, 2001; Wessels, 1997), as have technological possi- bilities and the economic incentives for transnational mass communication (see Löffelholz and Hepp, 2002: 15; Parks and Kumar, 2003). Consequently, the question of a trans nationalizing of the public sphere (or spheres) has gained importance in communications (and in political science, e.g. Wessler et al., 2008; Koopmans and Statham, 2010b; Risse, 2010). This question is of particular relevance, in our view, to the case of anthropogenic climate change — a global phenomenon in its causes, effects and discussed solu- tions (e.g. Beck, 2007: 34). Therefore, we will examine whether a transna- tional public sphere is emerging around this issue. As ‘[virtually no other approach has the potential to bring communication studies further forward in the age of transnational!zation’ (Esser, 2013: 113), we will use a compara- tive approach for our study. Compared to other studies, we will analyze a rather large number of cases, 27 countries from all continents, going beyond the scope of many comparative analyses.1
The last decade has seen tremendous change in the commercial news media that play a central role in political processes in democracies around the world, as well as considerable progress in cross-national comparative media research. But despite the impact of Daniel C. Hallin and Paolo Mancini’s book Comparing Media Systems, empirical research into the institutional and systemic preconditions of journalism and news production has not kept pace with the rapid changes in the media, nor with the advances made in other areas of comparative media research (such as studies of news media use, journalists’ role-conceptions, and of news content). In this piece, we call for further institutionally and system-oriented mixed-methods comparative research to advance our understanding of how current changes are impacting journalism, the news media, and ultimately politics in different settings. We suggest that existing conceptions of media systems as ideal types need to be supplemented with more empirically grounded and systematically comparative understanding of media systems as dynamic, evolving real types to capture how journalism is changing today.
eading researchers from different regions of Europe and the United States address five major interrelated themes: 1) how ideological and normative constructs gave way to empirical systematic comparative work in media research; 2) the role of foreign media groups in post-communist regions and the effects of ownership in terms of impacts on media freedom; 3) the various dimensions of the relationship between mass media and political systems in a comparative perspective; 4) professionalization of journalism in different political cultures-autonomy of journalists, professional norms and practices, political instrumentalization and the commercialization of the media; 5) the role of state intervention in media systems. © 2010 by Boguslawa Dobek-Ostrowska, Michal Glowacki, Karol Jakubowicz, Miklós Sükösd. All rights reserved.
The scholarly debate on the development of political communication in modern democracies makes reference to concepts of Americanization, modernization, and globalization (Chapter 2, in this volume). The framing of political communication in connection with macropolitical economic and societal processes of change raises the question of the convergence of political communication processes, which elicits ambivalent answers depending on the level of analysis, the point in time, the country, and the cultural context. While one can best speak of convergence in electoral campaign communication, the issue of parallel development tendencies in other areas of political communication still largely remains to be investigated. This is because, firstly, we have neither convincing theoretical concepts nor a comprehensive body of empirical studies on the processes of everyday political communication between elections, communication between government and citizens, or interaction between political actors and the media (Chapter 14, in this volume). Secondly, political communication in national arenas is often considered a constant factor in the policy process and scarcely conceded to have an independent explanatory contribution to make to political analysis. The most routinized communication relationships between political actors and journalists are nevertheless a critical factor in the democratic process in all Western countries. Democratic systems of government depend on political action and political decisions being publicly communicated and legitimated. The structures and rules of political communication are therefore an important variable in understanding the public representation of political objects.
Television news is an excellent means of comparing political communication across countries. News programs are part of almost every television system in the world. They are usually broadcast at prime time and audiences consistently rate them as the most important of all available information programs (Straubhaar et al. 1992; Hajok and Schorb 1998). Television news provides “survival-relevant information about novel events” (Newhagen and Levy 1998, 10). It also influences political orientation, informs opinion building, and serves as a control mechanism of state power. In the pluralist societies of the western world, television news exerts a strong influence on the very nature of political communication (Kamps 1999, 141). According to Schaap et al. (1998) the research literature on television news can be organized according to the fields of mass communication, with a focus on journalist working routines (Esser 1998), audience reception and the effects of television news at the individual level (Jensen 1998; Zillmann et al. 1998), and public opinion formation at the societal level. Thus, Iyengar and Kinder note for the United States: “television news obviously possesses the potential to shape American public opinion profoundly” (Iyengar and Kinder 1987, 1). This chapter will elaborate on a fourth approach to examining television news: the content and structure of television news (Bonfadelli 2000, 33–6). In a comparative empirical study, we have analyzed news programs from different countries according to three main categories of content and structure: news geography, issue/actor representation, and topical integration.
Most empirical studies of journalists' thinking and decision-making processes have been conducted as case studies of individual countries. They suffer from a considerable shortcoming insofar as they lack a larger context for assessing the validity of their findings. However, the question of how significant these findings are can be answered by use of comparative analyses, which include a range of different countries. The relevance of international comparative studies is demonstrated, for instance, when we examine the influence that journalists' political beliefs exert on their professional actions. To be sure, case studies of a particular national context can provide a basis for describing the beliefs of journalists in the respective country and the impact of these beliefs on the daily work in newsrooms. Yet, such case studies give no clue as to how much their findings have been influenced by characteristics of the respective media and political systems. The national context must therefore be eliminated if we want to get a clear picture of the connection between the political views of journalists and their professional decisions. This can be achieved by conducting a systematic comparison of various countries with differing media systems and political situations. Apart from its cross-national perspective, this approach also provides a formidable basis for categorizing the state of each country on an international scale. Journalists in Western democratic societies operate under similar legal, political, economic, and cultural conditions. They enjoy formidable legal protections, have considerable access to those in power, and are backed by substantial news organizations.
This chapter attempts an assessment of the current status of comparative political communication research. Its core concept is maturity. Comparative approaches to political communications, albeit promising and sometimes impressive, can seem ragged when compared, say, with the solidity of their application in other social sciences (e.g., sociology and political science). Our central point is that the quality of comparative research can vary not only in scientific rigor but also, and perhaps more importantly, in its ability to reveal fundamental and broadly influential features of the structures and cultures of the societies being examined. Our concern throughout this chapter therefore is that of how to recognize and to achieve such maturity in the subfield of comparative political communication scholarship. In fact, this is our third attempt to take stock of the “state of the art” of comparative political communication research. In the first such effort, more than a quarter century ago (Blumler and Gurevitch 1975) we depicted comparative political communication research as a “field in its infancy.” The dominant tone was one of uncertainty, illustrated by the opening paragraph of the essay: Writing in 1975, nobody could claim to be able to paint an assured portrait of the field of investigation to be described in this essay. It is not merely that few political communication studies have been mounted with a comparative focus. More to the point, there is neither a settled view of what such studies should be concerned with, nor even a firmly crystallized set of alternative options for research between which scholars of diverse philosophic persuasions could choose.