How to Win an Election: The Panorama Guide
You don't need to tell you there is an election on the horizon in Britain.
But what we can tell you is there is not much new in the cut and thrust of the political game, especially if - like Panorama - you have been watching elections play out for more than . But what clearly changed is how we engage with our politicians in this new media world.
Looking back through the archive, How to Win an Election: The Panorama Guide, throws light on the way elections play out in today's 24-hour world. But the journey starts back when radio rules the waves.
It wasn't until the swinging 60s that television bothered with elections, or politicians bothered with television.
It was US President John F Kennedy's success across the pond that inspired Harold Wilson to embrace the medium, becoming Britain's first politician to try and deliver the TV X-Factor.
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The Americanisation of Britain's political stage was then, and still is today, a concern. With this year making their debut on our TV screens, the parallel with US campaigns is ever more clear. Harold Wilson's affinity for the camera drew much the same reaction in his day.
But it wasn't all good news for politicians who took a natural shine to the camera. was to prove himself a tough interrogator, bringing his lawyer's style of questioning to the Panorama studio. The age of deference was over and the steely gaze of the lens did not lend itself kindly to all who went before it.
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And it wasn't only those in front of the lens who were swept up in the changing world of television. Arguably, democracy itself and the voting public were also changing. The last election in which public hustings were the chosen platform for communicating with the electorate was in 1966.
The television studio replaced the soapbox and the living room became the place where voters came face-to-face with their candidates, rather than the town hall or Trafalgar Square.
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Not everyone was happy with a world where image seemed to come before policy, a complaint resonating down the years to today's world of soundbites and 24-hour news.
Perhaps hinting at the fickleness of telly, Ted Heath made a surprise transformation from car-crash TV to television's golden boy.
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But it was Margaret Thatcher who finally broke the back of television and made it work for her.
The 1983 election saw Mrs Thatcher perform her way through the campaign with walkabouts and photo shoots. Once in power, she maintained an iron grip on her image.
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It was a lesson media-savvy Tony Blair took on board and onto new heights. In Blair's hands, television became a question of how he portrayed himself, not how he was portrayed.
Television was, at least in part, being transformed from the scrutinising eye turned on politicians to the play-thing of the political class.
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But now it's not just television. In elections to come, just how will our leaders navigate the world of Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and the digital media yet to come. That's one thing Panorama can't tell you, but we'll be watching.
How to Win an Election: The Panorama Guide is on Ö÷²¥´óÐã Four, Monday 29 March at 9pm.
Comment number 1.
At 30th Mar 2010, JJ PATON wrote:Fascinating programme and one of the best Panorama, or programme about Panorama political coverage, has made in a long time. The absence of Jeremy Vine's opinions and his cult-like approach of populist/sensationailst/opinion laden rhetoric (see Andrew Marr et al) rather than factual reporting, was most welcome.
Interesting to make a programme about elections and television and yet the most salient point does not seem to have been made, namely that the rise of TV media communications itself has corresponded with the fall in mass democractic activity e.g electoreal turn outs, membership of politic parties and political activism. Are the two related? i think we should be told!
TV, unlike the internet, is of course largely not politically interactive with its audience, with perhaps the exceptions being TV and radio Questions Time. TV content output is, and has always been largely entertainment focussed (rather than information and education), with TV itself adding to the rise in celebrity culture, with TV politics having alos become celebrity laden through the anture of how TV covers politics. TV has turned politics into entertainment, and its poltical commentators lighweight facilitators of personality sound bite politics rather than serious in-depth debate and discussion (Newsnight and most of its presenters excepted) with the only 'real' exception of Ö÷²¥´óÐã Parliament - the real direct thing untainted by any commentators often irrelevanmt views.
The banality of the cult of personality and celebrity, largely sponsored by TV and now its internet and print media off shoots has meant that TV, rather than the political classes themselves has undermined and de-personalised politics and reduced, it through the nature of its coverage, to that of a political soap opera. TV generates the stories, where often there in fact not be one. editors and programme makers decide on form and content, with the audience passive, this, with the above two exceptionshas added to a passive political audience - sofa box politics, rather than the real thing.
could Panorma make a critical anaytical programme about its own political coverage ove the years to explore how it has changed from political story observer to political story maker?
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Comment number 2.
At 17th Apr 2010, RedVioletRugbyDog wrote:I agree with many of the previous comments. The programme was really interesting and well made and its notable to see how, as spin has evolved, people have lost interest in party politics. What a fantastic resource the Panorama archive is and it's great to see it being put to good use like this.
One worry - there are so many excellent programmes on Ö÷²¥´óÐã4 these days, but is there a danger of turning it into a ghetto for the best and most challenging work of the Ö÷²¥´óÐã?
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