ROLE OF THE MASS MEDIA IN REDISTRIBUTION OF POWER

1
ROLE OF THE MASS MEDIA IN (RE)DISTRIBUTION OF
POWER

• Media analysis
• Estonia, 2004

2
Representation of women candidates during
elections to the European Parliament (Helina
Lindma)

• Content analysis
• 1246 media texts
• March June 2004
• Dailies Eesti Päevaleht and Postimees, evening
  paper SL Õhtuleht

3
The portrayals of female politicians in weekend
editions of newspapers and women magazines
(Evelin Kivilo)

• discourse analysis (repertoire analysis)
• 16 portraits of five well-known Estonian woman
  politicians
• years 2000-2004
• dailies Postimees (weekend supplement Arter),
  Eesti Päevaleht, SL Õhtuleht, womens magazines
  Anne, Stiil and Annabella

4
Findings

• When successfully entering the public sphere
  women politicians create a disturbance in gender
  order

5

• Mentioning of the candidates gender in the
  text1
• Male candidates 1
• Female candidates 10
• In the portrayals2 of well-known Estonian women
  politicians politics is represented as a very
  stressful and complicated field for a woman. The
  sub-discourses that appeared sacrifices,
  opposing the female and male politicians,
  difficulties etc
• 1 Representation of women candidates...
• 2 The portrayals of female politicians...

6

• Representation of women politicians in the media
  is gendered and it reproduces the gender order
  and power relations of the society in a kind of
  black-and-white, stereotypical way.
• Themes belonging to private sphere (home,
  relationships, looks, children, care, empathy)
  are predominant in the representation of women in
  the media

7

• The mentioning of different aspects in the
  texts1

8

• Top themes in the texts male candidates figured
  in1
• Governance
• EU
• Scandal
• Crime and law
• Business
• Top themes in the texts female candidates figured
  in1
• EU
• Governance
• Scandal
• Poverty, social issues
• Gender issues

9

• Women candidates were cited in 34 of all the
  cases when they appeared in the texts1
• Men candidates were cited in 40 of all the cases
  when they appeared in the texts1
• In Euro-election specific material men candidates
  were preferred (87) in discussion of the
  concrete serious matters of European Union1

10

• The analysis of portrayals2 showed that
• although many interviewed politicians had a
  background in law or hard science, these issues
  were not discussed. Instead appearance and
  interest in it, emotions and empathy were
  emphasized.
• To reconstruct a feminine role, relationships
  with other people (husband, children, etc.) and
  doing homework were discussed.

11

• Women politicians did not express their emotions,
  seemed self-confident, stable and strong. As
  women are stereotypically expected to be
  different (feminine?), qualities like crying,
  tenderness, emotionality, sensitivity and
  weakness were often attributed to them.
• The attitude towards women politicians who had no
  children or entered politics when having little
  children at home was rather negative.

12

• Women politicians themselves are actively
  participating in the reproduction of existing
  gender order, as authors of media texts.
• Women politicians as authors1 poverty, social
  issues, labour market
• Male politicians as authors1 EU, governance,
  business

13

• Seemingly innocent images of women politicians in
  the entertainment media such as womens magazines
  and weekend supplements of dailies are playing a
  noticeable role in spreading an understanding
  about womens role in politics and womens life
  in general.
• Even outstanding politicians do not question the
  way they are interviewed or portrayed in the
  media and thus they are unconsciously following
  gender patterns based on stereotypes, which often
  show women politicians in a trivial or negative
  context

14
Recommendations

• The representation of women politicians in the
  media should be critically and constantly
  reviewed in different research projects on
  different media
• Results should be introduced to the interested
  groups, such as women politicians, party
  executives and women NGO-s, journalists
• Educational projects and projects targeted to
  raise media literacy should be developed on the
  basis of research on how to understand media and
  cope with it

15

• Politics is becoming more and more person-centred
  and entertaining
• Many women politicians seem to believe that
  showing traditionally feminine qualities in the
  entertainment media (talking about their weight
  problems, private life, demonstrating clothes)
  improves their chances in elections.
• Male politicians also use entertainment media to
  gain popularity among the masses but male gender
  role does not include showing human weakness
  (public confessions about weight problems or
  clothing choices)

16

• Women politicians could control the process to an
  extent if they were more conscious of the power
  of gender stereotyping practiced in the media
• Women politicians could control the process to an
  extent if they were more conscious of the power
  of gender stereotyping practiced in the media
• The position of women politicians could improve
  if their media image became more serious and more
  problem-, not personality-oriented.