The Partiality in Italian Political Interviews: Stereotype or Reality?

Transcription

1 The Partiality in Italian Political Interviews: Stereotype or Reality? Enza Graziano and Augusto Gnisci Department of Psychology Second University of Naples Via Vivaldi, Caserta or Abstract. The aim of this work is to assess the toughness and the partiality of the main Italian political information broadcasts, showed during the election campaign for the general election of This interest is generated by the law 28/2000, known as par condicio, which guarantees adequate public visibility to all political parties. However, this equal admittance to mass media only concerns the time. Therefore, we analyzed interruptions because they can be considered a conversational index, with reference to the theory of equivocation. They are divided into threatening interruptions, supportive interventions and neutral events. The index of toughness shows that more than a half of studied broadcasts are tough. Moreover the index of partiality highlights that many public opinion s stereotypes are true, but there are some surprising exceptions. Results are discussed taking into consideration political and economic orientation of the channels and the par condicio law. Keywords: Political interviews; Interruptions; Par condicio; Toughness; Partiality. 1 Introduction The aim of this work is to assess impartiality of the main Italian political broadcasts analyzing some conversational indexes. This interest is generated by the law 28/2000 [1], known as par condicio, which states that broadcasters have to guarantee adequate visibility to all political parties. This law controls the television political communication, the principles according to which the time is distributed between political parties and the sanctions and measures if the law is broken. So, this law controls how much a political party or a politician appears in public, but doesn t control how they are treated during a political broadcast [2]. The theoretical reference is the theory of equivocation [3]. Equivocation is a type of vague, unclear, tangential communication that includes different linguistic acts in order not to answer the questions in an unequivocal and brief way. Evasiveness, which is a type of equivocation, isn t caused by intrinsic or natural characteristics of politicians, but it s related to situational elements. Politicians are continuously put in avoidance-

2 avoidance conflicts by interviewers [4]. Avoidance-avoidance conflicts are difficult communicative conflicts, or rather impossible to manage, because people are forced to choose not favorable communicative alternatives [5]. In other terms, every reply to this type of question can be a politician s face-threat. The politician s face concerns positive social attributes [6] that he/she wants to give of him/herself, of his/her party and of significant others connected to the party, for example, colleagues and allies [7] [8]. So a positive face affects received social approval and even electoral consent [9]. Obviously mass media are a powerful mean for amplifying and communicating the politician s positive face. Different ways exist to put a politician in front of a communicative conflict and face threat during an interview. The most studied way is the type of question asked to the interviewed [10] [11]. Only few studies have considered conversational or structural ways from a quantitative point of view, like interruptions. If we assume that an interruption has a negative value, for example, an interviewer can interrupt a speaker when he/she uses equivocation, so that he/she turns his/her attention to the problem. While intruding in the speaker s speech, interruptions can cause a perturbation of conversational flow, they can show conversational disagreement [12], they can try to take the floor or prevent the first speaker completing his/her speech, so that they are considered small insults [13]. From this point of view, interruptions are an index of aggressiveness, toughness, control and conversational dominance [14] [15] [16]. Indeed, this research showed that when we say interruptions, we refer to a very broad and complex phenomenon. So we must separate different types of positive or negative interruptions according to their purposes and effects [17] [15] [18]. In fact there are neutral events, supportive interventions, successful and unsuccessful interruptions [19]. Neutral events include the regular turn-taking: speakers take turns tidily synchronizing them, sometimes with brief pauses. Instead supportive interventions aim at supporting the speaker and show interest and attention for what he/she is saying, even if they are interruptions from a structural point of view. Real interruptions are those that disrupt the conversational flow and they can be successful or unsuccessful according to their outcome [19]. In successful interruptions, the interrupter prevent the first speaker to complete his/her utterance, he/she takes the floor and complete his/her speech. In unsuccessful interruptions, interruptee doesn t give the floor and interrupter can complete or not his/her utterance. So supportive interventions cause a face maintenance or improvement to who receives them [20], while successful and unsuccessful interruptions can create damage or face threat to who suffers them. To make it easier, from now on we will call them threatening interruptions. In a similar way as other studies about threatening questions [15], in this study a broadcast s toughness or aggressiveness is operationalized as the rate of threatening interruptions (successful and unsuccessful interruptions) made by the interviewers towards politicians, namely relatively to the other forms of turn taking in the interview. It s an index that measures how much an interviewer or a broadcast constitutes a face-threat for politicians. This index varies among 0 and 100 and when it increases it means that absolute toughness increases too. Impartiality or neutrality against partiality or tendentiousness, is operationalized as the difference between the rates of threatening interruptions received from different political parties (in our study, we took into account the Popolo della Libertà, Berlusconi s right party, and the

3 Partito Democratico, the most important left party, lead at times by Veltroni). When this index is about 0, it means a perfect broadcast impartiality toward politicians of different parties. Moreover it can take positive or negative values which show that the interviewer supports one party rather than the other. In our study, positive values indicate that the interviewer supports the right-wing party rather than the left-wing party, while negative values show that the interviewer supports the left-wing party rather than the right-wing party. As we will describe below in the method section, our research is focused on political broadcasts aired during the electoral campaign of Italian general election of 13 and 14 April The main aim of this research is to assess the level of toughness and partiality of the most important political broadcasts. The research wants to verify if some considerations of common sense or some journalistic analyses about interviewers and tv channels partiality are true or just stereotypes. We are referring for example to the supposed tendentiousness of Rai 3 and of some interviewers from different channels, like Santoro, against the right party and in favour of the left party. We are also referring to the largely claimed partiality of Mediaset channels, owned by the Prime Minister s family, or to the supposed progovernment partiality of some broadcasts like Porta a Porta. 2 Method 2.1 Sample Sample is formed by 57 hours of video recording material about 12 Italian political broadcasts of political information aired on different television, radio and digital channels during the pre-electoral period. In these broadcasts, there are the leaders of the main Italian political parties who run for the Prime Minister office. The broadcasts format was of two types: face-to-face interviews between one interviewer and one politician (for example, in In Mezz Ora ) and one interviewer which incites discussion between two or six politicians belonging to different parties, together with the presence of some experts (as in Ballarò ). 2.2 Coding System and Reliability The observers used an adaptation of Interruption Coding System- ICS [17] for coding interruptions. ICS is based on the distinction between Single and Complex Interruptions from one hand, and between Successful and Unsuccessful Interruptions on the other hand. We added Lexical Support and Floor Changing (with Pause or Synchronization) to the interruption categories included by ICS. Interruptions are assembled into neutral events, supportive interventions and successful and unsuccessful interruptions. Reliability between 4 independent observers is excellent (k =.91) [21]. 2.3 The Political Situation

4 The sampling procedure was conducted during the electoral campaign of Italian general election of For these elections two new big parties appeared in politics. One was a right-wing party, that is Popolo della Libertà (PdL), lead by Silvio Berlusconi. This party came out from the association of Forza Italia ( Go Italy ) together with Alleanza Nazionale ( National Alliance ). The other one was the Partito Democratico (PD), lead by Walter Veltroni. It was formed by the association between Democratici di Sinistra ( Left Democratic Party ) and Margherita ( Daisy, a moderate party). These two parties were born also in consequence of the problems and of the obvious incompetence of previous wide coalitions. They couldn t rule and manage the often conflicting internal needs due to the composition of coalitions themselves, because they were formed by too many parties. The left-wing government fell down only after two years from the previous elections and an overwhelming victory by the right-wing was predicted, which in effect occurred. Concerning the Italian television situation, essentially there are 7 national channels, among which three are public (Rai 1, Rai 2 e Rai 3), three are Mediaset private channels (Rete 4, Canale 5 and Italia 1) that belong to Silvio Berlusconi s family, and one is La7. Public television is managed by a Board of Directors (Consiglio di Amministrazione) designated by the Government. Over the years a kind of distribution of channels has happened. So Rai 1 would be a pro-government channel, Rai 3 would be historically bound to the left-wing, and Rai 2 would be managed by majority party or by the opposition party if the government is left-wing. Since few years a new pay tv is broadcasted in Italy, it is Sky, and the channel Sky Tg24 aires news and information 24 hours a day. 2.4 Results Table 1 shows broadcasts that are ordered according to their threatening level of interruptions. Interruptions constitute on average more than half on the turn taking modalities during interviews. In particular, interruptions are more than the half on the turn taking modalities in more than half of broadcasts (7 out of 12). The toughest interviewer is Santoro ( Annozero, Rai 2), followed by Floris ( Ballarò, Rai3) with very high values (> 60%) and by Formigli ( Controcorrente, Sky Tg24). A set of 6 broadcasts places itself within the range of 10 points around 50%. Among these programs, the toughest interviewer is Vespa ( Porta a Porta, Rai 1), followed by the two interviewers of Otto e Mezzo (La 7), by those of Telecamere and Tg3 Primo Piano, both of Rai 3, and then by Mentana ( Matrix, Canale 5) and Annunziata ( In Mezz Ora, Rai 3). Conferenza Stampa (Rai 3) is the least tough television broadcast. The radio and digital broadcasts place themselves at the less toughness levels. The broadcasts partiality is shown in Table 2 and it is referred to two political parties, namely Popolo della Libertà (PdL) and Partito Democratico (PD). Radio Anch Io (RadioRai), Telecamere (Rai 3), Tg3 Primo Piano (Rai 3) and Ballarò (Rai 3) support PD rather than PdL. Even Matrix (Canale 5) and Controcorrente (Sky Tg24) support PD. Annunziata ( In Mezz Ora, Rai 3) and

5 Santoro ( Annozero Rai 2) use more threatening interruptions towards PD rather than towards PdL, but this trend is restrained (around 5%). 3 Discussion and Conclusions This study highlights that threatening interruptions are very frequent in political interviews. They are more frequent than those made in informal contexts [22] and in other formal contexts, like in courtroom [23] [24]. These results are consistent with the ones of other international studies [14] [15]. Interruptions seem to be a television more than a radio or digital phenomenon. We can observe that Controcorrente (broadcast of the new information channel Sky Tg24) shows high levels of toughness. Moreover In Mezz ora indicates opposite levels of face threatening with respect to the common sense, namely it shows low levels of toughness. In general, among the twelve analyzed broadcasts, six are favorable to PD (among these, four in a very clear way), two are favorable to PdL, and four are fair. Among the five broadcasts of Rai 3, three clearly support PD, one is fair and the other one is in favor of PdL: this substantiates the left-wing political orientation of the channel. Conferenza Stampa seems to be fair; it s sent only during electoral campaign and it s also the least tough among television broadcasts. Perhaps this is due to the fact that it s the heir of the traditional political information broadcast (the former Tribuna Politica, that once was the unique broadcast of political information) and it s so organized: there are one interviewed politician and many journalists from different newspapers that take turns in asking questions. Concerning the other two broadcasts of Rai (Rai 1 e Rai 2), one is fair ( Porta a Porta ) and the other one, Annozero, is favorable to PdL. This last result is quite surprising. The only considered broadcast of Madiaset channels ( Matrix ) support the left-wing party. This result is consistent with what its host has afterwards declared about the difficulties with Mediaset after the general election of 2008 [25]. He was than dismissed. Otto e Mezzo of La7 is quite tough but substantially fair, consistent with results of other studies [2] conducted on the same broadcast but with different interviewers. The only broadcast of Sky seems to be consistent with the expectations, because it is very tough and quite contrary to PdL. In effect it s known that Murdoch, who is the owner of Sky, is in clear competition with Mediaset, whose owner is Berlusconi s family. Berlusconi is also a direct competitor of the satellite TV because he has got a digital pay TV. After all, if we consider the political situation of general election of 2008, only among the television broadcasts six out of ten are consistent with expectations of common sense and with journalistic analyses. The Matrix exception can be understood taking into consideration the following interviewer s dismissal (see above). However there are two remarkable exceptions to expectations. First of all, Annozero, presented by Santoro, is the toughest broadcast and it shows some trends in favour of PdL. Second, In Mezz Ora, whose interviewer is Annunziata, shows low levels of toughness and threatness towards PD, supporting PdL.

6 Our results point out that tendentiousness and impartiality coexist in the main Italian political broadcasts and that many of them show a bias which is consistent with the political orientation and/or with the orientation of the economic property of the channel and with who has designated the public channels offices (namely, the government). Hence, these results partly reflect stereotypes and expectations of public opinion. However there are some broadcasts which are substantially fair: among these we find two that are notoriously accused of favoring the left-wing party. We would remember that the considered indexes of toughness and impartiality are conversational indexes bound to interruptions, but they are not closely bound to content indexes. So, a possible interviewer s partiality doesn t leave out any other one based on different indexes, like questions [15] [9] [2]. Interruptions and other conversational indexes are not a purely linguistic phenomenon, but they show other remarkable social meanings with their complex implications. Those indexes and other measures should be used to guarantee an equal treatment to all political parties. This aim overshoots and at the same time completes the law 28/2000. In every democratic system, press should become the watchdog of democracy, it should develop indispensable antibodies for the regular execution of democratic rules. Without correct and impartial information citizens can t be fully responsible and aware of their choices. Future researches have to combine the results about different threatening and equivocation indexes joining them into a single corpus of results. References 1. Law 2000 February 22th, n. 28. Disposizioni per la Parità di Accesso ai Mezzi di Informazione durante le Campagne Elettorali e Referendarie e per la Comunicazione Politica (Regulation for Equal Access to Information Media during Electoral and Referendum Campaigns and for the Political Communication). Gazzetta Ufficiale della Repubblica, Gnisci, A.: Coercive and Face-Threatening Questions to Left-Wing and Right-Wing Politicians during Two Italian Broadcasts: Conversational Indexes of Par Conditio for Democracy Systems. J. Appl. Soc. Psychol. 38, (2008) 3. Bavelas, J. B., Black, A., Bryson, L., Mullett, J.: Political Equivocation: A Situational Explanation. J. Lang. Soc. Psychol. 7, (1988) 4. Lewin, K.: The Conceptual Representation and Measurement of Psychological Forces. Contributions to Psychological Theory, 1 (1938) 5. Bavelas, J. B.: Theoretical and Methodological Principles of the Equivocation Project. J. Lang. Soc. Psychol. 17, (1998) 6. Goffman, E.: On Face-Work: An Analysis of Ritual Elements in Social Interaction. Psychiatry 18, (1955). Reprinted in Goffman, E.: Interaction Ritual: Essays on Face to Face Behavior. Anchor, Garden City, NY (1967) 7. Bull, P.E.: Slipperiness, Evasion, and Ambiguity : Equivocation and Facework in non Committal Political Discourse. J. Lang. Soc. Psychol. 27, (2008) 8. Bull, P., Elliott, J., Palmer, D., Walker, L.: Why Politicians are Three-Faced: The Face Model of Political Interviews. Brit. J. Soc. Psychol. 35, (1996)

7 9. Gnisci, A., Bonaiuto, M.: Grilling Politicians. Politicians Answers to Questions in Television Interviews and Courtroom Examinations. J. Lang. Soc. Psychol. 22, (2003) 10. Bull, P.: On Identifying Questions, Replies and Non-Replies in Political Interviews. J. Lang. Soc. Psychol. 13, (1994) 11. Bull, P., Elliott, J.: (1998). Level of Threat: A Means of Assessing Interviewer Toughness and Neutrality. J. Lang. Soc. Psychol. 17, (1998) 12. Bull, P., Mayer, K.: Interruptions in Political Interviews: A Study of Margaret Thatcher and Neil Kinnock. J. Lang. Soc. Psychol. 7, (1988) 13. West, C., Zimmerman, D.H.: Small Insults: A study of Interruptions in Cross-sex Conversations between Unacquainted Persons. In Thorne, B., Henley, N. (eds.) Language, Gender, and Society, pp Newbury House, Rowley, MA (1983) 14. Beattie, G.W.: Turn-Taking and Interruptions in Political Interviews- Margaret Thatcher and Jim Callaghan Compared and Contrasted. Semiotica, 39, (1982) 15. Bull, P.: The Microanalysis of Political Communication: Claptrap and Ambiguity. Routledge, London (2003) 16. Roger, D.B., Schumacher, A.: Effects of Individual Differences on Dyadic Conversational Strategies. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 45, (1983). 17. Bazzanella, C.: Le Interruzioni Competitive e Supportive : Verso una Configurazione Complessiva. In: Stati, S., Weigand, E., Hundsnurscher, F. (eds.) Dialog-analyse III, pp Niemeyer, Tubingen (1991) 18. Murata, K.:. Intrusive or Cooperative? A Cross-cultural Study of Interruption.J. Pragmatics 21, (1994) 19. Roger, D.B., Bull, P.E., Smith, S.: The Development of a Comprehensive System for Classifying Interruptions. J. Lang. Soc. Psychol. 7, (1988) 20. Brown, P., Levinson, S.C.: Universals in Language Usage: Politeness Phenomena. In: Goody, E. (ed.), Questions of Politeness, pp Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (1978) 21. Cohen, J.A.: A Coefficient of Agreement for Nominal Scales. Educ. Psychol. Meas. 20, (1960) 22. Bazzanella, C.: Le Facce del Parlare: Un Approccio Pragmatico all Italiano Parlato. La Nuova Italia, Firenze (2001) 23. Gnisci, A.: Sequential Strategies of Accomodation: A New Method in Courtroom. Brit. J. Soc. Psychol. 44, (2005) 24. Gnisci, A., Bakeman, R.: Sequential Accomodation of Turn Taking and Turn Length: A Study of Courtroom Interaction. J. Lang.Soc. Psychol. 26, (2007) 25. Mentana, E.: La Passionaccia. Rizzoli: Milano (2009)

8 Table 1. Levels of Toughness of Italian political broadcasts during election campaign of Remark 1. Threatening Interruptions comprises successful and unsuccessful interruptions; Other Turn-taking comprises neutral events Broadcasts (Channels) Interviewers Threatening Interruptions Other Turn- Taking N % N % Annozero (Rai 2) M. Santoro Ballarò (Rai 3) G. Floris Controcorrente (Sky) C. Formigli Porta a Porta (Rai 1) B. Vespa Otto e mezzo (La 7) G. Ferrara, R.Armeni, L. Pace Telecamere (Rai 3) A. La Rosa Tg3 Primo Piano (Rai 3) B. Berlinguer, M. Mannoni, A. Di Bella, G. Giubilei Matrix (Canale 5) E. Mentana In Mezz'Ora (Rai 3) L.Annunziata Conferenza Stampa (Rai 3) G. Del Bufalo, G.S. Rossi Radio Anch'io (Radio Rai) A.Caprarica Incontri Digitali (Corriere Tv) Unavailable information TOTAL AVERAGE TOT

9 Table 2. Levels of Impartiality/Tendentiousness toward PdL and PD in Italian political broadcasts during election campaign of Remark 1. The sum of frequencies of the two main parties is less than the whole total because in the whole total there are also frequencies of other smaller parties. Remark 2. Impartiality index ( (PD-Pdl)) is around 0, which indicates absolute impartiality. When this index has positive values, it means PdL is treated better than PD; when it has negative values, it means PD is treated better than PdL. Broadcasts (Channels) Threatening PD PdL (PD-Pdl) Interruptions n % n % n % Porta a porta (Rai 1) Annozero (Rai 2) Ballarò (Rai 3) Tg3 primo piano (Rai 3) In mezz ora (Rai 3) Conferenza Stampa (Rai 3) Telecamere (Rai 3) Matrix (Canale5) Otto e mezzo (La 7) Incontri Digitali (Corriere Tv) Controcorrente (Sky Tg24) Radio anch io (RadioRai) TOTAL