The Effects of Political Communications on Youth Political Engagement in the 2012 Mexican Presidential Election Oniel Francisco Diaz Jiménez 1 ABSTRACT: There is a debate in the political communication literature about the effects of media and campaign messages on citizens political attitudes and participation in contemporary audience democracies. On the one hand, mediamalaise theories argue that such messages have a negative impact on citizens political involvement. On the other, mobilization theories contend that the effects of these messages on civic engagement is rather positive. However, research on the subject in new democracies such as Mexico, is still scarce. This article examines trends in a number of dimensions of Young Mexicans political engagement, as well as the effects of the media and campaigns on such dimensions during the presidential election of 2012, with data from the National Survey of Youth Political Culture 2012. KEYWORDS: Mexico, political communication, election campaigns, media and campaign effects, civic engagement. Introduction Citizens political engagement is one of the main purposes of election campaigns. However, there is an intense debate in the field of comparative political communication about the effects of media and campaign messages on political attitudes and participation of citizens. On the one hand, theories of media malaise argue that mediated political communications have a negative impact on citizens political involvement. On the other hand, mobilisation theories contend that the effect of campaign communications on political engagement is rather positive. Nevertheless, most research has focused on western advanced democracies. Only a few studies have tested the mobilisation and media malaise theories in the context of developing democracies such as Mexico. This paper will address both theoretical approaches on the effects of campaign communications by using data from the National Survey of Political Culture of Mexican Youth, 2012. The aim of the study is to assess the impact of exposure to various types of media and campaign messages on the attitudes and political participation of young people during the 2000 presidential election. We believe that the analysis of media and campaign effects in emerging democracies such as Mexico is higly relevant for comparative political communication research because, in contrast to the minimal effects theory, several studies have found that media and campaign messages may have a significant influence on political attitudes and behavior of Mexicans. A number of features of the mexican political and media environment, involving limited sources for political information and the predominance of television as source of political information for the population, as well as the decline of party loyalties among the 1 PhD Political Science and International Studies (University of Birmingham, UK). Department of Political Studies and Government of the University of Guanajuato, Campus Guanajuato. Email: ofdj2004@hotmail.com.
electorate are all factors that increase media and campaign impact on political knowledege, atittudes and behaviour. 1. Political communication and election campaigns An election campaign can be defined as the process by which a campaign organization (be it a party, candidate, or special interest organization) seeks to maximize electoral gains (Farrell, 1996: 161). It includes all those organised efforts (promotional or financial) to inform, persuade, and mobilize the electorate (Norris, 2002: 127). Election campaigns serve several important functions in contemporary democratic elections. They may increase the levels of political interest and information of people on relevant policy issues. Campaigns can also mobilize citizens to get involved in the electoral process in a number of different ways; for example, when they seek news about the candidates campaign events; discuss politics with family or friends; attend events organized by the candidates campaign teams; and donate money to finance campaings or when join them as activists. To the extent that citizens are more informed and interested in campaign events, they are more likely to vote on Election Day. However, campaigns are complex and multidimensional phenomena, in this sense, authors like Pippa Norris (2002a: 127, 2005: 5) and De Vreese (2010: 120) propose a four-element analytical model: 1) the contextual environment, made up of the regulatory framework, the structure of the media system and the party system in each country; 2) the campaign organizations (parties and candidates), with the strategic objectives they are seeking to communicate to the electorate; 3) the campaign communication channels used by these organizations to convey their political messages, and 4) the effects of these messages on the target audience 2. Despite the relevance of all above-mentioned areas of analysis, it is, perhaps, the study of campaign effects the one that has aroused the most interest in both political science and communication studies (Bryant and Zillmann, 1994; Farrell and Schmitt-Beck, 2002; Brady and Johnston, 2006). In order to clarify the analysis of campaign communication effects, Claes H. de Vreese (2010) provides a typology that divides them into: 1) cognitive and affective effects (effects on political learning/knowledge, agenda-setting and framing, and evaluation of political leaders). 2) effects related to the attitudes of people towards the political system (political efficacy and political cynicism) and, 3) the effects on political behavior (political involvement, voter turnout, and voting intentions) (Table 1). This paper focuses on the effects of campaign communications on a set of political attitudes and forms of political participation of Mexicans in the 2012 presidential election, usually labelled under the concept of political (or civic) engagement in the specialized literature. Table 1. A typology of the effects of media and campaigns. Cognitive and Perceptions affective effects of the political system Political behaviour 2 Depending on the effectiveness of campaigns, we may study a fifth element known as dynamic feedback loop, in relation to how campaign organisations learn from the responses of the target audience and therefore adjust their objectives and strategies accordingly (Norris, 2002: 127).
Agenda-setting and framing Evaluation of political leaders Political learning/knowledge Political cynicism Political efficacy Political involvement Voter turnout Voting intentions Source: Adapted from De Vreese (2010: 120). The effects of the media and political campaigns in Mexico As in many old and new democracies around the world (see Bowler and Farrell, 1992; Butler and Ranney, 1992; Swanson and Mancini, 1996; Gunther and Mughan, 2000; Plasser and Plasser, 2002a; Schafferer, 2006; Schmitt Beck, 2007), the media, especially television, play an increasingly important role as electoral intermediaries between parties and voters in Mexico. However, for most of the twentieth century, election campaigns were locallyoriented and people-intensive. Campaign events were mainly based on direct contact between candidates and voters (mass rallies and meetings with groups of prominent people). 3 This period could be considered what literature on professionalization of campaigns identified as the first phase or pre-modern era (Norris, 2002). Campaign communications during this stage were initially confined to the speeches of the candidates, advertisement in the press. Decades later with the expansion of radio and television, campaign messages also included interviews in national and local news (Langston, 2006; Langston and Benton, 2009; Lomnitz et al, 2010). However, during the process of democratization, Mexican political parties have professionalized significantly their campaign efforts (Wallis, 2001; Langston and Benton, 2009; Díaz Jiménez, 2015), by adopting a hybrid model, 4 that combines traditional practices based on direct contact with voters (including electoral mobilization practices based on clientelistic exchange) with modern media-intensive campaign tactics and strategies, based on the heavy use of media appeals (political advertising on radio and television), 5 Internet (websites and social media), sophisticated methods of public opinion research (surveys, focus groups, etc.), opposition research, political marketing, advertising and media management techniques (see, for a discussion on the concept of campaign professionalization, Farrell, 1996; Smith, 2004; 2006). This process of campaign professionalization is the result of large-scale changes in the party system (Klesner, 2005), 3 For example, whistle-stop tours of the federal states (Lomnitz et al., 2010) and tactics of electoral mobilization sustained by of patronage and clientelistic networks. 4 The hybridization of campaign is the country-specific supplementation of traditional campaign practices with selected features of the American style of campaigning (Plasser and Plasser, 2002: 19). 5 From 1997 to 2006, leading Mexican parties spent more than half of their campaign budgets on paid media appeals (spots) on radio and television (Lozano, 2006; Lawson, 2008).
the political financing system (Becerra, Salazar and Woldenberg, 2000), and the media system (Lawson 2002; Hughes, 2006). Although the effects of media-intensive campaign communications is still is a matter of great debate among political communication and electoral behavior scholars, numerous studies show that the minimal effects model, which strongly influenced research on the impact of the media and campaign communications on political attitudes and behavior in established democracies, may not be entirely adequate to explain the impact of the media and communications campaigns in new democracies like Mexico, characterized by low levels of party identification, high levels of media concentration, and limited sources of political information for citizens (Lawson, 1999, 2002, 2004a, 2004b; Moreno, 1999, 2002, 2004, 2009a, 2009b; Poiré, 1999; Lawson and McCann, 2005; Beltran, 2007; Valenzuela and McCombs, 2007; Flores-Macías, 2009; Greene, 2009; Valdivia and Beltrán, 2009). However, as in the American case, the findings of such studies are still contradictory: while some studies show a significant and substantial impact of communication campaigns on attitudes and political behaviour, other analyses differ as to the existence or magnitude of such effects. Also, some areas of research have been underdeveloped, such as the effects of campaign communications on a number of relevant dimensions of Mexicans civic engagement, including their levels of turnout, communal activism, political knowledge, trust and efficacy. 3. CAMPAIGN COMMUNICATIONS AND POLITICAL ENGAGEMENT IN MEXICO A growing literature on political communication has to do with the modernization and mediatization of election campaigns (Farrell, 1996; Swanson and Mancini, 1996; Norris, 2002a), and its effects on civic engagement (Norris et al, 1999; Newton, 1999; Norris, 2000a. b, 2001, 2002c). There is no agreement among experts in political culture and participation on the meaning and content of the concept of political (or civic) engagement, but is usually seen as a multidimensional set of political attitudes and actions that include what people know about politics, their bonds of social capital (measured by social trust and organizational membership), their support for the political system (including attitudes such as political efficacy and trust in government), and the most common types of political activism (including political discussion, voting turnout, and campaign activism) (Norris, 2002: 3). In their review of patterns of civic engagement in Mexico from a comparative perspective, Pippa Norris (2002b) points out that compared with other Latin American countries, the Mexican case showed a relatively low mean voter turnout in the nineties. Regarding the indicators of social capital, Mexicans exhibited a moderately active involvement in voluntary associations and community organizations (above average in Latin America), but a low level of social trust and moderate confidence in political institutions, little faith in democratic ideals, and low approval ratings of democratic performance. She concluded that it remained to be seen how far the long-term trends of human development and large-scale institutional changes that the country experienced as a part of the democratization process involving meaningful party competition, growing electoral contestation and accountability, as a result of the rotation of government and opposition in power a more limited presidency, among others would have the capacity to generate a renewed civic engagement and confidence in the political process and institutions among the population in subsequent decades, particularly in younger generations. However, after just over a decade of the Norris analysis, the situation does not seem to have changed substantially.
Recent studies, such as the National Survey on the Quality of Citizenship, IFE, 2013 (INE, 2014), reveal the still limited levels of civic engagement of Mexicans. Regarding social capital, almost half of all respondents said they did not belong, nor had they belonged, to an organization or association of any kind. The level of interpersonal trust also remains low, as well as confidence in political and social institutions. Only 27% of respondents said they could trust most people and, in general, trust in social and political institutions does not exceed 50% of respondents, except for three cases: the army (62%), teachers (56%) and churches (55%). As for subjective political efficacy, around 72% of the population believe that their opinions do not matter to politicians, and 71% disagree with the statement: People like me have an influence on what the government does. Finally, despite the fact that 53% of Mexicans prefers democracy over autoritarian forms of government, the country is still below the average support for democracy compared to other Latin American countries as well as in relation to other new and old democracies (INE, 2014). Low levels of civic engagement seem to be a widespread phenomena among the Mexican population, since there are few differences among young people under 25 years of age and the rest of the population regarding their patterns of civic engagement (Reimers and Cardenas, 2010). However, low levels of political involvement among young people are more worrisome because, unlike older generations that were politically socialized under the PRI authoritarian regime, younger generations were politically socialized during the final stage of the democratic transition or the fully competitive, multiparty era of the political system. For example, according to the Fifth National Survey on Political Culture and Citizen Practices (ENCUP, 2012), most respondents (65%), reported having little interest in politics, a figure that increased compared to the previous survey. The situation is even worse in the case of the young population between 18 and 29 years of age, of whom 67% show little interest in politics, 17% claim to have no interest, and only 15% is interested in political issues. 6 For its part, the National Survey on Political Culture and Participation of Mexican Youth, 2012 shows that only 1% of respondents are interested in the political sections of newspapers, which are mainly used for entertainment. With regard to their participation in social organizations, between 90 and 97% of Mexican youths have never been part of cultural organizations, student, sports, religious, political parties or unions (Gómez, Tejera, and Aguilar, 2013). Regarding electoral participation, 86% agreed that voting has little or no effect as a way of pressuring authorities. According to official data from the IFE on voter turnout in the presidential election of 2012, the elderly population of 80 years and above and young people between 20 to 29 years of age were the least likely to go to the polls (49.56% and 53.11% voter turnout, respectively) (INE, 2014). 7 Other studies show that levels of civic engagement among young Mexicans have remained low, but stable, especially regarding ways of politics beyond electoral participation level. However, their levels of satisfaction with democracy declined slightly in the period 2001-2008. As well as trust towards political institutions such as the presidency, governors and mayors, and the police (Reimers and Cardenas, 2010). 6 These numbers are very similar to those shown by other studies of public opinion such as the National Survey of Values in Youth 2012, according to which 89.6% of respondents said they are little or not at all interested in politics. 7 The exception among the young population are only those aged 18 to 19 who voted for the first time in this election with a voter turnout rate of 62% (INE, 2014).
Low levels of political engagement among youth are not unique to Mexico. For example, Delli Carpini (2000) noted a significant decline in civic engagement of young people in North America. Compared to the older population segments or young Americans in earlier times. Today's young adults (18-29 years) are significantly: less trusting of their fellow citizens; less interested in politics and public affairs; less satisfied with the functioning of democracy; less knowledgeable about institutions and political processes; less likely to read a newspaper or watch the news; less likely to register to vote; less likely to participate in politics beyond voting, and to join community organizations designed to address public problems through collective action or the formal policy process; and, in general, less likely to connect individual efforts to help solve public problems with more traditional, collective forms of civic engagement. The underlying causes of civic disengagement are diverse, complex and multidimensional (for a review of the factors affecting political disaffection see Hay, 2007). Several studies have pointed to a plethora of factors that have contributed to this phenomenon, including: [ ] the globalization process that erodes the powers and autonomy of the nation-state; the attention of the media to scandals that erode faith and trust in traditional institutions and representative figures of authority; the end of enormous ideological divisions between left and right in the main parties with the end of the Cold War, the 'death of socialism' and the emergence of catch-all parties; the proliferation of groups and causes with a single goal leading to a fragmentation of the demands and multidimensional political agendas in the political system and make it difficult for the government meets the diverse interests; and higher expectations of citizens and the lack of results from the government to meet these expectations in providing basic services (Norris, 2002b: 4). THEORIES ABOUT THE IMPACT OF MEDIA AND CAMPAIGNS ON CIVIC ENGAGEMENT The impact of exposure to the media and modern communications campaigns on citizen engagement and civic participation is a topic of intense debate and a developing research agenda. Two theoretical perspectives have offered opposing explanations: the theories of media malaise (or video malaise), and the mobilisation theories. Theories of media malaise The media malaise theoretical approach argues that exposure to the media in general, especially to television entertainment, and campaign communications that involve personalisation and negativity in political advertising and election news coverage have a negative impact on civic engagement and result in political disaffection, understood as a growing cynicism, alienation and declining confidence in government and political institutions by citizens. This theoretical perspective has its origins in the United States, in the work of Kurt Lang and Gladys Lang (1966) and Michael Robinson (1976). The Langs considered the decline of citizen political engagement in North America as a parallel process to the expansion and consolidation of television as the dominant source for political information. A decade later, Robinson would propose the term video malaise, to name the negative effects of the preference for television over print media as a means of political information for Americans. According to Robinson, media (especially television) coverage of public affairs, with a strong negative and anti-institutional bias had a negative impact on key dimensions of
political engagement of citizens, particularly on political trust and efficacy, which tended to produce politically disaffected citizens. Subsequently, several studies have delved into the negative consequences of changes in political communication in the United States on the political involvement of citizens in that country (Patterson, 1993; Cappella and Jamieson, 1997; Cappella, 2002). According to these studies, modern trends in news coverage, especially during election campaigns, as a result of the deregulation and liberalization of the American media system, such as the strategic framing approach to election news coverage that project political competition as a horse race, highlighting the negative personal attributes of candidates above their merits and qualities, and focusing on campaign events and political scandals instead of their policy proposals (issue framing) are related to the decline in the levels of political engagement observed in North America (Patterson, 1993; Cappella, 2002) 8. Studies from this approach are diverse. Some works analyze the effects of strategic framing and the increasing negativity of news coverage of politics in political trust and efficacy (Robinson, 1976; Patterson, 1993; Sabato, 1993; Kerbel, 1995, Cappella and Jamieson, 1997; Fallows, 1997), and the consecuences of negative images of government and politics, which are predominant in media entertainment for (Lichter et al., 1999; Lichter et al, 2000); some others focus on the impact of negative political advertising on voting turnout (Ansolabehere and Iyengar, 1995), and the eroding effects of TV entertainment on social capital (Putnam, 1995, 2000) (see, for a review of the literature, Delli Carpini, 2004). 9 Mobilisation theories Contrary to theories of media malaise, the mobilization approach argue that media expansion and consolidation as the major source of political information in modern societies, combined with the increasing levels of education around the world, is positively related to political mobilization and democratic engagement of citizens (Holtz-Bacha, 1990, Norris, 1996, 2000b, Newton, 1999). Exposure to the media and mediated campaign communications, it is argued, tends to mobilise people because it increases their levels of political interest and political knowledge as well as their sentiments of political trust and efficacy, it may also increase their levels of political activism and voter turnout (Newton, 1999; Norris, 2000b, 2001, 2002c). The approach also highlights the interaction effects between variables such as media exposure and education (Norris, 2000a, b). Perhaps the most important mobilisation approach in the field of comparative political communication is the theory of the virtuous circle between media consumption and civic engagement (Norris, 2000b). Based on a comparative analysis of data from the US and Western Europe, Norris argues that exposure to campaign communications is, in general, not a factor contributing to the decline of political engagement. On the contrary, citizens exposed to news and campaign communications are 8 For instance, Cappella and Jamieson (1997) analyzed the different impact of frames used in the media to present political and electoral information, upon citizens political interest and attitudes. According to their analysis, the use of strategic frames in media coverage that focus on negative aspects of the campaign, the confrontation between candidates, the results of surveys and opinion polls, etc., rather than issue frames focused in the proposals of parties and candidates about the issues and public problems generates political distrust and cynicism among citizens. 9 It is worth mentioning that although this theoretical perspective had its origins and has been mainly developed in the United States (Earl Bennett et al., 1999; Valentino et al., 2001; Avery, 2009; Hanson et. al, 2010), it has also been tested in the context of Western European democracies (Holtz-Bacha, 1990; Newton, 1999; De Vreese, 2005, of Vreese and Elenbaas, 2008; Elenbaas and De Vreese, 2008; Jackson, 2011; Pedersen, 2012) with mixed results that, as in the American case, are not entirely consistent.
better informed about politics, feel also more able to understand and influence political affairs, and trust more on government and political institutions. They are also more likely to get involved in communal and campaign activity, as well as to vote on Election Day. In this sense, the relationship between political communication and civic engagement seem to function as a circular and reinforcing mechanism in which people with higher levels of political interest and information are more likely to be exposed to messages from the media, Internet and political campaigns; in turn, those who are more exposed to the media and campaign communications become more politically active and engaged. Effects depending on the type of media channel/content However, the evidence found in other studies show that the effects of mediated political messages on civic engagement may well depend on the type of media (usually distinguishing between broadcast and print media) and media content (whether news or entertainment) which the citizen is exposed to. For example, according to Robert Putnam (1995, 2000) exposure to news in newspapers tends to increase civic engagement, in contrast to the negative consequences of watching television entertainment, which tend to increase levels of political disaffection. According to him, the decline of social capital and civic activism in North America is related to the increase in the number of hours to which individuals are exposed to television, since this reduces the time a person has to interact with other individuals. For Putnam, television has also made people less trusting of others, because TV programs tend to overestimate the negative aspects of reality (Putnam, 1995). Similarly, the analysis of Cristina Holtz-Bacha (1990) about the effects of exposure to political information and entertainment in the broadcast and print media, upon political attitudes and participation of citizens in Germany shows that political alienation and low political participation were more likely among individuals heavily expossed to entertainment in television and the print media. By contrast, exposure to political information, on both, television and newspapers, was related to a less alienated vision of politics and higher levels of participation (Holtz-Bacha, 1990: 81). The Kenneth Newton (1999) study on the case of the United Kingdom reached similar conclusions: while overall exposure to television showed a weak association with indicators of political cynicism and disaffection; exposure to news on television tends to inform and mobilize. In this sense, the study provides stronger evidence supporting the theory of mobilization, since reading newspapers turned out to be significantly and strongly associated with higher levels of political knowledge, interest and understanding. Similarly, Shah et al. (2001) argues that while some entertainment content causes a decrease in civic participation, the informative use of the media is positively associated with political participation. The Internet Studies on the effects of the Internet on political involvement yield mixed results. While for Putnam (2000) the impact of internet use is similar to television, in the sense that it erodes rather than promotes civic engagement, other analyses consider that communicative interactions through the internet are a complement of personal interactions and generate greater political participation (Wellman et al., 2001). More recently, other studies have found that there is a significant and positive relationship between the use of digital media and web 2.0 technologies and the levels of political knowledge and participation (Boulianne, 2009; Dalrymple & Scheufele, 2007; Dimitrova, Shehata, Strömbäck, & Nord, 2014; Tolbert & Mcneal, 2003).
Studies on Latin America and Mexico Some comparative studies of few countries that have included cases of the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe and Latin America (not including Mexico) tend to support the mobilisation theories (Schmitt-Beck and Voltmer, 2007; Voltmer and Schmitt-Beck, 2006; Curran et al., 2014). Other analyses focused solely on Latin America. For example, a study by Booth (2014) on the factors that positively affect community activism in Latin America show that consumption of news media has a positive effect on mobilization. Individuals that watch, hear, and read news are more likely to be involved in voluntary organizations. In this regard, the relation between news media exposure and community activity seems to be mutually reinforcing, since news media consumption encourages people to join voluntary organisations, and participation in these organizations leads, in turn, to greater news media attention. Another study that supports the mobilisation theories is Dominguez (2015) analysis on the interaction effects of civil services in Mexico and news consumption on trust in government. It shows that alongside local civil service systems, news consumption increases citizens confidence in the government. Some other analyses (Moreno, 1999, 2003, 2009b) have shown that exposure to political information during election campaigns can also foster significant increases in the levels of campaign awareness, political interest and involvement of Mexican voters. Regarding Voter turnout a number of studies provide evidence of the differential impact of direct and indirect channels of political communication on the electoral participation of citizens. On the one hand, according to Moreno (2003, 2009b), exposure to the news was the most important variable to explain the probability of voting in the presidential election of 2000, even surpassing the impact of the intensity of partisanship of voters. Watching the news also encouraged voter turnout in the presidential election of 2006, although to a lesser extent than in 2000. On the other hand, the perception of negativity in political campaigns favored the abstention of voters in the 2000 election (Moreno, 2009b), a finding that, according to the author, seems consistent with the Ansolabehere and Iyengar (1995) study on the negative consequences of negative advertising in voter turnout in North America. However, the study by Guerrero and Arellano (2012) argues that the effects of negative advertising on electoral participation were more limited in the 2006 presidential election. According to the analysis, of all negative ads transmitted by the two leading candidates (Felipe Calderón and Andrés Manuel López Obrador) and their parties in that election, only the spots on Lopez Obrador had a significant and positive effect (albeit moderate) on electoral participation. The relevance of the Mexican case The Mexican case is relevant for the literature on the impact of modern political communications on civic engagement, because it provides empirical evidence on a new democratic system, in a field mainly based on data from advanced western democracies, usually characterized by various factors that temper the impact of media and campaign messages on political attitudes and behavior, such as: institutionalised party systems, considerable levels of partisan loyalties among the electorate, diverse sources of political information available to the public, and sometimes, strong (or at least relevant) public broadcasting and print media sectors. In this regard, the analysis of the impact of political messages through different campaign communication channels on political involvement in a new democracy such as Mexico might constitute a crucial case study since it is a country with structural factors that
may possibly favor significative negative media and campaign effects on political engagement. These factors include a party system exhibiting levels of party identification among the electorate ranging from low to moderate, and a television-centric, predominantly private, and highly concentrated media system (particularly in the field of broadcast television), which offers limited plurality of sources of political information to the public, and whose media consumption patterns are primarily entertainment-oriented. 3. CAMPAIGN COMMUNICATION CHANNELS IN THE 2012 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION Election campaigns involve a number of messages directed to specific groups of voters. To do this, three types of campaign communication channels are used: a) traditional peopleintensive channels, based on direct contact with people; b) modern media-intensive channels, based on the use of print and broadcast media, and c) posmodern, Internet channels, based on the use of Internet websites, email and social media etc. (Norris, 2005). This study focuses on the effects of media-intensive and Internet-based channels. Parties and candidates have two venues of access to the media: the direct channels (also called controlled channels) since they allow full control of the content of political messages (e.g. spots), and the so-called indirect (or mediated) channels, which do not allow full control of the content of campaign messages (e.g. election news coverage). In this section, we will now review the content and effects of such channels in the context of the presidential election of 2012. Indirect channels (election news coverage) Studies on media coverage in the 2012 presidential election show significant differences in news coverage of leading candidates campaign events according to media type (Juárez Gamíz, 2013). For example, television coverage received by all candidates was predominantly positive and, although coverage tended to be more favourable to the candidate of the PRI-PVEM coalition, this was not to the detriment of its rivals 10. The study argues that neutral is the new standard of negativity on television since the single visual presentation of candidates facilitates visual recognition and positioning (Juárez Gamiz, 2013: 186). By contrast, campaign coverage in newspapers and, above all, on radio news, turned out to be more negative. News on the radio were the most critical, editorialised and negative for all candidates equally (Gamiz Juárez, 2013: 186-187) 11. Meanwhile, coverage in the press was considerably more favorable to the candidate of the left than to his rivals, Josefina Vazquez Mota, and Enrique Peña Nieto, who consistently was the subject of significantly more negative reports than AMLO during the campaign (Juárez Gamiz, 2013: 188). Regarding campaign coverage on Internet, Muñiz (2015) conducted a content analysis of reports published during the presidential campaign in the digital versions of five national newspapers: El Universal, Reforma, La Jornada, Excélsior and Milenio. The study shows a predominance of strategic game-framing over issue-framing in print news coverage. Furthermore, although slight differences between some newspapers were noted, generally 10 According to the official monitoring by IFE/UNAM of 29,993 informative pieces (not opinions, analysis or debate) broadcast on television, 99% had no opinion, of the 1% of news items valued, there were 163 positive and 313 negative ratings (IFE, 2012). 11 Monitoring by the IFE/UNAM shows that of the 10,6470 informative pieces (not opinions, analysis or debate) were broadcast on the radio, 96.7% had not been valued by news anchors or reporters, only 3.3% of the news items valued had positive evaluations 2,140 and 3,632 had negative ratings (IFE, 2012).
the predominant use of strategic game-frames constituted a common pattern for all newspapers. Other studies show that, despite extensive media coverage of the electoral process, some analyses on the impact of exposure to the news during the 2012 election show low levels of attention (and recall) by citizens regarding the news about campaign events (Maldonado Sánchez and Ortega de la Roquette, 2013). The percentage of people who recalled having seen, heard or read the most important news of the week related to political actors in competition, regardless of the media by which they got such news was only 20%. The ratio increased to one in four people during the formal 90 day campaign period. Overall, news about campaign events were those that had the highest percentage of recall among the population, followed by news of attacks and/or scandals. However, while for EPN, JVM, GQT, and JVM, news related to campaign events were among the most memorable; in the case of AMLO, 40% of the news that had a higher level of recall were attacks or scandals. Direct channels (Political advertising) One of the most important trends in the process of professionalization of campaigns is the intensive use of political advertising on television (Díaz Jiménez, 2015). The media consolidated since the midterm election of 1997 as the main intermediaries between voters and parties in Mexico. Therefore, from 1997 to 2006, parties spent more than half of their campaign budgets on paid media appeals (spots) on radio and television (Lozano, 2006; Lawson, 2008). However, the 2007-2008 electoral reform made significant changes to the media access model, prohibiting paid political advertising on radio and television, and establishing, instead, free airtime that is distributed among all parties. The aim of the reform was to reduce the high costs of election campaigns and to achieve a fairer balance in the time available to the different parties (Córdova, 2011). After the reform, the indirect state subsidy (free airtime) for Mexican parties and candidates became one of the most generous in the world and campaign communications in 2012 reached their highest audience in the history of Mexican presidential elections (Delphos, 2013). In compliance with the regulatory framework of media access for political parties established in the reform of 2007-2008, the IFE administered since the start of the precampaign until Election Day, the 48 minutes of official state time on radio and television, which divided into 30-second spots added up to a total of 19,840,931 ads for national parties (IFE, 2012). The electoral authority achieved an efficiency of about 97% in the scheduling and broadcasting of political ads during the different stages of the electoral process. This fact was often criticised as a spotization of campaigns by academics and commentators. A study based on audience measurement data (from IBOPE-AGB Mexico) about spots broadcasted in 10 television channels which together reach 85% of audience share in the country (Delphos, 2013), found that, as a result of the new model of political media access, parties in 2012 broadcasted an amount of spots seven times higher than in the previous presidential contests of 2000 and 2006, 12 but with a limited number of versions. The parties went from 10,045 ads (245 versions) in 2006 to 70.277 spots (172 versions) in 2012. In this sense, the Delphos research group argues that although the distribution of television advertisements according to the new regulatory framework of campaigns granted all political 12 Meanwhile, effective IFE scheduling reached 95.3% of the administration of spots of parties in the channels included in the study.
parties to reach virtually the entire electorate, 13 this assignment was excessive and privileged repetition and saturation at the expense of diversification and strategic planning, and shaped an overexposure of audiences to campaigns messages. The study shows that ads of parties exceeded by 3,000%, the number of spots on the air that conventional commercial brands usually place (Delphos, 2013: 329). [...] The four presidential candidates, individually, reached more than 98% of the universe of the national audience of 18 years of age or older. These potential voters were exposed about 753 times to the candidate s spots along the different stages of the race. [...] It should be considered that an effective standard for conventional commercial brands that pay to advertise on television is to make your target audience see the message three to five times during the time scheduled on the different channels (Delphos, 2014: 329). 14 Content of advertising Content analyses of the spots in the 2012 election show a high content of negativity and strategic framing in political advertising (Arellano Toledo and Jara Elias, 2013; Juárez Gámiz and Brambila, 2013). For example, according to Juarez Gámiz and Brambila (2013), most of spots versions produced by parties during the election exibithed an electoral strategies framing (55.5%) to the detriment of issue framing about public security (14.6%), social policy (13.6%), and the economy (13%). Regarding negative (or attack) advertising, a content analysis conducted by the author of this research, focused only on the spots produced by the campaigns of presidential candidates (those with a greater reach among the electorate), found a greater number of attack spots produced along the campaign. Of the total number of spots produced, 82% were promotional, 18% were of attack ads (Figure 1). 15 Figure 2. Types of TV ads by party/candidate in the 2012 presidential election. 13 Each presidential candidate reached more than 98% of the voting age national audience (Delphos, 2013). 14 However, it should be noted that young people aged 18-29 years was the audience segment less exposed to political advertising. 15 EPN was the presidential candidate of a coalition of two parties: the PRI and the PVEM. On the one hand, the PRI produced a total of 86 spots, of which 94% were promotional ads, 4.7% were attack ads and only one defense spot (1.2%). On the other, the PVEM, produced only promotional spots. The campaign of JVM produced 50 spots, 60% were promotional and the rest were attack announcements (40%). Regarding the AMLO s campaign, it produced 15 different versions of spots, 80% were promotional and 20% were attack ads.
Percentage of versions of spots produced 100 90 80 94 100 80 70 60 60 50 40 40 30 20 10 0 20 5 1 PRI PVEM PAN PRD/PT/CON EPN JVM AMLO Candidates/Parties Promotional Attack Defense The scope and effects of negative advertising As regards the audience reach of negative publicity in 2012, the study of the Delphos group, (2013) shows that, as in the elections of 2000 and 2006, negativity in advertising reached to a significant sector of the electorate. The total negative spots during the campaign were 12,186, equivalent to 17.3% of total spots broadcast during the 90 days of the election. The figure shows an audience reach for negative publicity of 35.2 million people, which means 95.7% of people aged 18 or over (Delphos, 2013: 350) 16. However, an analysis of the reception of political spots on the 2012 election (Martinez, Cárdenas, and Barrueta, 2013) shows that direct campaign communication channels, generated a high degree of saturation and weariness among voters. The huge amount and excessive repetition of the spots broadcast, as well as their lack of creativity, caused they were perceived negatively by the audience. The study assessed audience reception from a sample of 47 spots of the communication campaigns of the four presidential candidates. The reception and effectiveness of media appeals were assessed based on the standards used to evaluate commercial advertising, using a methodology developed by the specialized consulting firm Millward Brown. According to the study, audience recall of political advertising was very high. Of total ads, 60% of people claimed to have seen any of them. Unfortunately for candidates campaigns efforts, their ads came to have four times more negative associations than commercial advertisements (Martinez, Cárdenas, and 16 Negative campaigns reached more than 63% of the electorate, with frequencies between 3 and 8 impacts (Delphos, 2013).
Barrueta, 2013: 228). Regarding negative spots, like the rest of the campaign ads they were assessed as weak and caused even greater rejection and weariness among people who became tired of watching them (29% for negative spots versus 24% of electoral spots in general) (Martínez, Cárdenas and Barrueta, 2013: 231). Regarding Internet and social media as channels of campaign communication, the study points out that campaign coverage in this medium has still plenty room to grow in Mexico. However, the research also note that internet users who participated in the study were very attentive to the campaign messages and had a high predisposition for political participation (over 90% of them showed a high willingness to vote on Election Day). However, it also warns that the use of social networks by the candidates showed a lack of understanding about the nature of this channel of political communication and its relationship to the electorate, because networks were mainly used to destroy more that to promote the interaction and involvement of users (Martínez, Cárdenas, and Barrueta, 2013: 245). In short, the studies reviewed in this section suggest that negativity, personalisation, and strategic framing in direct and indirect campaign communication channels may have contributed to the erosion of political involvement of young Mexicans in the 2012 presidential election. For example, Ruben Jara, the coordinator of the Delphos research group argues that the 2012 election shows that the contextual environment of campaigns in Mexico, as a result of the new regulatory framework of political advertising, decreases the potential of direct campaign communication channels through which parties, candidates, and their campaign strategists seek to inform, persuade and mobilize voters. According to him [ ] the spotization seems to serve little to encourage the involvement of citizens in campaigns, which does not benefit the democratic system (Jara Elias, 2013: 28). 3. RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND HYPOTHESES Did campaign communications encourage or erode the civic culture of young Mexicans in the presidential election of 2012? Based on the literature review, we will test the following hypotheses about the impact of exposure to the media and diverse sources of political information during campaigns on a number of dimensions of political engagement of young people, including their levels of political knowledge, comunity activism, political trust and efficacy, political discussion and voter turnout. - H1: Mediamalaise. Exposure to the media, especially to TV entertainment and diverse sources of political information during campaigns (television spots and newscasts/political analysis programs, national/local newspapers and magazines), is associated with low levels of civic engagement and high levels of political disaffection among young people. - H2: Mobilisation. Exposure to the media (including TV entertainment) and diverse sources of political information during campaigns, especially the news media (including television news/political analysis programs) is associated with high levels of civic engagement among young people. - H3: Media form/type of campaign communication channel. Exposure to political information through television (including television spots and newscasts/political analysis programs), radio, Internet and social media will result in higher levels of political disaffection, than exposure to political information via magazines and newspapers.
TV Genre - H4: Form of campaign communication. Exposure to television spots will result in higher levels of political disaffection among young people than exposure to news, either on television or in the press. 4. METHODOLOGY-INSTRUMENT This paper draws on data from the National Survey on Political Culture of Mexican Youth 2012, which focuses on the attitudes and political participation of the Mexican population aged 18-29 years old who reside in urban areas, during the presidential election of 2012, with particular emphasis on young people trust in the integrity of the electoral process and the political institutions involved in the election, such as parties, candidates, and electoral management bodies. 3.2. VARIABLES 3.2.1. Independent variables Exposure to television news and entertainment. It was measured through dummy variables based on the question: What kind of programming do you most often watch on TV? Response options: Soap operas, sports, reality shows/game shows, comedy and series were recoded as Entertainment = 1, and other genres/i don t watch TV=0. Response options: Newscasts and political analysis programs were recoded as News/Political Analysis = 1, and other genres/i do not watch TV = 0. Figure 2 shows the entertainment orientation of young audiences in Mexico. Figure 2. Exposure to television in the 2012 presidential election What kind of programming do you most frequently watch on TV? Soap Operas News Sports Series Other Culture Comedy Reality shows and contests I do not watch TV Political analysis 4.7 4.4 4.1 2.7 1.1.5 10.4 15.4 21.8 32.9 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 Percentage of the audience Source: National Survey on Political Culture of Mexican Youth 2012.
Type of campaign communication channel Exposure to electronic and print media, the internet and social networks as sources of information during the campaign. It was measured trough dummy variables based on the question: Through what medium have you learned about the events of the 2012 presidential campaign? : 1. Television spots, 2. Television news and political analysis programs, 3. National newspapers, 4. Local newspapers, 5. Radio, 6. Magazines 7. Ads of political parties. 8. Conversations with family 9. Conversation with friends or neighbours 10. In conversations with co-workers 11. Internet, 12. Social media. The answers were recoded as the medium of interest, e.g. television spots = 1, other media/information sources = 0. In this vein, most of young Mexicans learned about the events of the presidential campaign through TV spots. In contrast, the percentage of respondents who followed the campaign through television news and the Internet was significantly lower. Figure 3. Exposure to campaign communications in the 2012 presidential election Through what medium have you learned about the events of the 2012 presidential election campaign? TV spots 55.4 TV newscasts and political analysis programs 22.1 Internet/social media Newspapers (national/local) and magazines Conversations with relatives, friends, neighbours or co-workers Adverts of political parties Radio Other 6.6 3.8 3.5 3.2 3.0 1.1 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 Percentage of the audience Source: National Survey on Political Culture of Mexican Youth 2012. 3.2.2. Dependent variables - Political knowledge: is evaluated with an additive index of three items designed to measure the levels of information of young people about the public posts to vote during the campaign. - Internal political efficacy: a scale was constructed based on the questions: When there is a problem on your street or in your neighbourhood, how effective are the following actions? : 1. Ask for help of politicians or influential officials, 2. Use the vote as a mean of exerting pressure on authorities, 3. Participate in a neighbourhood organization to put pressure on politicians, 4. Seek media attention, 5. Contact