Rollback: cause or effect?…
I believe Jay Rosen is correct about the concept of rollback:
This White House doesn’t settle for managing the news–what used to be called ‘feeding the beast’–because there is a larger aim: to roll back the press as a player within the executive branch, to make it less important in running the White House and governing the country.
And he’s demonstrated the concept at work in Cheney’s decisions regarding the press and his hunting accident.
Although I understand this concept and accept it, I still hang on to some shred of hope that practicing rollback is a political and rhetorical mistake. One reason: I’m not sure it can be demonstrated that rollback positively affects how the public perceives politicians, or that it negatively affects attitudes about the press, or that it affects political choices and participation in any way whatsoever. My wondering springs rather naturally from my academic discipline; a rhetorician wants to know more than how/why a message is constructed. I also want to know if it’s working. (I can, BTW, wonder the same things about my hope that rollback is a mistake.)
Whether rollback is working is far from clear. One thing is clear: We cannot assume that the shrinking audience for news in its many forms is a result of rollback. The audience has been shrinking for two generations. Surveys regularly demonstrate that the public’s attitude about the press swings and sways with the breeze:
Public attitudes toward the press, which have been on a downward track for years, have become more negative in several key areas. Growing numbers of people question the news media’s patriotism and fairness. Perceptions of political bias also have risen over the past two years.
Yet despite these criticisms, most Americans continue to say that they like mainstream news outlets. By wide margins, more Americans give favorable than unfavorable ratings to their daily newspaper (80%-20%), local TV news (79%-21%), and cable TV news networks (79%-21%), among those able to rate these organizations. The margin is only slightly smaller for network TV news (75%-25%).
In fact, the favorable ratings for most categories of news organizations surpass positive ratings for President Bush and major political institutions the Supreme Court, Congress, and the two major political parties. Favorable ratings for daily newspapers, local TV news and network TV news have all remained fairly stable since July 2001, even as public attitudes toward the news media have declined. The exception to this pattern are large, nationally influential newspapers, such as the Washington Post and New York Times, whose favorable ratings have declined markedly.
But is any of this a result of rollback or does it instead make the tactic of rollback (temporarily) possible? (And what about this pesky result: “favorable ratings…surpass positive ratings for President Bush and major political institutions”?)
Perhaps we’ll find evidence for or against rollback’s working in the interactive environment of the internet. But is the civic participation we’re seeing–especially in citizen journalism and other forms of providing content–evidence of a delegitimized mainstream news media or the natural filling process that follows the building of a new social space…or something else?
I wonder if there’s a tie in between the roll-back theory and the possibility that the Bushies are pursuing a 50%+1 strategy. Instead of the traditional practice of trying to build a bullet-proof mandate, the intention is to do just enough to keep 51% of the public on board (and much less if you’re not facing election).
If so, they don’t have to roll back the media across the board - just enough to keep the base wary of the dreaded MSM (a task made easier with an alternative, administration-friendly media infrastructure).
Sven… Perhaps. The PEW figures suggest that people are far more comfortable with local media than the national newspapers. A cause of rollback or an effect? Does it matter? I’d say a tie is likely if for no other reason than the strategy is so blatant.