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POL04
Campaigning and Public Relations
PP 070
“Opposition is Nonsense.” The Influence of Political Framework Conditions for the Success of Party Public Relations
O. Jandura
1
, M. Leidecker-Sandmann
2
1
University of Duesseldorf, Duesseldorf, Germany
2
University of Koblenz-Landau, Landau, Germany
Research on the question if and how political actors affect mass media is a longstanding tradition in communication science. While processes of agenda
setting have been studied for decades, the question why some political actors are more effective than others when it comes to influencing the media agen‑
da (Hopmann et al., 2012) has not been entirely answered, yet. Sciarini and Tresch (2013) criticize that agenda setting literature hardly ever looked at how
the ability to influence the media agenda varies across parties. Our paper argues that how effective political actors may influence mass media coverage is
determined by structural political framework conditions. Structural political framework conditions are features of political actors, which exist independently
of situation-specific conditions and are produced by political structures. Compared with situation-specific conditions, they are less “fleeting” or variable.
Framework conditions are exogenous factors that may be deduced from political science research. They include things such as party size, or the candidate’s
position as challenger or office-holder (e.g., Kranenpohl, 1999; Raschke, 1993). According to Esser (2000), we think that an actor’s structural features are,
on the macro level, significantly responsible for action in a social situation (situation-specific features only moderate or determine an actor’s options for
action). If we transfer Esser’s argument to our object of study, we assume that structural political framework conditions determine the agenda setting power
of political actors. However, up to this point, structural exogenous factors have been scarcely analyzed in communication science. Most of the studies address
political framework conditions in the interpretation of the results – only few make it their focus. We put them at the heart of our paper and systematize
four structural framework conditions of multiparty systems that may limit or support a political actor’s agenda setting power: (1) Level of power (position in
parliament), (2) relevance (party size), (3) level of acceptance (establishment), and (4) level of regionality (geographic anchoring). To collect and aggregate
existing knowledge on political framework conditions, research on the influence of political parties on media coverage (in European multiparty systems)
will be re-systematized against a background of a previously developed matrix of structural framework conditions. Methodologically, our paper relies on
an international comparative literature review. Each political framework dimension will first be considered separately in order to finally show possible
interactions with other dimensions. The study overviewmakes clear that parties in government are more successful at placing their themes in the media. In
addition, coalition parties see a broader repertoire of subjects reproduced in media coverage. Moreover, small as well as regional parties have a much harder
time placing their themes in the media.This is especially difficult for non-established small parties. Further, it becomes clear that there are not yet empirical
results for every field in the matrix of structural framework conditions. The focus of research is on the established large parties relevant to power politics.
For the numerically much larger group of non-established small parties there are – despite their significance for forming political will – hardly any results.
PP 071
Do Perceptual Processes Have an Influence on Online Communication Activities? Findings from a Study Among Political PR Practitioners
in Germany
O. Kelm
1
, M. Dohle
1
, U. Bernhard
2
, K. Sinemus
3
1
Heinrich-Heine-University Duesseldorf, Communication and Media Science, Duesseldorf, Germany
2
University of Applied Sciences and Arts Hannover, Hanover, Germany
3
Quadriga University of Applied Sciences Berlin, Berlin, Germany
Social media enjoy growing popularity, including in the field of public relations (PR). Almost all PR practitioners in the United States (e.g., Wright & Hinson,
2015) and a large number of European PR practitioners (e.g., Moreno, Navarro, Tench, & Zerfass, 2015) use social media for professional purposes. How‑
ever, little is known about why PR practitioners use social media. This also applies to political PR practitioners, and thus to PR practitioners with the aim
of influencing public opinion on political issues. One possibility is that their social media activities are driven by strategic considerations, which manifest
in an orientation towards external stakeholders like politicians, journalists, or the general public. Another reason for political PR practitioners’social media
activities might be a less strategically and more socially motivated co-orientation towards other political PR practitioners. In addition to being based on
individual or structural reasons, these considerations are based on perceptions: First, political PR practitioners can hold subjective assumptions of to whom
and to howmany people they direct their communication (e.g., Litt, 2012). Therefore, the wider social media’s reach among their target groups is perceived
to be by political PR practitioners, the more often they use social media for political communication activities (H1). Second, following the influence-of-pre‑
sumed-media-influence-approach, the perception that media have a strong influence on other people can have an impact on individuals’ behaviors (e.g.,
Gunther & Storey, 2003). Therefore, the more political PR practitioners believe that their target groups are influenced by social media, the more often they
use social media for political communication activities (H2). To test these assumptions, in 2015 a standardized survey of German political PR practitioners
was conducted (n = 1,067). The respondents were asked to assess how many politicians, journalists, other political PR practitioners, and German citizens
use Facebook and Twitter, and how strongly these groups are influenced politically by Facebook and Twitter (independent variables). To assess their social
media activities, the respondents were asked how often they used Facebook and Twitter to get political information, and how often they communicated via
Facebook and Twitter to call other people’s attention to important political topics and to cultivate work-related contacts (dependent variables). Moreover,
control variables were taken into account.The results partly support H1 and H2:The more the respondents thought that other political PR practitioners used