A narrativa da derrota política nos media portugueses

Abstract

This research aims to analyze how the media constructs the narrative of the defeat during the electoral campaign period. Therefore, we propose to conduct a comparative and innovative research study into the political communication and media studies areas, aimed at the narrative’s construction of the main candidates in the media coverage campaign. In the first part of the study, there will be established the theoretical framework about several changes in contemporary and democratic societies. In the theoretical part, wealso note the growing relevance of the media through the mediatization process. In the political area, this mediatization has gained significance since the political actors accommodate the significant internal changes that are capable of responding to the affirmation of the media with the objective of creating visibility. We reflect on the relationship between the media and politics, which is a dynamic interaction that leads themedia to create different narratives about the candidates on high interventionism through specific mechanism, especially during the electoral campaign. Given this context, we tried to answer the following question: “How is the narrative of defeat constructed in the Portuguese media during the election campaignperiod?”. To answer this question, we created three subquestions:1) "What are the dominant journalistic patterns in the Portuguese generalist media about the electoralcampaign of the general elections of 2011 and 2015?”; 2) "What is the interventionism ofthe Portuguese generalist media in the general elections of 2011 and 2015?" and 3) “Howdoes the media create representations of the defeated candidates during the 2011 and 2015general election campaigns?”. Considering these questions, we use a mixed methodology involving quantitative and qualitative methods. On the one hand, this research is based on a set of 2,370 medianews, extracted from the Portuguese press (Correio da Manhã, Público, Expresso, Sol,Visão and Sábado), radio (Antena 1, Rádio Renascença and TSF) and television (RTP 1,SIC and TVI) about the 2011 and 2015 general elections, focused on PS and PSD/PàFcoverage, using a content analysis. On the other hand, we will conduct ten semistructuredinterviews with the same journalists from the media as part of the analysis involved incovering the same elections through thematic analysis. In general, we conclude that the media constructs the winner and defeated narrative and how it relates to the power party’s coverage during the electoral campaign.In the analysis period between nine and ten weeks, there is an intensification of the mediarepresentation through an interpretive discourse centered on a highly game and strategic framing between the candidates. It was also noted that the existence of a gradual growth of references to the polls in the media resulted in, subsequently, the construction of postelection scenarios. Facing these possible results, the portraits of the winners and losers are created which are complemented by the creation of traces of the candidates' performance throughout the coverage. It also verified the existence of a visual and sound framing which complements the dominant media text. Despite the construction of the different imagesabout the candidates, in this study, there is an identical editorial treatment given.

Date of Award	23 Jul 2021
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Rita Figueiras (Supervisor)