Intimate Politics

Publicity, Privacy and the Personal Lives of Politicians in Media Saturated Democracies

James Stanyer

• Publisher: Polity
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN:
  9780745644776
  9780745644769
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9780745662077
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

It is often remarked that politicians' private lives are becoming a feature of political communication in many advanced industrial democracies. However, there have so far been no genuinely comparative studies examining the personalized nature of political communication. Intimate Politics provides for the first time a systematic comparative analysis of such developments in Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the UK and the US. Drawing on a wide range of primary and secondary sources, it assesses the extent to which the private lives of politicians have become a feature of political communication in each democracy. The book provides a comprehensive account of the shifting boundaries between the public and private, and whether any developments are universal or more advanced in some democracies than others, and seeks to explain why this might be. Intimate Politics will be of great value for students and scholars of communication and media studies and political science and is required reading for anyone who wants a fuller understanding of the transformation of mediated politics in advanced industrial democracies.

1

Soft Focus: Leaders’ Personal Lives Close-up

A lot of the publicity that politicians’ personal lives receive does not involve any intrusion by the media, and what is revealed is not considered scandalous in any sense. This information and imagery are often the product of cooperation between media professionals and political advocates, and are used with the express or tacit consent of the political actors in question. The information and imagery touch on a range of different dimensions of leading politicians’ personal lives, from incidents in their life stories and concerns about their personal well being to their relationships with family members and their domestic space (see figure 0.2). While existing nationally focused studies suggest such information and imagery increasingly permeate contemporary political communication in some democracies (see the introduction), there is no comparative data on the degree to which this aspect of politicians’ personal lives receives publicity, nor any attempt to explain coherently why this might be.

This chapter looks at the mediated visibility of the different domains of national leaders’ personal lives in a consensual non-scandalous context (see table 0.1). It examines the publicity given to each domain of the personal sphere, both cross-nationally and over time, in order to get a sense of whether and how coverage might have evolved in different countries. It starts by examining the publicity given to national leaders’ domestic realm and to those they have close relationships with (the second and third domains outlined in the introduction). It then examines the publicity given to national leaders’ inner lives (the first domain outlined in the introduction). It documents the coverage of significant events in the personal lives of national leaders and coverage of their life stories and incidents from those stories. Finally, it explores the possible causes underlying the findings.

Family life and the domestic realm

Research suggests that leading politicians’ family members, family life and domestic spaces are increasingly subject to media coverage (Chenu, 2008; Cockerell, 1989; Schroeder, 2004). Growing evidence points to the fact that the spouses and children of national leaders are in some democracies now subject to greater media exposure than ever before and are becoming public figures in their own right (Ponder, 1999). Similarly, in some countries, family events such as weddings, christenings and the annual family vacation attract coverage. Research also suggests that some leading politicians have been quick to invite cameras into their homes, to capture informal downtime with their families. This section examines press coverage of national leaders’ spouses and children, their family holidays and their home in order to get a sense of the extent to which their family life and domestic realm receive exposure.

Leaders’ families in the media

Perhaps the most striking findings in regard to the growing visibility of the spouses and children of national leaders comes from studies of the US First Lady and the so-called ‘first family’. Although the US First Lady does not ‘operate under a constitutional directive’, or receive ‘a policy portfolio’, studies show her mediated visibility has grown dramatically over the course of the twentieth century (Winfield & Friedman, 2003, p. 549). For most of the nineteenth and early twentieth century, the First Lady’s visibility was largely confined to official photographs. Florence Harding was the first to assume a limited public role in the 1920s, appearing with her husband during official photo opportunities; this trend continued with Grace Coolidge, who, in addition, made frequent appearances in newsreels of the day and women’s fashion magazines (Ponder, 1999). Eleanor Roosevelt was the first presidential spouse to attain a media presence independent of her husband, meeting regularly with journalists (see Bystrom, 2004; Caroli, 2003). However, according to some, it was not until the advent of television and Jacqueline Kennedy, who was dubbed the first ‘First Lady of the television age’, that the President’s wife obtained widespread global visibility (Schroeder, 2004; Watson, 2000). The subsequent First Ladies have all been more visible than their early-and mid-twentieth-century predecessors (Caroli, 2003). Hillary Clinton gained particular media prominence. According to one estimate, over a three-month period early in the Clinton presidency, Hillary gained more coverage than Vice President Al Gore. She appeared for a total of 52 minutes on three network evening news bulletins, compared to Gore’s 4 minutes (Diamond & Silverman, 1997). Laura Bush maintained a high public profile and Michelle Obama has continued attracting widespread media coverage in a variety of roles, and recently appeared in Vogue.

The President’s children have, historically, largely been invisible, well shielded from the prying media eyes. Of course there have been exceptions. Alice, the daughter of President Teddy Roosevelt, was the subject of much press coverage. Interest in the ‘often outspoken debutante and party goer’ did not subside until she married in 1906 (Ponder, 1999, p. 32). Studies suggest that the President’s children, especially from the latter part of the twentieth century, have gained an increasing amount of attention in the media compared to their predecessors, and their names are now widely known (see Quinn-Musgrove & Kanter, 1995; Wead, 2003).

Outside the US, the picture is less clear; it is not known whether the partners and children of leaders of other democracies receive a similar level of media attention. In the UK, various authors have pointed to the high media profile Cherie Blair achieved. Heffernan and Webb observe that Cherie Blair enjoyed such a profile during the 1997 electoral campaign in a way that was not true for the partners of previous party leaders, even Prime Ministerial ones (2004, p. 53; see also Page, 2003). Seymour-Ure (2003) has likened her profile during her husband’s time in office to that of the US First Lady. For example, in June 2007, the BBC screened The Real Cherie Blair, a fly-on-the-wall documentary with unprecedented access to Cherie’s private life over a six-month period. Sarah Brown, the wife of the former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, although she did not enjoy the high media profile of Cherie Blair, did not shy away from the limelight and played a public role, speaking at set-piece events such as the annual party conference, guest-editing the News of the World’s supplement magazine in July 2009, and playing a prominent role in the 2010 general election campaign (see also Smith, 2008). There is some evidence of the Prime Minister’s children receiving attention. The escapades of Mark Thatcher and the love life of James Major gained coverage, as did the drunken antics of Euan Blair, his choice of university, even his mother’s attempt to buy him a flat in Bristol.

Studies of the visibility of leaders’ spouses and children in other democracies are also few and far between. The high profile of the former French presidential First Lady, and former model, Carla Bruni, has excited much comment. Her whirlwind romance and marriage to Nicolas Sarkozy attracted global attention. She subsequently released an album and appeared on the cover of a range of magazines, in and outside France. In Spain, the 2002 marriage of the daughter of then Spanish Prime Minister José María Aznar became a major media event, with numerous glossy magazine spreads and television coverage (Sanders & Canel, 2004). Sanders and Canel note that Spanish politicians have regularly appeared with their families in magazines. Popular magazines such as Diez Minutos and Semana have regularly featured government ministers and heads of regional government and their families (2004, p. 205). This may hint at a transformation of politics, but there is no sense of whether partners and children of other national leaders attract the same levels of visibility as the US first family.

Table 1.1 Yearly average number of news items mentioning the national leader’s spouse on his or her own over a 15-year period: 1995–2009

Country	Mean
UK	53
US	30
France	29
Spain*	16
Italy	8
Germany	7
Australia	6
Mean	21

* Spain 1996 onwards. All numbers rounded.

Source: compiled by author. Measure: one newspaper, excludes tabloid newspapers.

Table 1.1 shows the average number of news items on leaders’ spouses (on their own, without the leaders) over a 15-year period in one serious or quality newspaper.

The table reveals that national leaders’ spouses in the UK, the US and France have been the subject of the greatest number of news items over the period, followed by those in Spain, Italy, Germany and Australia, whose leaders’ families received less attention. Although not shown in the table, the data revealed that coverage was concentrated on the spouses of certain leaders, namely Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton in the US, Cherie Blair in the UK and Carla Bruni in France.

Table 1.2 shows the coverage of national leaders’ children (still living at home and dependent on their parents). The table reveals that national leaders’ children are most visible in the US, the UK and Italy, and less visible in Australia, France, Spain and Germany. Again coverage was not spread evenly but concentrated on the children of particular leaders, namely Chelsea Clinton in the US, Euan Blair in the UK and Barbara Berlusconi in Italy. It should be noted the children and the spouses with the highest coverage are also mainly those that secondary literature suggested had the highest profiles.

Table 1.2 Yearly average number of news items mentioning the national leader’s children over a 15-year period: 1995-2009

Country	Mean
US	12
UK	9
Italy	6
Australia	1
France	0
Spain*	0
Germany	0
Mean	4

* Spain 1996 onwards. All numbers rounded.

Source: compiled by author. Measure: one newspaper, excludes tabloid newspapers. Up to 2 children still living at home and dependent on their parents. Where the leader has more than 2 children, the additional children were not counted. Children not dependent on their parents were also discounted. For exclusions, see appendix.

Leaders and family holidays

All leaders and their families take regular vacations throughout their time in office. Although they occur outside the domestic realm, they cannot be considered, I would argue, public events but, rather, a time when leaders are off-duty, relaxing with members of their family and friends even though they may receive publicity. While it is not clear from existing secondary sources how much publicity leaders’ vacations attract across countries, these sources d...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Figures and Tables
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction: Politicians’ Personal Lives in the Media Spotlight
• 1 Soft Focus: Leaders’ Personal Lives Close-up
• 2 Digging for Dirt: Publicizing Politicians’ Sex Lives
• 3 Changing Exposure: Critical Moments and the Uncovering of Politicians’ Infidelity
• 4 Transnational Revelations: Flows, Access and Control in a Global News Environment
• 5 Drawing Conclusions: Intimization and Democratic Politics
• Appendix: Research Notes
• Notes
• References
• Index