Making blame avoidance newsworthy: Identifying discursive strategies of ministerial blame avoidance and exploring their influence on media narratives

本研究调查了保守党政府在COVID-19大流行期间采用的指责回避策略，并探讨了他们在此期间对新闻媒体内容的影响。它侧重于塑造新闻制作过程的记者和政治行为者之间的动态，特别是与危机议程设置，政策结果和问责制的叙述有关。它涉及一些突出的问题，如媒体对政党赞助信息的依赖程度，以及新闻对诸如捏造、分散注意力和蒙昧主义等方法的敏感性。通过调查鲍里斯·约翰逊首相任期的近代史，在此期间，流行病管理是媒体的主要政策重点，本研究利用英国政治的一个独特时期，进一步了解危机沟通，政党对媒体议程的影响以及结构性媒体因素在决定政党战略中的重要性。通过对两年期间的印刷出版物和广播输出的内容分析，本研究将产生统计数据，显示不同媒体策略对责备管理目的的功效。诸如框架输出和问题突出性的可变性等措施将被理论化，作为战略成功的证据。时间序列分析将检查来源之间的流动，进而确定话语权力的有影响力的仲裁者。此外，对党的战略家、通讯官员和记者的采访将补充内容分析，以帮助更细致地了解“指责游戏”在实践中是如何运作的。与编码方案一起制定的假设将借鉴现有的研究，这些研究发现，诸如新闻党派和任职等因素是媒体代表性的重要决定因素。此外，鉴于人们越来越担心政府经常使用分裂的、民粹主义的技术来逃避责任，本研究旨在探索某些方法的作用，例如人身攻击，“死猫政策”，在政府更广泛的公关武库中。虽然有多项研究解释了民粹主义传播如何在议程设置和能见度寻求方面成为叛乱政党的有效工具，但本项目探讨了广泛的民粹主义风格是否对主流执政党有利，并考虑了它可能对更广泛的政治新闻报道状态产生的影响。最后，它讨论了有关媒体在面对公共关系技术时使政府承担责任的能力的问题，并将为加强监管框架和改进新闻编辑室做法提供建议。

This research investigates the blame avoidance strategies employed by the Conservative Government during the COVID-19 pandemic and explores their influence on news media content during this period. It focuses on the dynamics between journalists and political actors shaping the newsmaking process, specifically in relation to the agenda setting of crises, policy outcomes and narratives of accountability. It engages with salient questions regarding the extent of media dependence on party-sponsored messaging and the susceptibility of journalism to methods such as spin, distraction and obscurantism. By investigating the recent history of Boris Johnson's premiership, during which pandemic management was the media's predominant policy focus, this study takes advantage of a unique period in British politics to further the understanding into crisis communications, the influence parties have over media agendas and the importance of structural media factors in determining party strategy.Through a content analysis of print publication and broadcast output spanning a two-year period, this research will produce statistical data showcasing the efficacy of different media strategies for blame management purposes. Measures such as the exporting of frames and the variability of issues' salience will be theorised as evidence of a strategy's success. Time-series analysis will examine flows between sources, in turn identifying influential arbiters of discursive power. In addition, interviews with party strategists, communications officers and journalists will complement content analysis to help provide a more nuanced understanding into how the 'blame game' works in practice.The hypotheses developed in conjunction with the coding scheme will draw upon existing research which finds factors such as press partisanship and incumbency to be strong determinants of media representation. Furthermore, in light of growing concerns that the Government has regularly employed divisive, populist techniques to evade accountability, this research aims to explore the role of certain methods - e.g. personal attacks, 'dead cat policies' - within the Government's wider PR arsenal. Whilst there are multiple studies which explain how populist communications can be an effective tool for insurgent parties in terms of agenda-setting and visibility-seeking, this project explores whether a broadly populist style is auspicious for a mainstream, governing party, and considers the impact it may have on the wider state of political news reporting. Lastly, it addresses questions concerning the media's ability to hold governments to account when confronted by public relations techniques, and will inform recommendations for the strengthening of regulatory frameworks and the improvement of newsroom practices.