Political Scandals And Blame Management Essay ⋆ Political Science Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

Political scandals are pervasive events that span across nations, capture media and public attention, have no party division, and exclude no level of office. Scandals are mediated events that can involve presentations of corrupt acts. Although some scholars treat corruption and scandal as identical, they are not the same phenomenon. Joseph Nye provides the most quoted definition of corruption as the “behavior which deviates from the formal duties of a public role because of private-regarding (personal, close family, private clique), pecuniary, or status gains; or violates rules against the exercise of certain types of private-regarding influence” (1967, 419). While all corrupt acts can become scandals, not all scandals involve corrupt acts. As Suzanne Garment notes (1991), a scandal is not an event that is intrinsically evil or corrupt. Rather, it is an event that shocks and upsets the public. For example, sexual infidelity is considered a scandal although it does not involve corruption. Publicity is the second element of scandals that distinguishes them from corruption. Of all those behaviors that conflict with society’s moral standards, it is only the publicized ones that constitute scandals. John Thompson (2000) notes that scandals are interpretations of immoral acts defined through the media, elites, and public discourse. A scandal is as much related to the nature of the act as it is to the publicity that it receives. Corruption does not need an audience while scandals cannot exist without one. And while corruption is measured by the seriousness of the act itself, a scandal’s impact is assessed by the seriousness of the damages inflicted on political actors.

With the above in mind, a scandal can be defined as the information about an act that is considered immoral or shocking, made available to a large audience, which results in a loss or injury of reputation to the actor(s) involved. Scandals are further classified on the basis of the nature of the act, and the most frequent categories appearing in the literature are campaign violations, bribery, moral violations, and abuses of congressional prerogatives. Other classifications refer to the level of scandal activity; that is, whether the act is individual or institutional. According to Dennis Thompson, a scandal is institutional when “the gain a member receives is political rather than personal, the service the member provides is procedurally improper, and the connection between the gain and the service has a tendency to damage the legislature or the democratic process” (1995, 7). In the event of an institutional scandal, illegal conduct performed by an individual implicates the institution that person is associated with and undermines its reputation. Scandals are also classified on the basis of whether the scandal act is of high or low severity, ranging from “grand” to “petty,” and whether it is traditional or modern. Traditional scandals would include patronage and improper influence, while money laundering through electronic means would be a modern scandal.

Case Studies, Surveys, And Experimental Explorations Of Political Scandals

Systematic research on political scandals employs a variety of methodologies to understand their impact on voting behavior. Case studies show that the degree of scandal damage depends on its details. Ethical misconduct and moral charges are the most damaging and can harm severely or even irreversibly damage political careers, while campaign violations, bribery, abuse of congressional prerogatives, and relation with others involved in misdeeds leave only minor scars on the actors’ public profiles. Research on institutional scandals indicates that when blame can be shifted to endemic characteristics of the institution, it is diffused. The institution absorbs the negative impact of the scandal and the culpability of the individual member is discounted. In the case of individual scandals, as for instance bribery in return for a political favor, the blame does not involve the institution and its implications on the individual are more severe. In a public opinion survey, John Peters and Susan Welch (1978) found that the type of office the accused official occupies generates responsibilities and perceptions of these responsibilities shape scandal impact. The public allows executive office holders greater latitude to act and exercise a more independent style of political leadership compared with legislators. For that reason, public officials and the public react differently to explanations of corrupt behavior provided by legislators than to explanations provided by executives (e.g., mayors, governors, and presidents).The public is more forgiving of an executive’s misbehaviors compared to legislators’ misbehaviors. For the same reasons, judges are held to higher standards than are legislators.

Several scholars place emphasis on elements of the scandal publicity, such as the scandal frame and whether it is situated in the public or private sphere. As Paul Heywood notes (1997), when the act has an effect on the performance of public duty, it is considered “public,” and its implications are serious. However, activities driven by personal, “private” ends are considered to be outside the public sphere, lying outside the boundaries of public concern. The timing of the publicity also determines scandal impact. The further away a scandal breaks from an election, the more negligible its effect, because scandal impact deteriorates over time as novelty wears off. Scandal duration is also important. The longer a scandal stays on the public agenda, the more serious its implications, because its salience can shift voters’ opinions.

Experimental and survey evidence shows that character perceptions of those scandalized also determine scandal impact. According to Richard Fenno (1978), what a political actor gives off as a person has implications for accountability, because the public has the tendency to forgive people they know. Carol Funk (1996) and Tereza Capelos (2001) show that favorable political reputations centered around competence and qualification skills often operate as a protective shield, moderating the effect of a scandal. On the other hand, perceptions of integrity do not offer much cushion of support as they consistently plummet after a scandal. Also interesting is the finding that in the absence of reputation, scandal impact is more pronounced. The public evaluates unfamiliar political actors more harshly than politicians about whom they know something. Party identification is also shown to have a significant effect. As the literature on motivated reasoning suggests, party affiliation generates a feeling of identification. In the context of a scandal, partisan affiliation provides resistance to negative information that suppresses negative reactions and blame attribution. Issue agreement operates in a similar fashion. Public support for corrupt office holders is likely to continue among voters with strong policy preferences for the positions of the office holder, according to the findings of an experiment by Barry Rundquist, Gerald Strom, and John Peters (1977). Experimental studies also show that men and women are not evaluated in a uniform fashion in the context of a scandal. Leonie Huddy and Tereza Capelos (2002) find that female candidates enjoy a higher chance of survival due to gender stereotypes related to inferences of honesty.

Blame Management And Accounts

Scandal effects are manageable because political actors strive to maintain the approval of those to whom they are accountable. Kathleen McGraw (1991) explains that in their effort to shape citizens’ perceptions, politicians provide accounts, public explanations of their behavior. McGraw offers a fourfold typology of accounts: (1) Excuses deny some or any measure of responsibility of the offensive act in an attempt to weaken the causal link between the actor and the outcome. (2) Denials deny that the event in question occurred. (3) Justifications attempt to reframe the outcome, denying some or any measure of offensiveness in the act while admitting responsibility. (4) Concessions acknowledge the occurrence of the negative event with explicit or implicit assumption of responsibility, expression of regret, or offer of restitution.

Providing public accounts is a critical tactic that requires skill. McGraw provides evidence that the political loss can even be turned into political gain, if the reframing of the consequences of the act is successful. Serious offenses are associated with concessions, denials, and justifications, while seniority and high public support lower the likelihood of offering an explanation. Social-psychological literature also predicts a preference of concessions among female politicians and politicians of the ruling party, while politicians of the opposition use more excuses, assigning blame to the ones in power.

Despite the blame management efforts of those who find themselves caught in the web of public accountability, political transgressions stigmatize many political careers. Interestingly, in some cases the account can fall short of remedying the wrongdoing, creating unanticipated new problems. The cost for political actors translates to decreasing electoral margins, electoral defeat, resignation, or early retirement. In presidential systems, scandals are negatively related to electoral support for the party in control of the presidency. In parliamentary systems, they have implications for prime ministerial evaluations, following the decision to fire or protect scandal-implicated ministers. Scandals can erode trust and confidence in political institutions and the democratic system in general. The revelation that political actors abuse their power injects waves of public anger and encourages the rise of political cynicism and public disengagement. Political scandals are not only bad, however. They can be good when they expose abuses, promote public scrutiny toward openness in government, and stimulate debate about moral standards and political humility. Active citizens and accountable political leaders can mean gains for democratic politics.

Bibliography:

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