Political Corruption

Political corruption is a term generally used to describe the abuse of political or public office for private gain. Some of the more common forms of corruption concern issues of access to legislators and members of the executive branch, as well as patronage. It has been argued that while corruption is widespread and often considered systemic in many political systems, it is generally only in liberal democracies that its exposure leads to what has become a mainstay of modern political media coverage: the political scandal.

Political communication scholars have been interested in corruption especially as it pertains to three different areas: the increased importance of money in politics in general and campaigns in particular as a reason for an apparent increase of corruption, the exposure of corruption by the media, and the reaction following this exposure by the media and the persons involved.

It has been well established that political activity today poses higher financial burdens on the actors than ever before. While corruption for personal gain is certainly not uncommon, this motive does not account for the apparent increase in such practices. However, one of the issues that has often been related to this increase is the issue of financing political activity in modern society. The rising costs of political campaigns at all levels of government are generally a result of the increased need for advertising and as such have been well documented. It is generally thought that as political actors increasingly feel the pressure to secure higher levels of funding for their campaigns and for party activities, an increase in financial corruption is a likely result. In exchange for financial contributions, access may be granted or decisions may be made in favor of the funding sources. In the United States, campaign finance reform, including setting limits on contributions or spending, or even public financing, has often been touted as having the potential to limit corruption. However, political systems that do impose such limitations are not immune to corruption, as the wave of scandals throughout the world—for example, in Brazil, the Czech Republic, and Germany—has shown.

Another focus of media researchers is the investigation of the media's role in exposing corruption. This function of the media is often described as the fulfillment of its role as the Fourth Estate, providing checks on the functioning of government and contributing to remedying the consequences of corruption. The exposure of corruption and corrupt practices within the government are often the result of in-depth investigative reporting. It has been argued that in the United States, the media's execution of this function has diminished in recent years after its heyday during and immediately following the Watergate era. Similar developments have been discovered in the United Kingdom and throughout Europe. The so-called tabloidization of the media may be partially to blame, as the focus of news coverage has increasingly become the personal rather than the political or systemic. Under this model, the goal of investigative reporting has become to expose private peccadilloes rather than abuses of power and position. Additionally, patterns of media ownership have been cited as a reason for the decline of investigative reporting. On the one hand, the resources provided for newsgathering have generally declined under corporate ownership. On the other hand, conflicts of interest that may inhibit the exposure of financial connections between powerful interest groups or businesses and political actors may also have an influence on the nature of reporting.

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