The center for Policy Analysis for California Education released
a report earlier this week that found Gov.-elect Arnold
Schwarzenegger received the lion’s share of media coverage in
the nine-week recall election, during which his support among
voters more than doubled.
The PACE study followed four newspapers ““ The New York
Times, the Los Angeles Times, the San Jose Mercury News and the San
Francisco Chronicle ““ and found they all reported on
Schwarzenegger as much or more than incumbent Gov. Gray Davis and
far more than any other candidate, especially during the beginning
and end of the election.
Other major candidates ““ State Sen. Tom McClintock,
R-Thousand Oaks, Peter Camejo and Arianna Huffington ““
received minimal coverage compared to Schwarzenegger.
When PACE compared the amount of news space each candidate other
than Davis received, Schwarzenegger averaged 40 percent of the
coverage, Democratic front-runner Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante received
27 percent, and the combined coverage of McClintock, Huffington and
Camejo averaged 34 percent.
The media’s intense focus on Schwarzenegger during the
beginning and end of the campaign helped catalyze
Schwarzenegger’s rapid rise in the polls, said Bruce Fuller,
a professor of education and public policy at the University of
California, Berkeley and head of the PACE research committee.
“The data suggests that (Schwarzenegger’s)
domination of the media coverage helped to legitimize his
candidacy,” Fuller said.
Leah Lievrouw, a professor in UCLA’s graduate department
of information studies, agreed with Fuller’s hypothesis.
Lievrouw said it is likely that the sheer volume of coverage
Schwarzenegger received ““ much of it positive, especially in
the early part of the campaign ““ was influential.
“If you are a regular news reader and you see
Schwarzenegger is being covered in the same volume as Davis, there
is no question that that gives the impression that he is the one to
watch, the major challenger,” she said.
Lievrouw said articles that discussed negative aspects of
Schwarzenegger did little to counter the support he gained as a
result of earlier coverage because they came too late to influence
many voters, many of whom had already made up their minds.
Even articles in the Los Angeles Times that reported allegations
from 15 women who said Schwarzenegger sexually harassed them did
not have a significant effect on his support.
The vast amount of coverage Schwarzenegger received also could
have given him an edge over established politicians such as
Bustamante and McClintock because “it is hard not to conclude
that a person is important if they are getting so much space in the
paper,” Lievrouw said.
Fuller and Lievrouw both said the immense media focus on
Schwarzenegger was especially beneficial to him because of the
shortness of the election.
Fuller said the “blizzard” of coverage may have
helped legitimize Schwarzenegger’s campaign, while the
briefness of the recall election allowed him to avoid discussing
policy with which he was still becoming familiar.
Lievrouw agreed that the limited length of the election worked
in Schwarzenegger’s favor, saying that the media had less
time to develop its stories, dig into the past and make the
candidates explain their programs.
The study also found that California daily papers devoted more
time to analyzing the candidates sparse position statements than
The New York Times, which focused more on the personalities of the
candidates.
Lievrouw said The New York Times’ approached the recall as
an entertaining story which, because of its status as one of the
most prestigious papers in the nation, set a tone for other papers
and television media.