Are voters beginning to lose interest in scandals?

Are voters beginning to lose interest in scandals?

Journalism
Topic: Are voters beginning to lose interest in scandals?
Introduction
– define ‘scandals’
– Define ‘lose interest’
Body
– How interest is measured, eg. via pageview, newspaper circulation, tweets, etc.
– Consequences of scandals
– Brief discussion of the issue of distinguishing between coverage and actual interest and
whether interest translates into actions
*consider similar types of scandals from different time periods to chart the changes over time,
eg. Suez and Iraq, Nixon and Trump, Belchers and the MPs’ expenses scandal, Thorpe and
David Laws*
*two-thirds of examples must be UK-based*
– Voters conduct their own research in this Information Age, they are careful with what
they read: credibility of newspapers/sources
– Voters become numb to scandals as there are so many; candidates fire at each other
with unlimited political scandals at this day and age
– Voters believe in the candidate despite his/her shortcomings because they are
desperate for a change, e.g. Trump
– Voters ’turn a blind eye’ to their own party’s misbehavior: their lack of political knowledge
often suggests scandals do little to change voting results
Counter-arguments
– serious political, economic, social issues have taken a backseat
– Voters look for negative news
– E.g. George bush
References
Book:
– the Political Costs of the 2009 MPs Expenses Scandals (2014)
– Politics in a Changing World (2014)
– Campaigns and Political Marketing (2013)
– Political Journalism: New Challenges, new Practices (2013)
Journals:
– Turning a Blind Eye Experimental Evidence of Partisan Bias Attitudes Towards
Corruption (2013)
– Political Hypocrisy: The effects of political scandals on candidate evaluations (2013)
Links:
– http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2015/11/16/state-level-corruption-scandals-do-little-to-ch
ange-voters-minds-about-political-parties