Transmitting Information to the Press

H ow DO PUBLIC OFFICIALS ISSUE messages about their positions and activities to others in their political environment? Policy makers depend on the press to disseminate many of these messages. A large part of the press-government relationship consists of officials and reporters interacting as one seeks to make news, the other to gather it. A number of previous studies have sought to examine the techniques officials use in this interaction. However, some have dealt with only a few techniques and have often treated them as implicit parts of a discussion focused on other concerns.1 Others have been more comprehensive in categorizing the methods utilized to make the press.2 But none of these studies has attempted comprehensive categorization and then compared groups of public officials to discover if the various offices within a political system differentiate the ways officials utilize the press to transmit information. This identifies a gap in our knowledge concerning the press-official relationship. Filling this gap would permit more knowledge of the ways officials seek to make information available about political matters; it would also allow greater understanding of the way an individual's office structures his relations with the press. Consequently, the aim of this paper is to explore three questions: What techniques do officials use to transmit information to the press? Do different groups of officials use dif

Political science · Public Policy and Administration Research

• Meeting with the mass media

  Ofer Feldman•Political Communication•1986

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• Frequency of contact between japanese politicians and the press

  Ofer Feldman•Political Communication•1985

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