公关政治：当代西方政治生活的形态呈现

Politics of Public Relations: The Presentation of Contemporary Western Political Life

自20世纪后半叶以来,形象、议题与媒体日渐成为西方政治过程的重要节点,其政治生活形态则相应逐渐呈现出由选举政治到公关政治的嬗变过程。由于西方政治研究囿于民主选举与权力制衡两大视角,已无法有效解读西方政治生活的这一变化,亟须建构一种新的问题分析范式,以实现对西方公关政治生活形态的理论上的剖解、研析和实践上的判读、应对。通过对西方公关政治生活密室化和娱乐化的两种形态的框定、政治权力序列结构变化的厘析和政党形态的描述,我们认为西方公关政治的兴起将导致公共领域的崩塌,更会改变西方民主政治的生态,民主的深刻价值将被隐藏和稀释,其引以为傲的自由选举日益沦为一种表演,狂欢下的虚伪和事实上的低效则将是这种表演带来的必然结果。

Image,issue and the media have become important nodes in the process of west politics since the second half of the twentieth century. The political life pattern has correspondingly evoluted from electoral to public-relation( PR) based politics. The research paradigm of western politics,focused on the topics of democratic election and power balance,has gradually lost its effectiveness in interpreting the process. New paradigms are urgently needed to be constructed to provide theoretical analysis and practical response. By analyzing the two kinds of political characteristics,presented as backroom and entertainment,we presume that the rise of PR based politics would lead to the collapse of public domain and the dilution of democratic value in western society. The free electoral system,which has been proud of all along,would gradually reduce to a delusive show.