Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This study investigated how media frames of two “axis-of-evil” leaders, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, influence people’s perceptions of the leaders. In particular, we examined the effects of two types of frames (enemy vs. dialogue partner) and two types of story focus (policy vs. personal), while controlling for people’s familiarity with and favorability to the leaders and their countries. Conducting a between-subjects experiment, we found that the enemy and dialogue partner frames of Ahmadinejad and Kim had a significant impact on people’s perceptions of the leaders as a threat to the United States and as being open to dialogue with the United States. Moreover, the impact of the enemy frame depended on whether news stories focused on policies of the leaders or their personal traits and political maneuvering. The influence of the enemy frame was stronger when the frame was used in a story focusing on personal traits of the leaders than on policies of the leaders. Our study offers important empirical evidence regarding how media frames influence audiences’ perceptions of foreign leaders. Implications of the study are discussed in terms of the media coverage of international issues.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: The premise of political priming is that public evaluations of political leaders are made on the basis of issues that are on the top of citizens’ mind. This study investigated the impact of a national referendum campaign about a European integration issue on the evaluation of the incumbent government, the Prime Minister as well opposition leaders. Drawing on a content analysis of news media and a two-wave panel survey, the results showed that as the topic of the referendum (the introduction of the euro) became more visible in the media during the campaign, the importance of the euro issue for formulating general evaluations of political leaders increased. The incumbent government that was seen to handle the referendum poorly was penalized by the referendum. Exposure to news media outlets that covered the referendum extensively and offered negative evaluations of political leaders boosted the decline in overall performance rating of political leaders for politically less involved respondents. These results stress the necessity of considering the campaign and the specific content of the media to understand fluctuations in public opinion during a referendum campaign.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Opinion leaders are a prime target group for any company. Studies on consumer behaviour support the importance of personal sources of information and influence. Still, careful attention should be given to methods of identifying these individuals.
We assess existing methods to identify opinion leaders. In particular, we address the question whether the most prominent construct, the King/Summers scale, is able to reliably and validly identify those individuals that perform as opinion givers.
On the basis of a survey of 10’100 respondents on money matters, we test this concept of opinion leadership. We show that without the benefit of ego-centred network analysis any study runs the risk of misjudging the importance of individuals identified as opinion leaders. We suggest a combination of network size and opinion leadership, arriving at a role differentiation of four groups. With this, we draft a communication model for active opinion leaders, communicators, silent experts and inactives.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper intends to synthesize the existing literatures in psychology, political science, and management relating to the impact of expertise and interest on the foreign policy decision making behavior of leaders. We will develop new measures of these variables (leader policy expertise, policy experience, and policy interest) for use in assessing foreign leaders at a distance. Drawing our theoretical hypotheses from this literature, a broad population of world leaders (using both public and non-public sources) will be examined using our newly developed measures - so that we can begin to assess both the validity of our theoretical hypotheses as well as of our measures. We will analyze the results to see whether the expected behavioral correlates we anticipated seeing with varying levels of leader policy expertise, experience, or interest do indeed vary in the predicted directions for our leaders in their observed foreign policy decision behavior. This framework will then be integrated into existing models of assessment-at-a-distance of leaders employing other measures of individual characteristics. Specifically, M.G. Hermann's Leader Trait Analysis (LTA) content analytic technique and Preston's framework linking individual leader characteristics to styles affecting the structuring and use of advisory systems will be augmented with this new framework dealing with the impact of leader expertise, experience, and interest on behavior. The goal is to begin the process of developing more robust models for analyzing and predicting foreign leader behavior and policy making at a distance. Further, since there is very little research in the existing literature in which operationalized measures of leader policy expertise, experience, and interest are developed and tested, it is hoped that this research might help to begin filling this gap.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to explore the role that a charismatic figure plays in social movements. Using two prominent leaders--Stephen Bantu Biko and Martin Luther King, Jr.--as case studies, I examine the manner in which charisma is historically understood and explained in the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) of South Africa and the Civil Rights Movement (CRM) of the United States. In addition, I attempt to provide counterarguments to four traditional charismatic leadership frameworks. More specifically, I address and challenge the following theoretical premises: (1) Charisma is an innate characteristic (2) A single charismatic leader is necessary for movement success (3) A charismatic figure becomes an indispensable, almost “God-like,” role model for people to emulate, and (4) The death of a charismatic leader signals the inevitable decline of the movement. Finally, my thesis attempts to further complicate these perspectives by suggesting that charisma be understood as a form of cultural capital. This explanation, I hope, will add another layer to the current literature on social movements.