2005 ICA Political Communication Division Business Meeting, New York, NY

General Announcements (Gianpietro Mazzoleni):

The Political Communication Division is now the fifth largest division at ICA. It was previously the third largest division, but while its membership has continued to grow, membership in other divisions has grown faster. Membership is up 25% since 2003, and there are currently 522 members.

This year’s ICA meeting was attended by 2300, which is up from last year.

Program Planner’s Report (Patricia Moy):

At last year’s meeting in New Orleans, 141 papers were submitted and 88 were accepted. Six of nine submitted panels were accepted.

At this year’s meeting, 203 papers were submitted and 115 were accepted. Ten of 19 submitted panels were accepted. Most papers had three reviewers, and 169 reviewers took part in the reviewing process.

Web Site Information (Gianpietro Mazzoleni):

The division’s web site is located at: www.asc.upenn.edu/ica-policomm/

The division thanks Talia Stroud for putting it together. Division members are encouraged to send information about initiatives, calls for papers, position announcements, and other relevant material.

Newsletter Editor’s Report (Jill Edy):

The current editor will publish her last issue in August, 2005. The ICA Political Communication Division will select the next editor of the newsletter.

Joint Publications Committee Report (Montague Kern):

The ICA Political Communication Division’s representatives on the joint publications committee are Montague Kern, Barbara Pfetsch and Dhavan Shah.

Political Communication Report (Gianpietro Mazzoleni):

The journal’s volume this year comprised 550 pages, which is up from 500 pages last year. Upcoming articles include a study of the Daily Show and a review of Fahrenheit 9/11.

Proposed Award to Honor David Swanson (Gianpietro Mazzoleni):

Mazzoleni introduced a proposal for an award to be jointly presented by ICA and APSA every other year in honor of David Swanson. The proposed award would be called the David Swanson Award for Contributions to the Scholarly Infrastructure of Political Communication. The award would recognize service to the political communication divisions of ICA and APSA. It would be presented by a joint awards committee that included representatives from both divisions. The question of whether the award would be funded was left open.

Wolfgang Donsbach raised the question of what was meant by “scholarly infrastructure.” Ensuing discussion clarified that the award was meant to recognize the service of those who contributed to the field as journal editors, division leaders, and so on.

The sense of the division was that the proposed name of the award was somewhat awkward. After some discussion, the division agreed that the name of the award should be changed to the David Swanson Award for Service to Political Communication Scholarship.

Top Student Paper Awards (presented by Gianpietro Mazzoleni):

Three awards were presented. Authors of all three papers were present and received cash awards as well as plaques recognizing their achievements. Award winners were:

John C. Besley, Cornell University, “Entertainment Television and Its Interactions with Individual Values in Explaining Political Participation.”

Erik C. Nisbet, Cornell University, “Mass Media Use and Democratic Consolidation: The Case of Mali.”

Natalie Stroud, University of Pennsylvania, “Where There Is Smoke, There Is Fire: Media Effects, Selective Exposure and Fahrenheit 9/11."

Best Article of 2004 Award (presented by Winifried Schulz, committee chair):

Five scholars served on the committee this year:

Winifried Schulz, University of Nuremberg (chair)
Sandra Braman, University of Wisconsin
Lianne Fridriksson, Baylor University
Gerald Kosicki, Ohio State University
Howard Tumber, City University

The committee considered work published in 18 different journals and stipulated that at least one author must be an ICA member for the article to be eligible for the award. Schulz observed that there is a need for formalization of eligibility rules for the award, suggesting that such rules should speak to which journals should be considered by the committee.

The winning article is:

Jochen Peter, “Our Long Return to the Concept of Powerful Mass Media,” International Journal of Public Opinion Research.

Finalists were:

Rodney Benson, “Bringing the Sociology of Media Back in,” Political Communication.

Patricia Moy, Michael R. McCluskey, Kelley McCoy, and Margaret A. Spratt, “Political Correlates of Local News Media Use,” Journal of Political Communication.

Jochen Peter and Claese H. deVreese, “In Search of Europe: A Cross-National Comparative Study of the European Union in National Television News,” Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics.

Kathleen M. Schmitt, Albert C. Gunther, and Janice L. Liebhart, “Why Partisans See Mass Media as Biased,” Communication Research.

Dhavan V. Shah, Nojin Kwak, Mike Schmierbach, and Jessica Zubric, “The Interplay of News Frames on Cognitive Complexity,” Human Communication Research.

2006 ICA Meeting – Dresden, Germany

There is some discussion under way about a pre-conference or post-conference or both. Suggested sites for such a pre- or post-conference include Munich, Mainz, and Budapest. Another possibility would be to hold multiple pre- and/or post-conferences on different topics in different locations. Anyone interested in helping to organize a pre- or post-conference should contact conference organizers.

Incoming ICA President Ronald Rice paid a brief visit to the meeting to encourage members to attend the Dresden conference. A web site devoted to the meeting will be posted shortly at the main ICA website. The theme of the conference will be “Networking Communication Research.”