Political Communication in the Global Age - Does political advertising Essay

Political Communication in the Global Age - Does political advertising undermine or support democracy - Essay Example Most of their competitive campaigns include huge numbers of advertisements and negative appeal. Such campaigns can overwhelm voters. It makes them think these communications are manipulative and may turn them off. However, at the same time, such communications and campaigns are responsible for giving people access to information, keeping them up to date and engaged, it mobilizes them, gives them choice, gives them freedom, help those who are politically unsophisticated and bring many other advantages that positively impact democracy. Political advertising supports democracy by giving people choice and access to information as it is but to enable it to facilitate order and democracy even more, it should be driven by some regulations. More research needs to be carried out to identify gaps in political advertising versus democracy. When customers are in the process of making a decision about a commercial product – whether to buy it or not; they need to have information about that product. Better yet, they should be able to engage and interact with the product to get a better idea about it. In my opinion, having this information makes these customers powerful and facilitates decision-making. However, whether this decision is the â€Å"best† one or not is unclear until customers actually start using a product after purchase. Similarly, before voting, customers might need relevant information to be able to vote. At the same time however, well-equipped and even better funded candidates and political parties can devastate the voter with their political advertising campaigns that may include negative, competitive and attack ads. This paper will look at the arguments for and against political advertising and its relationship with democracy. It will then conclude whether political advertising undermines or supports democracy. To give readers a head start, the following section will explain what political advertising is and how, as a marketing tool,