Includes references and index.

Contents: Introduction: The crisis of civic communication -- Structure: Linkages between the mass media and politics -- Politicians and the press: An essay on role relationships -- The orientations of journalists to social and political institutions -- Towards a comparative framework for political communication research -- Comparative research: the extending frontier -- The formation of campaign agendas in the United States and Britain -- Political communication systems and democratic values -- Development: Producers' attitudes towards television coverage of an election campaign (UK election 1966) -- The construction of election news at the BBC (1979) -- Setting the television news agenda (1983) -- The earnest versus the determined: election news-making at the BBC (1987) -- Struggles for meaningful election communication (1992) -- Longitudinal analysis of an election communication communication system: newsroom observation at the BBC, 1966-92 -- Conclusion: The crisis of communication for citizenship: In and out of the ashes.