Institutions of Democracy

This report examines how the Telecommunications Act of 1996 created a highly pro-competitive strategic direction for public policy-makers that federal, state regulators, and state legislators appear to be following.

This report compares the 105th Congress to those that preceded it. This report is predicated on the assumption that strong partisanship and civility are not mutually exclusive.

The Minnesota Compact recognizes that improving the quality of public discourse requires a systemic solution involving the public, the press, and politicians.

APPC prepared a background report on civility in the House of Representatives for the bipartisan retreat held in Hershey, Pennsylvania during March of 1997.

This report analyzed thirteen television spots and fifteen free time spots in the 1997 New Jersey governor’s race.

This conference, hosted by the Annenberg Public Policy center, explored issues of accountability and disclosure in political advertising on television.

This report catalogs one of the most intriguing and thorny new practices to come onto the political scene in many years – the heavy use of so-called “issue advocacy” adverting by political parties, labor unions, trade associations and business, ideological and single-issue groups during the last campaign.

“Free Air Time and Campaign Reform, a conference co-sponsored by the Annenberg Public Policy Center and Free TV for Straight Talk Coalition and funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts, gathered nearly 200 members of the press, scholars in communications and politics, campaign reform advocates, campaign practitioners, consultants and candidates.

APPC Report #10, March 1997   About the author Kathleen Hall Jamieson is Professor of Communication and Dean of the Annenberg School for Communication and Director of the Annenberg Public Policy Program of the University of Pennsylvania. She is the author of Eloquence in an Electronic Age (Oxford, 1988), Dirty Politics (Oxford, 1992), and Packaging