Elections belong to voters 

The election date has been set. The official campaign period begins next week but unofficially the gloves have been off for months now.

The first skirmish has Helen Clark and John Key pitted against the leaders of the minor parties over their decision to skip the televised all-leaders debates.

This pact has been criticised, especially by the smaller parties, as being anti-democratic and anti-MMP. It has been defended, mainly by political insiders and journalists, as reflecting the reality of our two-tiered party system leading to two separate elections: one for Prime Minister, the other for potential coalition/support partners.

The best way to evaluate the Clark-Key pact is to ask a couple of broader questions: What is the purpose of an election campaign and what should we expect from our politicians and media throughout it?

It is impossible to overstate the importance of elections - they are the foundation of representative democracy. Elections give the voter an equal say, not in decision-making, but in electing the decision-makers.  At elections MPs are held to account by the people they represent.

Elections in New Zealand have an added importance. Unlike most other modern democracies, our parliament is sovereign. It does not share power with an upper house or state governments.  It is not limited by an entrenched constitution or Bill of Rights enforced by the courts using judicial review.

Triennial elections provide the only formal check on New Zealand's parliament.

An election is not a horse race, and it is not simply about who wins and who loses. Elections are the one time most New Zealanders actively engage in their political system - voting has become their only form of political participation.

The problem is voters, politicians and the media all enter the election arena with different, and to some extent, incompatible agendas.

What voters want most from a campaign is information, and in particular, policy information.

Election campaigns should spark national debate on important issues. More specifically, voters want to know what parties plan to do if elected. And The New Zealand Election Study  (NZES) found the vast majority of voters also want to know which parties plan to work together after the election.

Voters believe this information is crucial to an informed decision on election day. Henry Milner  has found a connection between having this information and maintaining high voter turnout. In the absence of such information voting is thought to be less worthwhile -a t best pointless and at worst risky.

The media is now the main link between candidates and voters.

But media scholars question whether they are providing the information voters need. According to Swanson and Mancini, the media tend to prefer personality over ideas; simplicity over complexity; and confrontation over compromise.

Campaigns have become increasingly "presidential" with more focus on party leaders and less on party platforms. Ratings are crucial and therefore entertaining the public is more important than educating them.

Chris Rudd and Scott Connew* from the University of Otago studied newspaper coverage of the smaller parties during the 2005 election campaign. They found that positive stories and coverage of policy were infrequent. Instead stories that could be framed in terms of personality, conflict and drama were preferred.

Moreover, smaller parties that were elusive about their post-election plans were given more coverage than parties that were open about them. The former were deemed newsworthy because they were "unpredictable" and promised a surprise ending; the latter were largely ignored because they lacked suspense and relevance.

There is an inherent tension then between what voters want from election coverage and what the media provide. But while the media are popular scapegoats, the public and politicians also share some of the blame.

The media have a commercial reality that is driven by ratings. Although the public claims to want more policy focus and better political analysis, the media complain that ratings for such coverage are poor.

Similarly politicians complain bitterly about how they are treated by the media: Interviewing styles have become aggressive; politicians are automatically treated as if they are either lying or manipulating the truth. But the media complain that politicians are now "media trained" to avoid answering their questions; their aggressive style is designed to cut through the politicians' "spin".

According to one former political insider, the uneasy relationship between candidates and media has led to politicians adopting a more cautious election strategy - elections are all about "avoiding blunders". But this approach is not conducive to the voter's need for more information.

The public wants information; the leaders want to "win", and the television networks want good ratings. In the last One News Colmar Brunton poll Labour and National, combined, took 88% of the total vote. The battle over the all-leaders debate is best understood in light of all this.

While there may be little incentive for Clark and Key to take part in the all-leaders debates, there is an obligation: Elections belong to voters and their needs during the campaign should take precedence.

Voters want information about policy and post-election partnerships. The more they see their leaders debate the important issues of the day, live and unscripted, the better. And it is fitting that at least one of those debates replicates the multi-party environment of parliament.

The onus then is on Clark and Key to front up, on the networks to provide a format that generates an informative, civil debate and on the voters to watch it.

*The study by Chris Rudd and Scott Connew is published in Political Science, Vol 59, No 2, December 2007.