Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign

This paper analyses the loss of Barisan Nasional (BN), a dominant party that had ruled Malaysia for the last 60 years and the rise of a new party Pakatan Harapan (PH), during the recent General Elections. The objective is to understand the campaigns launched during the 14th General Election, the str...

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Main Author:	Syed Abdullah Idid, Syed Arabi
Format:	Conference or Workshop Item
Language:	English English
Published:	2018
Subjects:	JQ719 Elections in Malaysia P87 Communication. Mass media
Online Access:	http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/ http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/ http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/2/Final%20Program%20UiTM%20-ICA%20REGIONAL%20CONFERENCE%202018.pdf http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/3/FOR%20IREP%20ICA%20BN%20CAMPAIGN%20241018.pdf

id	iium-67980
recordtype	eprints
spelling	iium-679802018-12-06T08:30:26Z http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/ Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign Syed Abdullah Idid, Syed Arabi JQ719 Elections in Malaysia P87 Communication. Mass media This paper analyses the loss of Barisan Nasional (BN), a dominant party that had ruled Malaysia for the last 60 years and the rise of a new party Pakatan Harapan (PH), during the recent General Elections. The objective is to understand the campaigns launched during the 14th General Election, the strategies and the issues championed. The question is posed whether campaigns matter? Can campaigns affect election outcome by influencing voter attitude and behaviour? This paper used findings from several studies to evaluate the effectiveness of campaigns by illustrating how campaigns used communication to acclaim, attack and defend their positions to gain voter sympathy (Benoit, 2007). There were advantages in the acclaim, attack and defense for BN but they were of no might to the attacks launched by PH against BN. BN’s strategy was premised of a return to power with a stronger majority causing party officials to conduct a campaign strategy geared more for party members than the voters. On the other hand, Pakatan Harapan assumed themselves as underdogs to woo the voters. Several issues influenced negatively the BN campaigns. Declaring Wednesday a voting day in the hope to have a low voter turnout and thus work to its advantage, disfavoured BN when voters expressed sympathy with the opposition parties. The redelineation exercise where several constituencies were amended, did not work to the advantage of BN as they were assumed to be. BN had assumed the popularity of their past programmes and policies with the voters as contained in the manifestos. Our studies found voters to generally favour issues highlighted by PH than BN. 2018 Conference or Workshop Item NonPeerReviewed application/pdf en http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/2/Final%20Program%20UiTM%20-ICA%20REGIONAL%20CONFERENCE%202018.pdf application/pdf en http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/3/FOR%20IREP%20ICA%20BN%20CAMPAIGN%20241018.pdf Syed Abdullah Idid, Syed Arabi (2018) Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign. In: ICA Regional Conference 2018, 24th-25th Oct. 2018, Shah Alam, Selangor. (Unpublished) http://icamalaysia.uitm.edu.my/
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Local University
institution	International Islamic University Malaysia
building	IIUM Repository
collection	Online Access
language	English English
topic	JQ719 Elections in Malaysia P87 Communication. Mass media
spellingShingle	JQ719 Elections in Malaysia P87 Communication. Mass media Syed Abdullah Idid, Syed Arabi Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign
description	This paper analyses the loss of Barisan Nasional (BN), a dominant party that had ruled Malaysia for the last 60 years and the rise of a new party Pakatan Harapan (PH), during the recent General Elections. The objective is to understand the campaigns launched during the 14th General Election, the strategies and the issues championed. The question is posed whether campaigns matter? Can campaigns affect election outcome by influencing voter attitude and behaviour? This paper used findings from several studies to evaluate the effectiveness of campaigns by illustrating how campaigns used communication to acclaim, attack and defend their positions to gain voter sympathy (Benoit, 2007). There were advantages in the acclaim, attack and defense for BN but they were of no might to the attacks launched by PH against BN. BN’s strategy was premised of a return to power with a stronger majority causing party officials to conduct a campaign strategy geared more for party members than the voters. On the other hand, Pakatan Harapan assumed themselves as underdogs to woo the voters. Several issues influenced negatively the BN campaigns. Declaring Wednesday a voting day in the hope to have a low voter turnout and thus work to its advantage, disfavoured BN when voters expressed sympathy with the opposition parties. The redelineation exercise where several constituencies were amended, did not work to the advantage of BN as they were assumed to be. BN had assumed the popularity of their past programmes and policies with the voters as contained in the manifestos. Our studies found voters to generally favour issues highlighted by PH than BN.
format	Conference or Workshop Item
author	Syed Abdullah Idid, Syed Arabi
author_facet	Syed Abdullah Idid, Syed Arabi
author_sort	Syed Abdullah Idid, Syed Arabi
title	Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign
title_short	Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign
title_full	Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign
title_fullStr	Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign
title_full_unstemmed	Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign
title_sort	barisan nasional in ge 14: miscalculating the political campaign
publishDate	2018
url	http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/ http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/ http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/2/Final%20Program%20UiTM%20-ICA%20REGIONAL%20CONFERENCE%202018.pdf http://irep.iium.edu.my/67980/3/FOR%20IREP%20ICA%20BN%20CAMPAIGN%20241018.pdf
first_indexed	2023-09-18T21:36:31Z
last_indexed	2023-09-18T21:36:31Z
_version_	1777412856761810944

Barisan Nasional in GE 14: miscalculating the political campaign

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