Społeczny odbiór debat przedwyborczych kampanii parlamentarnej 2011

Pre-election TV debates are not merely a means of providing information. Their primary objective is the implementation of carefully formulated marketing strategy. The process of making politics personalized and entertaining undoubtedly contributes to the surge in their popularity. They become not only a means of conveying the information included in election manifestos or outlining the profiles of candidates. They create a kind of show, based on specific rules and a top-down program, designed to reach out to voters effectively. Public opinion polls clearly show that the evaluation of the effectiveness of such programs is strongly correlated with the declared policy preferences. This article presents an image of pre-election debates with the use of the 2011 parliamentary campaign. The main aim of the discussion is to answer the question of whether pre-election television debates are an effective way of reaching out to voters. The second aspect of the analysis is the context of ”the debate over the debate”, which gives a specific character to the events described.