Overall, the media play an essential role in shaping collective views and opinions on various issues. Various agents of social construction create the image of any social institution. The idea of the civil service in the media today can be very ambiguous. On the one hand, civil servants are often accused of not paying due attention to citizens’ problems, incompetence, and deliberate bureaucratization of public administration (Bergström & Jervelycke Belfrage, 2018).
On the other hand, the civil service traditionally has a certain irrationally cynical image-prestige, opportunities to convert administrative resources into financial resources, etc. Finally, it is necessary to remember the proper positioning of the civil service as serving the interests of the state and society as a whole. The media can have a significant influence on the image of a particular state institution because it appeals directly to the minds of ordinary citizens.
The negative image of any social institution negatively affects society’s attitude towards it, and when it comes to public service, the consequences of such a negative attitude are severe. The civil service symbolizes power and relations for the population, and the negative image of officials leads to distrust of the authorities, causes social disorganization, frustration, and apathy. Image can be interpreted as one of the forms of social regulation and self-regulation of human behavior: individual and group. Image researchers believe that a professional skill alone will not provide a person with a job or a promotion (Bergström & Jervelycke Belfrage, 2018). To achieve success, it is required to win over the people a person works with; that is, a person needs to create the right image.
The coverage of civil servants’ work in the media and how successfully they cope with this task becomes of paramount importance for the formation of citizens ‘ perception of the authorities’ activities. The media activities are designed to strengthen the confidence of citizens in the power structures and form their favorable image. As a rule, measures to create the image of a civil servant are not isolated but represent a system of mutually agreed actions.
These actions are aimed at citizens, partners, opposition politicians, raising the prestige of the government itself as such. Naturally, the image of civil servants is formed, first of all, by adequate coverage and reflection in the media through other channels of the actual activities of officials.
Unfortunately, the media are often unfair in depicting the actions of state officials, laying an extremely negative attitude towards them among citizens. Due to the influence of the media, officialdom is often associated with a faceless gray mass or with unattractive people in glasses and jackets of not the first freshness. The media also often portray the civil service as something that stands on a par with a pile of papers, regression, or the lack of creativity that allows a person to create new things (Bergström & Jervelycke Belfrage, 2018).
The media often expose officials as negligent, indifferent, corrupt bureaucrats and thieves-businessmen in the most unfavorable light. Officials are a convenient object for attributing to them the causes of all the people’s troubles and misfortunes. The image of a businessman-an impudent grabber, stuffing his pocket and caring only about himself, is quite familiar to many ordinary people and was created not without the help of the media.
Due to the unfair attitude of the media, it can be difficult for officials to build a long-term perspective of work, to highlight the deep meaning of current events and state activities. The image of a civil servant and government structures are interrelated and depend on the type, character, and image of civil servants themselves, which citizens constantly encounter in everyday life. The media can promote specific ideas and ideologies, influencing the mass consciousness and the dominant point of view.
Reference
Bergström, A., & Jervelycke Belfrage, M. (2018). News in social media: Incidental consumption and the role of opinion leaders. Digital Journalism, 6(5), 583-598.