Analyzing Presidential Debates

Abstract

One of the most used theories in the research of political debates is the functional theory of campaign discourse. However, the theory has been criticized for being too culturally limited. In the present article, a Finnish presidential debate is analyzed from the perspective of functional theory. The goal is to critically evaluate the applicability of functional theory to the analysis of Finnish political campaigning. The results show that a Finnish presidential debate differs in many ways from an American presidential debate. The study shows how strongly the culture is reflected in political television debates and how important it is to take account of the cultural perspective in the development of a theory.