'Playing by the Book': Success and Failure in John Major's Approach to Prime Ministerial Media Management

Abstract

Both the Thatcher and the Blair governments have been accused of politicising the Prime Ministerial press operation. This article asks whether it is possible to maintain a constitutionally clearer demarcation between the expressly political and the strictly governmental, and at the same time still pursue a successful communications strategy. Based on semi-structured interviews with both national journalists and government and party media managers, it uses the example of the Major governments to illustrate that it is not. But it also argues, using the same example, that, unless we insist on a simplistic and outmoded conception of 'prime ministerial power', there is no simple correlation between, on the one hand, success and professionalised political control and, on the other, failure and what is termed here a 'civil service' approach.