Political Dramaturgy: A Dramaturg's (Re)View

Author(s): Art Borreca

Source: TDR (1988-), Vol. 37, No. 2 (Summer, 1993), pp. 56-79
Published by: The MIT Press
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Political

Dramaturgy

A Dramaturg's(Re)View

Art Borreca

Theatretakesplace all the time whereverone is, and art simplyfacilitatespersuadingone this is the case.
-John Cage (in Gilman 1969:231)

Context
Philosophical
In his Lives, Plutarch tells us that the Greek poet and politician Solon
went to see Thespis following one of his performances. Solon "asked
[Thespis] if he was not ashamed to tell so many lies before such a number
of people":
and Thespis replying that it was no harm to say or do so in a play,
Solon vehemently struck his staff against the ground: "Ah," said he,
"If we honor and commend such play as this, we shall find it some
day in our business." (n.d.: I 5)
Whatever the historical truth of this anecdote, it dramatizes a truism about
the relationship between theatre and politics throughout Western history.
Ever since theatre emerged as an aesthetic mode, both theatre practitioners
and politicians, from Thespis and Solon to Harold Pinter and Ronald
Reagan, have had to deal with the affinities between politics and theatre.
As Erving Goffinan wrote, "All the world is not, of course, a stage, but
the crucial ways in which it isn't are not easy to specify" (Goffman
1959:72). Substituting "politics" for the "world," the same might be said
about political life.
In what sense is politics dramatic and theatrical? Or, to follow Goffman
more closely, in what crucial ways is politics not theatrical?Since the I96os
a cross-disciplinary field of research and discourse in the social sciences,
known as "dramaturgy" or "dramaturgism," has burgeoned under the application of such questions to social interaction.' The field has historical
The Drama Review 37, no. 2 (TI38),

Summer 1993

56

Dramaturgy 57

roots in dramatic theory (e.g., Nikolai Evreinov's The Theatrein Life,

I927), literary theory (Kenneth Burke's "dramatism"),and sociology
(Erving Goffinan on role theory and frame analysis).It has grown as an
area mainly within sociology, but also within other disciplines,including
anthropology,social psychology, political science, philosophy, and performance studies. It has received contributionsfrom major figures in several
of these fields: for example, Hugh Duncan, Gustaf Ichheiser, Theodore
Sarbin,and Rom Harre(among others)in social psychology;Victor Turner
and CliffordGeertz in anthropology;MurrayEdelmanin political science;
RichardSchechnerin performancestudies.
The field is eye-blurringly wide: it is not uncommon to find
(as they are called) in one discipline (say, social psychol"dramaturgists"
who
seem
to
be unawareof dramaturgical
work in another (say, perogy)
formancestudies).2In an age of immense specialization,the dramaturgical
literaturerefreshesa dogged readerwith the old (but not dead) idea that
the humanitiesand social sciences share a common goal of understanding
human being.Although what "dramaturgists"
see in social realityis circumscribed by the theatrical paradigm, the best work acknowledges the
paradigm'slimits. Like any form of knowledge, dramaturgyis subject to
the limits of concept formation;its genius derives from how flexibly and
exhaustivelyit can employ the theatricalparadigmto get at how human
beings act, as Goffman would have said, "when they come into each
other'spresence."

Now is the time to take stock of dramaturgicalprinciples

from the perspective of the theatre, to see what understanding of the theatre has been employed all along, and to evaluate what might yet be done with the theatricalparadigm.
Not all the major thinkerswho have contributedto dramaturgywould
acknowledge themselves as dramaturgists.A history of dramaturgymight
include the media theoristsMarshallMcLuhanand Neil Postman, as well
as Daniel Boorstin (a historian)and RaymondWilliams(like Burke, a literary critic whose work led him to sociology), all of whom have constructed
paradigmsfor the dramatizingor theatricalizingeffects of the media in a
technologicalsociety. The most perceptivepolitical dramaturgybordersat
many points on such dramaturgicallyoriented media theory, although it
has tended to overlook dramaturgyoutside its own discipline.
That politics should become one of the main concers of dramaturgyis
not surprising,given the political history of the past three decades. First,
there has been the growth of the media's role in political processes, and
the symptomsand effects of that growth: the decline of old forms of "faceto-face"political rhetoric;the increasingscrutinyof politiciansin terms of
their public and private "characters";
and the proliferationof public affairs
programsthat "re-play"political events for us. Second, there have been
heavily mediatedevents: Vietnam, the first "televisionwar";such national
"dramas"as Watergate and Iran-Contra;the two-term presidency of a
formeractor;and the Gulf War, in which a televisionnetwork, CNN, was
as much a "player"as were the nationsinvolved.
Within political science, dramaturgy burgeoned in sync with these
events. The field grew exponentiallyfrom the mid-I97os to the mid-Ig8os,

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Borreca

in response (apparently)to Nixon and Watergateand then Reagan'sfirst

studies.As in
term. In the mid-Ig80s there was a decline in dramaturgical
all academic industries, the field reached a point where it had been
"plowed";it seemed as if there might not be that much more to say about
the applicationof theatreto politics. Reaganhad fulfilledthe prophecy;reality had overtakentheory. Yet articlesin the field still appear,and a glance
at the evening news revealsthat the theatricalparadigmhasn't lost its relevance; it has gained relevance.Now is the time to take stock of dramaturgical principles from the perspective of the theatre, to see what
understanding(or lack of understanding)of the theatrehas been employed
all along, and to evaluatewhat might yet be done with the theatricalparadigm. As long as televised (i.e., staged)politicalevent like the Democratic
Convention of 1992 can powerfully affect public response to a candidate
whose "character"was much in question, as long as issues of "character
perception" and media "performance"are central to the attainment of
power in our society, we need to be as clear-headed as possible about
dramaturgical
principles.
Those principleshaven't changed much since the pioneering sociology
of Kenneth Burke and Erving Goffmanin the I940S and 'Sos. Dramaturgy
proceeds from the premise that human beings are "symbol-usinganimals."
Dramaturgistsarguethat humanbeings are the only animalswho "cancontrol and structuretheir actions upon the basis of symbolic meanings that
are not reducible to 'natural'motives" (Combs and Mansfield I976:xviii,
explicating Burke). All human actions-writing of any kind, war, revolution, the creation of art, crime, running for political office, makingloveshare the propertyof symbolicity.As Robert Perinbanayagam
puts it, they
are all "methodsof knowing and making known, through various means,
whatever must be made known to prosecute and sustaintransactions,relationships, institutions,organizations,and social structures[...]" (I985:78,
explicatingBurke). Those transactions,institutions,etc.-indeed, society itself-are alwaysin a process of being constructed
in the course of human interactions,along with the symbolic environmentin which they take place.
(In this regard,dramaturgyanticipateda central claim of poststructuralist
criticismlong before it became fashionable.)
Human interactions (the interplay of human actions) are the focus of
dramaturgicalanalysis.They show us human actions enactedin space and
time, realizedin the three-dimensionalmanagementof language,clothing,
gestures, and objects. As Goffinan put it, the interactionalcontext of human behavioris "wherethe action is" (I974:I34). Moreover:
a status,a position,a socialplace is not a materialthing, to be possessed
and then displayed;it is [. . .] somethingthat mustbe enactedand portrayed,somethingthat mustbe realized.(1959:75;emphasismine)
In Goffman's system, the realization or fulfillment of human actions in
space and time is best understoodin theatricalterms: "performer,""role,"
"front"(the performer'sstage), "back"(backstage),and various concepts
evoking types of roles and degrees of awarenessin one's enactmentor performance (Goffinan 1959). And just as theatricalterminology, a language
drawn from discourseabout performance,graspsthe essence of enactment
in space and time, so a dramatic(or to use Burke'sword, a "dramatistic")
terminology, a languagedrawn from the analysisof plays, captureshuman
motives within the context of interaction. For example, according to
Burke, a "roundedstatementabout motives" contains five key dramatistic
terms:act, scene, agent, agency, purpose (1969:xv, et passim).Accordingto

Dramaturgy 59

Duncan (1968), the maintenanceof social hierarchiesis best understoodin

termsof tragicand comic forms.
Dramaturgistshave alwaysdebated the precise meaning of the theatrical
paradigmfor symbolic interaction,raisingrepeatedlythe philosophicalquestion: Is dramaturgicalterminologymerely metaphoricalor does it describe
reality?Burke and Goffinan came to different conclusions. Burke argued
that "dramais employed, not as a metaphorbut as a fixed form that helps
us discover what the implicationsof the terms 'act' and 'person'reallyare"
(1968:11);

Goffinan ended The Presentationof Self in Everyday Life by step-

ping back from the theatricalparadigmhe had been using and explaining
that it was "a rhetoricand a maneuver":
This reportis not concernedwith aspectsof theaterthat creep into
everydaylife. It is concernedwith the structureof social encounters.
[.. .] A characterstagedin a theateris not in some ways real,nor
does it have the same kind of real consequencesas does the thoroughly contrivedcharacterperformedby a confidenceman; but the
successful
stagingof eitherof these types of falsefiguresinvolves the use
of realtechniques-the same techniquesby which everydaypersons
sustainrealsocial situations.(1959:254-55)
For political dramaturgy,phenomena like media politics and the Reagan
presidency have forced again the question of whether reality inherently
possesses theatricalqualities,or whether it is in some sense nontheatrical
but being encroachedupon by forms of theatre,becoming "theatricalized."
The question, In what sense is politics theatrical?,is a variationon the
philosophical question that besieges all dramaturgy.One approachto adhave
dressingthe question is to examine the ways in which dramaturgists
used theatricalterms. Inevitablysuch an examinationis a meta-critique,an
interpretationof how dramaturgistsuse not only such terms as "role"and
"performer"but also "drama"and "theatre"themselves.This is as it should
be: the foundationsof dramaturgical
theory (Burke,Goffnan, et al.) are really critiques of terminology, of how to talk about the relations between
theatreand social life. Both Burke and Goffmanshow us that the theatrical
qualitiesof social life are intimatelyrelatedto a consciousnessof what we
mean precisely when we say that it is dramaticor theatrical.3If political
dramaturgismproceeds from the premise that political realityis eminently
describablein theatricalterms, then those terms must be used as precisely
as possible.
Moreover, a meta-critiqueof political dramaturgyacknowledgesthat the
relationbetween theatreand politics is first and last a philosophicalmatter.
Because it dealswith our perceptionof politics as theatre,with the fact that
politics appearsto possess theatricalqualities, it raises phenomenological
questions.Because it dealswith the natureof politicalreality,it raisesontological ones. To employ dramaturgical
terminologyat all is to have to deal
with its ontological status. This point is raised repeatedly in reviews of
literature.Dennis Brissettand CharlesEdgley arguethat "dradramaturgical
maturgy, and perhapsthe rest of social science, might be better off dropping all claims to ontology";after all, they argue, "being cognizant of the
dramaturgicalprincipleis only one way of being aware of one's awareness
[. . .]" (1990:34, 33; emphasis mine). But the fact that dramaturgyis a
mode of meta-awarenessat all suggeststhat its ontologicalpropertiesought
to be scrutinized.James Combs and Michael Mansfield,whose work figures prominentlyin the field of political dramaturgy,see this clearlywhen
they say:

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Borreca

If the Burkeanperspective[...] is to have universalapplicability,the

'onto-logic'of that image must be subjectedto philosophicalanalysis
[. . .]
The basic problemis whether the dramaturgical
perspectiveis on
organizationof social conduct, and thereforeimposed on reality,or
whether it is a descriptionof actualconduct, and thereforeinheresin
reality. (I976:xiv, xxvii)
Philosophers who have subjected the dramaturgical view to philosophical analysis-for example, Perinbanayagam and Bruce Wilshire-caution us
against formulating the ontological issue in terms of a dualism that
overdetermines the concepts of "reality" and "theatre." For these philosophers, to ask, Is dramaturgy metaphorical?, is at most to assume that the
theatre is something apart from reality and that, if the answer to the question is "no," then reality has somehow been invaded by theatre; it is at
least to proceed from the bias that theatre is in some sense unreal, and that
to discover that reality is theatrical would be merely to find ourselves once
again in Plato's cave.
The point is not to ask, Is dramaturgy metaphorical?, but to investigate
the very compulsion of symbolic interaction among human beings. For
Perinbanayagam (as for Burke), there is no duality between theatre and life;
the theatrical impulse among human beings emerged with their very capacity for meaning, and dramaturgy is "the efficient, efficacious, and parsimonious method of articulating and experiencing it" (I985:63). Wilshire
reformulates the theatre-life duality, from the perspective that "certain conditions of identity are theatre-like," such as play, mimetic response, role,
display, and recognition of self through the other, and that the theatre is
lifelike (I982:xiv).
For Wilshire, the theatre-life duality is one between mimetic qualities of life and of art, where these qualities are "'writ large'; the
theatre is historically posterior but ontologically or logically prior"
(i982:4).4

The questions of ontology must be asked of political dramaturgy. Are

we using a convenient metaphor that guides our perceptions or describing
something that exists in reality? Is there any other way into a perception of
reality than to construct a model for our perception that correlates in significant ways to what seems to be the reality itself? At its most perceptive,
political dramaturgy has always broached the philosophical complexity of
thinkers like Perinbanayagam and Wilshire, as well as the efforts of Turner
and Schechner to grasp the breadth and depth of the theatrical impulses
manifest in social reality. Because dramaturgy is deeply engaged not only
with "objects" of study (the manifest realities of political behavior, processes, systems, etc.) but also with the perspective from which those "objects" might be best analyzed, its focus is the breadth and depth of the
dramatic and theatrical ways in which politics appearsto impinge on our
perception.
The areas in which Solon's fear seems to have been realized are the raw
material of political dramaturgy. When Solon said that "we shall find [theatre] someday in our [political] business, he assumed a difference between
the two-a difference between the real and the pretended, the intermingling
of which would result in the corruption of the former (presumably, on the
levels of both its seriousness and substantiveness: its very reality). Today
when we speak of "dramatic" events in a political campaign, the "staging"
of a rally or of a "media event," we are no longer so sure that we're talking about two exclusive realities, one real and the other laden with illusion.
This apparent compounding of realities-or this perception of similarities

Dramaturgy 6I
between supposedly different realities-is the province of political dramaturgy. Politicaldramaturgywonders, Why does politics appearto us in the
garbof acting and performance,spectatorshipand response,and all the elements of dramalearned in high school: protagonistsand antagonists,confrontation,conflict, suspense, crisis, climax, and catharsis?
Why do politics
and theatreseem to sharecertainessentialattributesas human activities?
Traditionsof Analysis
Political dramaturgistshave failed to build coherent systems of thought
that addressthese sorts of questions.Many settle insteadfor a Solon-esque
view, assumingeither that to observe the theatricalaspectsof politics is to
see the ways in which politics has become corruptedby the evil forces of
performance,pretense, "dramatic"appealsto emotion, etc.; or that politics
and theatreare distinctlyseparate,with the theatrebeing set apartfrom reality. This division of the world into the "real"world of (business,political) affairs and the "unreal"world of the theatre underlay much early
political dramaturgy,spawninga traditionof analysisthat began and ended
with the identificationand categorizationof the dramaticelements of political life. No one in this tradition complained about the encroachment of
the theatre upon politics; in fact, they were acknowledging that the time
had come to take the dramaticqualitiesof politics seriously.They're there,
they said, they haveto be analyzed.But they didn't go much furtherthan
this.
For example, Orrin Klapp (I964) identified seven "outcomes"of "dramatic confrontation among public men" [sic] (e.g., hero-making,villainmaking, and fool-making)without pursuingthe natureof the confrontation
itself and why it can be called "dramatic"at all. His approachsuggested
that politics is "dramatic"because it manifestselements of drama.But this
is to suggest that a house is a temple becausethey both have windows and
doors, without examining the structureof either the house or the temple.
If Kennedy was made into a "hero" by the Cuban Missile Crisis, and
Nixon into a "villain"by Watergate,by what process did that occur?Similarly,Iran-Contrawasn't "dramatic"becauseit made Oliver North a "hero"
nor because the hearings naturallycontained suspense and climax. Symbolic interactionsuggeststhat perceptionsof North's characterarose from a
dynamic among players,media audience,and his own performancebefore
the cameras,in which he cast himself as a loyal servantof America. "Suspense" and "climax,"along with "character,"are attributesof a particular
arrangementamong those elements.
It's intriguingthat earlydramaturgists
didn'tseek out those arrangements,
but ratherthe elements themselves. Following Klapp, RichardMerelman
(1969) identifieddramaticdevices (personification,identification,suspense,
climax, catharsis,and others) and the kinds of political issues, settings,
group situations,and encounters that seemed to encourage their use, but
never stopped to ask, If dramaticdevices are "salient"(Merelman'sword)
at particularpoints in politicalprocesses,does this have to do with the natures of the processes themselves?More recently,James Rosenau (1980)
identifiedthe dramaticcharacteristics
of politicalsystems, "performancecriteria"for analyzingthem and, more important,"systemdramas"and "process dramas" that recur around the world (he provides a long list of
"socializationdramas,""decision-policy dramas,""bureaucraticdramas,"
and "mobilizationdramas").But althoughRosenau'sthinkingis highly systematic-characteristics,criteria, and dramasdepend on one another for
their existence;and these interlockingconcepts derive from the insight that

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Borreca

politics resembles dramain "the concerting of action on a large scale to

achieve goals"(3-4)-his system is rooted in the assumptionthat dramacan
be onlyan analogy,althoughhe never exploresthat assumption.
Even in FerdinandMount's The Theatreof Politics(1973), a rareinstance
in which categorizationgives way to speculation,the categoriesoutrun the
insights. Mount shows how various political "theatres"(e.g., Theatre of
Embarrassment,Theatre of Sentiment, etc.) need to be defined according
to the perceptionthat politicalevents, like theatre,"aremeant to be seen"
(5I). In turn, he uses his categoriesas a basis for addressingthe qualitiesof
political theatricality-inparticular,the dual condition of political actor as
observer and protagonist.Goffnan originallynoted this condition for the
presentationof self in social interaction.It has readypoliticalapplicationsfor example, to the press conferences of Ronald Reagan, who could be
seen to monitor himself cautiously, or to the speeches of George Bush,
who in his rhetoricalperformanceshas been Reagan'sopposite, a man who
flies free of his plannedtexts (writtenor mental),respondingto an ever-receding hope of hitting the mark with his audience. Mount missed an opportunityto galvanizehis categorieswith his sense of theatricalityand vice
versa, of viewing different"politicaltheatres"in termsof differentformulations of the observer-protagonist
relationship.
Then there is the opposite to Solon, an unexaminedBurkeanism:a line
of thinking based upon the assumption that politics simply is theatrical.
The foremostexemplum of this kind of thinkingis SanfordM. Lymanand
MarvinB. Scott's The Dramaof SocialReality(1975), which isolatessix "basic and essentialdramas"that legitimatepoliticalpower, and examinesseveral historical"dramasof resistance"to politicalpower (such as slaveryand
bandit life in the U.S.). The categorizationof data here assumes that the
dramasare "basic,"ever-present,a naturalpartof existence. This may have
been a seemingly undeniable claim in the wake of Watergate,but to assume that politics simply is theatreis as philosophicallynaive as to assume
that they are utterlydifferentfrom each other.
Still, within the kind of thinking representedby Lymanand Scott, there
developed a paradoxicalkind of fiercely anticapitalist(sometimes Marxist)
dramaturgy,which maintainsthe unexamined assumption that politics is
theatrical.In the work of Peter M. Hall (1972, I979), T.R. Young and
GarthMassey (1978), Young and John Welsh (1984), and Welsh working
alone (1985), the assumptionthat politics is a kind of theatregives life to
perceptionsof the enforced
politicalstagingsand image-managementof capitalist society-what these thinkers usually call "the dramaturgicalsociety."
In this society, powerful elites sustainboth their power and its institutions
by projectingpoliticaland culturalimages upon the masses,and by generating the illusion that society is in realityof the people, by the people, and
for the people:
[The dramaturgical
society] is one in which the interactionbetween
an atomizedmass of people and the majorinstitutionsand largest
organizationsis deliberatelymanaged,maskedby the profusegenerations of images of service, quality,or agency, and the projectionof
these upon the populationfor whose benefit these organizationsand
institutionsare ostensiblyacting. (Young and Massey 1978:79)
As Welsh puts it, "the dramaturgicaltechnology of the American state is
geared toward [sic] conveying the impression and appearanceof democracy, equity, accountabilityand participation[...]" (1985:21). Theatrelike

media stagingsmystifythe massesinto believing that they are in fact participatingin a democraticsociety, when they actuallyare not.
Through this paradigm,anticapitalistdramaturgistsbegin to probe the
theatricalmanifestationsof politics. Although they see media stagings(and
accompanyingimage-projections)as instrumentalitiesof a "falsepolitics"
(Welsh I985:5)-untruthful or inauthentic if not necessarily unreal in the

Solon-esque sense-they also see them as essential to the capitaliststate.

They are not evidence finallyof unrealtheatreinvadingthe politicalrealm
but of an utterlyreal (andpsychicallybrutal)processby which one kind of
dominantand self-perpetuating
politicalsystem sustainsitself. Referencesto
"false politics" and "mystification" (e.g., Welsh 1985:4, et passim) betray an

assumptionthat politicalrealityis necessarilya form of impressionmanagement enactedon a societalscale. Theatrelikestagingsand images, as instrumentalities of capitalistpower-maintenance,create an illusion that is the
capitalistrealityitself These can be broken down into a series of "mystifying" elements, such as television debates that maintain "the spectatornature of American political life," personality cults, and "the symbolic
generationof patriotism,"and, above all, democraticideology itself (Welsh
1985:4, et passim). Such stagings and images do not result from conscious

manipulation but from, so to speak, the presentation of the capitalist

macro-societalself in everydaylife.
To the anticapitalists,the Clarence Thomas hearings are a perfect example of how far capitalistsociety is willing to go to dramatizeits false
democraticideology. The hearingsrisked embarrassment
in the eyes of the

Anticapitalistdramaturgs
viewedthe ClarenceThomas hearingsas a perfect
exampleof howfar capitalist societyis willing to go
to dramatizeitsfalse
democratic
ideology.In this
analysis,politicsis a
processthatgenerates
appearances(in this image
Anita Hill is testifying
beforethe Senate) that can
becomerealityin the course
of beinggenerated.(Videotape courtesyofJerri
Hurlbutt)

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Borreca

world but sought to give the impression-worldwide-of democraticcarefulness, of judicious deliberationof a citizen'saccusations.Media criticismsof
the process were part and parcel of this false realityof judicious deliberation, suggestingthat criticismis "open"and centralto a largerdeliberative
process. False democraticideology was dramatized-andthe statusquo sustained-through the spectacle of media-createdpersonalitiesclashing with
one another.
The achievement of anticapitalistdramaturgism
begins with the perception of politics as a process that generatesappearances(stagings,images)
that canbecomerealityin the course of being generated.(The public personalitiesof ClarenceThomas and Anita Hill were constructedby a false process, but who is to say that who they appearedto be isn't who they really
assertvirtuallyexistentialconare?)And more important,the anticapitalists
ditions that persistin a self-perpetuating,
mediatedpoliticalworld: e.g., the
cultivation of political paralysis,inequality, and fundamentalunfreedom
through mass dependence upon media (see Young and Massey 1977:80,
Hall I979:298-99). Low voter turout, especiallyamong minorities,is the
cleareststatisticalevidence of these conditions.
But the work of these dramaturgists
is seriouslylimited by their emphasis on enforcement.They build upon Burke, Goffnan, and broadconcepts
of symbolic and "dramaturgical"
interactionwithout establishingthe theoretical status of the theatre in their analyses. They speak of "dramatizations," "stagings,"and "images,"without addressingtheir theatricalorigins,
and without elaboratinga dramaturgical
vocabularythat correlatestheatrical
aesthetics with political reality. Although their assumption that capitalist
leads them to examine the compoundingof theatre
politics is dramaturgical
and reality,they don't establishthose largerterms, "theatre"and "politics,"
themselves.
Above all, they overenforcethe dramaturgical
paradigmby takingimagecultureitself as evidence of capitalisttyranny.They argue that a process of
will help to create an "authenticpoliticalreality"(Welsh
"demystification"
1985:22), but they don't address the problem of authenticity and
inauthenticity. In a world in which the projection of images enforces a
existence, how will such demystificationtake place?Through
dramaturgical
new uses of the media?(How can the media be separatedfrom image-projection and staging?What would an "authentic"use of the media be like?)
Through a divorce between the media and politicallife? (How will thisbe
accomplished?)Anticapitalistdramaturgismfailsto probe the natureof theatreto get at how the media theatricalizesrealityin the firstplace, to gain a
perspectiveon the relationshipamong the dramaturgical
society, the media,
and the theatre.5
Although no dramaturgicalparadigmcan addressall cases (politicalsystems, processes, events) or answer unassailablythe question of simile vs.
homology (Is dramaturgymetaphorical?), to make a convincing claim
about that question it needs to establishthe following: (I) a theoreticalbase
that clarifies politics as a form of symbolic interaction with unavoidable
dramaticor theatricalqualities;(2) an interpretationof modem image-culture and its relationsto politics as symbolic interaction;(3) an interpretation of both drama (the Burke emphasis) and theatre (the Goffman
emphasis)as models for the kind of image-generationfundamentalto that
interaction;(4) some inquiryinto the natureof theatreas an art, and about
how aspects that distinguishit genericallymanifestthemselvesin mediated
politicalprocesses.
The most theoreticallyrefinedpoliticaldramaturgism
has addressedthese
concerns by bridging political philosophy and media or rhetoric studies,

Dramaturgy 65

and by settling on two extreme points of focus. First,the broadlytheoretical, in which a coherent dramaturgicalsystem works from a refined sense
of the theatreitself. Second, the case study, in which single (and singular)
events, systems, or processes are shown to pose essential dramaturgical
questions.6

The case study encouragesquantitativeresearchthat can help buttress,in

a positivisticway, a speculativedramaturgism.For instance, in I976 John
F. Cragan and Donald C. Shields examined how "mediated messages"
about three "foreignpolicy dramas"-thecold war, power politics, and neoisolationism-quiteliterallyplayed in Peoria (1977:275). They found that a
sampleof the populationof that town more readilyacceptedpoliticalmessagesabout the firsttwo dramas,and arguedfrom this evidence that people
(at least in Peoria and at most in whatever Peoria representssocially and
politically) tend to process media messages about foreign policy in
"dramatistic"
terms. Their study also found that "pretesteddramatistic[political] speeches" (289) can be written with great success on the basis of
"public opinion data gatheredin a rhetoricalform via a small sample researchtechnique"(275).

The great danger of the case study has always been that any
case can be easily stretchedbeyond the theoreticallimits that
it can endure. But there is one extended study that overcomes the danger, providing a possible bridge between the
case study and "universalizing"theory.
What Craganand Fields leave out of their study is an idea of what they
mean by "dramatistic."
They imply that messagesabout the cold war and
power politics are more "dramatistic"
presumablybecause those dramasinvolve greaterconflict, and that Peoriansprocessmedia messagesin termsof
Burke'sfive key terms of dramatism.Yet they seem to be suggestingsomething more fundamentalabout audiencehungerand its relationto the making of "politicaldramas."They seem to suggestthat dramatisticreceptionis
a need cultivated and sustained by dramaticmediation: that we receive
election campaigns,for instance, in dramaticterms because they are programmedand portrayedthat way, and that they are programmedthat way
to close a vicious circle that either begins or ends with our dramatistic
need. But in contrastto the anticapitalists,they also imply that this circle
separates"politicaldramas"from the usualrun of politicallife.
To this day the quantitativedramaturgical
case study remainsan exciting
possibility,which might synthesize dramaturgywith scientific research.In
the meantime a fuller articulationof political dramaturgycan be found in
qualitativecase studies, such as James M. Mayo's (1978) examination of
"environmentaldramaturgyin the political rally";Joanna B. Gillespie's
(1980) study of first ladies as symbolic charactersin the "moralityplay" of
presidentialleadership;Michael T. Hayes' (1987) investigation of policymakingwith regardto the nuclearfreeze;William F. S. Miles (1989) study
of the 1983 election campaign in Nigerian Hausaland; and Joseph W.
EsherickandJeffreyN. Wassterstrom's(199O) study of the Chinese "political theatre,"as played out in the 1989 democracy movement focused in
TiananmenSquare.

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Hayes, Mayo, and Gillespie all seek to reach "universal"dramaturgical

conclusions from their cases, and ultimatelynone of them flies free of the
Solon-esquetradition.In contrast,Miles and Esherickand Wasserstromuse
their cases to illuminatethe culturalspecificityof "politicaltheatre,"denying the universalityof Western social science/dramaturgy.For them, the
purposeof the case study is to capturea representativemoment in the ongoing politicaldramaof a given culture. One can only get at what is "universal"to thatculture:for example, the blending of modem and traditional
symbols in Nigerian political rallies,or the shift from "ritual-infusedpolitics" to state-defying"politicaltheatre"in 20th-centuryChina. These recent
writingsrepresentthe development of multiculturalismwithin politicaldramaturgy.7So far there have been too few studies to generalizeabout the
nature of this development. However, it's worth noting that, as political
dramaturgyhas thinned out, it has spreadout and sought to become engaged more globally.It may be going through a stage of redefinition,abandoning the searchfor universalprinciples,althoughnonethelessproceeding
(ironically)from the principlesset down by Goffman and Burke. (In this
connection, we should recall that Goffnan's The Presentation
of Self in EverydayLifegrew out of a casestudyof performancebehavioron an islandof
the United Kingdom.
The greatdangerof the case study has alwaysbeen that any case can be
easily stretchedbeyond the theoreticallimits that it can endure. But there
is one extended study that overcomes the danger, providing a possible
bridge between the case study and "universalizing"theory. In The Moro
as SocialDrama(1986), Robin EricaWagner-Pacifici
MoralityPlay: Terrorism
examinesthe dramaticand narrativestructurationof the Moro kidnapping.
(In 1978 Italy'sRed Brigade kidnappedAldo Moro, the presidentof the
ChristianDemocrats,as he was on his way to Parliamentto begin the process of ratifyinga new government.A two-month media spectacleensued,
she
ending with Moro's assassination.)Like the anticapitalistdramaturgists,
subscribesto the idea of political events as constructed, but she doesn't
equate the constructionof theatricalizedrealitywith capitalism.Instead,she
startsfrom the (postmodern) assumption that all events are generatedby
and within a culture. Like the multiculturalists,she demonstratesthat any
social drama itself dramatizes something essential about the society in
which it occurs. In the Moro case the competing plots dramatizedan essentialfragmentationof Italianculture.
To isolatewhat she calls the "socialdrama"in the Moro kidnapping,she
examines "the self-referentialdiscourse (both verbal and gestural)of the
protagonists[of the kidnapping]as it engages the mechanismsof the four
phases [of Turner'ssocial dramamodel of breach,crisis,redressand reconciliation or schism]"(9). She finds that social drama,as exemplifiedin the
Moro kidnapping,is a matter of multiple plots-"dramaturgicagendas"in
which "aestheticagendas"interact dialecticallywith "politicaland moral
imperatives"-thatare simultaneouslyscriptedand enacted by multiple participants;and of "masscommunicationsstages"that mediate and interpret
these plots, causing crucial competition among participantsand plots for
stage time (I4). The Moro affairillustratesthe triumph of what Turner
(1969, 1974, I990) called competing "liminoidperformances"over a "liminal center" or "ritualcenter"-of "the optionality of audience response"
(Wagner-Pacifici1986:278).8
Wagner-Pacificiimplies a theoreticalparadigmthat might be appliedto a
number of social dramasin Euro-Americanpolitics. The Moro affairis
obonly incidentallyher focus; her main concern is a set of dramaturgical
servationsabout the fine line between social dramaand formaltheatre(the

Dramaturgy 67

art of theatre).Her applicationsof Turnerimply that social dramamanifests

itself whenever persons involved in politics act to gain an audience,first and
foremost through decisive, singularaction (e.g., the kidnapping)and later
through the elongation of that initial action into an agenda that is structured and enacted to hold an audience'sattention. Media are the places of
enactment,the stagesto which an audienceturs its attention;it is through
a precise disposition of plot (enacted agenda) and stage (medium) that an
audience,and therebysocial (or political)dramaitself, is sustained.
Wagner-Pacificiposits phenomenological equivalenciesbetween observable aspectsof social reality-massmedia, mass audience,participants,political agenda-and elements of theatre-stage, audience, participants,actors,
plot, and action. The lattermanifestthemselvespreciselywhen the former
become arrangedin a dynamic configurationcorrespondingto the arrangement of the elements in theatre art. Social dramais what happens when
certainfactors-socialaction, social "plotting,"mass media, mass audienceare constructed in this configuration, a form that can only be called
"drama"or "theatre."From the perspectiveof early dramaturgists,
the conof social reality;but from
figurationwould representthe "theatricalization"
Wagner-Pacifici's
perspective,"theatricalization"
(she doesn't use this term)
takes place when the structuresand means of the theatreare drawn upon
to accentuate the configuration itself, to "overplay" it in forcing the
audience'sattention. The maintenanceof an audience-a sense of its presence-is the precipitatingforce behind the articulationof a "socialdrama."
The "competing plots" of Wagner-Pacifici'sanalysis persist because, in
Euro-Americansociety, the mass media offer themselves as stages, places
for the enforcementof attention. (The anticapitalistswould agreewith this
point.)
In Wagner-Pacifici'sanalysis,Turner'sschema of breach, crisis, redress,
and reconciliationor schism serves two purposes. First,it describesa basic
structuralpatternof the Moro kidnappingas a social drama(representedin
its competing plots). Second, it evokes a structureembeddedin mass-mediated society itself, one that becomes manifestwhen competing participants
manipulatemass communications stages, forcing social dramainto being.
Ultimately, Wagner-Pacificiimplies that a triad of participant(actor)-mass
communicationsstage-spectatorsmanifestssocial dramaspatially;Turer's
schema manifests it temporally.9By attending to the phenomenological
"place"and "moment"in which social dramaappears,Wagner-Pacifici(like
Brown) elaboratesthe dramaturgyof Burke and Goffman on a macro-sociological level. (Burke's dramatisticprinciples concern the enactment of
dramain time; Goffman'sprinciplesof impressionmanagementconcern the
embodiment of such dramatic enactment in time and space,within the
performativedimensionof symbolic interaction.)
Wagner-Pacificihas much in common with more broadlyinclusivetheorists.All of them identifythe point at which theatrebecomes manifestedin
the social world, the point at which it appearsto be thecase,and therebyexplore somethingfirstaddressedby Norman 0. Brown in Love'sBody:
Politicalrepresentationis theatricalrepresentation.A politicalsociety
comes into existence when it articulatesitself and producesa represento a stage,on
tative;that is to say, organizesitselfas theatre,addressed
which [the] representativescan perform[...]. (I966: II;
I emphasis
mine)
Brown's view extends Burke and Gofinan into politics: political society
comes into being when society organizesitself as theatre,by producingrep-

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resentativeswho are intended at most to actfor the people and who at least
act beforethem, are observed by them (are objects of spectatorship).
Wagner-PacificislightlyrearrangesBrown's claim by demonstratingthat, in
mass-mediatedEuro-Americansocieties, a theatricalpolity comes into being when society organizesitself theatrically,by developing "stages"(mass
communicationssystems)that compel a theatricalorganizationof the world
(places where politicians, activists, etc., can be observed by mass audiences); and moreover, that compel a theatricalconsciousnessof politicalreality, a sense that some degree of performance skill is essential to the
attainmentof political goals. With its impulse of representationas defined
by Brown, politics containsthe seeds of theatrewithin it; but it only "becomes" theatre when it manifestsitself as such, when representativesare
providedwith stageswhere they become observedby audiences,and when
spectatorship-ademandfor stage performance-becomesthe norm in political interaction.
Such was the case with the Moro kidnapping,and has been the case increasinglyin Euro-Americanpolitical events in the past two decades. The
centralityof media to politicalculture,and the developmentof ways to manipulateit, has heightenedthe dramaticconfigurationlatent in politics;discrete politicaland social dramascome more regularlyinto being in a context
that was alreadyinherentlytheatricalbut which did not alwaysgive way to
so many individual"performances."
Thus the VietnamWar and the protests
and endemic of an evolving "societyof the
againstit were media-saturated,
spectacle";but the Gulf War was plotted and performedwith an awareness
of the media stage. It was perhapshistory's most fully staged Theatre of
War. What Wagner-Pacificishows us is that the dramaticconfigurationhas
alwaysbeen presentbut that explorationsof the "mediastage"have made its
presence-andour awarenessof its presence-moreobvious.
The "inclusive" theoreticians who resemble Wagner-Pacificiinclude
James E. Combs, Michael W. Mansfield, Dan Nimmo, and Murray
Edelman.With the exception of Edelman,all of them get lost in categories
but arrive(like Edelman)at broad perspectivesfor applyingdramaturgyto
politics. For Combs and Mansfieldworking together,these include areasin
which dramacan be perceivedmost clearly:e.g., leadership,ritualand ceremony, mass media, the use of symbols, the notion of history and culture
in toto as drama (I976:xxiii-xxviii).

For Combs

(I980),

they are "dimen-

sions" of political drama:ritual,institutions,leadership,mass media, campaigns, and political movements (I980:I6-17, et passim).For Nimmo and
Combs, dramaturgical
analysisrevealsthe forms of "pseudo-myths"dramatized by politicalflacks(e.g., pseudo-qualities,pseudo-issues,pseudo-events,
etc. [I980:12-116]), as well as dramaticelements encouragedby the media: e.g., melodramaticnews coverage; campaignsas "seasonalritual dramas";the "nationalsoap opera"of politicalcelebrity(I983). Categorization
of this kind springs from a laudableeffort to systematizepolitical dramaturgy and to mark off the realmsof experience in which social or political
dramamanifests itself. (Admittedly, the current meta-analysispartakesof
this penchantfor categorization.)But it can be taken to an extreme point
at which categorizationcordons off political dramasfrom reality,and loses
sight of how those dramascome into being in the firstplace.
On this crucial matter, Combs, Combs and Mansfield, Nimmo, and
Nimmo and Combs all develop versions of Wagner-Pacifici'sperspective,
although with an importantdifference.Their perspectivesallow for greater
flexibilityin the making and manifestationof political dramas,and-in the
course of their categorization-they elaborate more fully than WagnerPacificidoes the dynamicof the actor-stage-spectator
triad.Where Wagner-

Dramaturgy 69

Pacifici concerns herself primarilywith phenomenology, with the boundaries of the configurationthat can be called "socialdrama,"the others extend their work to the dynamicsof dramaticand theatricalbeing that take
place once politicaldramaappearsor makes itself known.
At the heart of their work is the idea that "social drama"or "political
drama"and its "dimensions"or mythologies are produced and sustained
triad,with the
through the active reinforcementof the actor-stage-audience
more or less equal input of all three elements. In this regard,the work of
these politicalscientistsis more purelysymbolic interactionistthan WagnerPacifici's or the anticapitalists.For Combs, Mansfield, and Nimmo, the
presence and manipulationof mass communication stages as such doesn't
bring political dramainto being. Rather,political dramais producedwhen
essentialcomponents of ongoing symbolic interactionbecome "reified,"to
use Combs' (1980) term: when a place in which political action takes
place, for example, or self-imagespresentedby personsinvolved in that action, or the action itself, is treated as an object of either self-conscious
performanceor passive spectatorship,thereby transformingthem into "settings," "roles"or "dramatic"actions. Once symbolic interactionbecomes
reified, "dimensions"of politicaldrama(again to use Combs' term) come
into being: political campaignsenact a repeated reificationof particularly
persuasiveactions, symbols, and images. This perspectiveimplies that political drama involves a compulsion to repeat what has worked in the
past. This is why, in the 1992 presidentialcampaignwe hearda great deal

[T]he Willie Horton ad exemplified the reificationof television as a political stage, but television is not inherently dramatic (from the perspective of politics) until it is reified in
this way.
of dramaticrhetoricabout "familyvalues." The Republicanpartycompulsively repeatedthat which seemed to work for Ronald Reagan,becoming
rigid and stagnantin its rhetoric.
Like Wagner-Pacifici,Combs, Nimmo, and Mansfield all suggest that
the mass-mediabecome "stages"when they are treatedas such (reifiedinto
foci of passivespectatorship);however-and this is a crucialdifference-they
see the mass-mediaas a dynamic element within the performance-stagespectatortriad,ratherthan as a precipitatingforce. Their perspectiveis altogether more dynamicallyflexible than Wagner-Pacifici's.They see political
dramaturgyas a specific form of symbolic interactionistanalysis,which engages with forever emerging, receding, and re-emergingpolitical dramas.
These articulate(and re-articulate)themselveswhen politicalindividualsact
with an expectationof being seen and scrutinized.The final implicationof
Wagner-Pacifici'sanalysisis that the mass media in and of themselvesdramatize politics by offering "stages"where performanceand spectatorship
are bound to take place. For Combs, Nimmo, and Mansfield,the massmedia are only that-media-with their own properties(which include their capacities for mass communication).They don't demanddrama,but they are
easily reifiedinto stagesthroughthe alteratingly free and bound actionsof
human beings who, in the course of symbolic interaction, invest their
selves, the symbols they wield, the actions they take, and the places in
which these occur, with the statusof things either to be performedor ob-

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served. "Free"because human beings choose to invest themselves in this

way; "bound"because, by investing themselvesin this way, they generate
plans for and expectations of performanceas well as actual performances
(Combs and Mansfield I976, xxiii). They also generatea circularrelationship between the performanceof self-imagesand the nature of those images (Nimmo I974:I33-136). For example, the Willie Horton ad
exemplifiedthe reificationof television as a politicalstage, but television is
not inherentlydramatic(from the perspectiveof politics) until it is reified
in this way. However, once George Bush projectedan image of The Enforcer through this ad, he became bound to play it through, to sustainthe
dramatic(and theatrical)contingencies that the ad (and its self-projection)
demanded.
Freedomis the foremost question for the futurepoliticaldramaturgy-for
the analysisof both actorsand spectatorswithin the dramaticconfiguration
discussedby Wagner-Pacifici,Nimmo, et al. To broach a phenomenology,
as Wagner-Pacifici does, and an ontology, as Nimmo, Combs, and
Mansfield do, is to begin to approach the question. Thus far, the most
comprehensive political dramaturgy, rooted in a flexible, symbolic
interactionismand dealingwith the questionof human freedomwithin that
the
context, has been elaboratedby MurrayEdelman, whose Constructing
PoliticalSpectacle(I988) is the culmination of a career spent interrogating
political symbols, political language, and mediated political reality.'?
EdelmansharesNimmo, Combs, and Mansfield'sview that politicalreality
is at all times controlledby an interactionof audienceand "spectacle"-constructedand mediated events, symbols, and rhetoric.Whereas Nimmo, et
al. argue in essence for what Edelman calls the constructionof the spectacle itself (in Combs' analysis,the reificationof political acts, places, and
persons),Edelmanprobes the ongoing constructionof the subjectivepositions from which (whom?) those "things"become reified.Unlike his three
tricolleagues, who posit endlessly reconfiguringperformer-stage-spectator
ads, Edelman takes the triad as a "natural"property of a media-suffused
world; he analyzesthe fluid constructionand reconstructionof events, performers, and spectators,all of whom are "sites"of endlessly reverberating
signification.(The Willie Horton ad does not in itself reify television into a
stage;it only does so through the action of the candidatewho approvesit,
the handlerswho encourageand manageit, and the audienceswho receive
it as an image that depicts a "realproblem.")In this view, freedom is both
forever possible and forever in danger;to become conscious of the constructionis to move into a position to become free.
Edelman does not use a theatricalparadigmas such, although it is immoves in a new
plicit in his analysis.With his work, politicaldramaturgism
direction, in which dramaturgicalterminologyhas become so necessaryto
describingthe politicalworld that the theatricalparadigmitself need not be
made explicit. What matters is the dramaturgist'songoing implication of
the paradigm,his or her use of dramaturgical
terminologyto reflecta fundamental knowledge of social drama (in Turner's and Wagner-Pacifici's
sense of the term) as an essential form of political being. With Edelman,
the time to treat the generationand regenerationof performancetriadsas
an aspect of mediatedsociety itself has arrived.Next to the multiculturalist
case study, Edelmanrepresentsanotherdecisive directionin which political
dramaturgyseems to be moving."
Present Questions, Future Directions
In the flexible and inclusive symbolic interactionisttheory of Nimmo,
Combs, Mansfield,and Edelman,politicaldramaturgyand communications

Dramaturgy 71

theory meet, pointing in directions that need to be pursued further. For

example, once symbolic interactionin politics "enters"an observablydramatic or theatricalmode, it is unclearwhat sort of shift, if any, takes place
in the substanceand effect of symbolic representation.Nimmo and Combs
argue that dramatizedpolitical realitiestend to develop their own internal
logic. Patternsof reificationproduce a limited numberof kinds of symbolic
performances,such as melodrama (Nimmo and Combs 1983); these repeatedforms requiresettings,roles, and actions to be played and perceived
in particularways; and they generaterepeatedmyths (Nimmo and Combs
I980; see alsoJamiesonand Campbell I982). But do these forms enforce a
peculiarview of reality,as the anticapitalistsclaim, or does dramaticrepresentationby its naturepermit the spectatorthe choice to get up and leave
the play?(If you didn't vote for George Bush in 1988, did you reject the
Willie Horton ad and the performancetriadit helped sustain?Or did you
affirmthat triad-and the statusquo-by participatingin the processwithout
disruptingit?) "Politicaldrama"might be at once the most tyrannicaland
freeingforms of symbolicinteraction,with the capacityboth to immerseus
in a view of the politicalworld and to offer us a choice to createthe world
ratherdifferently.Contraryto Burke'sthinking,all forms of symbolic interaction might possess dramatisticproperties,but only those in which a performance triad becomes reified might be termed "social dramas" or
"politicaldramas."
In the past 30 years severalmedia theoristsand historianshave addressed
issues like these with such overarching dramaturgicalconcepts as the
"pseudo-event"(Boorstin 1987), "the medium is the message" (McLuhan
I965), "the medium is a metaphor"(Postman 1986), and "the dramatized
society" (Williams 1989). These concepts display a progressionfrom the
idea of mediated realityas on the one hand manufacturedand inauthentic
(Boorstin) and on the other hand primeval, sensorious, and essential
(McLuhan), to dramatizedreality as a habit and a need "built into the
rhythms of everyday life" (Williams I989:4) and as a determinantof our
perception of reality itself (Postman). In this last view, Burke and Solon
shake hands:what might be called a televisualizedworld proves that life is
(or has become) drama,yet we must be cautioned(in Postman'sview) that
such a world is evolving out of only the most debasedforms of theatrical
entertainment,upon which television draws.
The following areas of political dramaturgymight still be addressed
througha marriagewith media theory:
in thepolitical
I. The recurrent
patternsof dramaticand theatrical
representation
world.Can the dramatization(and theatricalization)of symbolic interaction ever involve the making of newforms of interactionor does dramatization by definition involve the repetition of forms (such as
melodrama)for which participantsand observersdevelop a habit and a
need? Nimmo and Combs' (1980) work on myth began to deal with
these questions, coming down on the side of constant, ongoing repetition.

2.

The typicalstagingsof dramaticpatterns.My references to "drama"and

"theatre"have implied that the formerinvolved the planningand performance of action (in Burke's sense) and the latterthe performanceitself
(in Goffman'ssense). But this distinctionmay no longer be reallyuseful.
The insistence on a correlationbetween political dramaand its staging
denies the possibility that drama can be culturallygenerated through
what Erest Bormannhas called "fantasychaining"(I972:387, et passim).
When Ronald Reaganconstructeda politicalmelodramawith references
to "the Evil Empire," his statements-his "performances"-ofthe refer-

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ences might have been relevantonly minimallyto the "drama"he generated. It seems possible that the staging of political dramamight take
place first in the realm of sheer consciousness,second in some form of
scripting (mental plan or written document), and third in physical and
gestural embodiment; from there it might become a repeated, reified
dramathrough mediation and "fantasychaining."To speak of "political
theatre"might be to speak only of the first moment of its occurrencein
the physicalworld, the moment of its initialmanifestation.
The assumptionthat political dramaturgyought to attend mainly to
political performance-speeches,media manipulation,etc.-encourages a
limited notion both of political theatreand of theatreart. If it becomes
reified, a performativetriadmight certainlybe the focus of analysis,but
it is more crucialto see dramaand performanceas thought structures,as
anticipatedprojectionsof images and thoughtsupon the world, as peculiarparadigmsof consciousness.
The least penetrating use of political dramaturgyis the simple (and
simplistic) demystificationof media manipulation,of "stagings."Politicians don't have control over every performancetriad that comes into
being in the course of a campaignor a term of office. For example,television as a politicalstage has become to a greatextent a givenreality.To
employ the resourcesof the realitymight not be to falsifyit but to be
true to it. The precisepoint at which this use becomes manipulationis a
differentmatterfrom the fact of staging, and one of the most complex
issues facingpoliticaldramaturgists.
3. Aproposthe questionof staging:the modesin whichpoliticaldramacan be
The modes need not necessarilybe theatrical-theydon't have
"staged."
to involve performanceand observation.The broadcastmedia of course
demand performanceor, at least, enactment,
but even in print one might
"stage"a dramawithout actually,physicallyperformingit. For if political
dramainvolves a performer-stage-spectator
configuration,it doesn't have
to be performedto exist, although of course it might in some sense be
fulfilled(or definitelyinitiated)when it is.
The idea that politicians, like actors in the theatre, act to gain some
type of responsefrom their public emphasizesonly one-halfof an essential dialecticaltransaction.As in certainforms of theatre,the responsein
political life has the potential to be an action itself; the performance
might be joined, setting in motion an ever-shiftingsymbolicinteraction,
in which performersand audiencemembersmove swiftlybetween these
"parts,"and the drama,as it comes into being, gains potentialfor perpetual regenerationthrough a triadthat reformulatesitself over and over
again.

Much fine work on politicalrhetoricand on the rhetoricof Reaganin

particularhas shown that performanceand its trappings(stage, props,
gesture,vocal tone, etc.) are crucialto the dramatizationof politicalreality (see for example Atkinson 1984; Denton 1988; Erickson 1985; Hart
1984; Stuckey I989). However, many of these same studies (especially
Denton, Erickson,Hart, and Stuckey) indicate that politicaldramarests
as much in the structureand substanceof what is said and appealedto as
in its "performance."The "dramatization"
of politics might involve the
minimal construction of a performer-stage-spectator
model within lanof politics might involve merely the approguage; the "theatricalization"
priate performanceof that model, the physical embodiment of what is
encoded in speech.
dramatistically
(in theusualsenseof theterm).If the centralques4. New analysisof "stagings"
tion of political dramaturgismshould no longer be the manipulationof
settings, props, symbols, etc., what is needed is a vocabularyfor the dy-

Dramaturgy 73

namics of actor and action analysis and the forms these can take. We
need to see how the politicalactor engages in the constructionof political symbolic action, the natureof her or his involvementin its dramatic
reification.This must involve a revision of Burke and Goffinan, of the
very idea of manipulation;it must not treat settings,symbols, etc., as if
they were divorced from the persons "performing"with or through
them. The concept of "politicalactor" or "player"is inseparablefrom
how she dressesor speaks,what she holds in her hands,the overallimpressionshe makes in the "reification"of performancetriads.
Why PoliticalDramaturgy?
To have reviewed politicaldramaturgismin this way is to suggest that it
is essentialto the politicalage in which we live now. Politicallife is getting
far ahead of where we are in our theory and consciousnessof dramaturgical reality.It's strikingthat politicaldramaturgyhas peteredout somewhat;
it makes one wonder about the relationshipbetween the worlds inside and
outside academia.There is an urgent need for an inclusivetheory of political dramaturgythat has something not only to say but to do in affecting
our consciousness of how our media-saturatedworld works, and of how
politics operateswithin it. This is not a Solon-esque warning, but a (distressingly)detachedobservationof what's going on.

The idea that politicians,like actors in the theatre,act to gain

some type of response from their public emphasizes only
one-half of an essentialdialecticaltransaction.
Politicaldramaturgyis a peculiarlychallengingform of thinkingbecause
it involves the probing of certain"common"perceptions.It's easy to make
observationsabout politics such as "Dukakislost becausehe didn't perform
is melowell"; "Bushgrew into being an actor, like Reagan";"Iran-Contra
dramatic,"etc. etc. etc. The function of political dramaturgyis to take us
to a state of reflectivethinkingwhere the use of dramaturgical
terminology
is not a reflexbut a choice, which graspsboth politicalphenomenaas well
as what dramaticterms are doing to the very structureof how we think
about those phenomena.
Since we assumethat dramaticand theatricalelements are presentin political life and see them at every turn, the only final, satisfyinganswer to
the question, Is dramaturgymetaphorical?might be that it is the great
Which comes first, the dramaturgichicken-eggquestion of dramaturgism:
cal triador politicalphenomena with the potentialto generatesuch triads?
To be always conscious of the question is not to have to answer it definitely; it is to let it inform at all times the dramaturgical
analysisof politics.
What is more, if one chooses to argue that politics is theatre, as Burke
probablywould have, one is not saying that politics can or will replacethe
art of the theatre.The theatreas an art has its own way with the triadof
not the least of which is a very literalreification
performer-stage-spectator,
of the stage. What politicaldramaturgydoes-and can do-is to describethe
triadicimpulseto which theatreart is connected. If it does this, it will have
reinforcedtheatreas an essentialactivity,not only within social life, but as
a formalundertaking-reflecting,refracting,and crystallizingthe triadsof social and politicaldrama.

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Notes
i. In the social science literaturethe terms "dramaturgy"and "dramaturgism"are used
interchangeably. In this essay I use the term "dramaturgy"because it is stylistically
less turgid, although it might cause confusion with the term "dramaturgy"as used
by theatre critics and dramaturgs.
2. See Bruce E. Gronbeck, "Dramaturgical Theory and Criticism: The State of the
Art (or Science)," (I980:3I5-330) for an excellent review of the dramaturgicalliterature as of 1980. For a more recent general review of the literature, see Dennis
Brissett and Charles Edgley, "The DramaturgicalPerspective" (1990:1-46).
3. For Burke, dramatism entails the philosophical interrogation of reality and being,
our perception of these, and our meta-perception in the form of our discourse
about them. In "Dramatism"Burke wrote: "Dramatismis a method of analysis and
a corresponding critique of terminology designed to show that the most direct
route to the study of human relations and human motives is via a methodical inquiry into cycles or clusters of terms and their functions" (1968:445). See also
Dramatism and Development (1972).

4. Perinbanayagam:"The theatre is not something apart from society [...]. Rather it

is a crystallizationand typification of what goes on in society all the time-or, more
sharply, what a social relationship in fact is" (1985:63).
Wilshire: "As the mimetic art par excellence, [theatre] reveals certain aspects of our
mimetic reality as human beings"
For Wilshire, to engage in dramatur(I982:xiv).
gical analysis is not to get either theatre or life to "supply an exhaustive set of literal terms adequate for itself which can then be applied metaphorically to the other
'side"'; rather it is a process of "[balancing] perpetually in our conceptual system
between notions of offstage and onstage" (xiv).
5. For probably the mostly overenforced idea of "the dramaturgicalsociety," see Guy
Debord, Societyof the Spectacle(I970). Although Debord isn't cited often by the anticapitalist dramaturgists,his Marxist analysis of social spectacle as a form of consumerist fetishization clearly impacted their thinking.
6. Early and pioneering case studies included two works that did not develop dramaturgical models but that laid the groundwork for them: Joseph R. Gusfield's Symbolic Crusade: Status Politicsand the American TemperanceMovement (1966), which
argued for two main forms of symbolism within political movements ("gestures of
cohesion" and "gestures of differentiation"), and Bill Kinser and Neil Kleinman's
The Dream That Was No More a Dream: The Search
for AestheticReality in Germany,
(1969), which offered the first image of the evolution of an entire sociI890-I945
ety-and a period of social history in toto-as a journey toward aesthetic fulfillment
and transcendence. (That is, a historical view of political power as sustainable
through the exercise of aesthetic power.)
7. Earlier instances of multicultural dramaturgy include Abner Cohen's work on Africa (1981) and FrankManning's work on the Caribbean (1980, 1986).
8. Wagner-Pacifici draws mainly upon Turner's "Liminalityand Communitas" in The
Ritual Process(1969) and "Liminal to Liminoid in Play, Flow and Ritual" (I974).
For the breach-crisis-redress-reconciliation/schismmodel, see Fields and Metaphors
(1974); From Ritual to Theatre: The Human Seriousnessof Play (1982); and "Are
There Universals of Performance in Myth, Ritual, and Drama?" (1990).
9. For another approach to societal performance triads, see Bonnie Marranca,"Performance World, Performance Culture" (1987).
io. Edelman's earlier work includes The SymbolicUses of Politics(1967), Politicsas Symbolic Action (1971), and Political Language: Wordsthat Succeedand Policies that Fail
(I977).
I . Yet another direction of the late I980s (and for the I99os) is what might be termed
"practical political dramaturgy,"as represented in the work of Joel Schechter, the
author of Durov's Pig: Clowns, Politics, and Theatre(1985). Following in a line of
drama critics who have commented on the performance aspects of politics-such as
Robert Brustein, Bonnie Marranca,and Gautam Dasgupta-Schechter has tested the
relations between political theatre (Brecht, et al.) and theatre in politics by running
as Green Party candidate for the New Haven Board of Aldermen and staging "political dramas"that capitalized on theatrical realities already at play in the campaign.

Dramaturgy 75
Schechter staged self-conscious political theatre in order to provoke an awareness of
false (and more hidden) theatrical manipulations at work in the New Haven power
structure (see Schechter 1989).

A SelectedBibliography
of PoliticalDramaturgy
(Although this bibliography focuses on dramaturgy in political science, it
also includes works consulted in sociology, media theory, rhetoric studies,
and performance studies.)

Atkinson, Max
Our Masters' Voices:The Languageand Body Languageof Politics. London
I984
and New York: Methuen.
Boorstin, Daniel
The Image:A Guide to Pseudo-Eventsin America.New York: Atheneum.
1987
Bormann, Ernest G.
1972
"Fantasyand Rhetorical Vision: The Rhetorical Criticism of Social Reality." QuarterlyJournal
of Speech58 (no. 4):396-407.
Brissett, Dennis, and Charles Edgley
"The Dramaturgical Perspective" and "Political Dramas." In Life as The1990
ater:A Dramaturgical
Sourcebook,edited by Brissett and Edgley, I-46, 34752. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter (revised edition).
Brown, Norman 0.
Love'sBody. New York: Random House.
1966
Brustein, Robert
"News Theatre." The New York Times Magazine, i6 June: 7, 36, 38-39,
1974
44-45, 48.
Burke, Kenneth
1966
Languageand SymbolicAction: Essays on Life, Literature,and Method. Berkeley: University of California Press.
"Dramatism."In The InternationalEncyclopedia
1968
of the SocialSciences,Vol. 7,
edited by David L. Sills, 445-51. London: Macmillan. (Also in Combs
and Mansfield 1976:7-17.)
A Grammarof Motives.Berkeley: University of California Press.
1969
A Rhetoricof Motives.Berkeley: University of California Press.
1969
Dramatismand Development.Barre, MA: Clark University Press.
1972
Burns, Elizabeth
1972
Theatricality:A Study of Conventionin the Theatreand in Social Life. New
York: Harper and Row.
Cohen, Abner
The Politics of Elite Culture: Explorationsin the Dramaturgyof Power in a
I98I
ModemAfricanSociety.Berkeley: University of California Press.
Combs, James E.
Dimensions of Political Drama. Santa Monica, CA: Goodyear Publishing
1980
Co.
Combs, James E., and Michael W. Mansfield
Drama in Life: The Uses of Communicationin Society.New York: Hastings
1976
House.
Cragan,John F., and Donald C. Shields
1977
"Foreign Policy Comm. Dramas: How Mediated Rhetoric Played in Peoria in Campaign '76." QuarterlyJournal
of Speech63 (no. 3):274-89.

76

Borreca
Dasgupta, Gautam
ArtsJournal I (no.
"The Theatricks of Politics." Performing
1988

2):

77-83.

Debord, Guy
1970
Societyof the Spectacle.Detroit: Red and Black.
Denton, Robert E., Jr.
The PrimetimePresidencyof RonaldReagan:The Era of the TV Presidency.
1988
New York: Praeger.
Duncan, Hugh
1968
Symbolsin Society.New York: Oxford University Press.
Edelman, Murray
The SymbolicUses of Politics.Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
1967
Politicsas SymbolicAction. New York: Academic Press.
1971
PoliticalLanguage: WordsThat Succeedand Policies That Fail. New York:
1977
Academic Press.
the PoliticalSpectacle.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
1988
Constructing
Erickson, Paul D.
1985
ReaganSpeaks: The Making of an AmericanMyth. New York: New York
University Press.
Esherick, Joseph W., and Jeffrey N. Wassertstrom
1990
"Acting Out Democracy: Political Theatre in Modem China." Journal of
Asian Studies49 (no. 4):835-65.
Evreinov, Nicholas
The Theatrein Life. New York: Benjamin Blom.
1927
Gamson, W.A.
"Goffman's Legacy to Political Sociology."
1985
(no. 5):605-22.

Theory and Society I4

Geertz, Clifford
1981
Negara: The TheatreState in NineteenthCenturyBali. Princeton: Princeton
University Press.
Gillespie, Joanna B.
"The Phenomenon of the Public Wife: An Exercise in Goffman's Impres1980
sion Management." SymbolicInteraction3 (no. 2):109-25.
(Also in Brissett
and Edgley I990:379-97.)
Gilman, Richard
The Confusionof Realms.New York: Vantage Books.
1969
Goffnan, Erving
The Presentationof Self in EverydayLife. Garden City, NY: Doubleday An1959
chor Books.
Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience.New York:
1974
Harper and Row.
Gronbeck, Bruce E.
"The Functions of Presidential Campaigning." Communication
1978
Monographs
45 (no. 4):268-80.
1980
"DramaturgicalTheory and Criticism: The State of the Art (or Science)."
Western
Journalof SpeechCommunication
44 (no. 4):315-30.
Gusfield, Joseph R.
Movement.
1966
SymbolicCrusade:StatusPoliticsand the AmericanTemperance
Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
Hall, Peter M.
"A Symbolic Interactionist Analysis of Politics." SociologicalInquiry 42
1972
(nos. 3--4):35-75
"The Presidency and Impression Management." In Studiesin SymbolicIn1979
teraction2:283-305.

Dramaturgy
Hare, A.P.
"A Dramaturgical Analysis of Street Demonstrations: Washington D.C.,
I97I and Cape Town, 1976." Group Psychotherapy,Psychodrama,and
Sociometry33 (no. I):92-I20o.
Social Interactionas Drama: Applicationsfrom Conflict Resolution. Beverly
1985
Hills, CA: Sage.
Hart, Roderick
VerbalStyle and the Presidency:A Computer-BasedAnalysis. Orlando, FL:
1984
Academic Press.
1980

Hayes, M.T.
"Incrementalismas Dramaturgy:The Case of the Nuclear Freeze." Polity
1987
19 (no. 3):443-63.
Jamieson, Kathleen Hall, and Karlyn Kohrs Campbell
The Interplayof Influence:Mass Media and Their Publicsin News, Advertising,
1982
and Politics.Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Co.
Kinser, Bill, and Neil Kleinman
The Dream That Was No More a Dream: The Searchfor AestheticReality in
1969
Germany,1890-1945. New York: Harper and Row.
Klapp, Orrin
1964
SymbolicLeaders:PublicDramas and PublicMen. Chicago: Aldine Publishing Co.
Lyman, S.M. and M.B. Scott
The Drama of SocialReality.New York: Oxford University Press.
1975
MacCannell, Dean
n.d.
NonviolentAction as Theatre:A Dramaturgical
Analysisof 146 Demonstrations.
Haverford: Haverford College Nonviolent Action Research Project,
Monograph No. o0.
McLuhan, Marshall
Media: The Extensionsof Man. New York: McGraw Hill.
1965
Understanding
Manning, Frank
I980
"Go Down Moses: Revivalist Politics in a Caribbean Mini-State." In Ideologyand Interest:The Dialecticsof Politics(PoliticalAnthropologyYearbookI),
edited by Myron Aronoff, 31-56. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction
Books.
1986
"Challenging Authority: Calypso and Politics in the Caribbean." In The
Frailtyof Authority(PoliticalAnthropology,Vol. 5), edited by Myron
Aronoff. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books.
Marranca,Bonnie
"Nuclear Theatre." In Theatrewritings,
1984
147-52. New York: PAJ
Publications.
"Performance World, Performance Culture." PerformingArts Journal 10
1987
(no. 3):21-29.

Mayo, James M., Jr.

1978
"Propagandawith Design: Environmental Dramaturgyin the Political
Education32 (no. 2):24-27. (Also in
Rally."Journalof Architectural
Brissett and Edgley I990:353-63.)
Merelman, R.M.
"The Dramaturgy of Politics." SociologicalQuarterlyio (no. 2):216-4I.
1969
Miles, William F.S.
"The Rally as Ritual: Dramaturgical Politics in Nigerian Hausaland."
1989
ComparativePolitics21 (no. 3):323-38.
Morley, Terry
"Politics as Theatre: Paradox and Complexity in British Columbia."
1990
Journalof CanadianStudies25 (no. 3):19-37.

77

78

Borreca
Mount, Ferdinand
The Theaterof Politics.New York: Schocken Books.
1973
Natanson, Maurice
Research26
"Man as an Actor." In Philosophyand Phenomenological
1966
(no. 3):327-41. (Also in Combs and Mansfield 1976:4656.)
Nimmo, Dan
"The Drama, Illusion and Reality of Political Images." In PopularImages
1974
of Politics:A Taxonomy.Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Nimmo, Dan, and James E. Combs
SubliminalPolitics:Myths and Mythmakersin America.New York: Prentice1980
Hall.
MediatedPoliticalRealities.New York and London: Longman.
1983
Perinbanayagam,Robert
1985
SignifyingActs. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press.
Plutarch
n.d.

The Lives of the Noble Graeciansand Romans.Translated by John Dryden.

Revised by Arthur Hugh Clough. New York: Modern Library.

Postman, Neil
1986
Amusing Ourselvesto Death: Public Discoursein the Age of Show Business.
New York: Penguin Books.
Rosenau, James
The Dramasof PoliticalLife. North Scituate, MA: Duxbury Press.
1980
Schechner, Richard
1988
Performance
Theory.New York and London: Routledge.
Schechner, Richard, and M. Schuman, editors
Ritual, Play and Performance:Readings in the Social Science/Theatre.New
1976
York: Seabury.
Schechter, Joel
Durov's Pig: Clowns, Politics,and Theatre.New York: Theatre Communi1985
cations Group.
"Politics as Theatre; or, How I Too Lost the Election in 1988." TDR 33
1989
(no. 3):54-65.
1989
"Reagan in Bohemia." AmericanTheatre6 (no. 7):34-36, 118-19.
Stuckey, Mary E.
Rhetoricof Ronald Reagan. New
1989
Getting Into the Game: The Pre-Presidential
York: Praeger.
1990
Playing the Game: The PresidentialRhetoricof Ronald Reagan. New York:
Praeger.
Turner, Victor
The Ritual Process:Structureand Anti-Structure.Chicago: Aldine Publishing
1969
Co.
1974
Dramas, Fields, and Metaphors:SymbolicAction in Human Society. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell University Press.
"Liminal to Limonoid in Play, Flow and Ritual." Rice UniversityStudies60
1974
(no. 3): 53-92.

1982
1990

From Ritual to Theatre: The Human Seriousnessof Play. New York: PAJ
Publications.
"Are There Universals of Performance in Myth, Ritual, and Drama?" In
Intercultural
Studiesof Theatreand Ritual, edited by
By Means of Performance:
Richard Schechner and Willa Appel, 8-18. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.

Wagner-Pacifici, Robin Erica

The Moro MoralityPlay: Terrorismas SocialDrama. Chicago and London:
1986
University of Chicago Press.

Dramaturgy 79
Welsh, John F.
1985
"Dramaturgy and Political Mystification: Political Life in the United
States." Mid-AmericanReviewof Sociologyo1 (no. 2):3-28.
Williams, Raymond
"Drama in a Dramatised Society." In RaymondWilliamson Television,ed1989
ited by Alan O'Connor, 3-13. London and New York: Routledge.
Wilshire, Bruce
Role Playing and Identity:The Limits of Theatreas Metaphor.Bloomington,
I982
IN: Indiana University Press.
Young, T.R., and Garth Massey
"The DramaturgicalSociety: A Macro-Analytic Approach to Dramaturgi1977
cal Analysis." QualitativeSociologyI (no. 2):78-98.
Young, T.R., and John Welsh
CriticalDimensionsin Dramaturgical
I984
Analysis. Lubbock, TX: Red Feather.

Art Borreca is Assistant Professorof theatrehistory, dramaticliterature,and dramaturgy at the University of Iowa. He is also the dramaturgfor the Iowa Playwrights Workshop.He has recentlypublished "The Making of the British History
Play, I956-1968" in Theater 3, and is workingon a book on British historical
drama,The Past's Presence.