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How Has Art Assisted in the Keeping Events or People in the Foreground of the Collective Memory?

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A growing body of academic work shows that autocratic regimes manipulate collective retentiveness of the historical past as a means to legitimize their grip on political ability. ane While these studies have significantly furthered our understanding of how dictators apply officially sanctioned memory as "rhetorical weapons," two they are mostly limited past ii weaknesses. Beginning, current scholarship is often undertheorized and tends to exist based on single-example studies. 2d, existing analyses are marked past a narrow empirical focus on museums and monuments as vehicles of collective memory; the question of how autocratic regimes cultivate memory through mass media remains largely unexplored.

This article will address both of these weaknesses. First, on a methodological level, the article introduces frameworks of narrative assay to the report of collective retentiveness in dictatorships. Non only do these frameworks enable cross-regime comparisons, but they besides help to demonstrate that commonage retention narratives provide autocratic regimes with a communicative device that taps into unlike dimensions of political legitimacy. Second, on an empirical level, the commodity will demonstrate that dictatorships use news media photographs of the leader to communicate collective memory narratives to mass audiences.

The commodity'southward statement will be developed through a systematic comparison of Eastern asia's surviving single-party communist regimes: North Korea, China, Vietnam, and Laos. Through a rigorous quantitative content analysis of over 2000 propaganda photographs, I am able to show that – by following "screenplays" that are encoded in collective memory narratives – propaganda imagery casts regime leaders in very dissimilar roles: parental caregiver (Due north Korea), intermediary (People's republic of china), and party bureaucrat (Vietnam, Lao people's democratic republic).

The article thus makes a more general contribution to ongoing debates regarding the personalization of dictatorships. Ordinarily, it is argued that greater personalization carries a high gamble of undermining the durability of non-democratic rule. 3 Notwithstanding, these arguments are primarily based on an institutional agreement of personalization, defining personalistic regimes as "autocracies in which discretion over policy and personnel are concentrated in the hands of i human being, armed forces or civilian." 4 On the other mitt, the result of media personalization – which "refers to a change in the presentation of politics in the media, as expressed in a heightened focus on individual politicians" 5 – has largely been neglected by scholars of autocratic politics. Attempting to fill up this gap, the following analysis will evidence that media personalization can take positive effects on autocratic survival. Specifically, by establishing a link between commonage memory narratives and personalistic propaganda imagery, the analysis demonstrates that photographs of the leader may serve to legitimize the regime equally a whole.

Collective memory in autocratic regimes: ways forrad

Driven by a wider "retention boom" in political and public life, inquiry on commonage retention has grown considerably in recent years. 6 Based on the work of French sociologist Maurice Halbwachs, this scholarship shows that collective memory is not an objective epitome of the historical past; instead, collective retentiveness is a highly selective reconstruction that emphasizes some details while omitting or minimizing others. seven As such, collective retentivity

refers to the distribution throughout society of what individuals know, believe, and feel nearly the past, how they guess the by morally, how closely they place with it, and how much they are inspired by it as a model for their comport and identity. 8

This "distributed version" of commonage memory – which rejects the thought that memory is something that groups possess, but instead argues that remembering occurs through interaction in the group – implies two things. 9 First, commonage retentiveness performs political functions in the present. In particular, collective memory operates equally a constraint on political action: "by proscription (through taboos and prohibitions) and by prescription (through duties and requirements)." 10 Second, because memories of the by can be instrumentalized to serve unlike social and political objectives, collective retentiveness is a tool of power. Mirroring Harold D. Lasswell'south famous definition of politics, the written report of collective retention thus engages the question of "who wants whom to remember what, and why." 11 Oft, analyses of the power effects of collective memory distinguish betwixt "official" accounts of history – sponsored by land and authorities agencies – and "mnemonic resistance" by social groups who disagree with hegemonic representations of the past. 12

Related to the 2nd point, it should be emphasized that dictatorships make information technology much harder than democratic regimes to organize mnemonic resistance. In detail, by restricting the freedoms of speech and clan, autocracies reduce the space for societal retention agents to participate in the deliberation of how the historical past should be remembered. Hence, whereas in democratic regimes the evolution of commonage memory tends to be pluralistic and cocky-critical ("What did we do incorrect?"), dictatorships typically monopolize interpretations of the historical past to engage in a "blame game of grievance and victimhood." xiii

Building on these theoretical foundations, a growing number of empirical studies bear witness how autocratic regimes forge collective memory and appeal to officially sanctioned interpretations of the by every bit a means to legitimize non-autonomous dominion. One well-documented strategy is to draw parallels with historical events and periods. For example, the regime of Vladimir Putin – facing a wave of popular protest – fostered fear of revolutionary mass movements by establishing a link between the legacies of the 1917 Russian Revolution and the catastrophic state collapse of 1991. 14 A farther mnemonic strategy is to go along alive memories of collective trauma – such as the 1994 genocide in Rwanda 15 or the "century of humiliation" in China 16 – and convince the population that just the current regime tin assist avoid a echo of these horrific events. Conversely, actively repressing traumatic memories may as well help generate political legitimacy – for example, Hun Sen'due south dictatorship in Cambodia enforces a policy of collective amnesia regarding the atrocities committed during the Pol Pot era to distract from the fact that many Central khmer Rouge operatives yet occupy tiptop positions in government. 17

Although current scholarship on collective retentiveness in autocratic political systems has significantly furthered our understanding of how dictators dispense history for political ends, the literature suffers from two weaknesses. First, existing piece of work is generally undertheorized and proceeds predominantly through single-case study methods. eighteen Second, studies focus largely on monuments and museums as vehicles of remembering, thereby ignoring the office that authorities-controlled mass media play in how collective retentivity is constructed. 19

In this article, I address both of these weaknesses. For one, to enable theory-guided, cross-regime comparisons, I utilise narrative assay to the written report of autocratic politics. Partly considering narratives help to create "the illusion of an authentic retention," narratology has been identified as a methodological approach of slap-up value to the investigation of collective memory. 20 More by and large, narratology has been employed in a wide range of Political Scientific discipline and International Relations subfields, demonstrating that stories – defined as "the organization of events into a plot" 21 – are powerful instruments to influence targeted audiences' attitudes and behaviour. 22

The potential of narrative analysis for the subfield of autocratic politics lies in the capacity of narratives to contain various types of legitimacy. As Tannenberg et al. contend, non-democratic regimes typically seek to depict legitimation from different sources, stressing that "these claims are not mutually exclusive and are often invoked in parallel." 23 Narratives, due to their key elements, are ideal communicative devices to make such multi-track legitimacy claims. For example, by linking carve up events through causal chains, narratives let political actors to portray themselves as capable "fixers" of problems that weigh on society – along the lines of "x acquired a problem, nosotros accept dealt with x." 24 At the aforementioned time, narratives involve different characters, asking audiences to side with the "hero" against the "villain." 25 In other words, narratives do not just provide a machinery to communicate performance on policy issues, but they also help to forge identities.

Too as enlarging the methodological tool kit of dictatorship studies, the article will also make an empirical contribution to our understanding of non-democratic politics past analysing how commonage memory narratives are communicated through state-controlled mass media. In detail, the inquiry will examine photographic images of regime leaders – an analytical focus that is motivated by iii factors. First, visual communication is, generally speaking­, more powerful than verbal communication. Research shows that images – when compared to text – are more attention-grabbing, 26 permit for new information to be candy more quickly and more accurately, 27 and are more memorable and easier to recall. 28 Second, and more than specifically, scholars of collective retention take argued that visual images tin can trigger collective remembering. While other forms of communication – such as museums, Television receiver documentaries, and schoolbooks – serve to disseminate the content of memory, photographs function as aids of memory, allowing audiences to remember cued narratives of the historical past. 29 Third, in any political system, political leaders are among the foremost "narrative entrepreneurs." 30 As "narrator[due south]-in-primary," 31 they occupy a unique position to shape and communicate political narratives and, to an extent, embody such narratives. Related to this, in that location is a rich literature that shows how politicians in democratic political systems effectively employ visual forms of communication to make rhetorical arguments and create a sense of identification between themselves and target audiences. 32 Chiefly, it is possible to distinguish "hard" personalization strategies, which bolster the politician's prototype at the expense of the political party, and "soft" personalization strategies, which employ the persona of the politician to communicate the party'due south values and policies. 33 In brusk, in that location are good reasons to believe that photographs of the leader provide autocratic regimes with a powerful storytelling device to generate legitimacy for the ruling party.

Official versions of the by in East asia's communist regimes

Offset in the tardily 1970s, the communist dictatorships of E Asia have undertaken significant ideological adaptations. While the regimes of China, Vietnam and Laos accept carried out market-oriented reforms that challenge Marxist-Leninist dogma on economic policy, Northward Korea has embraced "our-way socialism" – an ideological construct that "has little to do with class struggle, economical redistribution, or social equality," but instead "has everything to practice with national independence and autonomy." 34 At the same time equally abandoning the utopian communist vision of a classless order, the 4 regimes have turned their propaganda efforts towards the past. As various studies bear witness, the active tillage of collective memory has, since the fall of the Soviet bloc, provided a significant source of legitimacy for single-party rule in East asia. 35

Narratology: an belittling framework

Frameworks for narratological analysis allow us to recognize comparative similarities and differences in regard to how Eastern asia'southward communist regimes manufacture official retentivity. First, narratives engage in the process of characterization – that is, the process of "ascribing data to an amanuensis in the text so as to provide a character in the storyworld with a certain property or properties." 36 Perhaps the most traditional character classification – going dorsum to folktales and fairy tales 37 – is the one between hero and villain. Whereas the villain is morally corrupt and guilty of causing misfortune to other characters, the hero represents positive moral values and alleviates others' misfortune.

2d, "story development is inconceivable without the setting, which makes it possible for actions to accept place and actants to get involved in them. It is impossible to imagine roles and events without embedding them in fourth dimension and space." 38 Based on this bones assumption, scholars of narratology have devised a range of schemes to describe the spatio-temporal background confronting which stories unfold. For example, "[a]n important aspect of the cerebral mapping of narrative texts is the attribution of symbolic meaning to the various regions and landmarks of the narrative earth." 39 In other words, stories differ in how symbolic geography creates partitions between spaces, often past dichotomizing the narrative world into oppositions, such as colonizing/colonized or urban/rural. Regarding the temporal dimension of storytelling, narratologists frequently highlight that narratives vary in their duration, measured as the divergence between the narration and the narrated. forty Storytellers can employ variations in elapsing to foreground certain events while backgrounding other events: if an episode is narrated in great detail, this suggests that it is of particular significance.

Third, any story, through the procedure of emplotment, "transforms the succession of events into a meaningful whole which is the correlate of the act of assembling the events together and which makes the story followable." 41 In a widely applied framework, Booker distinguishes seven basic emplotment modes, including the "overcoming the monster" plot and the "rebirth" plot. Narratives that follow the "overcoming the monster" plot "testify the hero beingness called to face and overcome a terrible and deadly personification of evil." 42 On the other hand, what distinguishes the "rebirth" emplotment mode is that a central figure "falls under a dark spell which eventually traps them in some wintry state, akin to living death […] Then a miraculous human action of redemption takes place, focused on a [hero] who helps to liberate the [figure] from imprisonment." 43

Finally, narratives differ in the causal mechanisms they employ to tie different events into a coherent plot line. A framework developed by Rock 44 – which is frequently used past narrative analyses of public policy 45 – delineates iv different types of causal mechanisms: accidental (e.yard. bad luck, natural disaster), intentional (the villain acts with purpose), inadvertent (problem was caused by ignorance or carelessness), and mechanical (people human action similar automatons).

Heroic stories of the party: differences and similarities

Analysed through the narratogical framework just sketched, it becomes apparent that, to legitimize their autocratic grip on power, E Asia'south communist regimes push outward-oriented narratives of collective memory, identifying external enemies who – in the past – exploited the land's human and natural resources, and exercised tearing and coercive control over people'due south lives (see Table i). In all 4 cases, the respective regime party is anthropomorphized equally the brave and principled hero who liberated country and people from oppression by strange powers. While official historiographies may also contain tales of heroic deeds by other actors – including leaders (e.g. Kim Il-sung, Hồ Chí Minh) and the military – information technology is the party who acts as the story's central "figure."

Table one. Narratives of collective memory in East asia's communist regimes.

All the same, beyond similarities on the dimension of label, collective memory narratives brandish marked differences. For one, the regimes' historiographic stories differ in their emplotment. Official narratives in Democratic people's republic of korea, Vietnam and Laos are written around the "overcoming the monster" plot type. The story goes something like this: for centuries, the people had fought confronting foreign invasion and occupation; however, it was only when the regime party came on the scene – providing strategic leadership and organizational coordination – that this fight was won. North Korean historiography traces the long history of resistance against foreign aggressors from the kingdom of Goguryeo (37 BC to 668 Advertising), which – unlike neighbouring kingdoms – refused to serve as a Chinese or Japanese vassal state, to the unsuccessful 1919 insurgence against Japanese colonial dominion. 46 Information technology is at this signal that Kim Il-sung is introduced equally the strategic mastermind who, by organizing the masses into a Marxist-Leninist movement, not only puts an cease to colonialism but likewise leads the North Korean people to victory in the Groovy Fatherland Liberation State of war against the United States – known in the Westward every bit the Korean War. 47 Vietnamese historiography describes a similarly long tradition of resistance to external enemies, ranging from anti-Chinese uprisings in the showtime century – led by the legendary Trưng sisters – to the struggle against French rule during the era of colonialism. However, so the story runs, information technology was only "[i]due north the twentieth century, thanks to the 'vivid lite' of 'Uncle Ho,' the Communist Party, and the People's Army, [that] the Vietnamese would bring to fruition what the two sisters had begun." 48 Likewise, in Laos, "[t]he whole history of the Lao people is proclaimed to be 'a secular struggle for independence and liberty,'" 49 pitting the Lao people against aggressive neighbours – such equally the Burmese and the Thai – and French and American imperialism. Even so, the fight was only won in the 1970s, after "[t]he party allegedly brought 'correct line and leadership' and therefore united the previously uncoordinated 'rebellions' into a revolutionary forcefulness against foreign domination." fifty

In contrast, the collective retentiveness narrative of the Chinese regime is based on the "rebirth" plot type. The story is fairly simple: China had long been a proud and powerful nation, but – due to the "corruption and incompetence" of the Qing rulers and the Kuomintang (KMT) regime – the state roughshod casualty to foreign interference and exploitation. Confronting this narrative groundwork, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) presents itself every bit the hero who will elevator the "night spell" that has been cast over the land: "Only the Communist Party of Mainland china can salvage Prc; only the political party can develop and rejuvenate Cathay." 51 Thus, compared to the other communist regimes, the China'south rebirth narrative "doesn't only criticize outsiders"; instead, it lays role of the blame for "foreign invasion" on the shortcomings of political regimes that came before the CCP. 52

In addition, differences in emplotment shape the temporal dimension of the setting. China'due south rebirth story focuses on a relatively short time menses – the and so-called "century of humiliation," which spans from the First Opium War (1839–1842) to the horrors of Japanese occupation during World War II. 53 On the other manus, the "overcoming the monster" stories unfold over much longer periods – in the case of North Korea and Vietnam, over a period of around ii k years.

More significantly yet, collective retentiveness narratives are held together by different types of causal mechanisms, which – in turn – determines the spatial dimension of the narrative setting. Whereas North Korean historiography employs mechanical causality to explain why states invade other states, the regimes of China, Vietnam and Laos apply intentional causality to make sense of violent and exploitative behaviour at the international level. Specifically, North korea's collective memory narrative is set in a globe of hyper-rationality – a world in which states are driven past one single goal: expanding their power. This means that the Korean people – under the guidance of the Workers' Political party of Korea (WPK) – may have succeeded in expelling Japanese and American forces; however, given that the international system continues to be populated by power-hungry automatons, this victory is only temporary. As Armstrong puts information technology, the North Korean regime generates "a collective sense of anxiety and fear of outside threats" 54 – or, in the words of French, "a abiding land of paranoia." 55 By stoking mistrust of the outside world, the collective memory narrative serves to justify juche – literally "self-reliance" – as the regime's official credo. Juche defines a uniquely North Korean form of nationalistic socialism that owes more to social Darwinistic ideas of "the survival of the fittest" than to the class theory of Marxism-Leninism. 56

While North Korean historiography thus depicts a world that is governed past natural, unchangeable laws, the collective memory narratives of China, Vietnam, and Laos are set up in a globe that is of our own making. The "Chinese dream" promoted past the CCP posits that the global community is able to pursue "win-win cooperation and the peaceful resolution of international and regional disputes." 57 Likewise, the Vietnamese regime rejects "the zero-sum view of the earth divided into 'friends and enemies.'" 58 Instead, it is possible to "become friends with all countries," fifty-fifty with former enemies – a worldview that is shared by Lao historiography, which bears hit parallels with the official Vietnamese interpretation of historical events. 59

In brusk, the commonage retentiveness narratives of the four communist regimes differ on the dimensions of emplotment and causality, which in turn shape the spatio-temporal background against which these stories unfold. Consequently, the legitimacy claims that follow from these narratives are also different (see Figure i). While the communist parties in Red china, Vietnam and Laos declare that, under their rule, the country improved its status in the international hierarchy vis-à-vis colonial and expansionist powers, the North Korean regime justifies its rule by portraying itself as the protector against a naturally dangerous world. Both status and protection are basic social goals; their achievement or frustration tin trigger powerful collective emotions, such as pride, anger, shame or fright. 60 Moreover, the regimes' collective memory narratives propose dissimilar explanations as to why the political party has been able to deliver on these goals: in the "overcoming the monster" plot (Democratic people's republic of korea, Vietnam, Laos), the party coordinates the people's heroic efforts through ideological and organizational guidance; in the "rebirth" plot (China), the party rectifies previous regimes' mistakes and shortcomings.

Figure 1. Narratives of collective memory in Eastward Asia's communist regimes.

Narrating the party's achievements through photographs of the leader

The main empirical argument developed in this article is that East Asia'south surviving communist regimes employ photographs of the leader to cultivate commonage retentivity. That is to say, collective memory narratives provide a "screenplay" for how to visualize the leader in mass propaganda.

Inquiry on political communication in democratic regimes has produced ample evidence that "politicians use visual imagery to tell their story and become their point across." 61 While photographic images are normally understood to exist directly copies of reality, information technology needs to be stressed that photographs do not represent but participate in the construction of reality; they are necessarily fractional and selective, and can exist only as staged and strategic equally other forms of communication. 62 In particular, for the purpose of telling stories through photographs of politicians, visual content can be controlled on three dimensions:

  • What visual cues are encoded in the politician'south trunk language and actions? For instance, politicians can imbue themselves with attributes of compassion past holding and kissing babies; meanwhile, facial expressions and gestures play an of import part in communicating competency and leadership power. 63

  • Are other participants depicted in the epitome? For example, by actualization with large crowds or interacting with common citizens, politicians can manufacture the impression that they have mass appeal and are "close to the people." 64

  • In what setting does the leader appear? For example, military settings convey messages of patriotism and security. 65

By controlling the production of propaganda photographs on these three dimensions, East Asia'due south communist regimes can – first of all – communicate the causality function of their commonage retention narratives. Regimes that employ an intentionality mechanism and claim that the party succeeded in establishing the land every bit a sovereign nation state – thereby improving the state's status in the global bureaucracy – can visualize this accomplishment by portraying the leader in the context of domestic politics and international affairs. Such images send out the bulletin that "we are an contained land, we manage our own affairs."

H1: The leaders of China, Vietnam and Laos are more likely to be depicted in settings of domestic politics and international diplomacy.

The narrative of the Due north Korean regime, on the other paw, is based on mechanical causality, claiming that the political party bestows protection against danger. Hence, rather than creating collective emotions of pride, the propaganda machine will seek to instil feelings of calmness. This can exist achieved past creating an prototype of an "all-knowledgeable and wise" leader who can exist trusted to provide fundamental security – in particular, food, shelter, and protection against physical harm.

H2: The North Korean leader is more likely to exist depicted in settings that relate to the production and distribution of basic necessities.

H3: The North Korean leader is more than likely to be depicted in settings of military grooming and operations.

Moreover, photographs can be strategically produced to communicate the emplotment element of collective memory narratives. To begin with, the CCP's "rebirth" plot draws up a directly comparison with preceding regimes, whose self-serving greed is singled out as the principal trigger for China's "century of humiliation." As Vickers explains, the CCP'southward legitimacy narrative "contrasts the squalor and suffering of pre-revolutionary China, where the rich looked subsequently themselves and the government did nothing for the poorest, with the situation in 'New' China, where the government cares for all the people." 66 I expect that this ethos of "serving the people" will also exist reflected in photographs of the Chinese leader.

H4: The Chinese leader is more than probable to exist depicted with large crowds.

H5: The Chinese leader is more than likely to be depicted engaging with ordinary citizens.

In contrast, those communist regimes that accept crafted "overcoming the monster" narratives of the historical past (North Korea, Vietnam, Laos) experience less pressure level to evidence that they are "accountable to the people." This is not to say that these regimes consider mass legitimacy unimportant; in fact, amidst mounting abuse allegations and growing social inequality, the governments of Vietnam and Laos are increasingly concerned nigh their legitimacy. 67 Rather, my argument is that the "overcoming the monster" narrative – considering it emphasizes the ruling party'southward role in providing top-down guidance in the struggle confronting foreign aggressors – relies less on crowds and ordinary people equally visual storytelling devices than China's "rebirth" narrative.

Totalitarian screenplays: a quantitative content analysis

To demonstrate that collective retentiveness narratives are communicated through photographic images of the leader, I apply quantitative content analysis. Put in simple terms, the method "is based on counting the frequency of certain visual elements in a clearly defined population of images, and so analyzing those frequencies." 68 Quantitative content analysis is the standard methodological tool for studies that investigate strategic visual communication by politicians and parties in democratic regimes. 69

Research design

Photographs of current regime leaders are chosen as the unit of measurement of analysis. In North Korea, Kim Jong-un has been referred to equally the country's "supreme leader" – a mere symbolic title that nevertheless signals de facto political power – since 2011. In China, Xi Jinping was elected general secretary of the CCP in 2012 and president in 2013. The Vietnamese government had, since the mid-1980s, dissever the meridian party and state leadership positions between two individuals; however, in 2018, CPV general secretary Nguyễn Phú Trọng (in office since 2011) was also elected president. The Lao regime, on the other hand, hangs on to a dual leadership system, dividing executive power betwixt the general secretary of the LPRP (Bounnhang Vorachith; since 2016) and the prime government minister (Thongloun Sisoulith, since 2016).

Equally I aim to compare media content distributed by four divide regimes, my analysis lends itself to a strategy of cluster sampling – that is, selecting units of analysis from groups of content. Specifically, photographs were sampled from online newspapers over a iii-year time frame (January 2017 – December 2019). 70 In the case of China and Vietnam, news outlets were chosen based on empirical considerations; in the case of North korea and Lao people's democratic republic – because major news publishers practice not maintain websites that would permit a systematic sampling of photographic images – news outlets were chosen on more businesslike grounds (see Table 2). 71 In cases where a paper published more one photo of the aforementioned issue, all photographs of that event were added to the sample. I based this decision on the logic that, if newspapers distributed several photographs of the same event, they deemed the event to be particularly of import. In countries where photographs were sampled from more than i news outlet (Vietnam, Lao people's democratic republic), duplicates were removed from the sample. In total, these decisions resulted in a sample of 2113 photographs.

Table ii. Sample backdrop.

Each photograph in the sample was coded on 5 binary variables, indicating the presence (value = 1) or absence (value = 0) of the following visual elements in relation to the leader, other subjects, and the setting:

  • Politics and diplomacy: leader participating in regime meetings or engaging in diplomatic activities (east.thousand. visiting other countries, hosting strange politicians, attending multilateral summits and other events).

  • Basic necessities: leader appears in settings that chronicle to the production and distribution of bones necessities (food, clothing) or the provision of shelter (construction sites).

  • Military: images of the leader wearing a military uniform, visiting troops, inspecting weapon systems, overseeing manoeuvres, parades and other military operations (e.grand. natural disaster relief) or bestowing medals and promotions.

  • Crowds: depictions of the leader appearing before an approving audience or engaging with large groups of people (e.one thousand. waving, giving bearding handshakes).

  • Ordinary citizens: portrayals of the leader giving full attending to ordinary citizens (e.yard. speaking to individuals or small groups, posing for a photo, partaking in joint activities).

The coding procedure followed guidelines of good do. In item, I employed iii coders, none of whom had been involved in the design of the codebook. One coder coded 100% of the sample, the other 2 coders coded a random sample of 10% (211 photographs). Moreover, I followed a blind coding arroyo – that is to say, coders were not informed about the purpose of the written report. Finally, intercoder reliability for each variable was calculated using Krippendorff alpha. Equally can be seen, intercoder understanding was generally very high: for all variables, Krippendorff blastoff is larger than .80 (see Table iii), which is considered the cut-off betoken for a good reliability test.

Table 3. Intercoder reliability.

Findings and discussion

As outlined earlier, the collective retentiveness narratives of the iv communist regimes differ on 2 key dimensions: causality and emplotment. Narratives that are based on a causal mechanism of intentionality (China, Vietnam, Laos) heighten the following claim to legitimacy: the regime party succeeded in increasing the country's status in the international bureaucracy of states. On the other mitt, the Northward Korean authorities maintains a narrative that pushes a mechanistic causal account of global events, portraying the world in a natural state of "survival of the fittest." The resulting legitimacy merits is a different one: the regime party protects the people against a hyper-hostile environs.

As can be seen from Figure 2, these narratological differences clearly shape the strategic practise of photography production in the four communist regimes. Binary logistic regression reveals that these differences in visual frequencies are statistically significant (Table 4), thus confirming H1-H3. For one, the leaders of China (OR = 2.25; p < 0.001), Vietnam (OR = 3.39; p < 0.001) and Laos (OR = four.84; p < 0.001) are portrayed in contexts of domestic politics and international diplomacy with much greater frequency than the North Korean leader. 72 These images serve to signal that sovereign international status has been achieved.

Effigy 2. Quantitative content assay: frequency of visual elements (in %).

Table 4. Regression models: narrative causality.

Moreover, the quantitative content analysis shows that Kim Jong-un – compared to his counterparts – is more probable to be visualized in settings that chronicle to the production and distribution of basic necessities, and settings of military security. These images create a sense of calmness, reassuring citizens that they are in "prophylactic hands." The propaganda machines in China (OR = 0.07; 0.42; p < 0.001), Vietnam (OR = 0.03; 0.81; p < 0.001), and Laos (OR = 0.14; 0.11; p < 0.001) – where collective memory narratives practise not fuel a sense of commonage paranoia – produce far fewer images that visualize the leader equally an "all-knowledgeable caregiver."

Furthermore, while the Chinese authorities pushes a commonage memory narrative that follows a "rebirth" plot construction, the other regimes apply an "overcoming the monster" emplotment model. These narratological devices provide audiences with a simplified explanation of how the government parties achieved what they achieved. China's "rebirth" story claims that the CCP worked to remedy the shortcomings of preceding regimes; "overcoming the monster" narratives, on the other hand, argue that the party provided decisive organizational and ideological guidance in the people's struggle confronting external threats.

The quantitative content assay again finds strong empirical support for a link between collective memory narratives and patterns in the visualization of autocratic leaders for propaganda purposes. Photographs produced by the Chinese propaganda car – in an effort to portray the CCP as more accountable than previous regimes – portray the leader every bit "close to the people" with much greater regularity than imagery produced past the other 3 communist parties. Specifically, Xi Jinping is regularly depicted either appearing before crowds or engaging with ordinary citizens. Or put differently, binary logistic regression indicates that the leaders of Democratic people's republic of korea (OR = 0.49; 0.30; p < 0.001), Vietnam (OR = 0.30; 0.37; p < 0.001), and Lao people's democratic republic (OR = 0.12; p < 0.001; OR = 0.45; p < 0.01), are significantly less probable to appear in photographs with crowds or ordinary people (Table five). We can therefore have H4 and H5.

Table 5. Regression models: narrative emplotment.

Overall, the quantitative content thus shows that official collective retentivity narratives provide "screenplays" for the visualization of authorities leaders. Through propaganda imagery, leaders are presented as the visible apotheosis of the authorities party'south heroic role in officially sanctioned stories of the historic past. Additional longitudinal analyses were conducted to demonstrate that photographic storytelling does indeed work at the government level, not at the leader level (meet Appendix). 73

The causal inference tin can exist further strengthened by because rival explanations. In detail, there are two possible causal alternatives that warrant further discussion. First, one could make the case that differences in photographic imagery tin can be linked to the degree of institutional personalization: because the N Korean leader plays a much more powerful role in the political system than his counterparts in Prc, Vietnam and Laos, he dominates the visual propaganda output – non only in the political sphere, only in all spheres of public life. 74 Second, it is possible to argue that differences in the visualization of authorities leaders are due to path-dependent "stickiness": Xi Jinping and Kim Jong-un follow a screenplay that is dictated by the institutionalized practice of the "inspection bout" – a propaganda tool that can be traced back to Mao Zedong'southward "mass line" method of political leadership and Kim Il-sung'south doctrine of "anti-bureaucratism," respectively. 75

To address these rival explanations, it helps to analyse a number of typical photographs – that is, images that are representative of the regimes' photographic strategies – in more depth. This allows for a detailed examination of visual elements that are hard to measure quantitatively, thereby providing a more than holistic understanding of the part scripted for the leader.

As other scholars have observed previously, "on the spot" guidance tours allow the North Korean propaganda apparatus to portray the leader equally a parental caregiver. For instance, equally Lim argues, "[t]hrough his constant guidance tours, the leader manufactures an image of a parent (or male parent) who always listens to the people's problems and tries to solve them." 76 The location, as the quantitative content analysis shows, is one photographic technique that helps create the parent paradigm: by placing the leader against backdrops that connote basic man needs – such equally military manoeuvres (protection against physical damage) or farms (food) – propaganda photographs imbue the leader with connotations of paternal care. Other photographic techniques are more subtle. Perhaps nearly importantly, typical photographs of guidance tours (encounter Figure 3) are packed with visual cues that suggest that Kim Jong-un imparts his infinite wisdom to his "children." Such cues can be encoded in Kim'south body linguistic communication (e.thousand. gesticulating in an instructive style) or in the behaviour of other individuals in the photograph (east.g. officials feverishly taking notes). To develop the epitome of a "benevolent" and "amicable" father 77 – rather than a stern and distant patriarch – photographs of guidance tours ofttimes depict Kim in casual, somewhat eccentric, outfits. This gives the viewer a sense of Kim's personality, which in turn makes the North Korean less intimidating and more approachable.

Figure three. The parental caregiver: Kim Jong-un. Source: Reproduced with permission from KCNA/Xinhua.

The Chinese leader, also, regularly embarks on inspection tours. Yet, typical propaganda photographs of these tours (see Figure 4) cast Xi Jinping in a different role, that of an intermediary between the people and the political party. Every bit the content assay reveals, Xi is frequently seen interacting with ordinary people or appearing in front of approving crowds – usually "mass actors" (qunyan) controlled by the propaganda machine. 78 Moreover, in marked contrast to Kim Jong-united nations, typical photographs portray Xi as a listener rather than a teacher or an teacher. At the same time, Xi's choice of clothing projects ability and authority. The navy blueish, zippered windbreaker – which, in recent years, has get an almost uniform-like outfit for government officials at all levels of government – is peculiarly instructive. While designed to project a modest and honest appearance, "the jacket is [also] a reminder of the conformity that is expected within an authoritarian arrangement." 79 The arresting sight of Eleven and his entourage wearing matching windbreakers (Effigy 4, bottom) carries connotations of obedience and hierarchy, leaving no question as to who wields power and authority in this frame.

Figure 4. The intermediary: Xi Jinping. Source: Reproduced with permission from Lui Siu Wai/Xinhua (top), Ju Peng/Xinhua (bottom).

On the other hand, leaders in Vietnam (Nguyễn Phú Trọng) and Laos (Thongloun Sisoulith; Bounnhang Vorachith) are cast in the part of party bureaucrats (Effigy five). Typical propaganda photographs project qualities of political leadership not simply through the setting – photographs are commonly prepare behind the "closed doors" of domestic politics or international diplomacy, far removed from mutual people's mundane everyday lives – but also through the leaders' actions (due east.one thousand. giving speeches, chairing meetings). In add-on, typical photographs are saturated with symbols of national pride and sovereignty (such as flags and statues), which serves to remind people that, "had it not been for the political party, the country would still exist shackled to colonial and imperial control."

Figure v. Political party bureaucrats: Nguyễn Phú Trọng and Thongloun Sisoulith. Source: Reproduced with permission from VNA/Xinhua (elevation), KPL/Xinhua (bottom).

In short, analysing more muted photographic techniques reveals that authorities leaders play qualitatively different roles in propaganda imagery. These roles are scripted past the corresponding regime's collective retentiveness narrative, rather than by institutional structures or norms: the parental caregiver provides protection confronting a naturally hostile world (North korea), the intermediary vows to restore pop accountability to a system previously plagued by abuse and self-serving behaviour (China), and the party bureaucrat reminds audiences that it was the ruling party's organizational top-down guidance that helped secure independence from colonial oppression (Vietnam, Laos).

Conclusion

Through a systematic comparing of Eastward Asia'due south communist regimes, this article has made two contributions to our understanding of how dictatorships manufacture collective memory to their own political reward. First, on a methodological level, the commodity introduced narratology to the written report of autocratic politics, suggesting that storytelling can exist an important legitimation strategy. For case, narratives may generate legitimacy by featuring clear-cut hero and villain characters (identity legitimacy), and by detailing the heroic deeds of the ruling political party (output legitimacy). Second, on an empirical level, the article has demonstrated that dictatorships do non simply industry commonage retentivity through museums, monuments and schoolbooks, merely also through mass media – specifically, propaganda photographs of the leader.

These findings are of wider significance, equally they evidence that media personalization does not take to come at the expense of the regime political party. The visual analysis provides show that "soft" personalization strategies may serve both to communicate the personal traits and qualities of the leader as well as to brand arguments most the legitimacy of the party as an abstract organization. The commodity thus encourages future research on autocratic politics to broaden the belittling focus across the rather narrow phenomenon of institutional personalization. In detail, while the preceding enquiry has been concerned with the content of visual propaganda, information technology is worth investigating – for case, through survey experiments – whether leader-focused imagery succeeds in eliciting authorities back up amid citizens. 80

1 Chatterje-Doody and Tolz, "Regime Legitimation"; Kelley, "Maintaining Power"; Wang, Never Forget.

2 Shain, "Decision," 213.

iii For case, Geddes et al., How Dictatorships Work; Grundholm, "Investigating Regime Personalization."

4 Geddes et al., "Autocratic Breakdown," 319.

5 Rahat and Sheafer, "The Personalization(south) of Politics," 67.

half dozen On the "memory boom" in both academia and civic life, meet Blight, "The Memory Boom."

vii According to Halbwachs, memory is shaped past cadres sociaux (social frameworks) – cognitive schemata that individuals acquire through communication and interaction within social groups. See Halbwachs, On Collective Memory.

8 Schwartz, "Concept of Collective Memory," 10.

9 The "distributed version" label is from Wertsch, "Collective Memory," 119.

10 Olick and Levy, "Collective Retentivity and Constraint."

11 Confino, "Collective Memory," 1393.

12 On mnemonic resistance, run into Ryan, "Retentiveness, Ability and Resistance."

13 Shain, "Determination," 217.

14 Chatterje-Doody and Tolz, "Regime Legitimation."

15 Kelley, "Maintaining Power."

16 Wang, Never Forget.

17 Chandler, "Cambodia Deals with Its By."

18 Other scholars share this critical cess. For example, see Wang, Memory Politics, 2.

xix A notable exception is the analysis of Russian Television programmes in Chatterje-Doody and Tolz, "Authorities Legitimation."

20 Erll, Memory in Civilisation, 78; as well run across Abel et al., "Collective Retentiveness"; Zerubavel, Fourth dimension Maps.

21 Robertson, "Narrative Analysis," 124.

22 In detail, scholarship on social movements (Polletta and Chen, "Narrative and Social Movements"), public policy assay (Jones et al., "Narrative Policy Framework"), and public affairs (Roselle et al., "Strategic Narrative") has considerably improved our agreement of how political actors can use strategic storytelling to further their goals.

23 Tannenberg et al., "Regime Legitimation Strategies," viii.

24 Stone, Policy Paradox, 227.

25 Jasper et al., "Character Work."

26 Bucher and Schumacher, "The Relevance of Attention."

27 Graber, Processing Politics.

28 Brosius, "The Furnishings of Emotional Pictures."

29 Erll, Memory in Culture; Assmann, "Memory."

xxx Subotić, "Ontological Security," 615.

31 Krebs, Narrative and National Security, 49.

32 For comprehensive reviews of this literature, see Schill, "The Visual Image"; Dumitrescu, "Nonverbal Advice."

33 Holtz-Bacha et al., "The Personalization of Politics"; Poulakidakos and Giannouli, "Political Leaders on Instagram."

34 Armstrong, "Ideological Introversion and Regime Survival," 111.

35 Pelley, Postcolonial Vietnam; Tappe, "Lao Historiography"; Wang, Never Forget.

36 Jannidis, "Character," 21.

37 Propp, Morphology of the Folktale.

38 Herman and Vervaeck, Handbook of Narrative Analysis, 57.

39 Ryan, "Space," 428.

40 Bridgeman, "Time and Space," 58–9; Prince, Narratology, 31.

41 Ricœur, Fourth dimension and Narrative, 67.

42 Booker, The 7 Basic Plots, 48.

43 Ibid., 194.

44 Rock, Policy Paradox, 208–18.

45 Jones et al., "Narrative Policy Framework."

46 Ch'oe, "History in Democratic people's republic of korea," 518.

47 Cumings, N Korea, 124–six; Lim, Personality Cult, 78–82.

48 Pelley, Postcolonial Vietnam, 181.

49 Stuart-Play a joke on, "Historiography in Lao people's democratic republic," 86.

l Tappe, "Lao Historiography," 436.

51 Wang, Never Forget, 138.

52 Callahan, The Pessoptimist Nation, 27.

53 Hays Gries, China's New Nationalism, 45–52.

54 Armstrong, "Reconstruction of Democratic people's republic of korea," para. 3.

55 French, Country of Paranoia, xvii.

56 Armstrong, The North Korean Revolution, 221.

57 Sørensen, "Eleven Jinping's 'Chinese Dream,'" 59; also see Mayer, "Cathay's Historical Statecraft."

58 Thayer, "Vietnamese affairs," 39.

59 Lockhart, "Constructing a National History."

60 Oatley, Emotions, 79–86.

61 Schill, "The Visual Image," 121.

62 Bleiker, "Mapping Visual Global Politics," 12–3.

63 Grabe and Bucy, Paradigm Bite Politics, 104; Schill, "The Visual Paradigm," 122–three.

64 Grabe and Bucy, Prototype Bite Politics, 107.

65 Schill, Stagecraft and Statecraft, 79.

66 Vickers, "'Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,'" 528.

67 Nguyen, "Resilience of Vietnam's Authoritarian Government"; Sayalath and Creak, "Authorities Renewal in Laos."

68 Rose, Visual Methodologies, 88.

69 For case, Poulakidakos and Giannouli, "Political Leaders on Instagram"; Lalancette and Raynauld. "The Power of Political Image."

70 Photographs in these newspapers are typically provided by the regimes' respective news agencies. I decided confronting sampling directly from news agencies, as not all agency photographs necessarily make it into news apportionment.

71 The official newspapers of the Workers' Party of Korea and the Lao People'south Revolutionary Party are Rodong Sinmun and Pasason, respectively. Nonetheless, in both cases the online search office is severely express.

72 It is worth stressing that North korea'southward comparatively low value on this variable is not due to the country'southward international isolation. As a matter of fact, Kim Jong-un appears in settings of international diplomacy more than frequently than the Vietnamese leader (33.five% vs. xxx.5%). Instead, the low value is primarily driven by the relative absence of images set in a context of domestic politics (5.5%).

73 In addition, one could check to what extent these results are driven by unforeseeable events, such every bit international crises or natural disasters. However, the problem is that in that location is no objective measure of an "unforeseeable effect"; rather, it is the regimes' propaganda organs themselves – facilitated by censorship and media command – that decide whether unforeseeable events are turned into news items. Moreover, even if regime were forced to respond to a sure result, studies of visual political communication in autonomous regimes have demonstrated that public relations professionals are skilled in responding to unforeseeable events with photographs that are visually consequent with the politician's or party's overall prototype strategy (east.g., Lalancette and Raynauld. "The Ability of Political Image," 908–9).

74 Equally a number of scholars highlight, the N Korean leader is relatively unconstrained in terms of policy and personnel decisions. For example, in Geddes et al. "Autocratic Breakdown," North korea is classified as a "political party-personal" authorities, whereas the regimes of China, Vietnam and Laos are identified as "party-based" types.

75 Both Mao Zedong and Kim Il-sung Mao challenged the historical materialism of Marxism – in other words, the supposition that political ideas and ideology are determined past the economic structure. Instead, they believed that political leadership, by mobilizing mass enthusiasm and fomenting workers' ideological commitment, is able to create the fabric weather of communism.

76 Lim, Personality Cult, 113. Also encounter also see Kwon and Chung, Democratic people's republic of korea, 27–ix.

77 Lim, Personality Cult, 86.

78 I would like to thank one of the anonymous reviewers for making this point.

79 Gerwitz, "Xi Jinping's Favorite Item of Habiliment."

80 A study that takes a footstep in this direction is Bush et al. "The Furnishings of Authoritarian Iconography."

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Source: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13510347.2020.1849146

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