How do actors rationalise mediatisation adaption strategies? The Liberal Party of Australia 1983-2013

Political parties are constantly facing the challenge of adapting their political communication and election campaign strategies as media technologies rapidly change. Since the 1980s, studies of mediatisation have examined system-wide effects demonstrating that parties have adapted their political communication and electoral campaigns strategies to changing media environments. However, little is known about how political actors within party structures negotiate changing environments on the ground or how they rationalise decisions to adapt and adopt new strategies. Using internal party archives and elite interviews, this study examines how Liberal Party of Australia politicians and party operatives negotiated changing media environments between 1983 and 2013. The study reveals that Liberal Party actors struggled to utilise the media effectively during the 1980s, producing communication products ill-adapted to the needs of media organisations. However, by the 2010s, political actors had become adroit as a result of lessons learned from previous failures. Today, Liberal Party actors use specific tactics and make deliberate political communication choices to match the demands of media organisations in order to maximise their capacity to shape and dominate political debate in Australia.