HABERMAS AND THE PUBLIC SPHERE

• An area in social life where individuals can come together to freely discuss and identify societal problems, which can influence political action.
• Habermas describes it as ‘a virtual/imaginary community which doesn’t necessarily exist in any identifiable space.‘
• He argues that the development of early modern capitalism brought into being an autonomous arena of public debate
• He argues, the public sphere came to be dominated by an expanded state and organised economic interests
• Question he asked himself “How can this model be universalised during the era of mass politics in a highly differentiated, organised capitalist society?”

Watchdog

• “The watchdog role is said to override in importance all other functions of the media, and to dictate the form in which the media should be organised”
• “Once the media becomes subject to public regulation, it will lose its bite as a watchdog and may even be transformed into a snarling Rottweiler in the service of the state”

CURRAN AND SEATEN

• The media is controlled by a small number of companies that make products to create profit
• Media concentration adversely affects media content
• Diverse ownership creates diverse products

NOAM CHOMSKY- MANUFACTURING CONSENT

Online article has adverts which relates to Chomsky’s advertising and structure of ownership where the endgame is profit and the paper is advertising a product unrelated to the paper. curran and seaton- media is controled by companies to make products to make profit

5 filters of media:

1- Structure of Ownership

• Only a few companies
• Endgame=profit

2- role of advertising

• selling advertisers a product

3- links with the establishment

• crucial to process of journalism

4- flak

• Diversionary tactics
• challenging/manipulating

5- uniting against a common enemy

• a target
• something to fear

AGENDA SETTING, FRAMING, MYTH MAKING, CONDITIONS OF CONSUMPTION

“media is a mechanism that is deliberately used by the rich and powerful [the elite] as a way of ‘manufacturing consent'”

Roland Barthes

• read the signs