REGULATION THEORY (LIVINGSTONE AND LUNT)
Regulation- This is the control over products in the media industry.
Regulation Theory
- A key aspect of the theory is the underlying struggle in recent UK regulation policy between the need to further the interests of citizens on the other hand, and the need to further the interests of consumers on the other.
- This is shown through Ofcom which regulates UK media. The main regulatory duties of Ofcom appear to address the needs of citizens while others seem to address the needs of consumers.
- Linvingstone and Lunt argue that the interests of citizens and those of consumers cannot be easily reconciled. This suggests that there is an increasing tendency in recent UK regulation policy to place the interests of consumers above those of citizens.
Curran and Seaton’s power and media industries theories | ||
A political economical approach to the media argues that, patterns of ownership and control are the most significant factors, in how the media operates (this creates bias).Rich people like owning the newspapers because they like controlling people’s opinions. (media and news is very political due to the ownership of them. This creates a bias in the political views. The rich people like owning the media as they like to control people’s opinions.) |
in most media industries we are dominated by a small number of giant conglomerates.
This theory says that- These companies are all about profit and power
concentrated ownership of large companies like the big six results in lack of choice, lots of the same product- The products they make tend to be quite repetitive, similar and there isn’t a big choice or diversity, because it is all about profit and power. If a film company makes a very successful action movie, they will want to continue that profit and keep the power, so it is very tempting for them to make another with exactly the same storyline.
The primary democratic role of the media is to act as a watch dog, big rich companies have more power and giant conglomerates all own the newspapers and enforce a political compass/ viewpoint onto the newspapers, breaking the theory by Habermas public sphere and reducing the expression between people of our own ideas and opinions – “” input quote.
“From it can be extrapolated a model of a public sphere as a neutral zone where access to relevant information affecting the public is widely available.”