Lecture 5 Rethinking the Public Sphere

8/8/2019 Lecture 5 Rethinking the Public Sphere

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Rethinking the Public Sphere

Politics 113: Politics and the Media

Lecture 5 Emma Blomkamp


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Readings

Required: John Thompson, excerpt from The

Media and Modernity(CR)

Recommended:

JM Roberts and Nick Crossley (eds.), Introduction in AfterHabermas: New Perspectives on the Public Sphere, Oxford:

Blackwell Publishing, 2004. (SLC 193.9 H11sVc)

Further reading:

Nancy Fraser, Rethinking the Public Sphere (1990). Journal

article available through JSTOR database.

Peter M Shane (ed.) Democracy Online, London: Routledge,

2004. Especially the Introduction and Chapters 1 and 4.


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Habermass public sphere

Historical model, modern ideal Concepts arose in concrete situation of 18thC

Feudalism commercial society (bourgeois)

Private individuals assembled as public

Rational-critical discussion, informed/reflected by media Constitutional rights institutionalising public sphere

Public sphere ideal type Access for all citizens

Free from power(state, commercial) Rational-critical discussion

Generating public opinion as political consensus/control

Media informing, facilitating, representing


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Transformation of public sphere

Towards mass media

19th-20thC medias industrial revolution

Political enfranchisement/conflict

Literacy rise; censorship decline

Commercial impetus advertising

0

1

2

3

4

5

67

8

9

1800 1900 1950

Highest-selling newspaper (millions)

0

2

4

6

8

10

1920 1923 1924 1939

UK radio sets (millions)


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Building businesses

Commercial

concentration

Press: 1910s : riseof media barons

and newspaper

groups.

Cinema: 1930s-

40s: Big five

dominate industry

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

1900 1920 1940 1960 2000

Newspapers owned by groups (US, per cent)

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

1900 1939 1946

Top studios' film revenue (US$ millions)


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The masses

Mass communication -> Mass audience

Mass market:

industrialisation/commercialisation of media

Mass appeal:

human interest news, tabloid tendencies n.b. mass = imagined as much as a real unity


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Mass media and politics

Mass society critique (1930s-40s)

e.g. Frankfurt School and culture industry theory

Mass media = passive populace

Masses willing/powerless victimsThe deceived masses are today captivated . . . They insist on

the very ideology which enslaves them . . . To be pleased

means to say yes . . . The liberation which amusement

promises is freedom from thought . . .

- Adorno and Horkheimer, The Culture Industry, Enlightenment asMass Deception (1944)

- Depoliticising media serves capitalism

(and/or despots, e.g. Hitler)

Criticisms of mass society thesis


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Transformation and refeudalisation Pre-capitalist developed capitalism

Citizens: debating consuming

Individuals parties, associations

Public opinion sectional interests

Public opinion non-public opinion

Deliberative media depoliticised media

Journalism: conviction commerce

Separate spheres public privacy

Blurring public/private boundaries

The demise of the public sphere


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Rethinking the public sphere

Common criticisms of Habermass model

Exclusivity of historical public sphere

Embedded power structure

Misrepresents media

Idealises golden age of the press

Simplifies media practices and products

Mass media help more than hinder modernrepresentative democracy


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Rethinking the public sphere

Postmodern & feminist critiques Public sphere is gendered concept

Impossibility of ideal speech situation communicative rationality

truthful discourse

unequal groups: more competition than

deliberation

Need state intervention


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Public or Publics?

Multiple public spheres

Subaltern counter publics:parallel discursive arenas where members ofsubordinated social groups invent and circulatecounterdiscourses, which in turn permit them to

formulate oppositional interpretations of their identities,interests, and needs. - Nancy Fraser


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Global or transnational publicsphere public of publics - James Bohman

Cultural public sphereJim McGuigan

Significance of cultural expressionand artistic and literary debate

Political impact Critical intervention in the mainstream

Alternative public spheres


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The tabloid sphere

Talk show as postmodern agora?

Inclusion of ordinary people

Forum for ideas and emotions suppressed inpublic sphere

Erosion of boundary between public and

private

Inconsequential, uninformed discussion


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The internet as a public sphere

Cyber-optimists see a digital revolution

Online chatroom = electronic coffee house?

Internet embodies public sphere ideals:

Free and easy accessibility

Domination-free

Interactivity and hypertextuality

Citizen journalism and blogging

The blogosphere means we now hear what partysupporters once said in private discussions over a beer

- Bill Ralston in New Zealand Herald, 26 July 2009


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Internet

realities

- DigitalDivide Material

equipment:access to

ICT Mentally

equipped

See, for example, http://www.bridges.org/publications/65/exec_summary


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Cyber-pessimists (or realists?) doubt itsdemocratic potential Different from face-to-face communication

Less clear distinction between public and privatediscourse

Series of global villages

Commercialisation of the Internet

Control of and on the Internet


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Commercialisation of internet

Source: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/know-your-playing-field-the-real-top-100-domains


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Politics on the internet

Democratic potential not exploited Internet communities = weak publics


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Towards digital democracy?

Unequal access to new media

The Internet is a social space

(not a tool) Mark Poster, Whats the Matter with the

Internet? (2001)

New forms of identity

constitution and social

interaction

The Internet has not (yet?)revolutionised democracy


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Public sphere: past, present, future

Was there a public sphere? Issues of extent of openness, rationality,

consensus, autonomy

Issue of public sphere v public spheres Is there a public sphere?

Ideals still important

Limited representations in reality

Can there be a better public sphere? Yes, according to numerous media theorists

But obstacles in practice and principle


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Coming up next....

113 lectures:

- Friday 6/08: New Zealand Media

- Thursday 12/08: Media Freedom and Regulation

- Friday 13/08: New Zealand Media guest lecture

Public lectures:

Monday 9 Aug, 6.30pm, Maidment Theatre: No Land is

an Island: Twenty-first Century Politics by EmeritusProfessor Barry Gustafson.

Tuesday 10 August, 12-1pm, Maidment Theatre: Winter

lecture 4, Citizens as gatekeepers, Luke Goode

Lecture 5 Rethinking the Public Sphere

Documents

Transcript of Lecture 5 Rethinking the Public Sphere