MEDIA SYSTEMS AND COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE TERMS/ESSENTIALS
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
- Media system model purpose not classification but identification of characteristic patterns of
relationship between system characteristics
- Liberal model Britain, Ireland, north America
- Democratic corporatist model northern continental Europe
- Polarized pluralist model Mediterranean countries of southern Europe
- Liberal model relative dominance of market mechanisms and of commercial media
- Democratic corporatist model historical coexistence of commercial media and media tied to
organized social and political groups and relatively active but legally limited role of the state
- Limitations of data severe restrictions on our ability to draw any firm conclusions about the
relations between media and society
CHAPTER 2: COMPARING MEDIA SYSTEMS
- The structure of media markets the developments of a mass press
- Newspapers southern Europe small elite, mainly urban, well educated, politically active
- Newspapers southern Europe sophisticated and politicized in their content, involved in a horizontal
process of debate and negotiation among elite factors
- Newspapers northern Europe and north America mass public not necessarily engaged in political
world involved in a vertical process of communication mediating between political elites and the
ordinary citizen
- Strong political parallelism the culture and discursive style of journalism is closely related to that of
politics
- Party-press parallelism broader concept of political parallelism
- External pluralism pluralism achieved at the level of the media system as a whole, through the
existence of a range of media outlets or organizations reflecting the points of view of different groups
or tendencies in societies
o External pluralism and its parallelism high level of political parallelism
- Internal pluralism pluralism achieved within each individual media outlet or organization. refer to
cases where media organizations both avoid institutional ties to political groups and attempt to
maintain neutrality and 'balance' in their content
o Internal pluralism and its parallelism high end political parallelism
- Government model and its parallelism high end of political parallelism
- Government model public broadcasting is controlled directly by the government or by political
majority
- Professional model and its parallelism low end political parallelism
- Professional model a strong tradition developed that broadcasting should be largely insulated from
political control and run by broadcasting professionals
- Parliamentary/proportional oportional representation model and its parallelism middle of political
parallelism
- Parliamentary/proportional oportional representation model control over public broadcasting is
divided among the political parties by proportional representation
- Civic or corporatist model similar to the parliamentary model in the sense that control of public
service broadcasting is distributed among various social and political groups, but differs in that
representation is extended beyond political parties to other kinds of 'socially relevant groups'
- Professionalization formal 'professional' training has become increasingly common, and does often
play an important role in defining journalism as an occupation and social institution
- Dimensions of professionalization autonomy, distinct professional norms, public service orientation
, - Autonomy talking about the corps of journalists taken as a whole, instead of autonomy of
individuals
- Distinct professional norms professions with a certain style of life, code of ethics and self-conscious
identity and barriers to outsiders
- Public service orientation professions are oriented toward an ethic of public service
- Instrumentalization control of the media by outside actors, who use them to intervene in the world
of politics
- Role of the state the state plays a significant role in shaping the media system in any society
- Public service broadcasting most important form of state intervention
CHAPTER 3: THE POLITICAL CONTEXT OF MEDIA SYSTEMS
- Pigtail’s point on development of the advertising industry a variety of cultural and economic factors
have made brand-name marketing and therefore advertising less central to European business
- The degree of concentration of capital, media/economic it is likely that where capital is highly
concentrated there will be a relatively high degree of interrelationship between the state and media
owners
- Liberal democracies US (example)
- Welfare state democracies predominate in Europe
- Role of the state owner/regulator/funder of media
- US regulated politics by First amendment
- Europe more active state intervention
- Majoritarian politics winning party concentrates power
- Majoritarianism associated with the notion of the journalist as a public servant of the public
servant of the public as a whole, internal pluralism, neutral professionalism
- Spain example of an effective government control in a majoritarian system
- Italy example of power sharing in a consensus system
- Interest group of majoritarian democracy competitive and uncoordinated pluralism of independent
groups
- Interest group of the consensus model coordinated and compromise-oriented system of
corporatism
- Individualized pluralism political representation is conceived and organized in terms of the relation
between governing institutions and individual citizens, along with a multiplicity of competing special
interests
- Organized pluralism organized groups are more central to the political process
- Pillarized system different sub communities’ structure most aspects of social life, and institutions
are separated by subcommunity
- Corporatism the formal integration of social groups into the political process
- Liberalism in contrast with democratic corporatism
- Rational-legal authority form of rule based on adherence to formal and universalistic rules of
procedure
- Bureaucracy an administrative apparatus that is autonomous of particular parties, individuals and
social groups, acts according to established procedures and is conceived as serving societies as a
whole
- Autonomous judicial system other principal institution of a rational-legal order
- Negative connotation of bureaucracy origins in complaints about administrative apparatuses losing
accountability
- Political clientelism refers to a pattern of social organization in which access to social resources is
controlled by patrons and delivered to clients in exchange for deference and various forms of support
- Polarized pluralism ideological distance with significant anti system political parties
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
- Media system model purpose not classification but identification of characteristic patterns of
relationship between system characteristics
- Liberal model Britain, Ireland, north America
- Democratic corporatist model northern continental Europe
- Polarized pluralist model Mediterranean countries of southern Europe
- Liberal model relative dominance of market mechanisms and of commercial media
- Democratic corporatist model historical coexistence of commercial media and media tied to
organized social and political groups and relatively active but legally limited role of the state
- Limitations of data severe restrictions on our ability to draw any firm conclusions about the
relations between media and society
CHAPTER 2: COMPARING MEDIA SYSTEMS
- The structure of media markets the developments of a mass press
- Newspapers southern Europe small elite, mainly urban, well educated, politically active
- Newspapers southern Europe sophisticated and politicized in their content, involved in a horizontal
process of debate and negotiation among elite factors
- Newspapers northern Europe and north America mass public not necessarily engaged in political
world involved in a vertical process of communication mediating between political elites and the
ordinary citizen
- Strong political parallelism the culture and discursive style of journalism is closely related to that of
politics
- Party-press parallelism broader concept of political parallelism
- External pluralism pluralism achieved at the level of the media system as a whole, through the
existence of a range of media outlets or organizations reflecting the points of view of different groups
or tendencies in societies
o External pluralism and its parallelism high level of political parallelism
- Internal pluralism pluralism achieved within each individual media outlet or organization. refer to
cases where media organizations both avoid institutional ties to political groups and attempt to
maintain neutrality and 'balance' in their content
o Internal pluralism and its parallelism high end political parallelism
- Government model and its parallelism high end of political parallelism
- Government model public broadcasting is controlled directly by the government or by political
majority
- Professional model and its parallelism low end political parallelism
- Professional model a strong tradition developed that broadcasting should be largely insulated from
political control and run by broadcasting professionals
- Parliamentary/proportional oportional representation model and its parallelism middle of political
parallelism
- Parliamentary/proportional oportional representation model control over public broadcasting is
divided among the political parties by proportional representation
- Civic or corporatist model similar to the parliamentary model in the sense that control of public
service broadcasting is distributed among various social and political groups, but differs in that
representation is extended beyond political parties to other kinds of 'socially relevant groups'
- Professionalization formal 'professional' training has become increasingly common, and does often
play an important role in defining journalism as an occupation and social institution
- Dimensions of professionalization autonomy, distinct professional norms, public service orientation
, - Autonomy talking about the corps of journalists taken as a whole, instead of autonomy of
individuals
- Distinct professional norms professions with a certain style of life, code of ethics and self-conscious
identity and barriers to outsiders
- Public service orientation professions are oriented toward an ethic of public service
- Instrumentalization control of the media by outside actors, who use them to intervene in the world
of politics
- Role of the state the state plays a significant role in shaping the media system in any society
- Public service broadcasting most important form of state intervention
CHAPTER 3: THE POLITICAL CONTEXT OF MEDIA SYSTEMS
- Pigtail’s point on development of the advertising industry a variety of cultural and economic factors
have made brand-name marketing and therefore advertising less central to European business
- The degree of concentration of capital, media/economic it is likely that where capital is highly
concentrated there will be a relatively high degree of interrelationship between the state and media
owners
- Liberal democracies US (example)
- Welfare state democracies predominate in Europe
- Role of the state owner/regulator/funder of media
- US regulated politics by First amendment
- Europe more active state intervention
- Majoritarian politics winning party concentrates power
- Majoritarianism associated with the notion of the journalist as a public servant of the public
servant of the public as a whole, internal pluralism, neutral professionalism
- Spain example of an effective government control in a majoritarian system
- Italy example of power sharing in a consensus system
- Interest group of majoritarian democracy competitive and uncoordinated pluralism of independent
groups
- Interest group of the consensus model coordinated and compromise-oriented system of
corporatism
- Individualized pluralism political representation is conceived and organized in terms of the relation
between governing institutions and individual citizens, along with a multiplicity of competing special
interests
- Organized pluralism organized groups are more central to the political process
- Pillarized system different sub communities’ structure most aspects of social life, and institutions
are separated by subcommunity
- Corporatism the formal integration of social groups into the political process
- Liberalism in contrast with democratic corporatism
- Rational-legal authority form of rule based on adherence to formal and universalistic rules of
procedure
- Bureaucracy an administrative apparatus that is autonomous of particular parties, individuals and
social groups, acts according to established procedures and is conceived as serving societies as a
whole
- Autonomous judicial system other principal institution of a rational-legal order
- Negative connotation of bureaucracy origins in complaints about administrative apparatuses losing
accountability
- Political clientelism refers to a pattern of social organization in which access to social resources is
controlled by patrons and delivered to clients in exchange for deference and various forms of support
- Polarized pluralism ideological distance with significant anti system political parties
