Slavko Splichal

Imitative Revolutions Changes in the Media and Journalism in East-Central Europe

Abstract The essay examines a decade of changes in the media after the collapse of the socialist system in East-Central Europe. A unique transformation from socialism to capitalism makes traditional “middle-range” evolutionary theories of modernisation and (post)modern “detraditionalisation” inadequate to grasp the substance of the inordinate changes in the (former) Second World. Instead, an attempt is made to apply Gabriel Tarde’s theory of imitation based on the triad consisting of innovation, imitation, and opposition. Tarde’s theory of imitation as a general law of development seems to offer a valid explanation of these (r)evolutionary changes because it transcends the division between dependency and diffusionist modernisation theories, and identifies communication (technology) as particularly important on both accounts. Several oppositional tendencies in the ECE countries are identified which are, in different degrees, spread throughout the region and reflect the imitative nature of the new systems. The imitative tendencies are clustered in two broader groups: (1) those imitating external environment, primarily Western Europe and the USA, which comprise denationalisation and privatisation, commercialisation, inter- or transnationalisation, and “cross-fertilisation”; and (2) those “imitating the past”, i.e. the former system of state socialism: renationalisation, and ideological (nationalistic and religious) exclusivism.

The principle of publicity, public use of reason and social control:

This article examines the intellectual history of the concept of ‘publicity’, originally defined by Immanuel Kant as the transcendental formula of public justice and the principle of the public use of reason, but later largely subsumed under the concept of ‘freedom of the press’. The notion of the press as the Fourth Estate/Power was a valid concept and legitimate form of the institutionalization of the principle of publicity in the period when newspapers emanated from a new (bourgeois) estate or class: they had a different source of legitimacy than the three classic powers, and developed as a critical impulse against the old ruling estates. Yet the discrimination in favor of the power/control function of the press, which relates to the need of ‘distrustful surveillance’ defended by Bentham, clearly abstracted freedom of the press from the Kantian quest for the public use of reason. In democratic societies where the people rather than different estates legitimize all the powers, the control dimension of publicity embodied in the corporate freedom of the press should be effectively supplemented by actions toward equalizing private citizens in the public use of reason.

‘New’ Media, ‘Old’ Theories Does the (National) Public Melt into the Air of Global Governance?

■ Since its earliest conceptualizations, publicity was believed to contribute significantly to the democratic social order; it normatively legitimized the press and other media as constitutive of the public and public opinion. Yet all the ‘old’ mass media rooted in the property rights of their owners failed to enhance and complement the corporate freedom of the press with technologically-feasible actions towards equalizing citizens’ opportunities to participate in public debates. The most recent technological advances in communication do not seem to resolve this age-old controversy. Rather, an attempt is needed to change the media in the way that would allow of publicity in its original three-dimensional design: personal right to communicate in public, surveillance of the public over government (governance), and mediation between the state and civil society. ■

Media privatization and democratization in Central-Eastern Europe

While the rebirth of civil society in Western Europe is typically related to the processes of informatization and global economic restructuring, the importance of civil society in Central and Eastern Europe is rooted in &dquo;radical&dquo; civil movements mobilized against the state-party system and its monopolistic economic and political power. In the West, the distinction between the state and civil society is normatively aimed at the restoration

Journalistic education and professional socialisation Summary of a survey study in 22 countries

investigate the extent to which national differences of social structure, economic and political system, level of development and educational systems affected the ideas and beliefs of the students, both about the world and about journalism. The project was directed by the authors of this paper but it is in large measure the result of the unrewarded scientific efforts of our collaborators. We append a list of their names and institutional affiliations (Appendix) and we would like to take this opportunity to thank them publicly and sincerely for their co-operation. We must also say that, while we could not have written the report without the material they provided, the responsibility for this paper rests entirely with the authors. The interpretations and conclusions we have drawn are our own and we do not seek to imply that they in any way reflect the views of our collaborators. The research group was formed initially at the New Delhi Congress of the IAMCR and supplemented by personal invitations. The aim was to gain

Journalism between de-professionalisation and democratisation

The article reflects on contemporary processes of de-professionalisation of journalism, its consequences for democratic processes and challenges to citizen journalism. It is argued that both the dilemmas of mainstream journalism and the emergence of citizen journalism are consequences of an array of evolving factors having to do with complex transformations in the media landscape and its industries, professional and ‘leisured’ content creation, employment and technologies, shifting patterns of media use among citizens, as well as broader permutations in social and cultural patterns. In the first section, we briefly address the long-term historical decline of professional journalism; in the second section, we look at some of the attributes of the current crisis; in the third section, we probe some of the key features of what has come to be called citizen journalism, a development that is contradictorily entwined with both the de-professionalisation and the democratisation of journalism. In the conclusion, we turn our eye to some paths for future research.

Ownership Regulation and Socialisation: Rethinking the Principles of Democratic Media

AbstractThe article examines three topics fundamental to contemporary media democratisation discourse: the principle of publicity, media agenda setting, and information subsidies. In complex democratic systems, the idea of publicity primarily refers to the media and the public sphere, where the “public use of reason” or “public discussion” can take place. The fundamental significance of the mass media for the political system is based on their role in the processes of (public) opinion formation and expression: the mass media help determine and demonstrate the limits of legitimate public discussion in society. Information subsidy limits access to information and inhibits free (political) expression by forcing the media to conform to particularistic political or commercial interests and beliefs of subsidisers. Because mass media have extremely important functions for democratic societies, they require public regulation to eventually help transform them into public services, and mass media into public servic...

Journalism and Journalists

Journalism was born in the seventeenth century as a supplementary, part-time occupation of printers, postmen, or tradesmen; with industrial and bourgeois revolutions, it became fully institutionalized in the mass media. In earlier periods, journalists largely belonged to self-sustained free professions of the middle class; with industrialization they joined the class of workers employed by the press publishers. In the age of media digitalization and convergence, an increasing number of journalists belong to the precariat class or – according to the ‘ideology of nonprofessionalism,’ which suggests that ‘everyone can be a journalist’ in the digital age – they are not (considered) part of the professional journalistic workforce at all. Journalists are commonly associated nationally into trade unions and professional associations. The largest international association of journalists is the International Federation of Journalists.

Bentham, Kant, and the right to communicate

Abstract Bentham favored a free press as an instrument of public control of the state, in the interest of the general happiness. Kant favored free public discussion as an instrument for the development and expression of autonomous rationality. But a free press embodied in the property rights of the owners of the press may well fail to achieve either Benthamite or Kantian goals. Such goals lead to a personal right to communicate rather than to a corporate right to press freedom.

Rethinking Publicness: The Precedence of the Right to Communicate

Abstract The principle of publicity was originally conceived as a critical impulse against injustice based on secrecy of state actions and as an enlightening momentum substantiating the “region of human liberty,” making private citizens equal in the public use of reason. Early debates on freedom of the press pointed toward the idea of publicity as an extension of individuals’ freedom of thought and expression. With the constitutional guarantee for a free press in parliamentary democracies, discussions of freedom of the press were largely reduced to the pursuit of freedom by the media, thus neglecting the idea of publicity as the basis of democratic citizenship. The concepts of public service media and, to a lesser extent, the model of social responsibility of the press attempted at recuperating the latter dimension of publicity, but with very limited success. The discrimination in favour of the power/control function of the press clearly abstracted freedom of the press from the Kantian quest for the public use of reason. In democratic societies where the people rather then different estates legitimise all the powers, the control dimension of publicity embodied in the corporate freedom of the press should be effectively supplemented by actions toward equalising private citizens in the public use of reason.