MEDIA, CULTURE AND

SOCEITY (MEDS202)
INSTRUCTOR: NISHA KUNWAR
 UNIT III: Media, Politics and Identity

Cultural diversity and Stereotypes and media

Media and political
plurality in media portrayal (Discuss
communication (Agenda-
(Bollywood, Hollywood diversity, inclusion,
setting and framing)
and Kollywood) tokenism etc.)

Virtual sphere: The

Media's role in shaping internet as a public
public opinion sphere (Democracy and
Internet)
Cultural diversity and plurality in media (Bollywood, Hollywood
and Kollywood)

• The Cultural Studies Reader" (1993)

• "Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices"
(1997)
Stuart Hall
• His work explored how identities—especially racial, ethnic, and
gendered identities—are constructed in media and how media
representations both reflect and shape societal attitudes toward
diversity.
• First Dashain of a New Bride ft. Swastima Khadka, Nischal
Basnet | Mann Kholaun Coke Sanga (Nepal) – YouTube
• Most Emotional and Loving Mothers TV Ads – YouTube
• Most Emotional and Loving Mothers TV Ads – YouTube
• 5 Heart Touching Ads by Preganews
(You will Surely Cry)#Yoursecondhome series – YouTube
• Surprise! Surprise! - Part 5 - Dostana
(2008) | Abhishek Bachchan, John Abraham, Priyanka Chopra – YouTu
be
• Modern Family | Cam Meets His Match at a Mandatory Parent Playda
te - YouTube
Let’s discuss Media Representation…
Stuart Halls’ Representation Theory
• How media RE-presents Reality-social events, places, people, gender, race.
• How accurate are these representation from reality?
• ‘Reality meaning’-------’Media meaning’
• Subject single fixed meaning---no
• Media gives meaning to the subject= Media Meaning
• Its not an after occurrence—after the event rather, constitutive one
• Media is a meaning maker
• Who is the meaning maker ?Mass media.
• Fix a meaning to certain person, event, places . Hence, meaning maker.
• Hegemonic media, Limited representation
• Dominant meaning to certain
• Stereotypes repeated use
• Fixated meaning to certain subject.
• Lack of diversity
• Narrows society’s perception of things, gender race,
• Stereotype naturalized.
How to reject?
Reception Theory—
Role of audience in creating meaning of the media text.
Hall believed in power of the audience.
Why do it?
To assert dominance, hegemonic media
Agenda of those who made it.
Agenda-setting Theory, Framing.
• Interrogate the text-Who framed the text?
• Why?
REPRESENTATION
IN MEDIA
• Representation in media refers to how various individuals,
groups, and communities are portrayed in various forms of
media, including television, film, print media, digital media,
and advertising. It is a critical concept in media studies, cultural
studies, and social sciences because it has a profound impact on
how people perceive themselves and others, as well as on
broader societal attitudes and norms.
Here are key aspects of representation in media:
1. Diversity and Inclusion: Representation involves the presence
and visibility of different demographic groups, such as racial
and ethnic minorities, gender identities, sexual orientations,
disabilities, age groups, and socioeconomic backgrounds, in
media content. The goal is to ensure that media reflects the
diversity of the real world and includes underrepresented
voices.
2. Stereotypes: Media often relies on stereotypes, which are
simplified and generalized images or characteristics associated
with particular groups. Stereotypes can be harmful when they
perpetuate biases, reinforce discrimination, or lead to
misperceptions about specific communities.
1. Authenticity and Accuracy: Authentic representation
means accurately depicting the experiences, cultures,
and identities of different groups. It involves
consulting with individuals from these communities
and avoiding misrepresentation or cultural
appropriation.
2. Tokenism: Tokenism occurs when one or a few
representatives of a marginalized group are included
in media content to create an appearance of diversity
without addressing the broader issue of
underrepresentation. Token characters can reinforce
stereotypes and lack depth.
3. Positive and Negative Portrayals: It is essential to
analyze whether media representations tend to be
positive or negative for specific groups. Positive
portrayals can challenge stereotypes and promote
understanding, while negative portrayals can
perpetuate bias and discrimination.
4. Intersectionality: Representation should consider
intersectionality, recognizing that individuals belong
to multiple identity groups simultaneously. For
example, a Black woman's experience may differ from
that of a Black man, highlighting the importance of
nuanced portrayals.
1. Media Ownership and Control: The ownership and
control of media outlets by particular groups or
corporations can influence what gets represented and how
it is represented. Media ownership can impact the diversity
of voices and perspectives in the media landscape.
2. Audience Impact: Media representations can shape public
perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors. They can reinforce
existing social norms or challenge them, making media a
powerful tool for social change.
3. Media Literacy: Educating individuals about media
literacy is crucial to help them critically analyze and
interpret media content. Understanding how media
representations are constructed and the potential biases
involved empowers audiences to be more discerning
consumers.
4. Advocacy and Activism: Many advocacy groups and
activists work to promote more inclusive and accurate
representation in media. They may engage in campaigns to
challenge harmful stereotypes, demand better
representation, and support diverse voices in the industry.
In recent years, there has been a growing awareness and movement toward more inclusive
and responsible representation in media, driven by increased recognition of the importance
of diversity and the power of media to shape perceptions and influence society.

Media creators, organizations, and policymakers are increasingly called upon to address
representation issues and promote more equitable and inclusive media content
Assignment
• "How do media and cultural representations perpetuate stereotypes,
and what impact do these stereotypes have on societal attitudes and
behaviors towards different groups?"
STEREOTYPES AND MEDIA
PORTRAYAL

Debate
Stereotype

• Meriam Webster Dictionary;

• A standardized mental picture that is held in common by members of a group and that represents an
oversimplified opinion, prejudiced attitude, or uncritical judgment
• Simply, a stereotype is a generalized belief about a particular category of people (Wikipedia)
• The term "stereotype" in its modern sense was first coined by the American journalist and psychologist
Walter Lippmann in his 1922 book Public Opinion.
• Lippmann used the term to describe how people form simplified and generalized mental images of others,
which may not necessarily reflect reality.
• These mental shortcuts, or "stereotypes," are often based on group membership, such as race, gender, or
nationality, and can lead to biases and misjudgments.
How does it affect us, our culture?

• Inaccurate Generalizations (Eg: Asians are good at Math)

• Reinforcement of Prejudices (Eg: Women are bad drivers)
• Perpetuation of Social Inequality
• Limiting Opportunities
• Harmful Effects on Mental Health
• Impact on Social Relations
• Undermines Diversity and Inclusion
• Cognitive Biases
Media and political communication Media's role in shaping public
(Agenda-setting and framing) opinion
If the invention of the penny press in the 19th century
gave working class Americans their own
newspapers(access to information), and along the way
created tabloid journalism and investigative reporting;
then is commercialization of the press so bad after all?
 Content
Background of the Study
Overview
What is Agenda-setting?
Factors affecting Agenda Setting
Criticism of Agenda-setting Theory
Hypothesis
Attribute Agenda Setting
Psychology of Agenda setting Attribute
Sources of media agenda
Consequences of Agenda setting Effects
Revisiting agenda-setting
New Research Field
Some Personal Observation
Background of the Study
• Agenda-setting theory was formally developed by Dr. Max McCombs and Dr. Donald
Shaw in a study on the 1968 presidential election deemed “the Chapel Hill study.”
(Hubert Humphrey Vs. Richard Nixon)
• The study used a sample of voters from Chapel Hill, North Carolina and was designed to
compare what these voters “said were the key issues of the presidential campaign with the
actual content of the news media to which they were exposed during the campaign”
(Lowery, S.A. & DeFleur, M.L., 268)
• Research Methodology-Survey
• The study discovered a high correlation between the “relative media emphasis and voter’s
beliefs about the importance of the same list of issue”
What is Agenda Setting ?
• Agenda-setting describes the "ability (of the news media) to influence the importance placed on
the topics of the public agenda". The study of agenda-setting describes the way media attempts
to influence viewers and establish a hierarchy of news prevalence. Nations with more political
power receive higher media exposure.
• The agenda-setting by media is driven by the media's bias on things such
as politics, economy and culture, etc. The evolution of agenda-setting and laissez-faire
components of communication research encouraged a fast-pace growth and expansion of these
perspectives. Agenda-setting has phases that need to be in a specific order in order for it to
succeed.
• levels of agenda setting theory: First Level: issues to influence the people what people should
think about.
• Second level: Media focuses on the characters of issues how people should think about
• Agenda setting theory is used in a political ad, campaigns, business news, PR (public relation)
• Gate-keeping, Framing, Priming
Factors affecting Agenda setting

• Gatekeepers, editors and managers and other external influences.

• Non-media sources like government officials and influential personnel.
• For example, “if the media has close relationship with the elite society, that class will
probably affect the media agenda and the public agenda in turn”.
Criticisms of Agenda setting theory

• Media users are not ideal. The people may not pay attention to details.
• The effect is weakened for people who have made up their mind.
• Media cannot create problems. They can only alter the level of awareness, priorities,
importance, etc.
Overview
• This article presents five research fields and made a brief review of the main findings of
agenda-setting theory and discussed several new research fields including the basic
concepts and views of the agenda-setting theory in the field of new applications.

Basic Agenda-setting Effects

•The Chapel Hill study found transfer of salience from the news media to the public
Sources of the Media Agenda
•Who sets the media agenda?
Internet dramatically changed the communication landscape with introduction of myriad
new channels, is the new frontier for research on these traditional agenda-setting effects.
Hypothesis
• Hypothesis 1
Large numbers of people have access to the Web and regularly go to many different sites there for news,
information and commentary
1-Digital Divide,2- the audience for websites concerns habits of communication,
3-The Internet audience will scatter widely across all those diverse websites

• Hypothesis 2
The agendas to which people are exposed on the Web are highly divergent rather than the traditional news
media.
Synergy
Amortizing the costs and increasing the profits of news by distributing the same basic content through different
channels

• Prediction-the end of agenda setting?

Attribute agenda setting
• The initial stage of agenda-setting theory focused on the salience of objects, usually public issues, but sometimes other objects.
Object
Agendas are defined abstractly by a set of objects.
In turn, these objects have attributes, a variety of characteristics and traits that describe them.
Transfer of Salience
•First level—Careful positioning of the best teams and players on the national television schedule increased the salience of NBA game
(what)

•Second level—Careful production of player and coach interviews, instant replays and other communication elements that framed
professional basketball in exciting way (how)

•One core proposition is that elements prominent on the media agenda become prominent over come on the public agenda

•The media not only can be successful in telling us what to think about, they also can be successful in telling us how to think about it
Psychology of Agenda-setting Effects
Need for Orientation

• Namely that is grounded in the idea that individuals have an innate curiosity about the
world around them. For a wide variety of public affairs topics, the news media provide
this orientation.
•Uncertainty
(Knowledge)
•Relevance
(Personal Involvement)
• Low relevance defines a low need for orientation; high relevance and low uncertainty, a
moderate need for orientation; and high relevance and uncertainty, a high need for
orientation
Sources of the Media Agenda

• Who sets the media agenda?

• The norms and traditions of journalism
Significance
Timeliness
Accessibility
• The nature of news organization
• The daily interactions among different news organizations
Imitate each other

• Other sources
Government, company, organization
Consequences of Agenda-setting Effects
• Agenda-setting effects*/the transmission of object and attribute salience from the press to
the public about issues, political figures and other topics*/have significant consequences
for people’s attitudes and opinions
• This stage of agenda-setting theory has identified three distinct consequences of agenda
setting for attitudes and opinions:
[Link] an opinion,
[Link] opinions about public figures through an emphasis on particular issues and
3. shaping an opinion through an emphasis on particular attributes.
Revisiting Some Basics of Agenda-setting
Theory
• Measurement of Issue Salience---the prominence of the news about an issue (e.g., page
placement, size of headline, amount of time or space, appearance in the lead)
• Knowledge Activation and Agenda-setting Effects--accessibility and applicability,
influence of both the amount of exposure to the media (accessibility) and the level of
political sophistication (applicability)
New Research Field
• Corporate Reputations
Agenda setting links the business journalism and public agendas, with both
First level—the influence of media coverage on awareness and prominence of a company or its CEO
Second level—the influence of descriptions in the news on the images of a corporation and its CEO
•Growth and Expansion of the NBA
First level—Careful positioning of the best teams and players on the national television schedule
increased the salience of NBA game
Second level—Careful production of player and coach interviews, instant replays and other
communication elements that framed professional basketball in exciting way
•Agenda-setting Role of Organized Religion
Organized religion plays a significant agenda-setting role in the lives of its adherents
• Agendas in Contemporary Society
creative scholars will continue to apply the core ideas of agenda-setting theory in more and
more new arenas.
Some Personal Observations
Strategies of Replication and Extension
• replication is a tradition in communication research that is more honored in the breach than in the
observance. Replication is discussed in most methodology textbooks, but seldom found in the
journals. Replication is vital. Each of our studies is limited in time and space, and any single study
is bounded by the particular methodological decisions that operationalize the measurement of the
key concepts in its research questions and hypotheses. Given these inherent limitations in our
work, replication is vital.
Agenda setting, Journalism and Society
• Mass media-surveillance of the environment, fostering consensus in society, and transmission of
the cultural heritage
• Using the metaphor of the media agenda, how well do the priorities of that agenda, as reflected in
the daily practice of journalism, correspond to the larger social value and utility of those items?
• Setting the agenda is an awesome responsibility.
Thank you for your
Patience!
GATEKEEPING, FRAMING, PRIMING
• Gate + Keeping = gatekeeping is the control of what information goes
in media to reach the public.
• According to the Westley Mclean model of the editorial function,
gatekeeping is described as the role of the media that decides what the
audience can take and what they cannot, it decides what is important
and what is not important, and finally, the gatekeeper decides how and
in what way a story should be told.
• In short, the information that reaches the audience is specific,
selective and has passed a lots of editing gates before being published
 FRAMING
• Framing is closely related to agenda-setting.
• In the agenda-setting, we learned that the audience is given
an image of what to think, here, Framing is the process by
the media influencing the audience on how to think about
something.
• Being given all the information on something, framing
allows the media to also give a perspective to the audience.
For example, what a political party has done or is going to do
to the society is the agenda, framing helps the public whether
they should look at it in a positive aspect or in a negative
one. It focuses on the field of how the meaning should be.
• This has a larger effect on both the audience and the framer.
This ideology can keep a person in heights or suddenly bring
that person down in minutes. The audience are taught to
adapt to the frame of reference given by the media
PRIMING
• Media effects refer to how mass media affects its audience in decision making. Priming is considered as the
predecessor of agenda setting, one of the theories of media effects. Priming has its base in cognitive psychology
which relates to associative network model of human memory.
• Priming is a concept through which the media effects among the people are enhanced by providing a basic
perception human minds take decisions based on the preconceptions that are already been stored in our memory.
The memories are stored as a form of nodes -and they are interconnected effectively and mostly act as a frame of
reference to the decisions that we make.
• Priming enables the audience to evaluate the situation and to conclude how effective the media have been in order
to make a decision by providing a frame of reference. Thus media creates an influence among people to make
judgement or a decision.
• Priming has been particularly evaluated during the elections and while choosing the right candidate. Particularly
when it comes to politics where people lack the knowledge concerning political matters, they base their decisions
on the information from the media which actually influences their decision making on whom to elect. This theory
was put forward by Iyengar, Peters, and Kender in 1982 and labelled it as the priming effect.
• Priming is an important concept in media effects. As agenda setting brings out only the importance of the issue,
priming offers explanation on how the information from the media are stored in the human mind and how it
influences in making decisions. Media affect the judgement or behavior by stimulating the associating thoughts
which are caused due to the mental relationships created inside the memory.
Example:
Researches are implemented applying the priming concept to understand
the impact of TV programmes and violent behaviour among the viewers.
Even during the elections, the campaigns are used to emphasis certain
issues and how it influences the people in choosing the right candidate
has been observed by applying this concept.
The media easily influence children and their behaviour can be based on
the contents shown in the television. For e.g. a child tends to enact the
qualities of their favourite character in movies and tend to display their
characteristics.
Media's role in shaping public opinion

In his 1922 book, “Public Opinion”, Walter Lippmann argued that people do not know the
world directly, but only as a “picture in their heads”

He proposed that a professional, "specialized class" collect and analyze data, and present
their conclusions to the society's decision makers, who, in their turn, use the "art of
persuasion" to inform the public about the decisions and circumstances affecting them.

Lippmann also argued that people, including journalists, are more apt to believe "the
pictures in their heads" than to come to judgment by critical thinking
Lippmann's perspectives on public opinion:
1. Limited Cognitive Capacity: Lippmann argued that individuals have limited cognitive capacities and are
unable to directly access and process all the information about complex issues. He introduced the term "pseudo-
environment" to describe the mental images people create based on the limited information available to them.
2. Media as Mediators: According to Lippmann, the media acts as a mediator between events in the external
world and the formation of public opinion. The media provides a filtered version of reality, shaping the way
individuals perceive and understand the world.
3. Sterile Information: Lippmann highlighted that the information people receive through the media is often
"sterile" because it lacks the context and firsthand experience that would make it fully meaningful. He argued
that individuals rely on stereotypes and simplifications to navigate the overwhelming amount of information.
4. Manufacturing Consent: Lippmann's work laid the groundwork for the concept of "manufacturing consent,"
which was further developed by Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman. This idea suggests that mass media,
intentionally or unintentionally, serves the interests of powerful elites by shaping public opinion in a way that
aligns with their objectives.
5. Role of Experts: Lippmann proposed the idea of relying on experts and specialized organizations to analyze
and interpret information on behalf of the public. He believed that a more rational and effective democratic
process would involve the input of knowledgeable individuals who could help guide public opinion.
• Walter Lippmann's ideas had a profound impact on the study of media, communication, and political science.
While some of his views have been subject to criticism and debate, his work initiated important discussions
about the nature of public opinion, the media's role, and the challenges inherent in a democratic society with
complex information flows.
VOX POP
• The opinions of people recorded talki
ng informally in public places
• A broadcast for radio or television in
which people going past in
a public place are asked their opinion
on a particular subject
Is this Political communication?
Political Communication
Brian McNair
• Denton and Woodward---the crucial factor that makes communication ‘political’ is not the source of a
message [or, we might add, referring back to their earlier emphasis on ‘public discussion’, its form], but its
content and purpose.
• In simple words, According to McNair, it is a Purposeful communication about politics.
• This incorporates:
1. All forms of communication undertaken by politicians and other political actors for the purpose of
achieving specific objectives.
2. Communication addressed to these actors by non-politicians such as voters and newspaper columnists.
3. Communication about these actors and their activities, as contained in news reports, editorials, and other
forms of media discussion of politics.
In short, all political discourse is included in our definition. By political communication, therefore, I, like
Graber, have in mind not only verbal or written statements, but also visual means of signification such as dress,
make-up, hairstyle, and logo design, i.e. all those elements of communication which might be said to constitute
a political ‘image’ or identity. (McNair)
• Absent from the book (if not from our definition) is any substantial
discussion of the subject of interpersonal political communication.
• It need hardly be stressed that the political discussions of people in
public bars or at dinner parties, the behind closed-doors negotiations
of governments, and the information gleaned by journalists from face-
to-face meetings with high-level sources, are highly significant for the
political process.
• By their nature, however, they are hidden from the analyst, requiring
methodologically difficult and costly empirical research to uncover
their secrets.
• Lacks, governmental communication, substantial discussion of local
(i.e. city and district, regional and town) politics. As Bob Franklin and
others have described, local government is a sphere of political
activity in which communication is of growing importance (Franklin
and Murphy, 1991; Franklin, 1994).
• There are political actors, narrowly defined: those individuals who aspire, through
organizational and institutional means, to influence the decision-making process.
• Political actor includes, the established political parties: aggregates of more or less
like-minded individuals, who come together within an agreed organizational and
ideological structure to pursue common goals.
• Non-party actors like, trade unions, consumer groups, professional associations.
(non-party organisations with political objective)
• Purpose of all this communication is to persuade. Who? The audience or the
citizens.
• Media functions both as transmitters of political communication which originates
outside the media organisation itself, and as senders of political messages
constructed by journalists.
Non-party actor: the Pressure Group
• Pressure groups (or single-issue groups, as they are also known) may be distinguished from the public
organisations listed above in that they are typically less institutionalised and more overtly ‘political’ in
their objectives, being concerned with such issues as the conservation of the natural environment, and
the prevention of cruelty to animals being reared for human food consumption or for use in the testing of
drugs and cosmetics.
• They tend to campaign around single issues, such as the anti-nuclear movement in the early 1980s, and
the British anti-poll tax campaign of the late 1980s and early 1990s (Deacon and Golding, 1994).
• They are unlike the established parties, however, in drawing their support and membership from a more
diverse social base.
• While the Labour and Conservative parties in Britain (and the Democratic and Republican parties in the
US) are traditionally associated with ‘labour’ and ‘business’ respectively (given that these associations
are much looser now than was once the case) an organisation such as the Campaign for Nuclear
Disarmament, and its equivalent in other countries, at the height of its influence drew support and active
membership from the entire spectrum of social classes in Britain. The environmental movement
likewise, has found support across classes, age groups, and religious and ideological affiliations.
non-party political actor- terrorist
organisation
• Although the term ‘terrorist’ is value-laden, and may be rejected by
groups whose members may prefer to see themselves as ‘freedom
fighters’ in ‘national liberation’ or ‘resistance’ movements, we shall
use the term here to refer to groups which use terror tactics – urban
bombing, hi-jacking, assassination, and kidnapping, to list the most
common – to achieve their political objectives.
• In this sense, many of the world’s governments, including those of
South Africa, Israel, France, and the US, have at one time or another
committed acts of (state) terrorism.
Globalization and international Political Communication

• International Politics is about the world we live in, the challenges we face, power and struggles, and
the opportunities and the obstacles for relations among peoples, societies, states and organizations.
• The International communication is a practice that occurs across international borders.
• International political communication can be seen as an auxiliary but also constitutive discipline of the
International relations in the wider field of the Political science.
• At the very core of International relations is Political communication through which the most
important actors of world politics realize political goals.
• It is a given fact that there is a connections between media and politics. Considering that experiences
in Political Communication are manifested in unique ways in different democracies and scientific
cultures.
• Dynamic, cross-border, environment where exists a constant exchange of political content
between states; with the participation of other actors in international relations, in which
these actors defend their values and interests and substantiate their actions on
the international scale in front of a worldwide audience.
-Mykola Borysovych Yeromin
 • IN YOUR OPINION WHICH OF THE
COUNTRIES YOU THINK IS THE MOST
FRINEDLY?
• SYRIA
• RUSSIA
Let's Quiz! • USA
• CHINA
• CANADA
• FRANCE
MANIFESATION OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICAL
COMMUNICATION
• The need for international communication was due to the increasing effects and influences of
globalization. As a field of study, international communication is a branch of communication studies,
concerned with the scope of "government-to-government", "business-to-business", and "people-to-
people" interactions at a global level.
• Successful International communication strategies must consider a wide range of cross-cultural issues:
The correct way to address people. HOW TO BUILD TRUST.
• So, how does it display/manifest itself?
Coercion Vs. Consent
Military/ Hard Power

Economic relations (BtoB/GtoG) coercive or co-operative?

Diplomacy (GtoG)

Soft power/ Culture (PtoP)

Covert actions?
ARE COVERT ACTION A MANIFESTATION OF INTERNATIONAL
POLITICAL COMMUNICATION?
 COERCIN ? OR CONSENT?

• Use of Military power: threat, force

• Economic relations: trade, aids, sanctions
• Covert actions: secret missions, supporting a coup
• Are these also a manifestations of international political
communication?
Manifestations of international political
communication

DIPLOMACY

SOFT POWER
DIPLOMACY
•
tact · tactfulness · sensitivity · discretion · subtlet
y · finesse · delicacy · judiciousness · discernme
nt· prudence · cleverness · skill · politeness · tho
ughtfulness · understanding · care · soft
skills · savoir faire
• statesmanship · statecraft · negotiation(s) · discus
sion(s) · talks · consultation · conference · dialog
ue· international relations/politics · foreign
affairs· foreign policy
• Diplomacy refers to spoken or written speech ,
acts by representatives of states (such as leaders
and diplomats) intended to influence events in
the international system.
• It is a tactful way to deal with or influence others
• Tool/ instrument of Global governance and
foreign policy.
 THE
ATTRACTION
OF CULTURE

WINNING THE HEARTS OF THE PEOPLE!

SOFT POWER
Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics

• Joseph Nye coined the term "soft power" in the late 1980s
• Soft power lies in the ability to attract and persuade. Whereas hard power—the ability to coerce—
grows out of a country's military or economic might, soft power arises from the attractiveness of a
country's culture, political ideals, and policies.
• Hard power remains crucial in a world of states trying to guard their independence and of non-state
groups willing to turn to violence.
• Bush administration's national security strategy.
• ‘the ability to get others to act in ways that are contrary to their initial preferences and strategies’ (Nye,
2011, p.11). This is the ability to coerce, through threats and inducements (“sticks” and “carrots”). On
the contrary, soft power is the ability to get ‘others to want the outcomes that you want’ (Nye, 2004a,
p.5), and more particularly ‘the ability to achieve goals through attraction rather than coercion’
• Example: economics, education, leadership, institutions, culture, foreign assistance, cinema/arts.
Propaganda and
Soft Power
• Critically looking at soft power.
• Is twisting hand better than
twisting minds?
Politics, Media and Democracy
• The principles of liberal democracy as we understand them today grew out of the
bourgeois critique of autocracy in early modern Europe,
• Beginning in the sixteenth century and culminating in the French Revolution of
1789, with its slogan of ‘Liberty, Equality, Fraternity’.
• In the political structures of autocratic societies, such as those typical of the
absolutist monarchies of European feudalism, power resided in the king or queen,
whose right to rule was divinely ordained by God.
• Subordinate classes – the peasantry and artisans – were subject to divine order,
lacking political rights of any kind. Even the aristocracy, ‘lording’ it over the lower
classes in society, owed unquestioning allegiance to the monarch.
• The institutions of state were directed primarily to the maintenance of this
hierarchical system, and to the suppression of dissent, from wherever it came
• The emergence of the bourgeoisie (or capitalist class) as the dominant economic force in
Europe and America required the overthrow of autocracy and its monopolisation of
political power.
• For capitalism to develop freely there had to be freedom of thought and action for those
with entrepreneurial skills and the wealth to use them.
• There had, therefore, to be freedom from the arbitrariness of absolute power, an end to
the ideology of divine right, and recognition of the status of capital, earned in the
marketplace rather than inherited.
• Consequently, bourgeois philosophers such as Locke and Milton worked out a critique of
autocratic power, replacing it with a theory of representative democracy and individual, or
citizenship rights, which reflected in the ideological sphere the realities of bourgeois
economic and political power.
• Voting rights were introduced, gradually extending to wider and wider sections of the
population, through such means as the British Reform Act of 1832. Constituent assemblies
– such as the British House of Commons – were erected, and constitutional constraints on
the abuse of political power put in place. The main concern of liberal democratic theory
was thus ‘to grant individuals civil liberties against the incursion of the state’ (Bobbio,
1987, p. 10). For th
• For the bourgeoisie, rejecting the principle of divine ordination, the extension of citizenship
rights was also a necessary stage in the legitimation of its own political power, as the
dominant class of a new type of social formation.
• By ‘formally requesting the consent of all citizens’ (ibid.) elected political leaders had the
right to demand respect and loyalty even from those who had not voted for them.
• Equally, citizens had the right to dissent from the prevailing political wisdom, and to expect
that they would be able to express their views at the ballot box at agreed intervals.
• The citizen’s right to choose presupposed the availability of alternatives from which a
meaningful selection could be made, and a rational, knowledgeable electorate capable of
exercising its rights.
• Democracy was real, in other words, only when it involved the participation of an informed,
rational electorate. For Italian political sociologist Norberto Bobbio, liberal democracy
assumes that citizens, ‘once they are entrusted with the right to choose who governs them’,
are sufficiently well-informed ‘to vote for the wisest, the most honest, the most enlightened
of their fellow citizens’ (ibid., p. 19).
• Drawing these strands together, we can identify the defining characteristics of a democratic
regime in the following terms: constitutionality, participation and rational choice.
• Constitutionality First, there must be an agreed set of procedures and rules governing the conduct of
elections, the behaviour of those who win them and the legitimate activities of dissenters. Such rules will
typically take the form of a constitution (although some countries, like Britain, do not have a ‘written’
constitution) or a bill of rights.
• Participation Second, those who participate in the democratic process must comprise what Bobbio terms
a ‘substantial’ proportion of the people. In the early democratic period, as we have noted, citizenship
rights were restricted to a small minority of the population – men with property and/or formal education.
• For John Stuart Mill, one of the great early theorists of liberal democracy, only this guaranteed the
rational, informed electorate demanded by democracy.1 In reality, of course, this restriction merely
demonstrated the close relationship between democracy and the rise of the bourgeoisie. Gradually,
voting rights were extended to the lower classes and, by the early twentieth century, to women. In the
US, only in the 1950s were blacks able to vote. Conversely, societies which deprived the majority of their
people of voting rights, such as South Africa until the elections of April 1994, have rightly been viewed as
‘undemocratic’.
• Rational choice a third condition of democracy, as already noted, is the availability of choice (Democrat
versus Republican, Labour versus Conservative, Christian Democrat versus Social Democrat), while a
fourth is the ability of citizens to exercise that choice rationally. This in turn presupposes a knowledgeable,
educated citizenry.
PUBLIC OPINION AND THE PUBLIC
SPHERE
• The importance of an informed, knowledgeable electorate dictates that democratic politics must
be pursued in the public arena (as distinct from the secrecy characteristic of autocratic regimes).
• The knowledge and information on the basis of which citizens will make their political choices must
circulate freely and be available to all. But democratic policies are public in another sense too.
• While democratic theory stresses the primacy of the individual, the political process nevertheless
demands that individuals act collectively in making decisions about who will govern them.
• The private political opinions of the individual become the public opinion of the people as a whole,
which may be reflected in voting patterns and treated as advice by existing political leaders.
• Public opinion, in this sense, is formed in what German sociologist Jürgen Habermas has called ‘the
public sphere’. By the public sphere we mean first of all a realm of our social life in which
something approaching public opinion can be formed. . . . Citizens behave as a public body when
they confer in an unrestricted fashion – that is, within the guarantee of freedom of assembly and
association and the freedom to express and publish their opinions. (Quoted in Pusey, 1978, p. 89
• Habermas locates the development of the public sphere in eighteenth-century Britain,
where the first newspapers had already begun to perform their modern function of
supplying not only information but also opinion, comment and criticism, facilitating debate
amongst the emerging bourgeois and educated classes.
• Quoting Thomas McCarthy, Habermas shows how these new social forces gradually
replaced a political system ‘in which the [autocratic] ruler’s power was merely represented
before the people with a sphere in which state authority was publicly monitored through
informed and critical discourse by the people’ (quoted in Habermas, 1989, p. xi).
• In the coffee-house and salon cultures of Britain and France, debate and political critique
became, for the first time, public property (meaning, of course, the bourgeois public, which
excluded the mass of poor and illiterate underclasses).
• According to Habermas, the first use of the term ‘public opinion’ was documented in 1781,
referring to ‘the critical reflection of a [bourgeois] public competent to form its own
judgments’ (ibid., p. 90). Gripsund notes that the public sphere thus emerged as ‘a set of
institutions representing a sort of “buffer zone” between the state/ king and private sphere,
to protect them from arbitrary decisions that interfered with what they considered private
activities in an irrational way’ (1992, p. 89).
Thank you for your patience!
If you have any questions,
kindly raise them!
Thank You