Lesson 7 Globalization and Mass Media
Lesson 7 Globalization and Mass Media
Lesson 7 Globalization and Mass Media
The mass media are seen today as playing a key role in enhancing globalization, facilitating
culture exchange and multiple flows of information and image between countries through
international news broadcasts, television programming, new technologies, film and music.
International flows of information have been largely assisted by the development of global
capitalism, new technologies and the increasing commercialization of global television, which
has occurred as a consequence of the deregulation policies adopted by various countries in
Europe and the US in order to permit the proliferation of cable and satellite channels.
The cultural imperialism theories of the 1960’s to 1970’s paved way to the “cultural globalization”
perspectives which have predominated media scholarship in the 90’s, indicating for some a shift
away from a more neo-Marxist rigid one-way model of cultural domination towards a more
sophisticated analysis and appreciation of “multi-directional flows” across countries,
acknowledging the emergence of regional markets, the resistance of media audiences to
American culture and the diversity in the forms of engagement with media texts.
The decline of cultural imperialism thesis, most critics have moved away from understanding
global culture as synonymous with homogenization, or cultural synchronization, or
“McDonaldization”, recognizing diversity and the impact of reverse flows on Western cultures.
National media systems were considered predominant until the 1970’s, giving rise to concerns
that a single global media model was taking over since the 1990’s. The main features of this
growing convergence towards the liberal American model are a weakening of government
intervention and decline of the role of the state in communications, with a move towards market
regulation, commercialization and predominance of Anglo-American journalistic
professionalism, accompanied by the crisis of the public service broadcasting tradition in
Europe.
Critic on the other hand assert that a global media system is not replacing national
communication media as there are still distinctive differences between political systems and
cultural particularities which prevents complete homogenization. Cultural globalization theorists
have thus underscore the need to recognize the blending of local cultures with global foreign
influences, understanding in a process of hybridization and not homogenization.
Hybridization – Neverdeen Pieterse (2004) sees hybridity as being part of a certain “postmodern
sensibility”, a contemporary reaction to racial purity and tight nation border controls and a
liberation from the West’s historical legacy of Eurocentric thinking and colonialism. The
hybridization argument thus contends that the impact of global culture does not lead to the
extinction of local cultures.
Held (1999) noted how global communication changed the relationship between localities and
social circumstances. As the argument goes, the image provided by the media of distant events
and of how people from other parts of the world live has resulted in a celebration of difference,
stimulating a cosmopolitan orientation in sectors of the public, although on the other hand
global media and the increasing global flows of people and goods across borders has not
destroyed local ties.
Deterritorialization – it opens up new markets for film companies to explore the life stories of
diasporic communities and the need of these deterritorialized populations for contact with their
homeland. As an example, from the 80’s onwards, satellite television has created the means for
the catering to these geo-cultural groups in the host countries of Europe and the US, with new
communication technologies assisting diasporic communities in their urge to stay in touch with
news and relatives from their native land.
The fact that media systems are transcending the barriers of the nation-state has stimulated
globalization theorist to see media globalization as necessarily contributing to erode the power
countries to control, regulate and/or use their media for educational and cultural purposes
within national boundaries. Globalization is seen to have the very nature of the previous strong
relationship that existed between the media and the state. The state however still continues to
matter because it can still play a role in shaping media policy and national television systems.
Herman and McChesney (2004) argue that the global media market is still dominated by US
interest and by the US domestic market. The whole global media has come to be dominated by
9 or 10 companies. They develop in Schiller’s revised understanding of cultural imperialism as
being “transnational cultural domination”, indicating the shift away from American hegemony
towards transnational capitalism and presenting a picture of globalization as a process driven
“from above” by giant media corporations supported by deregulation policies of various states.
Marshall McLuhan (1980) provides that the rise of new communication technologies would
culminate in the creation of a “global village” capable of enhancing international
understanding between people and forging new communities.
The internet has been the fastest-growing sector of the media. The expansion of the internet has
been enormous. Thussu (2006) provided that there were 20 million users in 1995 and 400 million in
2000. Statista, a think tank research agency, provide that there are 3.65 billion internet users in
2018.
Castells (2000) considered one of the main philosophers of cyberspace, has shown how the
internet has revolutionized international information exchange due to its ability in moving data
across border.
He has also pointed out how the internet has become well suited for the expanding
individualism of contemporary reality, with consumers using the web to create their own
content and distribute it to the global audience.
The internet is also seen as strengthening the cultural identities of diasporic people, as
well assisting in social networks with like-minded individuals, social groups and various
communities across the globe.
Reference:
Matos, C. (2012) Globalization and the Mass Media. In Encyclopedia of Globalization. Oxford:
Wiley-Blackwell