The document discusses the relationship between democracy and the news media. It notes that Beppe Grillo and the Five Star Movement in Italy rely entirely on the internet and social media rather than traditional news outlets. It also discusses how Silvio Berlusconi has long dominated Italian media through his ownership of television channels, newspapers, and influence over public broadcasting. The document raises concerns about the concentration of media ownership and its impact on press freedom and democracy.

1. Democracy and the news media

2. Beppe Grillo and the Five Star Movement
Italian elections, February 2013
• The movement is based entirely on the internet, it has no
headquarters and no local offices
• Grillo has more than 1 million followers on Twitter and Facebook
• 5SM candidates for parliament were picked in on-line elections
• It has a strict rule not to appear on television talk shows
• During the election campaign Grillo did not give any television or
newspaper interviews, because journalists, like politicians, are the
“enemy”
• The Italian press, both liberal and conservative, is extremely hostile
to the 5SM. Politicians denounce Grillo as a right-wing demagogue;
a left-wing anarchist; a personality cult

3. • For the past 30 years, Sylvio
Berlusconi’s Mediaset empire has
controlled Italy’s top three national
TV channels
• He owns a major daily newspaper
(Il Giornale), a popular news
magazine (Panorama), and a large
publishing house
• As head of government for most of
the decade from 2001-2011,
Berlusconi also maintained a tight
grip on the state broadcaster, Rai,
appointing its board and sacking
“hostile” journalists
• Italy ranks 57th on the Reporters
without Borders press freedom index,
behind Hungary, Haiti and Burkina
Faso

4. What are the functions of media
in a democracy?

5. The liberal model of media in a democracy:
- Watchdog: holding governments to account, guardian of the public
interest
- Whistle-blowing, investigative reporting, exposing wrongdoing
- Informing, educating, mobilising
- A mirror held up to the world
- A public forum for debate
- A voice for the voiceless
- Builder of consensus

6. Market model
Basic principles:
• Society’s needs are best met through
unregulated supply and demand
• Consumers generate demand
• Media are like all other goods and services
• Private, unregulated ownership is best

7. “The only reliable, durable, and perpetual guarantee
of independence is profit.”
James Murdoch, 2009

8. Paul McMullan,
deputy features
editor, News of the
World (1994 to
2001), to the
Leveson Inquiry,
London, 2011
“Circulation defines what is the public interest.
I see no distinction between what the public is
interested in and the public interest. ...
What is of interest to the public is what they put
their hand in their pocket and buy.”

9. 2002 2008

10. September
2002

11. “It’s silly to point the finger
at these programmes for
puffing up the property
market, forcing people into
taking out massive
mortgages, or into
negative equity.
“Blaming such shows and
their presenters for the
present uncertain state of
the property market is like
blaming TV chefs for the
great increase in obesity.”
Kirstie Allsopp, presenter,
“Location Location Location”
(Channel 4), July 2008

12. Advantages:
– Efficiency
– Responsiveness
– Competitiveness
– Flexibility
– Innovation
Disadvantages:
– Concentration of ownership
– Entertainment beats information
– Reliance on advertising
– Journalism is expensive!

13. Rupert Murdoch, Davos, 2011

14. How democratic are the corporate media?
• Extremely steep hierarchy
• Upper levels usually from higher social classes
• Very white and male
• Lower levels have very little say over content
• Content is aimed at a specific audience
• Comment is limited to a few “star” writers
• Very narrow range of views broadcast or in print
• Almost entirely unaccountable to the public

15. The ‘propaganda model’
• Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky,
“Manufacturing Consent”, 1988
• Five filters:
– Ownership
– Advertising
– Sources
– ‘Flak’
– Anti-communism (now largely replaced by ‘Islamic terror’)

16. Guardian journalist Nick Davies
commissioned

17. “The rules of production”
Nick Davies (investigative reporter, The Guardian),
author of Flat Earth News (2008)
To make more money:
1. Run cheap stories
2. Select safe facts / ideas
3. ‘Ninja turtle’ syndrome
4. Avoid the electric fence
5. Always give both sides of the story
6. Give them what they want
7. Bias against the truth
8. Go with the moral panic

18. Dilemma:
• Mass media are businesses
• But they also are providers of information
and carriers of culture
• Tension between private profit and public
interest

19. How influential are the media?
• In 2006, 41% of Americans said Iraq in 2003 had weapons of
mass destruction or a major programme for developing them
• 49% believed Iraq was directly involved in the September 11,
2001, attacks or gave ‘substantial help’ to al-Qaeda
(Poll of 851 Americans by WorldPublicOpinion.org, March 1-6, 2006

20. UK general elections, voting patterns among
readers of The Sun newspaper
1992 1997 2001 2005 2010
Conservative 45 30 29 33 43
Labour 36 52 52 45 28
Source: Ipsos MORI

21. Does Fox News influence
voters, or merely reinforce
their existing opinions?
• Study of 9,256 towns in the
US where Fox cable TV was
introduced after 1996
• Measured the impact of the
introduction of Fox on the
vote share in the presidential
elections of 2000
• It found Republicans gained
just 0.4 to 0.7 percentage
points in the towns that
broadcast Fox News
Quarterly Journal of Economics,
August 2007

22. Fox failed to stop Obama… twice!
• Backing the right-wing Tea Party movement was not an unequivocal
political success
• It may have damaged the Republican Party by turning people
against more moderate conservatives
• Not only was Fox unable to prevent Obama’s re-election, but it failed
to stop his health care plan
• The Democrats did not suffer losses in the 2010 mid-term elections
primarily because of opposition on Fox; they hesitated on health
care reform and there was a deep recession
• There were legitimate grounds for criticism of Obama from the left

23. Other events in recent history that
should not have happened if the
media control our minds…

28. Recent stories that should not
have happened if the media were
100% dominated by corporate
interests…

30. UK parliamentary expenses, 2008

31. Wikileaks Iraq /Afghan diplomatic cables, 2010

32. Milly Dowler, 2011

33. ‘Public sphere’ model of the media
• Media are not like other products
• Society’s needs not met entirely through market
system
• Consumer power is not democracy
• Profitability is not the sole determinant of value
• Government may have a role to play