This document summarizes a BA journalism student's week 2 activities which included readings on media ownership and control from McQuail's Mass Communication Theory and a lecture on the political economy of journalism. Key points from the readings discussed how economic forces like advertising revenue can influence media content and shape ownership models. The lecture covered four theories of the press and discussed how ownership concentration, regulation, and feedback systems can constrain journalists. In seminar, students debated where power lies in journalism and what factors like political pressures, criticism, and advertising constrain reporting.

1. BA journalism: week
2
DATE: 20/10/2016

2. This Week
◦ This week we looked at who owns and controls the media and discussed the topic
further in the seminar. We also discussed how profit can affect the media industry and
what is shown by them. Another issue which we discussed was what the constraints
and challenges of being a journalist are.
◦ The reading we had to do this week was Power Without Responsibility by Curran and
Seaton and McQuails Mass Communication Theory.
◦ In this blog post I will be elaborating on the reading this week, the key points in the
lecture and what we discussed in our seminar about the lecture and my own
thoughts on the reading.

3. Notes on McQuail’s Mass Communication
Theory
This book looks at the social and cultural implications of mass media due to the political and
economic forces shaping media institutions.
◦ Media is at the centre of three main forces: political, economic and technological.
Economic principles of media markets (McQuail, Chapter 9, Page 226)
◦ Picard says that the American news industry receives more than 80% of its income from advertising
and accounts for 60% of content.
◦ Media based on advertising revenue are more vulnerable to unwanted external influence on
content
◦ Media that is based on consumer revenue are vulnerable to shortage of finance
◦ Different sources of revenue require different measures of market performance
◦ Where multiple markets apply, performance in one market can affect performance in another
◦ Advertising in specialist media can promote diversity of supply
◦ Certain kinds of advertising benefit from concentration of the audience market
◦ Competition for the same revenue sources leads to uniformity.
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4. ◦ The belief that ownership ultimately determines the nature of media is not just a Marxist
theory
◦ Most media belong to one of three categories of ownership: commercial companies,
private non-profit bodies and the public sector.
Media ownership and control (McQuail, Chapter 9, Page 228)
◦ Freedom of the press supports the rights of owners to decide on content
◦ Form of ownership inevitably has an influence on context
◦ Free competition is the best defence against misuse of powers of ownership
Mass media governance (McQuail, Chapter 9, Page 234)
◦ Different types of media need different forms of governance
◦ Control can be justified more for mass-media than small-scale media
◦ Neither publication censorship nor punishment for publication alone are consistent with
freedom and democracy
The regulation of mass media (McQuail, Chapter 9, Page 235)
◦ Different media are subject to different degrees of regulation and there are four main
factors which relate to these differences: the strength of the medium’s claim to freedom,
the degree to which a potential harm to society is perceived, for reasons of equitable
allocation, and the relative practicability of effective regulation.
◦ There are three models which explain the main differences in the degree to which
governments can intervene, although they are becoming less distinct due to deregulation
and technological convergence.

5. Lecture: The Political Economy of
Journalism
◦ During the lecture we looked at the four theories of the press:
◦ Authoritarian: where the citizens of the country are only given what the country think is appropriate
to them and information has censorship on it. In this theory, the press in independent, however,
produces propaganda. There is no information on the media economy in this. Examples of
countries with this theory of the press is China, Saudi Arabia and any other current dictatorship.
◦ Libertarian: in this theory of the press, citizens are well informed and are expected to use that to
inform democratic decisions and protect themselves from tyranny. The press doesn’t have any
censorship in this model and independent press holds power to account. Citizens have lots of
information in the media economy. Examples of countries who have this is the UK, France,
Australia, Germany and any current country with democracy.
◦ Social responsibility: in this theory, citizens are well informed but are expected to use this to support
the state. There is some censorship to protect the community and independent press operates
as a public service. Information on the media economy is based upon objective facts. Examples
of this include Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and other emerging democracy countries.
◦ Soviet/ communist: this is similar to the authoritarian theory but communication can be two-way
rather than one-way. The state controls the press/media. The media economy consists of
propaganda and the press is totally state owned. Examples of this includes North Korea, Soviet
Russia and Nazi Germany.

6. The Lecture Continued
◦ During the lecture, media ownership was discussed. Most media companies are owned
by a small number of rich people called moguls. An example of a mogul is Rupert
Murdoch who owns The Sun, The Times, Sunday Times and Sky Television.
◦ Regulation was also mentioned in the lecture. There ate some journalistic constraints
when it comes to regulation because there are issues when it comes to the freedom
to publish and what a person can publish.
◦ The rule of the law is another challenge of the political economy. There are many laws,
such as defamation laws which can constrain what can be published.
◦ Flak was also part of the lecture. This is a feedback system which can be in the form of
complaints and threats of libel action.

7. The Seminar and My Thoughts
◦ The main question in the seminar was: Where does power lie in the world of journalism?
In my opinion, the power lies with the dominant companies who pass on their ideologies
through their popular news. For example, Rupert Murdoch owns The Sun, which is one of
the most popular newspapers in the UK. Therefore, the type of stories and things they put
out there can greatly influence the way people think. This shows how powerful they are
since they can influence the public sphere and change the way members of society
view certain issues. For example, the news information put out by popular newspapers
affected the way some people viewed Brexit and it played a factor in how they voted.
This illustrated how much power the dominant companies have since their hegemonic
values can affect people.
Another point which came up in the seminar was “if you own the press, you can control
it.” I agree with this statement to an extent as I feel that those in power have control over
what happens and can therefore use that as a way of controlling the people paying
attention to it.

8. Another question in the seminar was: What constrains journalists?
There are many factors which constrain journalists, some of the factors which were
discussed in the seminar were political constraints, flack, fear and advertising.
I believe that political constraints can definitely constrain journalists, this is because you
cannot openly say things against the government when speaking of countries with an
authoritarian system like Russia and china. This can affect a journalist who wants to put
out their views but cannot due to the circumstances.
This leads to another constraint mentioned in the seminar which is fear. In my opinion,
fear is definitely a constraint for journalists because a journalist may not want to put out a
piece of work which may offend people and therefore get a lot of flack.
Flak is also a constraint since the journalist may be afraid of criticism. However, I feel that
as a journalist you may need to deal with criticism at some point, especially if not
everyone shares the same view as you do. Not everyone has the same perspective on
an issue, and your perspective could receive flak at some point from people who don’t
agree, but this is something that you would need to deal with because you cannot
please everybody in society.
Advertising is another constraint which a journalist may face. As a journalist, your content
needs to reach the people it is intended for since they are the ones who will purchase
the product, the audience would not purchase something which does not suit them.
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