This document provides an overview of a research project that mapped media and communication research in seven countries. The project examined the contents and trends of current research in Finland, the US, Germany, France, Japan, Estonia, and Australia. It conducted 186 interviews with experts in these countries. The document summarizes some key findings from the research, including: 1) Media landscapes in the countries are being transformed by new communication technologies and convergence, as well as increasing concentration of media ownership. 2) Main research institutions and organizations in each country were identified, with most located in academic settings. 3) Approaches to media and communication research showed both similarities across countries as well as national characteristics. Major approaches included studies of

1. r
Review Article
Corrent Trends in Media Research
JUHA HERKMAN
In today's eraof extensivespecialisation researchers
cornrnunication technologyas well as fue econornics
tend to know little about other approaches than that
of communicationinsofar as fuesesubjectswere re-
of their own expertise. Conceptions of research lated to media research. The project not only
fields are often based more on personal and com- mapped academic media and communication re-
mon assumptionsthanknowledgeproducedby em- search but algo, insofar as possible, research by
pirical analyses.This article tries to clarify fue em-
governmental institutions, prívate agencies and
pirical reality of media research summarisingfue
by media companies.The findings were based on data
results of the project 'Mapping Media and Com- concemingyears2005-2006,by and large, although
munication Research',which exarninedthecontents a few of the sub-projectshave sample data from a
and trends of current media and communicationre- longerperiod and algo a more historical perspective
search in seven countries: Finland, the United on the changesand continuities in media and com-
States,Germany, France, Japan,Estonia and Aus- munication researchin a target country (e.g., Ger-
tralia. The project was funded by the Helsingin many,France and Japan).The gathering and analy-
SanomatFoundation and carried out by the Com- gis of the data were carried out during autumn2006
munication ResearchCentre (CRC, University of and spring 2007.
Helsinki) during a nine-month period betweenau- The project team agreed on the researchques-
tumn 2006 and spring 2007.1The purpose of the tions, the researchprincipIes and the structure of
project was to produce an overview of media-re- reports in advance in order to enhancemeaningful
lated research,in connection~with launch of the
the comparison among the countries. Thus, the basic
Foundation, but at the same time it offered a rafequestionsand methods behind each country report
opportunity to outline the similarities and differ-arethe same.The most important part of each sub-
ences among academic approaches in the above- project was the interview study of key persons in
mentionedcountries. media and cornrnunicationresearch.In all, 186 ex-
The project's main researchquestionswere the perts were interviewed (seeTable 1). Only the Ger-
following: man sub-project wa~based mainly on analysis of
written sources(Koivisto & Thomas 2007, 5).
1. What kinds of media and communication re- The interviews produced data, not only facts
searchare carried out in each specific country about media and communication research in each
and who is doing fue research? country, but algo evaluations and visions of the
2. How do different approaches relate to each state and future of suchresearch.The project team
other? members together decided on the organisation,
themesand questions for the interviews. In all, the
3. What is the relationship between researchand data of the project consists of secondarydata from
the media industries? previous studiesand existing statistics and primary
4. In which direction is researchheadedin the fu- data from interviews with key personsin media and
luce? communicationresearchas well as some statistical
analysesmade by fue country teamsthemselves.
The focus of fue project was on media research,
but At first glance the task of mapping the current
the researchers algo took into account studies in state of media and communicationresearchin large
speechcornrnunication,organisationalcornrnunica- countries suchas the U.S., Japan,France and Ger-
tion, public relations, researchand developmentof many looked like 'a rnissionimpossible'. It is clear
145

2. Tablel. Expertslnterviewedfor 'Mapping Media and Communication
Research'
Finland Estonla Germany Franca U.S. Japan Australia N=
AII 32 22 12 19 40 37 24 186
Academy 16 9 11 16 35 14 18 119
Olher 16 13 1 3 5 23 6 67
Men 20 13 7 12 31 30 19 132 ~
Women 12 ~ 5 7 9 7 5 54 :,
j
Ihat this kind of short-termproject cannotreveal all- of countries indicates the interests of the Founda-
inclusive or completeknowledgeof an issueascom- tion, which is no doubt interested in 'new innova-
plex as media and communication researchin any tive media markets' in South Korea and Japan,the
country. Eventhe definitions of the key conceptsof 'world's leading media market' -Ihe U.S. -various
'media research'and 'communicationresearch'vary examples of the 'Old World' (France, Germany,
in different contexts which, in tum, has a multitude Great Britain), and the relationship of these coun-
of effects on research institutions and disciplines in tries to the 'domestic context' (Finland) and its
the countries studied. Thus, each country createsa close neighbour(Estonia).
unique context for media and communication re- VariationsamongIhe countriesalgoproved to be
search.Furthermore,the nationalmedia statistics as interesting from the academicpoint of view. Differ-
well asthe statisticalanalyses usedas a background encesin size,languages, societies,culturesand poli-
in country-specific sub-projectsare often based on cies in eachcountry made for an unusual combina-
data and methods that are not directly comparable tion and forced the researchers Ihink about their
to
to eacholher. positions as researchers a newway. Academic re-
in
As a result, this article will not provide statisti- searchnowadaysis remarkably specialisedand re-
caUycomparableknowledge aboutmedia and com- searchers tend to know little about approaches
munication researchin the target countries. More- other than their own, even in their borne country -
over, it may not be possible to make broad conclu- not to speak of approaches in other countries or
sions from Ihe qualitative comparisonsbetweenthe continents. 'Mapping Media and Communication
countries. The goal of the article is simply to pro- Research' can therefore help media scholarsto 10-
vide a general overview of the current media and cate themselvesin the broadercontext of the whole
communicationresearch Ihe countriesstudiedand
in field of research.
to compare the countries descriptively rather than This article adopts the structure used in coun- I
analyticaUy.The comparisonhere is based mainly try-specific reports. Therefore, the four main sec- ¡
on the country-specific sub-reports of 'Mapping tions are: 1) The media landscapes, 2) Main re- j
Media and Communication Research', but in searchinstitutions and organisations, 3) Main ap-
contextualising the project, the article algo draws proachesin media and communicationresearch, and
upon olher references.2 4) Future challenges to research. In the country-
It rnight be asked why Iheseparticular countries specific reports eachsectionwas consideredmainly
were included in the project. The targetcountriesdo from a nationalperspective.In Ibis paperthe goalis
not constitute any homogenous group, quite the to clarify Ihe sirnilarities in researchtraditions in ad-
contrary. They are located far from one another, dition to identifying national characteristics. The
Ihey represent various languages culturesand in
and first section then outlines the contexts -the struc-
somecasestheir connectionsto media and commu- tures of the media market, media and communica-
nication researchdo not appear self evident. The tion legislation, and media consumption-and indi-
choise ?f target countries ,,:,as. originaUy made by c.ateswhere the resear~hin ea~h country i~ posi- ~
the proJect's sponsor,Helsrngrn SanomatFounda- tloned. The second sectlonconsldersIhe marn aca- ,
tion. The Foundation has algo funded the same demic and non-academicresearchorganisationsin
kinds of projects for SoulhKorea and GreatBritain. each country, and the third section focuses on the
Those projects are being carried out at the Univer- contentsand trends in mediaand communicationre-
sity of Jyvaskyla, and they are not included in this search.These sections are based on data gathered
summarybecausetheir results were not yet avail- by interviews as well as data from quantitative
able at the time of writing this article. The selection analysesmade either by the researchteams or by
146

3. earlier researchers.
The fourth section summarises tion and distribution but also mediapolicies and leg-
the views of the experts interviewed on the future islation in the targetcountries (e.g., Valaskivi 2007,
challengesand developmentsof media and cornmu- 23-24; Herkman & Viihiimaa 2007, 11-12). Conver-
nicationresearch. genceand its consequences media markets,con-
for
tent and communication policies have been much
.discussed in many countries since the early 1990s
The MedIa Landscapes (see Baldwin et al. 1996; Küng et al. 1999; Marsden
One task of the project was to map the structures & Verhulst 1999; Hassan 2000; Murdock 2000;
ofmedia landscapes fue targetcountries.This ob-
in Iosifidis 2002; Lowe & Hujanen2003).
jective was emphasised especiallyiffthe caseof Ja-
pan becausethe Japanese context is the most unfa- 2) Concentration of media ownership was an issue
miliar from a Europeanpoint of view. Becausethe that carne up in one way or another in every target
target countries are remarkably divergent, it was country. Most evident was the historical concentra-
not easyto find dimensions in the various media tion of the press (e.g., Puustinen 2007, 18;
landscapesthat are clearly comparable. Neverthe- Rahkonen2007, 25-31), but it was clear that cross-
less,the connectionsof the media and communica- media ownership and conglomerateshave also be-
tion industriesto the so-called globalisationprocess come more and more common in every target coun-
reveals at leastthree interrelated but possibly con- try during the past few decades(e.g.,Aslama et al.
tradictory tendenciesthat link the target countries' 2007,22-23; Herkman & Viihiimaa 2007, 15-16;
media landscapes, namely: 1)changesin media and Koivisto & Thomas 2007, 8). Another tendencyhas
communication technologies, 2) concentration of beenfue globalisation, or at leastthe internationali-
media ownership, and 3) the ideal of a diverse or sation, of media corporations. This tendency has
pluralistic public sphere. not only occurred in the homelandsof the world's
biggest media corporations (e.g., the U.S., Japan,
1)In eachtarget country it has beenclear for several Germanyand France),but also in smallercountries
years that fue diffusion of fue Internet, online com- and media markets suchas Finland and Estonia. For
munication and mobile technology challengesthe example,the Finnish company SanomaWSOYwas
'old media' in various ways. First, 'old media' have the largest media company in the Nordic countries
beendigitalised and fused with the Internetand mo- until year 2007 and is also a leading magazinepub-
hile networks, asfue digitalisation of television, fue lisher in the Benelux countries as well as in some
increasing number of web-papers and magazines, East Europeancountries. Similarly, the Norwegian
and the pilots of mobile- TV demonstrate (e.g., firm Schibstedand fue Swedishhouses of Bonnier
Aslama et al. 2007, 27-28, 40-42; Herkman & and Kinnevik own substantial shares of Estonian
Viihiimaa 2007, 15-31; Valaskivi 2007,38-39). Sec- newspaper and television markets (Salovaara-
ond, technological changeshavealsore-arranged glo- Moring & Kallas 2007, 16, 19).Along with concen-
bal and national media markets so that the 'old tration fueTe simultaneously-and paradoxically
has
media' increasinglyhave to compete with new net- -been a tendency towards micro-level and user-gen-
work communicationand ICT industries. erated content production by social networks (e.g.,
The most immediate pressurehas beendirected Aslama et al. 2007, 16-17). According to David
towards print media, which in every target country Hesmondhalgh (2002), this trend has be en more
has lost its strengthas a media form and advertising generalamongglobalising cultural industriesduring
channel.Even thoughchanges have not Jet beenfa- the late 1990sand early 2000s.
tal or devastating,in every target country the press In each country the media market could best be
is now searching for ways to maintain its audience describedas an 'oligopoly', in which the market is
and advertising share especially in the competition mostly sharedby a few large companies(seePicard
for younger media consumers.A good example of 1989,31-33). In most target countries there was
this is fue New York Times Company,which on the also one media corporation that was remarkably
one hand is one of the most traditional and recog- larger than the others and therefore undeniably led
nised U.S newspaper houses, while on the other the competition. These corporations included, for
hand it has successfully invested a great deal in example,Time Warner in the U.S., Bertelsmannin
online services.(Aslama et al. 2007, 36-38) Germany,Vivendi in France,News Corporation in
The third change is the technological conver- Australia and SanomaWSOY Finland. Thesewere
in
genceofbroadcastingand telecornmunication, which the companies that were also more international
will affect not only mediamarketsor media produc- than their local competitors. Time Warner, News
147

4. Table2. SomeDetails on Media Markets ofTarget Countriesin 2004-2005
Flnland Estonla Germany France U.S. Japan Australia
Largest media co. Sanoma- Eesti meedial Bertelsmann Vivendi Time Warner Sony Co. News Co.
WSOY Schibsted
Revenue,
in US$ million c.2,700 -22,196 22,194 43,652 63,895* 23,859
TV viewing
Leaderin
(min/day) 169 270 226 207 491 190 187 ~
i
advertising
share("lo) Papers
(55) Papera
(44) Papera
(45) TV(33) TV (42) TV (47)TV (35), ..1
* Total revenue: Sony's media revenue in 2004-2005 was 'only' 6,375 million US$. The advertising Agencies Dentsu and
Hakuhodo have higher net revenues and are larger Iban the largest 'pure' media company, the newspaper firm Yomiuri Shimbun.
Corporation, Bertelsmannand Vivendi belongedto However, since 9/11 and the Iraq war there has
the ten largest media companies in the world been widespread discussion about the 'dumbing
(Joukkoviestimet2006,333), while SanomaWSOY, down' and narrowing ofU.S. news content(Aslama
in terms of its net revenue, was the largest media et al. 2007,32-34), which suggeststhat the 'liberal'
company in the Nordic countries until year 2007, tradition might have seriousproblems with increas-
when SwedishBonnier overhauledit. It is clear that ing news competition and its relationship to social
media industries would be evenmore concentrated and national interests(cf. CurTan2002). In contrast
without state regulation and legislation that pre- to the U.S., Francehas relied on state regulation to
vents monopolisation and trusts. Among the target guarantee the diversity of the public sphere. In
countries Estonia had a surprisingly diverse media Francethe public sphereand freedomof expression
ownership that must have somethingto do with the have beenlinked to national intereststo whose cul-
relative youth and small size of the Estonianmedia tural integrity the dominance of the U.S. entertain-
market. By contrast the Japanese media market is ment industries, for example, is seenas a threat.
structuredquite differently and in a way that makes This kind of 'protectionism' may in turn cause
it difficult to compareto the other ta:tgetcountries: other problems (including for media and communi-
large advertisingagencies Japan, example,
in for also cation research) than would a more 'liberal' ap-
have an important Tole in content production, and proach. (Puustinen2007,11-12.)
theseagenciesare even bigger players in the media Since the 1990sthe dominant question in estab-
markets than 'traditional' media companies (see lishing a diverse and pluralistic public spherein Eu-
Valaskivi 2007, 14,30). Topehas beenthe statusof public service broadcast-
ing (PSB). The liberalisationand deregulationofthe
3) Even though there has beena drastic changeto- media has beena growing trend in many European
wards a market-driven or commercial media land- countries, not leastbecauseof an EU media policy
scape in the target countries, there is still a strong that has stressedeconornicvalues over a civic soci-
argumentfor the idea of a pluralistic or diverse pub- ety, for example,and the expandingmarkets in tel-
lic sphereas the core of a democraticsociety. How- ecommunication instead of in othermedia (Kaitatzi-
ever, strategies to achieve this ideal vary from Whitlock 1996; Jakubowicz2004). In Finland some
country to country. For example,the U.S. has from 40 per cent of the audienceshare of public service
the very beginning relied on commercially-based television has been parallel to that in Germany,
media competition alongside objectivity as a news France and many other EU countries (Joukko-
standard. It is taken for granted that the less the viestimet 2006, 338), but there has also been con-
state regulates media, the better the result for de- stantand lively criticism of PSB's Tolein the media
mocracy: free news competition guaranteesdiver- market in Finland (Herkman & Viihamaa 2007,16-
sity of media contentoThus, public service broad- 17). In France the state has interfered in television
casting accounts for only two per cent of the operation perhaps more than in any other target
American television audienceshare (Joukkoviesti- country represented in the 'Mapping Media and
met 2006,338). Communication Research' project, thanks to a
148

5. media policy thatregulatesprogrammingdirectly by understandthe conditions necessaryfor the emer-
nationality and language(Puustinen2007, 11-12). gence of a well-functioning public service broad-
It is interesting that broadcasting in Japanand caster'. They continue,that 'a weakness minority
is
Australia have close resemblances the European
to programming, importantand sensitiveissuein Es-
an
model with their mixed systems of public service tonia and also in Latvia since both countries have
and private commercial networks (Valaskivi 2007, large Russian-speaking communities. ...The other
18; Rahkonen2007, 22). The influence of the BBC major problem for public broadcastingin Estonia is
has been important all over the world in initiating the absenceof an independent,predictable, stable,
public broadcasting in the early twentieth century. and adequate system of funding' (ibid., 27). The
Also the problems of Japanese Australian PSB
and problemsof PSB in small countrieslike Estoniaand
seemto be similar to Europe's. Japanesepublic Finland aretherefore basically problems createdby
broadcasterNHK has encountereddifficulties, ow- limited resources.
ing to credibility problems, political scandals, As the Estonian example illustrates, there are
digitalisation and financing. NHK has a 'renewal perhaps more country-specific differences than
program' to reducethe numberof employeesby ten similarities in societies,cultures,languages, markets
per cent by the end of 2008. (Valaskivi 2007, 27.) A and media policies. Table 3 summarisessome na-
similar renewal programmehas been enforced, for tional characteristics in media landscapes of the
example, in the Finnish public broadcasting com- countries included in the 'Mapping Media and
panyYLE. Meanwhile, in the Australia report Juho CommunicationResearch' project.
Rahkonenemphasises pressure that liberalisa-
the Television has been,and still is, the most popu-
tion of media market places on public service lar medium in every target country: people spend
broadcastingin general: 'Given the neo-liberalmar- most of their media time watching television (see
ket economy and the keen competition, the legiti- Table 2). Television has also constructed the most
macy ofnon-commercialbroadcasting no longer
can influential medium for publicity. In many countries
be takenfor granted' (Rahkonen2007,22-23). televisionhas beenthe leading medium for advertis-
Estonia presentsan interesting exceptionamong ing. But if we estimate the relative status of each
the Europeantargetcountries in its relation to PSB. mediumin relationto media landscapes, seepro-
we
The 19 per cent channelshareof public television in found differences among the target countries. For
Estonia is remarkablyless than in other European example, Finland and Japan even today are tradi-
targetcountriesor the- average
EU (Salovaara-Moring tional 'newspaper countries' in which circulationsof
& Kallas 2007,18-19;Joukkoviestimet 2006,338).In dailies per person are among the top five in the
its strongemphasison commercialbroadcastingEs- world along with Norway, Swedenand Switzerland
tonia represents typical post-communistsociety in
a (Joukkoviestimet 2006, 335).
the Baltic afea, where, since the collapse of Soviet Even though circulation of dailies is continu-
Unionandtheregainingof independence, medialegis- ously but slowly decreasing,newspapersare still
lation has supported a U.S. style liberal market by far the mostpopular channelfor massmedia ad-
po.licy.As Salovaara-Moringand Kallas (2007, 26) vertising in Finland: newspapers dominate advertis-
put it: '... eachBaltic statedisplays a problem com- ing by 54 per cent of the market share, substan-
mon to Centraland EastemEurope:a failure to fully tially more than television's share of 19-20 per
Table3. SomeNational Characteristicsin Media Landscapes(2004-2005)
Finland Estonia Germany France U.S. Japan Australia'
-
...
Relatlvely high newspaper television, television cinema, television, mobile. Iv, television,
cable-Iv magazines cinema newspaper magazines
Relatively low television? print media newspaper newspaper, print media? newspaper
Internet
State regulation deregulation weak deregulation strong weak quite high deregulation
Historical small market, independent in World War 11, strong national 'world's biggest', World War 11, small and
dimension high tech, 1991, Russian federal republic identity, culture high tech, isolated
Nokia minority language industries u-strategy market.
conservative
'New' media falling behind, in frontline, 'neweconomy' coming to in frontline most behind,
digital TV e-voting crisis 2002 frontline, developed. going onllne
Minitel mobile
149

6. l I
cent, which againis much less than television's av- The German media landscape has be en struc-
erage30 per centshareof massmediaadvertising in tured by decisionsmade by the Allies after the Sec-
the EU (Herkman & Viihiimaa 2007, 18-20; ond World War that even now influence the German
Joukkoviestimet 2006, 122, 334). In Japan tele- press and broadcasting which are constricted from
vision still dominatesmedia markets both in terms taking form as 'total' massmedia (see Koivisto &
of viewing time and advertising revenue (Valaskivi Thomas 2007,6). The FederalRepublic emphasises
2007, 27), but the very specialcharacteristic of the the regional press,and therefore 'a specificity of the
Japanese media landscape the incredible boom of
is German media landscape is the relatively under-
mobile communication including the mobile internet, sized role of the supra-regionalparty press' (ibid.,
broadcasting, books,online music downloadingand 8). Even the public media in Germanyis organised
even the 'virtual wallet'. Japanis the indisputable by federalstructureinsteadof by centralisedmodelo
leader in mobile content developmentand approxi- New media in Germanysuffered significantly from
mately two to four years ahead of Europe. (Ibid., the crises of 2002, which endedthe hype of the vir-
30-32, 38-39.) The status of each medium in such tual 'New Economy'. Since that time, media indus-
country-specific characterisations is classified in tries have paid more attention to the so-called core
Table 3 as 'relatively high' or 'relatively low'. Ja- business.(Ibid., 8-9.)
pan is actually amongthe top countries in the world The crises of the 'new media bubble' and 3G
in every media sector,and it is thereforehard to de- mobile licenses in Germanyalso upsetthe Finnish
rifle any medium that would have relatively low sta- media landscapeat the beginning of the twenty-first
tus in the Japanese medialandscape. century. Before that, Finland has been on the
The 'statuses'of media are, of course,linked to frontline of the 'digital revolution', and the key-
historical, social and cultural developmentsin each word in the media branch was convergence. But
country. For example,Japanese successin the mo- more recently, media companies have focused on
hile market is connectedto a post-war policy that their traditional trade instead of such things as
has emphasisedtechnologicaland economic devel- mergerswith the ICT business.However, the influ-
opmentand led to an information societyand 'u-Ja- ence of Nokia on the national economy is so huge
pan' (Ubiquitous Japan)strategies as national en- that the ICT branchis an engine of the twenty-first
deavours (ibid., 10-11,24). The samekinds of vi- century Finnish media business. In household
sions or strategies have recenti y come into the Internet connections Finland has not been among
world in all the target,countries one way or another, the world's flor even Europe's top countries (e.g.,
but there are significant differences in the commit- Joukkoviestimet 2006, 346), but Finland was the
mentto the developmentof ICT. first country in the world to move completely to
According to interviews in information technol- terrestrial digital television,during the year 2007.
ogy, for example, Australia 'lags behind other devel- The special characteristics of the U.S. media
oped countries' and 'the digital revolution is just landscapeare, of course,its leading role as an enter-
[now] aboutto hit Australia' (Rahkonen2007, 17).3 tainment producerin the world and the vastness and
The reasonfor this may well be the isolation of the diversity of its nationalmedia markets.A strongdo-
continent, the relatively small population and the mestic market makes the U.S. media branch quite
high degree of urbanisation,which in turn have led independentfrom international influences and also
to a combination of conservativemedia policy and keeps it on the frontline of technological and con-
concentrated media market (ibid., 18-21). Likewise, tent development(Aslama et al. 2007, 14-15). The
late assimilationinto global information networks in U.S. is still unquestionably 'a television country':
France can be linked to the strong maintenanceof 'Although on-line andmobile mediahavebecomein-
national identity through languagelaw and cultural creasingly important, ...the statistics illustrate the
protectionism. By contrast, by developing and re- crucial role of television as a medium in the U.S.'
taining its own network communication system (ibid., 15-16). After becoming independentin 1991
'Minitel', averted the spread of the Internet in Estonia adopted the U.S. model of liberal media
France for many years. Later, the French eagerly markets in many ways. Television also dominates
adopted the Internet while European ICT enthusi- the Estonian media landscape,and cable-TV espe-
asm crystallised at the EU's Lisbon meeting in cially has a relatively strong position there
2000, and today France is one ofthe top-countries (Salovaara-Moring & Kallas 2007,18-22). Rapid
in EuropeanInternet connections.Nevertheless, the socialchangesand the role of the Russian-speaking
cinema still hasa unique statusin Frenchmediacul- minority have been the key questions of Estonian
roce.(Puustinen2007,10-12,19.) medialandscape policies (ibid., 6, 27).
and
150

7. Main Research Institutions countries. Especially in countries with very tradi-
and Organisations tional academic institutions like France and Ger-
many, much of the researchis carried out by other
The country-specific characteristics in the media disciplines than those specifically called media or
landscapesdiscussedabove constitute background cornmunication research.A great dealof humanistic
for mediaand cornmunication research eachcoun- and social scientific media and communicationre-
in
try. Because the size of the population varies searchisdone, for example,in sociology,the politi-
among fue target countries,fue sizesand structures cal sciences,linguistics, psychologyand fue educa-
of the university systems are also quite different. tional sciences. The roots of media and communica-
But there are also congruencies structuring media tion research found in more traditional academic
in are
and cornmunication research eachcountrystudied disciplines such as history, philosophy, sociology,
in
for 'Mapping Media and Communication Re- science of law, the study of literature, psychology
search'. and political sciences-a fact that still affects meth-
First, in all countriesmedia and communication odologies, theories and perspectives in media and
research carried out by universities and other aca- cornmunication
is research.
demic institutions suchas polytechnical schoolsas Table 4 illustrates the size of fue acadernicinsti-
well as by non-academicresearchinstitutions and tutions of media and communication education in
organisations. Non-academic researchis done by eachtargetcountry. It has to be kept in mind that it
public and private agenciesor by research teams in is very difficult to obtain comparabledata even for
media companiesand funded both publicly and pri- the numbers of universities, BA/MA/PhD pro-
vately. In each country there is a much greater de- grarnmes and professorsfor a specific discipline. As
greeof private funding of mediaand cornmunication mentioned,the definition of disciplines and number
researchthan public funding. This is evident in the of subjects included in the disciplines vary from
broadly business-orientatedICT sector. Basically, country to country. The subjects mar also go by
organisationsdoing media and cornmunicationre- different llames.
searchin each country are not after all so different. Another problem is that the bigger the country,
Second,in all financing of academicmedia and the more difficult it is to obtain reliable data about
cornmunicationresearch shareof humanitiesand fuesekinds of numbers:
the tracing all mediaand cornmu-
social sciencesis marginal comparedto that of fue nicationprograrnmes fue U.S., for example,is ex-
in
natural sciences,cornmunicationtechnological de- tremely time consuming work, and the numbers of
velopment and business research.As the U.S. re- programmes and professors change continuously.
port explains it, 'comparedto other social sciences, Thereforefue datain Table 4, especiallyvis-a-vis fue
communicationhas traditionally receivedless fund- U.S. and Germany,have beenculled from various
ing' in general(Aslama et al. 2007,72). Hence,hu- secondarysources,and, in fue case of Germany,are
manistic and social media and communication re- from sevento ten years old. Becausefue number of
searchis not at the core of the academic funding universities, programmes and professorships of
systemin any target country. media and communication research has steadily
Third, the discipline of academic media and grown in Germany(Koivisto & Thomas 2007, 26-
cornmunicationresearch undefined in many target 30), it is assumedthat fue Germannumbersin Table
is
Table4. SomeDetails oi AcademicMedia and CommunicationEducation and Researchat the National
LevelI
Finland Estonia Germany Franca U.S. Japan Australia
Universitles 13 2 52 (1997) 22 c.400 c.230 37
MA/PhD
programmes 27 11/1 131 (2000) -109/93* 53/39 118
Professors 42 13 160(2000) 147 ---
National Nokia/ITC, newcentres formal and statecontrol, hardto strong private Non-
characteristics private of excellence hierarchical unclear discern, sector, hierarchical,
funding system discipline healthcomm. research industries
vs.
associations academy
,, ::;, ',i ,,
* In joumalism and mass communication only.
151

8. ~
4 are too small. The total numbersof MA and PhD pline, but the main reasonis the richness of fue re-
prograrnmes fue U.S. will algobe muchgreater
in than search conductedby fue industries (Valaskivi 2007,
the numbers in Table 4, which includes only pro- 42). In Japanfue Toleof research associations algO
is
grarnmes injoumalism andmass cornrnunication. Pre- exceptionally strong (ibid.). In countries like Japan
sumably, U.S. is a leaderin mediaand cornrnuni-
fue and fue U.S. where 'media hasbecomea huge busi-
cation education and research fue world. Thus,Ta-
in ness', media-related researchis algo big business
ble 4 tells more in a generallevel aboutthe scale of (Aslama et al. 2007, 66), and the Tole of academic
acadernic mediaand cornrnunication education tar-
in mediaand cornrnunication research remainedmar-
has
gel countriesthan it doesaboutexactfigures. ginal from fue point of view of fue media industries.
More interesting in Table 4 are the short de- Social scientistshave algo positioned themselvesto
scriptions of fue nationalcharacteristicsof research be critical actors in society, thereby increasing the
organisationsand institutions. For example,France gap betweenacademicsand industries. Among the
and Germany proved to serve quite conservative target countries the critical tradition has remained
and constricted academic environments for media quite strong in the U.S., France and Finland, while
and cornrnunication research because their hierar-
of algO Japan,
in Australia and Germanymany scholars
chical and introverted university structures.In Ger- see their task as constituting a critical counterforce
many the postgraduate qualification process, Ha- against econornicinterestsof industry.
fue
bilitation, 'does not encourage scientific originality' The gap between industries and academic re-
(ibid.,18). In Francethe problemhas beenthe rela- searchhas not encouraged industries to finance hu-
ti ve youth of discipline and the low status of manistic and social scientific researchor education.
'Infocom' (Sciences 1 'information et de la com-
de The problem has been sharply criticised by an Aus-
munication)in the government controlled systemof tralian professor: 'Industry takes the graduales but
acadernicresearch and disciplines (Puustinen2007, puts very little back to the journalism academy'
26-31). In both countries the identity of media and (Rahkonen 2007, 56). In Finland, the situation
communication researchhas been poorly defined, changed after the Helsingin SanomatFoundation,
and much of the research beensplinteredamong
has basedin fue Sanoma WSOY corporation,was estab-
various more traditional and establisheddisciplines lished in 2005. The Foundation has become the
(Koivisto & Thomas 2007, 15, 43-44; Puustinen most prominent sponsor of humanist and social
2007, 30-32). media research Finland. Helsingin SanomatFoun-
in
In 'the new world', academic systems seemto dation algo funded the 'Mapping Media and Com-
be less hierarchicalthan in fue bornecountriesof fue munication Research' project. (Herkman &
modero Europeanuniversity, and media and com- Viiharnaa2007,47-51.)
municationresearch Japan, U.S. andAustralia
in fue But the difficulties in obtaining funding for aca-
is in many ways more pragmatically oriented than, demic humanistic or social scientific media and
for example,in Germanyand France. But this does communication researchbecome more evident in
not mean that academic researchand media indus- comparisonwith technological or natural scientific
tries are closely linked in fuesecountries either. On research in every target country. For example,
the contrary,there seemsto be quite a gap between whereasthe Academy of Finland and prívate Finn-
mediaindustriesand academicresearch every tar-
in ish foundationsfinanced humanistic and social sci-
gel country. The only exception might be Estonia entific mediaand cornrnunication research with some
where recentsocialchanges haveencouraged ac- aU 7 rnillion euros in 2006,Nokia alone financed its re-
tors in fue field to work together.In a small country searchand developmentby almost 3.9 billion euros
like Estonia,humanistsand social scientistshave to in the very same year (ibid., 45). In many target
look for collaborative projects if they are to obtain countries, owing to the strong economic assump-
extensivefunding for larger research projects. (See tions of ICT, stateorganisedresearch funds are algo
Salovaara-Moring& Kallas 2007,56-57.) nowadayschanneledmostly to information techno-
It is actuallyquite surprising how separate fue
are logical development by various national research
acadernic humanisticand socialscientific media and programmesand semi-public foundations. For ex-
cornrnunication research from mediaindustriesin the ample,fue total researchfinancial by the Academy
U.S. and Japan, where cornrnunication mediain-
and of Finland in 2006 was approximately 257 million
dustries have an essential position in structuring euros.The share of humanistic and social scientific
whole societies. In Japanthe relative modesty of media and communication research was between
academic media and communication researchcan one and two per cent, with the majority of the
partly be explained by the obscurity of the disci- funding allocatedto technologicaland biD sciences.
152

9. Meanwhile, fue Finnish Funding Agency for Tech- cultural aspects of media and communication, and
nology and Innovation (TEKES) funds research and 3) those that focus on media and communication
development activities undertaken by companies technology. These three categories could be found in
and research organisations registered in Finland. In all countries but their ratings and precise definitions
2006, TEKES invested 465 million euros in research vary from country to country (see Table 5). Fur-
and development projects in companies, universi- thermore, the categories are not exclusive and, in
ties and research institutes, but humanistic or social many cases, they overlap. For example, cultural and
scientific media research had only a very limited feminist studies often combine cultural and political
role in those projects. aspects with their analyses, and technological re-
On a nationallevel, then, fue funding of human- search is sometimes linked to social and political
istic or social scientific media and communication re- analysis as it is in the case of information society
search is quite marginal in every target country and research. Thus, definitions here simply mean that
dependent on prívate funding. Country-specific in- some dimension of the research appears to be more
terests may arise in some approaches, however, be- prominent than others. It is also necessary to note
cause they fit current economic and social conjunc- that 'political' is understood more traditionally here
tures. A good example is health communication re- as 'politics' or 'policy' than in representation or au-
search in fue U.S., which does not at all have fue dif- dience analyses of cultural or feminist studies,
ficulties that are discussed above (Aslama et al. where 'political' often refers to identity politics or
2007,73,83-84). constructionofmicro-levelpowerrelations.
In Estonia almost all media and communication
Main Approaches in Media and r:search see~~d to have. some connection with s?-
C " t" R h clal and pol1tlcal queshons because of the rapld
ornrnurnca Ion esearc ...
changes m soclety after the collapse of fue SovIet
Many generalisations made in this paper are based Union: 'Media is analysed as part of society and
on interviews rather than on statistics, but in defin- not as a separate unity. The rapidly changing soci-
ing fue main research approaches in target countries ety creates new problems to which the academic
the conclusions are based mostly on various statis- community must respond.' (Salovaara-Moring &
tical analyses found in research publications. The Kallas 2007, 63.) Specific social and political
problem is that primary data, methods and fue clas- themes in Estonia are fue Russia-speaking minority
sifications behind these statistics have been so het- and adaptation to fue post-communistic era (ibid.,
erogeneous that it is hard to make sophisticated 61). It is thus not an overstatement to claim that all
comparisons between countries. Nevertheless it is academic media and communication research in Es-
still possible to give a rough overview of fue main tonia has a strong connection to social and political
approaches in media and communication research. questions. It is notable that some topics that are
In most countries the main approaches found in highly popular in the Nordic countries, such as
media and communication research can be classified popular culture, feminist media studies and organi-
in one of three general categories: 1) those that em- sational communication, are dealt with only in fue
phasise political and social questions in relation to student MA theses but otherwise remain in Estonia
media or communication, 2) those that emphasise unpublished (ibid., 62). A special national character-
Table5. MainApproaches in Media and CommunicationResearchin 2006
Flnland Estonla Germany France u.s. Japan Australia
MostpopularlhernesMediaand Politicall Massmedia; ICT; Mediaand Massmedia; ICT; Mediaand Journalism
in academicjournals popular societal Communi- popular culture; ICT; Advetising popularculture; and newsmedia;
(or books) culture; cationin Politicall andPR* Mass media* Communication
Politicallsocietal; general societal studies;
Journalism Culturalstudies
studies
National Feminist Semiotics, Humanities, Social con- Diversity, National- Cultural studies,
characteristics critique, Ethnicily, Unübersicht- structivism, MCR, Media Asian, Political
Cultural Post- lickeit, Online Newtechnology,ellects Western economy
studies socialism National
* The U.S. and lapan data are basedon published books (not articles) and are Iherefore not directly comparable to other countries.
153

10. -
istic in Estonia is the influence of the famous Tartu Germany and France have quite different rela-
schoolof semiotics(ibid., 64). tions to media and popular culture studies. While
In Finland media and popular culture proved to suchapproaches popular in France,the research
are
be the most popular topic in academicthesesespe- has beenconcluded more under the distinctive na-
cially at fue MA level (Herkman & Viihamaa 2007, tional traditions rather than under the label of
57), but a later analysis of academic articles pub- Anglo-American cultural studies.This has meant a
lished in English reveals that Finnish scholarsem- more elitist-based and more protectionist attitude
phasisealgo social and political themes,especially vis-a-vis commercial popular culture, and the ap-
in their postgraduatework. There were algo clear proachhas tberefore been highly critical in nature.
differences among Finnish university departments However, since the 1990s,Frenchmedia and com-
and disciplines: the humanities emphasisedmedia munication research opened up to international
has
and popular culture, while social science empha- influences, and a new generation of scholars has
sised social and poli tic al as well as journalism re- emerged with a different relationship to popular
search(ibid., 57-59). However, it becameclear that culture studies. (Sumiala-Seppanen 2007, 99-101.)
in Finland, it is possible to speak of 'linguistic' or Today the point of view of social constructivism
'cultural' turns in media and communication re- dominates French media and communication re-
searchbecause cultural and feminist studies have search,and the fascination with new media tech-
algohad sucha greatinfluence on more socially ori- nologieshas broken throughto fue extent that it can
entedmasscommunication research. be classified as the most popular theme in France
Popular culture was algoa popular research sub- (Puustinen2007, 63-69).
ject in Japanand Australia. Japanhas a strong re- Research into newmedia technology-especially
searchtradition into Japanesepopular culture and online communication-is steadilybecoming more
media history (Valaskivi 2007, 72-75), while Aus- common in Germanyas well, even though,the con-
tralia is world famous in Anglo-American cultural servative and hierarchical academicsystemempha-
studies (Rahkonen2007,58-62). However, in Japan sises more traditional approachessuch as research
today popular culture studies are often connected into mass communication and media effects
to 'new media' phenomenasuch as anime, digital (Koivisto & Thomas 2007,42-43). Germannational
gamesand World Wide Web (Valaskivi 2007, 66). characteristics include the strikingly high share of
Therefore,Japanese academicmedia and communi- humanities-for example,linguistics -among media
cation researchin many casesis highly focused on and communicationscholars' orientation (ibid., 32-
new information and communicationtechnologyas 33) as well as 'the lack of clarity' (Unübersicht-
is the researchby private organisations.It is worth lickeit) in the field (ibid., 15). Koivisto and Thomas
recalling that the Japanesedata here are based argüe that the conservatism of universities has led
solely on books published on media and communi- to difficulties inserting cultural studies into a Ger-
cation issuesand the ranking of approachesmight man context, and authors see that multidisciplinary
be quite different had the ranking beenmadeby aca- cultural studiescould serve asa way out of the cul-
demic articles. Overall, Japanese academic media de-sacof the 'deadlocked political constellation of
and communicationresearch modestcomparedto
is fue Germanuniversity' (ibid., 66-71).
the private sector, with strong roots in traditional Lack of clear definition could algo describe the
western mass communication research (ibid., 67- U.S. media and communication approachesin that
69). In Japan technological approaches are very fue research field is so huge and diverse that it is al-
strong,and recently there have beenefforts to pro- most impossibleto make any generalisations.How-
mote collaboration betweenacademic and private ever, there are some approachesthat are obviously
research as well as effects to develop genuinely stronger than others in the U.S. Traditional mass
interdisciplinary projects betweentechnologicaland communicationresearch(MCR) is still perhapsthe
socialapproaches (ibid., 82-83). most popular approach found in U.S. media and
The national characteristic of Australian media communication research, even though interest in
and communication research is pragmatism new communication technology -especialIythe
(Rahkonen 2007, 57). Another key aspect in Aus- Internet -increases continuously. National charac-
tralia is the popularity of the political economyre- teristics of the U.S. are the continuous popularity
sulting from 'fue exceptionallyconcentrated owner- of media effects researchand the strong emphasis
ship structure'of Australian media. 'The Australian on researchinto advertising and public relations.
version of politic al economy is algo known as the (Aslama et al. 2007, 83, 110-111.)It is evident that
"media matesapproach".' (Ibid., 60.) the remarkablerole of commercialmedia industries
154

11. in the U.S. has led to these kinds of national em- manistic approaches are more 'cultural' in that they
phases in media and communication research. rely on qualitative methods and put more emphasis
A common feature in every target country is an on theories and concepts of symbolic reality than
emphasis on empirical research, The status of em- do social approaches, which are more 'materialist'
pirical research is naturally highest among prívate and have stronger traditions in the use of quantita-
research organisations, but academic media and tive methods and the reliance on empirical data
communication research is algo mainly based on em- about social realities. These differences, however,
pirical analyses, even though the academy discusses are ill-defined and by no means all-inclusive. Quite
theoretical questions more than does prívate, indus- the contrary. It seems that discourse analysis and
try-based applied research. Yet solely theoretical in- textual analysis as well as criticism of post-mod-
vestigations seem to be quite marginal in today's ernism and post-structuralism have today become
academy. According to interviews, the most empiri- part of almost all humanistic and social media and
cal emphasis among the target countries is found in communication research in fue target countries.
the U.S. and Australia, while theory has the strong-
est support in France and Japan, and perhaps in
Germany. Future ChaUenges to Research
In most countries quantitative methods still have Even though there were many differences among the
the strongest position in empirical analysis, but target countries, those scholars interviewed seemed
qualitative methods have increased their popularity to be strikingly unanimous about the future chal-
since fue 1980s and fue so-called 'cultural' or 'lin- lenges to academic media and communication re-
guistic turn' (see e.g., Bonnell & Hunt 1999). Pri- search. The challenges can be grouped in five inter-
vate research organisations still rely on quantitative related categories that were crystallised in fue U.S.
methods, especially on surveys, Jet algo in the report (Aslama et al. 2007, 121). The same catego-
academy quantitative methods such as laboratory ríes can be found in one form or another in every re-
experiments, surveys and content analyses evi- port:
dently domínate in the U.S., Estonia, Germany and
, , ..e
1 Th h . d ..
c angmg me la envuonment
Japan. In France and Fmland qualItat1ve methods
seem to have an exceptionally strong position in 2. National vs. international orientation
academic media and communication research, but 3 Th 1 ,
h ' ." b d ' . h h .e qua Ity o f t he researc h
t lS 1mpress10n lS ase on mterv1ews rat er t an
being the result of statistical analyses. 4. Affirming the institutional status of the disci-
The differences among methodologies and the pline
confrontation between theory and empiricism vary ."
b th d.. 1 . d h th t d . t th 5. Improvmg relatIonsh1ps between academia and
y e lSC1p mes an approac es a omma e e .
.m d ustry
nat10nal contexts. Aslama et al. (2007, 138-139) ar-
gue that tension between humanistic and social sci- The first challenge is fue rapidly changing media en-
entific approaches is especially characteristic of the vironment that has been discussed in more detail in
U.S. media and communication research, but it is the section 'The media landscapes'. In the Japan re-
evident that the same kind of distinctions can be port Katja Valaskivi (2007, 79-80) summarises the
found in most of the target countries. There are changes with the term 'convergence', which com-
clear differences between humanistic media (film and bines technological, economical and cultural dimen-
television studies, literature studies, linguistics, art sions of 'converging media systems' (cf. Murdock
history, etc.) and social scientific media (mass com- 2000; Iosifidis 2002). In particular changes in com-
munication research, media sociology, journalism munication technology and markets have been so
studies) and communication approaches, even rapid that many scholars distrusted the ability of
though fue 'linguistic' or 'cultural turn' and the in- academic research to react fast enough: the academy
fluences of cultural and feminist studies have per- seems to lag behind in technological, social and eco-
haps made disciplines more similar than ever before nomic changes. On the other hand it is possible to
(see e.g., Ferguson & Golding 1997; Murdock ask to what extent academic research should react to
1997). rapid changes in fue media environment and to what
The separation of social scientific 'research' and extent its task is to 'slow clown' or 'denaturalise'
humanistic 'studies' algo draws lines between the continuous talk about change and the techno-
theory and empiricism as well as between quantita- logical hype? Considerable continuity can algo be
tive and qualitative methods. It was clear that hu- found in media environments, while the social his-
155

12. -
tory of the mediahas demonstrated changes
that are in their world history The Human Web(2003). Aca-
not always so 'radical' or 'revolutionary' as they are demic humanistic and social scientific media re-
claimed to be in contemporarydiscourses(see e.g., searchhas become a 'second-class citizen', with
Winston 1998; Mattelart 2001; Briggs & Burke short-term financing and employments that do not
2002). support substantialresearchprojects, which in tum
The secondchallenge is linked to the first that are essentialfor renewing the discipline. Todaythe
deregulation and liberalisation of the media have majority of academicmedia researchis carried out
opened national media markets -at least to some by prívate funding that emphasises industry-based
extent-to intemational or global competition. Con- applied studies instead of so-called basic research.
centrationof media ownershipandmergersof media Therefore, the key question in all target countries
companieshave beenone result of this processand proved to be how to affirm the conditions for self-
have made national media marketsmore dependent containedacademic research.
on global media corporations (see Croteau & The fourth challenge,affirrning the institutional
Hoynes 2001; Doyle 2002). At the sametime aca- status of the discipline, is also linked to the previ-
demic media and communicationresearch been has ous challenges.It is obvious that the relatively low
quite nation-bound because of its commitmentto institutional statusgoeshand in hand with a low de-
nationallanguages cultural boundaries well as
and as gree of academic financing. Many scholars inter-
to national media and education policies. Many viewed believed that strengtheningfue institutional
scholars interviewed saw a contradiction between statusof fue media and communicationdiscipline in
the emphasisin media researchon nationalperspec- the academy would therefore meanmore money for
tive and media industries'emphasison intemational research.But there are also other dimensionsto fue
issues. 'lack of disciplinary clarity'. As the country-spe-
According to the France report, cultural protec- cific reports of fue 'Mapping Media and Communi-
tionism and accentuating Frenchlanguagein univer- cation Research'project demonstrate, fueTe pro-
are
sity policy is a problem in fue intemationalisation found disagreements defining media and commu-
in
of French media and communication research nication researchas an academic discipline. Disa-
(Puustinen 2007, 74-77). The situation is com- greementsare in many casesso fundamentalthat it
pletely different in Finland, for example, where really seemsto be a 'mission impossible' to define
publishing in English is fue most important means any clear-cut discipline of media and communica-
of achieving merit in fue academy.Interviewees,es- tion research.From this point of view, requirements
pecially in small or isolated countries like Finland, for the congruency of the field can also be seenas
Estonia and Australia, seemedto long for intema- belonging to paradigm battles and a threat against
tional research collaboration. Again it is possibleto plurality or diversity of research; therefore, many
ask if ranking by publications in intemational ref- scholars, especially those from humanistic or cul-
ereedjoumals -a habit adopted from natural sci- tural approaches,were quite happy with the cur-
ences-is truly the best way to evaluatehumanistic rentmixed situationin mediaand communication re-
or social media and communication research. To searchin fue academy.
what extent should media and communication re- The fifth challenge is to overcome the gap
searchbe national in, for example,and take part in betweenacademicmedia research and media indus-
public debateson media's Tole in society or fue na- tries. Many scholarsboth in fue academy and in pri-
tion state? vate organisations voiced fue desirefor increased co-
The third challenge,guaranteeing high quality of operation between industry and the academy.Aca-
research,is intimately linked to complaints about demicswere expected take media industries'prac-
to
the poor financing and resourcesof contemporary tical orientationmore seriously, vice versa,while
and
academic media and communication research.As industries were expectedto leam more substantial
shown in the section 'Main research institutions thinking from the academy instead of purely
and organisations',humanistic and social scientific economy-oriented investigations.Someinterviewed
mediaand communicationresearch not at the core
is truly believed thatacademicresearch help indus-
can
of1he academyin any of the target countries. This tries to contextualisecurrentchanges fue media en-
in
is not surprise.Since the SecondWorld War, devel- vironmentandincreaseknowhow,for example,about
opmentin all research haveemphasised large-scale, qualitative research methods.Academic researchers
institutionalised and bureaucratically applied thought that they in tum could benefit from indus-
projects whose goal is economic progress or mili- tries' hugeresources updatedmicro-level exper-
and
tary success, McNeill and McNeill demonstrate
as tise in media and communicationtechnologies,pro-
156

13. duction and marketing. The problem in developing of 'creative industries' among academic institutions
collaboration between the academy and industry is (e.g., Rahkonen 2007, 66-67). The key question here
the critical task of the academy, which was still seen is to what extent co-operation between fue academy
as central by many scholars. The sub-projects and industry is possible without losing the critical
showed that it is now trendy to speak, for example, potential of academic research.
Notes References
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Siira, Rona1dRice and Pekka Aula from the U.S. Communication.
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Aura Lindeberg and Elina Perttula worked as CurTan,James (2002) Renewing the Radical Tradition,
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A Comparative Introduction, 35-58. London: Sage. New York: Routledge.
JURA RERKMAN, D.Soc.SC., Academy of Finland Postdoctoral Researche1; Depart-
ment of Communication, PL 54, FI-OOOI4 University of Helsinki, juha.herkman
@helsinki.fi
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15. r
Appendix
Facts about the 'Mapping Media and CommunicationResearch'
The project'sbudget was a total of 275,000euros (for sevencountries).Tbere were nine researchers allin
plus five researchassistants tour team leaders.Togethertheir work was a little less than five researcher-
and
years (60 months).The U.S. sub-project's team,consisting of two team leaders,two researchers, research
a
assistantand an advisor, was the largest,while the Australian project (one researcherfor six months), the
Finnish (a project leaderand one researcherfor five months)and the Estonian(two researchers, together
working five months)were the smallestsub-projects.
Table. Employees 'Mapping Media and Communication
in Research'
Leaders Months Researchers Months Assistants Months
Finland 1 2 1 5 --
Estonia -2 5 --
Germany -1 9 1 2
France 1 1 1 5 2 2
U.S. 2 2 2 11 1 2
Japan -1 6 1 2
Australia -1 6 --
CornmunicationResearch Centre CRC at the University of Helsinki is carrying out the samekinds of stud-
ies on mediaand communicationresearch Belgium, the Netherlandsand Russiabetweenauturnn2007 and
in
spring 2008. More sophisticatedsummariesand meta-analyses ofall country-specific sub-projects will be
completed by the end of 2008.1 Tbe budgetsof theseprojects are total some 150,000 euros,for which tour
researchers three research
and assistantsareworking. This paper therefore,gives only a brief surnmary of
the results of the 'Mapping Media and Cornmunication Research'project from auturnn2007. Since auturnn
2007 the director of the CRC and head of the projectshas beenProfessorHannuNierninen.
Note
1. The analysis will be done by Juha Koivisto and Peter Thomas, researchers from the German sub-project.
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