Democracy and the Media—Revisited

Abstract

The model which dominated twentieth-century analysis of political communication systems is now out of date in many respects. Essential in the authors’ view is a reconsideration of some of the foundational concepts of political communication scholarship. They propose fresh lines of thought on: a communication-sensitive definition of democracy; the purposes of civic communication; evaluations of media roles in terms of those purposes; the politics–media axis; and new citizen roles in new-media conditions. Noting that values are always at stake in how political communication is organised, practiced and received, they distinguish two different conceptualisations of researchers’ policy roles for harnessing and enhancing communication, citizenship and democracy—as a visionary destination and as a journey towards it, respectively. They conclude that both deserve prominent positions on academic road maps.

KEYWORDS:

• citizenship
• democracy
• political communication
• journalism
• mediatisation
• new media
• communication policy

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This article started life as a lecture delivered by the first author at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia on 31 May 2014, and was subsequently nourished by his collaboration with the second author. The article benefited greatly from an after-lecture discussion session with faculty members and postgraduate students of the University's Department of Communication and from comments by Lance Bennett, Lee Edwards, Jack McLeod, Giles Moss, Katy Parry, Slavko Splichal and David Weaver.

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Jay G. Blumler (corresponding author) is Emeritus Professor of Public Communication in the School of Media and Communication, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK.

Stephen Coleman is Professor of Political Communication in the School of Media and Communication, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK. Email: [email protected]