scholarly journals Populism and media policy failure

2018 ◽  
Vol 33 (6) ◽  
pp. 604-618 ◽  
Author(s):  
Des Freedman
Keyword(s):  
Media Coverage ◽  
Media Policy ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
Far Right ◽  
Digital Platforms ◽  
Policy Failure ◽  
Policy Paradigm ◽  
Policy Frameworks ◽  
Media Environments ◽  
Media Systems

Far right populist politicians and movements have secured high levels of visibility thanks to often compliant media outlets and unregulated digital platforms. The pursuit of media coverage and the communication of rage are no longer incidental but essential to the growth of reactionary populisms. Yet, while prominent liberal media outlets are ‘aghast’ at events such as the election of Donald Trump and the Brexit vote, little attention has been paid to the structural conditions and policy frameworks that have facilitated the circulation of clickbait and misinformation, together with the incessant coverage of their leaders, that have been exploited by far right movements. This article identifies four areas of ‘media policy failure’ that have nurtured highly skewed media environments and concludes by calling for a new policy paradigm based around redistribution that aims to reconstruct media systems in order to undermine the appeal of populist forces on the far right.

scholarly journals Media policy for private media in the age of digital platforms

2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 395-409 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gunn Enli ◽  
Tim Raats ◽  
Trine Syvertsen ◽  
Karen Donders
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Policy Research ◽  
Policy Instruments ◽  
Media Policy ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Digital Platforms ◽  
Playing Field ◽  
Political Traditions ◽  
Media Markets ◽  
Media Systems

Digital platforms such as Google, Facebook and Netflix have caused a watershed moment not only for markets and businesses but also for media policy. Concerns about the US-based digital platforms’ impact on national media markets have grown among European media businesses as well as policy makers. Media policy research argues that small media markets are particularly vulnerable to global players and foreign influence, but that market size must be understood also in the context of political traditions. This article investigates how digital platforms influence media policy for private media businesses in the small media systems of Norway and Flanders. Drawing on 20 qualitative interviews with CEOs and top-level media managers in these two small media markets, we ask what private media businesses expect from policy makers in light of the intensified competition from digital platforms, what experience they have with cooperating with policy makers and what explains the differences between Norway and Flanders. A key finding is that the managers in both markets want policy makers to regulate digital platforms to secure level playing field, and that the Norwegian respondents had more positive experiences with co-regulation and expressed more trust in policy makers and policy instruments, compared to the Flemish. Despite the global players and the need for transnational solutions, regional variations in policy making still matters, and might inform the discussion about how to regulate the digital platforms.

Framing conflicts in digital and transnational media environments

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 476-488 ◽  
Author(s):  
Curd B Knüpfer ◽  
Robert M Entman
Keyword(s):  
Frame Analysis ◽  
Information Flows ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Digital Platforms ◽  
Transnational Media ◽  
Political Conflicts ◽  
Framing Processes ◽  
Media Environments ◽  
Media Systems ◽  
The Way

This article provides an overview of established and emerging approaches to frame analysis as a tool for analysing dynamics of political conflicts. It first surveys the approaches taken by contributors to this special issue and notes some implications for further research. The second part of the article then outlines four ways in which digital platforms and transnational information flows might influence the way framing contests play out in current and future media environments. These include: (1) fragmentation within media systems; (2) increasing transnational information flows that potentially create transnational publics; (3) altered framing processes and effects in the more complex networked environments; and (4) architectures and emerging logics of digital platforms. The authors believe these four factors will become crucial for understanding the connections between frame competition and political conflicts.

scholarly journals The Communicative Constitution of Hate Organizations Online: A Semantic Network Analysis of “Make America Great Again”

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 205630511879076 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean M. Eddington
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Network ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Organization ◽  
White Supremacist ◽  
Far Right ◽  
Network Analyses ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
White Supremacists ◽  
Media Systems ◽  
Communicative Constitution

In the context of the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election, President Donald Trump’s use of Twitter to connect with followers and supporters created unprecedented access to Trump’s online political campaign. In using the campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again” (or its acronym “MAGA”), Trump communicatively organized and controlled media systems by offering his followers an opportunity to connect with his campaign through the discursive hashtag. In effect, the strategic use of these networks over time communicatively constituted an effective and winning political organization; however, Trump’s political organization was not without connections to far-right and hate groups that coalesced in and around the hashtag. Semantic network analyses uncovered how the textual nature of #MAGA organized connections between hashtags, and, in doing so, exposed connections to overtly White supremacist groups within the United States and the United Kingdom throughout late November 2016. Cluster analyses further uncovered semantic connections to White supremacist and White nationalist groups throughout the hashtag networks connected to the central slogan of Trump’s presidential campaign. Theoretically, these findings contribute to the ways in which hashtag networks show how Trump’s support developed and united around particular organizing processes and White nationalist language, and provide insights into how these networks discursively create and connect White supremacists’ organizations to Trump’s campaign.

Far-right populism and foreign policy identity: Jair Bolsonaro's ultra-conservatism and the new politics of alignment

2021 ◽  
Vol 97 (2) ◽  
pp. 345-363
Author(s):  
Feliciano De Sá Guimarães ◽  
Irma Dutra De Oliveira E Silva
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Role Theory ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
Far Right ◽  
New Politics ◽  
The World ◽  
Role Conceptions ◽  
National Role Conceptions

Abstract In the last two decades, far-right populists have formed governments all over the world. However, systematic analyses on how far-right leaders recreate their countries' foreign policy identity are still underdeveloped. In this article, we analyse how far-right populist leaders use their conservative identity-set to align with other right-wing governments and how they use the same conservative repertoire to deal with ideological rivals. More precisely, we argue that these leaders tend to overemphasize a deep conservative identity-set towards other far-right populist governments, something we call ‘thick conservative identity’. This profoundly conservative identity-set is composed of three national role conceptions: anti-globalism, nationalism and anti-foe. However, they do not repeat this identity-set towards ideological rivals, preferring to use a more nuanced and contradictory one, something we call ‘thin conservative identity’. The trigger of such difference is the anticipated mutual expectation of conservatism between Ego and Alter, in which Ego mimics Alter's deep conservatism. We use Jair Bolsonaro's alignment with Donald Trump and Bolsonaro's relationship with China as illustrative cases. We use the main concepts of role theory to understand both how conservative alignments are created and how far-right governments deal with ideological rivals.

scholarly journals Trump Plays the Devil – the Devil Plays Trump

2021 ◽  
pp. 117-134
Author(s):  
Katharina F. Gallant
Keyword(s):  
Media Coverage ◽  
Charismatic Leadership ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
The Devil

The presidency of Donald Trump is a core example of the role of sensationalism in politics. Trump has accused political opponents of both devilry and moral degradation, but such accusations have gone both ways. In her examination of German media coverage of Trump, Katharina Gallant shows how Trump has been portrayed as politically and morally inadequate. Bringing together Cohen’s traditional framework with Paul Joosse’s work on charismatic leadership, this chapter illuminates how Trump has emerged as a devil figure for the left wing in Europe, while similarly being someone that the European left-wingers have had few options for dealing with.

scholarly journals Fascism-lite in America (or The Social Ideal of Donald Trump)

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 291-315 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ewan McGaughey
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Political Ideology ◽  
State Intervention ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Campaigns ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
Citizens United ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Supreme Court

Abstract What explains the election of the 45th President of the United States? Many commentators have said that Trump is a fascist. This builds on grave concerns, since Citizens United, that democracy is being corrupted. This article suggests the long term cause, and the shape of ideology is more complex. In 1971, an extraordinary memorandum of Lewis Powell for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce urged that ‘[b]usiness interests’ should ‘press vigorously in all political arenas for support’. Richard Nixon appointed Powell to the Supreme Court, and a few years later, despite powerful dissent, a majority in Buckley v. Valeo held that candidates may spend unlimited funds on their own political campaigns, a decision of which Donald Trump, and others, have taken full advantage. Citizens United compounded the problems, but Buckley v. Valeo was the ‘Trump for President’ case. This provided a platform from which Trump could propel himself into extensive media coverage. The 2016 election was inseparable from the social ideal pursued by a majority of the Supreme Court since 1976. No modern judiciary had engaged in a more sustained assault on democracy and human rights. Properly understood, ‘fascism’ is a contrasting, hybrid political ideology. It mixes liberalism’s dislike of state intervention, social conservatism’s embrace of welfare provision for insiders (not ‘outsiders’), and collectivism’s view that associations are key actors in a class conflict. Although out of control, Trump is closely linked to neo-conservative politics. It is too hostile to insider welfare to be called ‘fascist’. Its political ideology is weaker. If we had to give it a name, the social ideal of Donald Trump is ‘fascism-lite’.

scholarly journals Medier og selvstændighed i Grønland

Politik ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Signe Ravn-Højgaard
Keyword(s):  
Nation Building ◽  
Digital Platforms ◽  
The Public ◽  
Media Regulation ◽  
Media System ◽  
The Media ◽  
Streaming Services ◽  
Potential Impact ◽  
Media Systems ◽  
Public Economy

This article discusses the potential impact of Greenlandic independence on Greenland’s media system and suggests initiatives necessary for maintaining strong Greenlandic media in the future. Using Manuel Puppis' (2009) theory of the characteristics of small media systems, the Greenlandic media system is described. It is shown that it is built with the following aim in mind: the media should support the Greenlandic society by being independent and diverse, strengthening the Greenlandic language, and providing quality journalism that can heighten the public debate. However, as a small media system it is vulnerable to global tendencies where legacy media lose users and advertisers to digital platforms like Facebook and streaming services. The article argues that the vulnerability of the Greenlandic media system could increase if independence leads to a tighter public economy, impeding the media's ability to support Greenlandic society and culture. An interventionist media regulation could, therefore, be a prerequisite for a strong Greenlandic media system that can act as a unifying and nation-building institution.

News reception and authoritarian control in a hybrid media system: Russian TV viewers and the Russia-Ukraine conflict

Politics ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 026339572110414
Author(s):  
Maxim Alyukov
Keyword(s):  
Digital Media ◽  
Television News ◽  
Authoritarian Regimes ◽  
Authoritarian Rule ◽  
Additional Information ◽  
Cross Media ◽  
Media System ◽  
Media Environments ◽  
Media Systems ◽  
Media Repertoires

Authoritarian regimes attempt to control the circulation of political information. Scholars have identified many mechanisms through which actors can use broadcast and digital media to challenge or sustain authoritarian rule. However, while contemporary media environments are characterised by the integration of older and newer forms of communication, little is known about how authoritarian regimes use different media simultaneously to shape citizens’ perceptions. In order to address this issue, this study relies on focus groups and investigates Russian TV viewers’ cross-media repertoires and their reception of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. It argues that some citizens evaluate state-aligned television narratives as more credible when they are reinforced by similar narratives in digital media. Citizens’ reactions to this synchronisation are predicated on their type of media use. For not very active news consumers, the reliance on digital media can verify the regime’s narratives in television news. Others can escape the synchronisation effect by actively searching online for additional information or not using digital media for news. These findings show how authoritarian regimes can utilise the advantages of hybrid media systems to shape citizens’ perceptions and specify the conditions under which citizens can escape the effects of the regime’s simultaneous use of different media.

Digital News and the Consumption of Political Information

2019 ◽  
pp. 248-262
Author(s):  
Silvia Majó-Vázquez ◽  
Sandra González-Bailón
Keyword(s):  
The Internet ◽  
Digital Platforms ◽  
Demographic Groups ◽  
News Consumption ◽  
Novel Approach ◽  
Digital News ◽  
Filter Bubbles ◽  
Media Systems ◽  
Reported Data ◽  
The Web

The Internet has fundamentally changed how people access and use news. As Dutton and others (Chapter 13, this volume) note, there are concerns that the Internet leads us to get stuck in “echo chambers” or “filter bubbles”—limiting our access to points of view that might challenge our preexisting beliefs. This chapter introduces a network approach to analyzing news consumption in the digital age. The authors explain how we can compare patterns of news consumption across demographic groups, countries, and digital platforms, and determine if there are differences across groups of users and media systems. Measuring news consumption has long been difficult owing to the limitations of self-reported data, so this chapter is notable in offering a novel approach that leverages the digital traces that people leave behind when navigating the Web.

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