lecture 6: public sphere

political economy

Habermas and public sphere

contextualisation

• historically situated (18th c)

• specific class of people (well educated, politically potent)

• well informed participants (role of newspapers)

• specific locales (example coffee house)

Habermas intelectual approach

• idealisation (how it should be)

• generalisation (public sphere inherent to democracy)

• public sphere fills space between private/individual sphere and the government

• note: firm = individual (legal person = entity that can do things an everyday person can usually do in law - such as enter into contracts, sue and be sued, own property,…)

four characteristics

• there should be a site for debate to take place

• this site should be accessible in principle to all members of society

• it should be a protected realm for critical and rational debate

• opinions emanating from that site should be recognised as legitimate by public authorities

contemporary case: internet (Dahlgren)

problem definition

• many theorists today agreethat strong democracy requires vibrant public sphere of open and reflexive debate over problems of living together with difference

• in contemporary, large scale, dispersed and complex societies, mass communications media are required to support such a sphere

• however, mass emdia have been shown by variety of critical theorists to have failed in this role

new potential

• number of critical theorists see internet as holding potential to reinvigorate democratic culture and forexpanding and enhancing public sphere

• the two way, decentralised medium offers greater opportunity than state and/or corporate controlled mass media for voicing views, performing identities, encountering diverse ideas and information, and engaging in dialogue and debate with difference

limitations

• those researching possibility of internet expanding democratic culture have also pointed out significant factors limiting open and reflexive debate online, including

  • inequalities in access and participation,

  • unreflexive communciation,

  • fragmentation of discourse into like-minded deliberative enclaves,

  • state surveillance and censorship

comment on Dahlgren

• colonisation of cyberspae

  • platformisation fo access

  • extensive monitoring of consumer behaviour and preferences

    • directly by platform owners

    • indirectly through resale user info

  • customisation/targeting of content

    • agenda setting and priming

    • framing

one-sided view?

• result is reproduction and dominance online of the discourse and instrumentalist practices of consumer capitalism and marginalisation of open and reflexive debate central to strong democratic culture

historical case: pamphlets

what are pamphlets?

• censorship, repression (religious, political, topical interest)

• political significant (low price to reach maximum audience)

space or place

• pamphlets distributed to network of pedllers

• flexible and dense distribution network functioned as commercial feedback loop

• pedllers also functioned as collectors of news

public opinion

• intially, pamphlets illegal, but repression unsuccessful

• authorities sought to control pamphlets through licensing system, which also proved to be inefficience

• royal authorities and nobility reverted to pamphlets themselves, as means of propaganda

• with advent of parliamentary democracy, pamphlets became institutionalized and became more dialogic form of communication

communicative reason

• two genres of political pamphlets served same function: persuade public

• popular literacy forms including sensationalism and vulgarity competed with more argumentative styles

• by end 19th c, number of argumentative that contained mostly political commentary had increased. this coincided with the rise of parliamentary democracy

• pamphlets introduced new communication modes that were more dialogic and argumentative that those fo previous times, but boundaries with literary forms of communication remained permeable

equal access

• reach of pamphlets extended beyone bourgeois class

  • price kept low to reach large audience

  • written in vernacular and often read out loud and publicly discussed

• pamphlets used by elite ot persuade and gain support for their (competing) causes

in sum

• public communications space did indeed exist in 17th c

  • as former state territory conquered by public

  • with boundaries contested by adverse commercial and political powers

  • and in which inherited literacy modes of expression competed with rational argumentation styles

  • at service of both elites and counter-elites

competing views

• pamphlets contributed to emergence of communicative public space stood far from ideal proposed in habermas public sphere theory

• competing view: effect of Habermas’ belief in rationalism is dramatic

historical conclusions

• pamphlets contributed to transformation fo society dominated by coercive kind of rule to one represented by more hegemonic approach

• public sphere not only place for contestation by also contested place in its own right - precisely because it created public realm in which antagonist opinions could be vented

• public sphere grew as communicative space for non-violent conflict resolution, in environment characterized by sharp political divisions and religious conflicts

cultural studies

citizenship and the quality of journalism

• journalism celebrated when reports current affairs but denounced when focuses on private or emotional matters

• classifications and evaluations of tv programs generally based on unarticulated distinction between journalisma dn entertainment or between journalism and popular/tabloid journalism

masuline and feminine journalism?

• adopt position good citizen rooted in education, cultural capital and social habitus fo white, male, professional managerial class. However, if media organisations want to look for ways to adress, challenge and represent all people as citizens, reconsideration of traditional value system is needed

• masculine: rational; quality journalism

• feminine: emotional; popular journalism

television, difference and public quality

two perspectives on media and citizenship

• affirmative conception of media as public educators

• threefold iportance of media

  • media set agenda and thus have power to determine issues that audiences think about

  • media play crucial role in constituting or enhancing democratic culture by making it concrete and visible

  • every time TV program generates public debate, society becomes more cohesive entity

• deconstructive approach of media as instances of governmentality

  • alternative approach that wishes to discuss citizenship-oriented character of popular media, centralizes question as to how to deal with difference, because:

    • politics of difference is at heart contemporary citizenship

    • recognition of and respect for difference and commitment to orchestration of encounters across proliferating and cross-cutting identities should be at the heart of this public investigation

popular journalism and the quality of public debate on good citizenship

• popular news as having decisive role in establishing wider discursive space for public deliberations over social issues?

  • popular journalism considered potentially just as vital as regular journalism, they implicitly/explicitly kept holding on to quality of the info, the independence of the journalist or produced, the rationality of the opinions as well as the content of the text as primary axis of concern → popular journalism might be useful for citizens, but only to extent it resembled (features of) quality journalism

• general assumption remains that info is major need of viewers and listeners in role as citizens. However…

  • shouldn’t info shift from goal to a means to an end: promoting citizens’ involvement in democracy?

  • shouldn’t info be represented in way that appeals to the audience?

  • shouldn’t public-oriented journalism mean that people aren’t addressed as passive customers of entertainment industry but as potentially active citizens who value info they can use in both personal and social life?

  • => reappraisal of the traditional set of journalistic values

public sphere vs private sphere

• by neglecting private sphere, journalist seem to assume that reproductive services, most of which happen to be delivered by women, are less valuable

• however, democracy doesn’t stop at the front door, and neither does the making of moral choices

from providing information to democratic involvement

rationality vs emotionality, opinions vs experience

• important to take emotions as seriously as rational claims or abstract rumes when it comes to gaining more insight into democratic culture. If one views emotionality like rationality as instance of moral concern, exercising control over emotions less important than careful discussion of their appropriateness

• actual practice amply demonstrates that it’s quite possible to discuss emotions or emotionality in rational fashion

• consequence of line of reasoning in talk sows is exclusion of everyday life from democratic scrutiny as well of democratic relevance

• should become more routine for jounalists to undertake reports on subjects like changing views of friendship or relationships, or prevailing norms and practices of raising a family

• many journalists trouble imagining individuals may want to expose themselves in public and share their private worries with others. These journalists implicitly rely on view of autonomous self, which fuels frequent critique that they exploit people by subjecting them to voyeurism and showing no respect for their privacy

autonomy vs dependency, detachment vs involvement

• concept ideal citizen still mainly associated with ideal of detached, objective outsider

• current journalism fails to acknowledge significance people’s immediate world

• relational viess as alternative to autonomy ideal

• autonomy view still dominant in majority of political talk shows. Shouldn’t it be possible to express relational views of self-identity in these programs as well?

• crucial that media take into account existence alternative forms of individuality

conclusion

• a model: focusing on dialogue, relational concept of individuality, and recognition of significance of emotions adn journalism of everyday life

• in this model: experts just one source of info among many