"Brasilien hat mehr als einen Berlusconi: Zehn Familien kontrollieren die Medienlandschaft. Politische und wirtschaftliche Interessen sind eng miteinander verzahnt. Alle Versuche, das zu ändern, sind bislang gescheitert." (Einleitung)
"Comparing Media Systems Beyond the Western World offers a broad exploration of the conceptual foundations for comparative analysis of media and politics globally. It takes as its point of departure the widely used framework of Daniel C. Hallin and Paolo Mancini's Comparing Media Systems, exploring
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how the concepts and methods of their analysis do and do not prove useful when applied beyond the original focus of their "most similar systems" design and the West European and North American cases it encompassed. It is intended both to use a wider range of cases to interrogate and clarify the conceptual framework of Comparing Media Systems and to proposed new nidels, concepts, and with processes of political transition. Comparing Media Systems Beyond the Western World covers, among other cases, Brazil, China, Israel, Lebanon, Poland, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and Thailand." (Publisher description)
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"Following the revolutions, the battle for the Arab blogosphere has turned from being a competition over accessing the Internet and circumventing government controls to a cyberwar for the predominant narrative through Facebook, Twitter, and traditional media [...] Social media is reinvigorating trad
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itional print and broadcast media, including satellite networks, which are adopting multi-platform strategies [...] Social media is serving as political cover: News outlets are recognizing the benefit of using social media to preempt official repercussions by disseminating sensitive stories first on social media sites and in other cases to gauge possible reaction before going to print or air [...] Numerous media observers and professionals have complained that professional journalists, citizen journalists, bloggers, activists, and pro-government contributors in the region lack ethics, do not understand libel, practice incitement, and fail to meet other international journalism and legal standards [...] While user-generated content is plentiful, authenticating this content can take up valuable resources. Training for citizen journalists and non-journalists who are online would help established media outlets and the public to gauge the accuracy and authenticity of news and information." (Executive summary, page 8-9)
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"Die Protestwelle nach der umstrittenen Präsidentschaftswahl im Iran vom Juni 2009 lenkte die Aufmerksamkeit der Weltöffentlichkeit auf die lebendige Internetkultur der Islamischen Republik. Das Internet, heißt es, befördert den gesellschaftlichen Wandel in Ländern wie dem Iran, doch inwiefern
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unterscheidet sich das Netz von den Printmedien? Stellt es tatsächlich eine neue öffentliche Sphäre dar? Welchen Einfluss haben soziale Netzwerke wie Facebook, Twitter oder YouTube auf die Organisation von Demonstrationen? Bringt die iranische Blogosphäre eine Kultur des Dissidententums hervor, die das islamistische Regime am Ende zu Fall bringen wird? Diese wegweisende Studie bietet Einblicke in die Internetkultur im heutigen Iran und untersucht die Auswirkungen der neuen Kommunikationsformen auf Gesellschaft und Politik. Die Autoren warnen davor, "Blogger" mit "Dissident" gleichzusetzen, denn auch das Regime hat längst mit der "Kolonisierung Blogistans" begonnen. Das Internet, so eine ihrer Thesen, bringt Veränderungen mit sich, die weder die Regierung noch die Demokratiebewegungen vorhersehen konnten und können. "Blogistan" ist nicht nur eine Fallstudie zur Internetaneigung in der islamischen Welt, sondern das Buch macht auch deutlich, welche Auswirkungen die Neuen Medien auf gesellschaftliche Strukturen und Prozesse haben." (Verlagsbeschreibung)
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"There has been a growing debate about the extent to which the Internet influenced the Arab World’s recent revolutions described as the “Arab Spring”. This belief that the Internet had a contribution is supported by several events and evidences that occurred prior to these revolutions and prov
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ided clear indications about the Internet’s power. This paper investigates the effect of the Internet on shaping politics in Egypt. Research was conducted a few months before the revolution (January 25, 2011) covering the relevant literature, and the news and events that took place. A questionnaire was sent to a sample representing different segments of Internet users in Egypt to recognize their perceptions towards the value of the Internet in politics. Findings indicate a high interest among Egyptians in accessing news online, especially international and privately owned media. In addition, survey participants recognize the Internet’s potential for committing political change. Survey results show that the Internet is perceived in Egypt as a strong tool that political candidates could use to communicate with citizens; however, it is still used primarily for mobilization and information dissemination. Moreover, it was proven that age, gender, education and reading frequency of online news all have varying effects on civic engagement and perception of the role the Internet can play in politics in Egypt." (Abstract)
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"In March 2005, a relatively nonviolent uprising ousted an authoritarian president in the former Soviet republic of Kyrgyzstan. In the aftermath of the so-called Tulip Revolution, press rights advocates and journalists welcomed the promise of greatly enhanced freedoms. However, the new regime proved
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to be as authoritarian and corrupt as its predecessor and little liberalization of the press system was evident five years later. Physical assaults continued, including murders, as did harassment, libel suits, impediments to access to information, license denials and self-censorship. There was only slow movement toward privatizing of state-owned media. Independent and oppositional media also remained in financial peril due to the country’s weak economy and high poverty level. Thus, 20 years after independence and a half-decade after the Tulip Revolution, the Soviet propaganda model for a press system was dead in name, but many major attributes survived, with significant implications for the continuum of authoritarianism in other postcommunist nations. The degree to which the April 2010 coup and subsequent constitutional change to a parliamentary democracy will spur an expansion of press rights and sustain market-based independent media outlets remains speculative amid grave concerns about continuing anti-press events." (Abstract)
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"For Palestine's diaspora and exiled communities, the internet has become an important medium for the formation of Palestinian national and transnational identity. Miriyam Aouragh looks at the internet as both a space and an instrument for linking Palestinian diasporas in Palestine, Jordan and Leban
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on. She closely examines the uses and limits of internet technology under conditions of war, along with the ways in which virtual participation enables the generation of new ideals for political reconciliation and self-determination. Through the internet, participants reconstruct a virtual 'Palestinian homeland', gain a space for recovering the past, for overcoming issues of mobility, and for generating social change. This book provides a new angle on those affected by the Israeli-Palestine conflict, and furthers understanding about the connection between electronic media, politics and national identity more widely." (Publisher description)
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"The May 2011 general election has been the most contested and most discussed in Singapore’s history. Prior to the polls, the government relaxed the rules on election campaigning in the Internet. For the first time in the highly wired city-state with its tech-savvy population of 5 million people,
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opposition parties had the chance to mobilize supporters via social-networking media like Facebook and Twitter. Bloggers used cyberspace extensively for political debate and comment. While the ever-ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) posted its worst result in decades, the opposition gained historical victories, at least by Singapore standards. Observers were quick to label the polls as an “Internet election”, implying that media activism in the city-state’s cyberspace had a decisive impact on the ballot. A more measured reading of the election outcome, however, suggests that the polls were not decided in Singapore’s web. The voters’ choice was largely influenced by bread-and-butter issues as well as a call for divergent voices in politics and more control of the government. Although online political expression since the mid-1990s has challenged the PAP’s authoritarian rule and has changed Singapore’s political culture, its impact in electoral terms has so far been limited. The PAP still keeps the city-state tightly under control, online and offline, and is likely to continue its dominance in the foreseeable future. It remains to be seen if Internet media activism can push the city-state towards an open democracy." (Abstract)
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"This article examines debates about national identity in the media landscape of post-referendum and post-independence South Sudan. Having never existed as a sovereign state and with its citizens being a minority group in Sudan, collective action among South Sudanese has historically been shaped in
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response to external pressures: in particular, the aggressive nationbuilding pursued by successive Khartoum governments that sought to Arabize and Islamize the South. Today, in the absence of a clear-cut enemy, it is a major challenge for South Sudan to devise a common identity that unites the putative nation beyond competing loyalties to ethnicity, tribe and family. Analysing opinion pieces from South Sudanese online media and placing them in the context of contemporary African nationalism, this article gives an initial overview of the issues that dominate the public debate on national identity: fear of tribalism and regionalism, commemoration of the liberation struggle, language politics, and the role of Christianity." (Abstract)
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"This paper takes a critical look at the view that the Internet can serve as a laboratory of political experimentation for reconfiguring the repertories of political actions. The overall discourses on information and communications technology (ICT) are too often focused on technology and infrastruct
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ure, when the question of its use should be central. In order to comprehend how ICT can serve as a democratic enhancer, this paper critically examines the African anthropology of the state and of the public sphere. It captures the African endogenous productions of political modernity and the subsequent way ICT is appropriated and indigenized by African local instances. African states and civil societies do not fit into prescriptive Western paradigms. In order to encourage the effective use of new technologies, this paper has developed the so-called “African model of ICT practice”, which proposes a set of hypotheses that aim to enable the effective usage and integration of ICT within the democratic process in the context of an African self-defined political reality." (Abstract)
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"From this short survey of some key thinkers, can we conclude that there is a causal link between media and good governance? Does the existence of a free media increase accountability and reduce corruption? Do media influence society in positive ways and liberate the individual? As one would expect,
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the short answer is “it depends.” There is no consensus or easy, single answer to these questions. Neither is there a set of recommendations in a report such as this one, apart from common-sense recommendations to those donors and policy-makers who may be reading, to thoroughly understand media and politics in a given country before intervening, as well as the caution to do no harm. It is hoped that this report has introduced and shone a light on academic research related to subject of media and democracy. There are obvious differences between the media environments that are studied by the scholars profiled above: established democracies (in the case of Norris), developing countries (Nyamnjoh, Berger, Sen, Reinikka and Svensson, Besley and Burgess), and fragile/post-conflict states (Allen, Putzel, and Stremlau), which show the importance of, above all, context." (Conclusion, page 34)
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"Using a controversial issue in South Korea, a government plan to relocate the administrative capital, this study examines attribute agenda setting. Linking survey data to an analysis of news coverage, more specifically, the article explores how television news has influenced the way the public eval
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uates the plan and its various attributes, i.e. potential benefits and problems of the relocation. Findings support the idea that the media could increase public salience of certain attributes by placing them more prominently in news coverage. An important outcome of attribute agenda setting was its priming effect. Issue attributes emphasized in the media were functioning as important standards by which the audience evaluated the plan. These findings, taken together, enhance the intercultural validity of attribute agenda setting by demonstrating that the theory can be applied to South Korea, a country with a unique cultural tradition." (Abstract)
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"While views may differ on the factors that made the 2011 Egyptian revolution possible, the role of mass media will remain undisputable. The Internet-based social networks caught the Mubarak regime by surprise, and the popular disillusionment with the‘national’ media led the public to turn to pr
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ivate newspapers and satellite channels for keeping pace with the events. This paper examines the role of specific media during the 18 days of the 2011 Egyptian revolution – from 25 January to 11 February, 2011 – which we have divided into four parts. It discusses how these media contributed to the unfolding of events, conceptualized the protests and the demands of the public, and presented the actors that participated in or opposed the revolution. These points are addressed by discussing the content of the Facebook pages of the Sixth of April Movement and We Are All Khalid Said, as well as that of a private Egyptian newspaper, al-Shuruq, and the state-run newspaper al-Ahram." (Abstract)
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This book features case studies and reports on the use of web 2.0 and social networking applications and services to increase the impact of research on policy in Latin America. During 2010 and 2011 Fundación Comunica, with funding from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC, Canada) an
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d assistance from the Association for Progressive Communications (APC), supported a series of small research projects examining the use of online social networking services to link research and policy in the region. For the Impact 2.0 projects, the most successful uses of web 2.0 and online social networking to connect research and policy were those that involved the public in campaigns and consultations. Less successful were those projects that focused on the direct relationships between researchers, policymakers and other stakeholders.
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