mediadev library

Filter

Sort by:

Direction:

Digital and Social Media in Africa

Henri-Count Evans, Tinashe Mawere, Ruth Teer-Tomaselli (eds.)

London: University of Westminster Press (2025), xi, 194 pp.

"This book provides case studies on the strategies used by African governments in monitoring and controlling digital and social media, as well as the implications of such actions for claims about media freedom and freedom of expression. Further, the book examines the human rights challenges posed by ... more

External Link (13)

Google Scholar (10)

WorldCat (11)

Media, Economy and Society: A Critical Introduction

Christian Fuchs

London; New York: Routledge (2024), vi, 459 pp.

"This essential guide to the critical study of the media economy in society teaches students how to critically analyse the political economy of communication and the media. The book introduces a variety of methods and topics, including the political economy of communication in capitalism, the politi ... more

Download (0)

The Political Economy of Mainstream Television Channels in Ethiopia: Perspectives from Ownership and Regulations

Nemosa Gizachew Eranfeno, Agaredech Jemaneh Gemeda, Abdissa Zerai Bamano

Observatorio (OBS*) Journal, volume 17, issue 3 (2023), pp. 74-96

"The main objective of this article was to explore the political economy of mainstream TV channels in Ethiopia from the perspective of ownership and regulations. The study used a qualitative approach to document analysis. It also conducted an in-depth interviews with randomly selected media monitori ... more

External Link (11)

Google Scholar (12)

WorldCat (11)

Free to Hate: How Media Liberalization Enabled Right-Wing Populism in Post-1989 Bulgaria

Martin Marinos

Champaign: University of Illinois Press (2023), 391 pp.

"Martin Marinos applies a critical political economy approach to place Bulgarian right-wing populism within the structural transformation of the country’s media institutions. As Marinos shows, media concentration under Western giants like Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung and News Corporation have l ... more

External Link (8)

Google Scholar (8)

WorldCat (7)

Access Rules: Freeing Data from Big Tech for a Better Future

Viktor Mayer-Schönberger, Thomas Ramge

Oakland, Cal.: University of California Press (2022), 209 pp.

"Access Rules mounts a strong and hopeful argument for how informational tools at present in the hands of a few could instead become empowering machines for everyone. By forcing data-hoarding companies to open access to their data, we can reinvigorate both our economy and our society. Authors Viktor ... more

External Link (15)

Google Scholar (16)

WorldCat (14)

Strings Attached: Sustainability and Dependence in Five Models of Local and Community Media
Top Insights

Franz Krüger

Journal of Alternative and Community Media, volume 7, issue 2 (2022), pp. 179-197

"Sustainability is a key issue for local and community media in the Global South as well as the Global North, albeit in different ways. After identifying significant gaps in the sustainability literature, the article presents and discusses a taxonomy of ‘models’ – the relationships that arise ... more

Download (0)

Economía política de la comunicación y la cultura en América Latina, 1970 y 1980

Cesar Bolano(Coord.)

Buenos Aires: CLACSO (2022), 714 pp.

External Link (8)

Google Scholar (8)

WorldCat (8)

Turkey’s Communicative Authoritarianism

Burçe Çelik

Global Media and Communication, volume 16, issue 1 (2022), pp. 102-120

"The majority of current political communication studies focus on discursive dimensions of communications and disregard how communications partake in the governing of populations through economic, material and institutional practices. By focusing on Turkey’s case, here I move beyond this approach ... more

Download (1)

The Political Economy of the Media in Sierra Leone and the Potential for Private-Sector Investment

Ibrahim Bangura

BBC Media Action;PRIMED (2022), 13 pp.

"The purpose of this political economy analysis (PEA) is to understand how political and economic factors have affected, or hindered, the media sector in Sierra Leone as well as the potential for private sector investment in the media [...] The report presents a contextual analysis of the media sect ... more

External Link (9)

Media Influence Matrix: Jordan. Technology, Public Sphere and Journalism

Mohammad Abu Hawash, Marius Dragomir

Budapest: Center for Media, Data and Society (CMDS) (2021), 28 pp.

"As for internet use, the percentage of the population with access to internet rose to 89% in 2019 from 48% in 2015. Access to a mobile phone and internet in Jordan has become a matter of choice rather than affordability or accessibility. The Syrian refugee crisis explains the overshooting in mobile ... phone penetration in Jordan during the 2010s. During the past decade, the Jordanian telecommunications industry has transformed from duopoly to oligopoly. Jordan’s three major telecommunications companies together worked to protect their positions in the Jordanian telecoms market. The market saw constant growth and a rapid introduction of new media technologies. Due to these technological advancements, the country has become known in the region as an increasingly influential tech hub [...] In the public sphere, Jordan has experienced an unstable legal and regulatory landscape for the media. The government constantly revises its audiovisual media and publications laws. This places those media networks with a proximity to the state at an advantage, since they have deeper insight into the expectations of the state. Independent media, on the other hand, suffers from the successive governments’ meddling in the foundational laws of the media industry. The work of journalists has been often obstructed by the blocking of hundreds of websites for failing to comply with one or another rendition of the publications law. Many journalists found their employers losing investors and/or funding after the state issued a registration requirement for websites publishing content out of Jordan. Due to strong public pressure, this requirement in the publications law was later revised. Jordan’s journalism sphere had a more difficult decade than the technology field. Restrictions on internet access and high taxes on independent media (compared with tax-exemption status for some media agencies that are close to the government) hurt several media organizations. Stagnation and decline in consumption of print media added to the woes. Jordanian newspapers are enjoying higher readership than ever but also the lowest revenues per reader in history. This is due to declining subscription rates. Jordanian journalists were stunned in the first half of the 2010s to see Jordan’s daily newspaper Al-Arab Al-Yawm end print circulation and shut down operations completely a few years later. Subscriptions to daily newspapers declined by 50% compared to their 2000s levels." (Pages 4-5) more

Download (0)

Overlooking the Political Economy in the Research on Propaganda

Aman Abishek

Harvard Kennedy School Misinformation Review, volume 2, issue special issue (2021), 14 pp.

"A thematic meta-analysis – of recent literature on online propaganda in the context of the Global South, and 20 Facebook-funded research projects in 2018 – shows that research is overwhelmingly focused on the psychological and behavioral impacts of propaganda. This research advocates for promot ... more

Download (0)

Media Influence Matrix: Israel. Technology, Public Sphere and Journalism

Roni Dorot

Budapest: CEU Center for Media, Data and Society (2021), 30 pp.

"Although internet penetration rate in Israel stands at 88%, internet infrastructure, and notably the roll-out of fiber-optics, was not properly regulated until December 2020. Therefore, among other things, Israel’s internet speed was in decline in comparison to OECD countries, although it is expe ... cted to rise in mid-2021. Moreover, frequencies for 5G network deployment have been allocated only as late as August 2020, in significant delay compared to technologically progressed countries. Following global trends, Israelis draw on different technological means to use the internet, and especially to consume media. While fixed telephony demand is in decline, smartphones took over the market with 88% of smartphone ownership. Israel records a specific digital divide among marginalized groups like the Arab population and ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Jews. Together with the 65+ age group, these three main sectors are susceptible to be affected by digital illiteracy. The international technology conglomerates that control the Israeli market are Facebook (with its daughter company WhatsApp) in the field of messaging applications and social media, and Google Chrome browser, while the operating system (OS) market is dominated by Microsoft (on desktop) and Google (Android on mobile). The four main Israeli groups operating in the communications market are: Bezeq, HOT, Cellcom and Partner. They are all active in five telecom segments and market them in bundle packages for relatively low prices: cellular, fixed (telephony and internet) infrastructure, internet providing, international calls and multichannel TV. This highly saturated and competitive market has damaged the revenues and future incentives of these companies to invest in cutting-edge infrastructure. Israelis get most of their political information from online news sites. Some 76% of the public in Israel consume news content on social media at least once a day (40% of Jews and 66% of Arabs). The leading social media platforms are YouTube, Facebook and Twitter; they make a central source for the dissemination of politics, and have significant power in shaping public opinion. Nevertheless, “fake news” is also circulating fast and efficiently on these platforms, making disinformation a troubling phenomenon for Israeli society. Few journalistic initiatives took upon themselves the responsibility for public fact-checking. Traditional media struggles with fragile financial sustainability and business models. Given the populist effect that fake news has on consumers and, consequentially, on revenues, it is risky to rely on traditional media solely, in this matter." (Page 4) more

Download (0)

Who Owns the Media in Bangladesh?

Dhaka: Center for Governance Studies (CGS) (2021), 57 pp.

"This report documents a snapshot of media ownership in Bangladesh in late 2020 and identifies its major patterns. By no means is this report exhaustive nor does it cover all aspects of ownership of media in Bangladesh. In the absence of baseline data, our primary objective was to build one with the ... more

Download (0)

Coronelismo e a propriedade dos meios de comunicação: A influência da mídia no poder político

Vinicius Holanda Melo, Gustavo Raposo Pereira Feitosa

Videre, volume 13, issue 28 (2021), pp. 385-412

"O presente artigo visa investigar os usos políticos das concessões de rádio para titulares de mandatos eletivos após a redemocratização, tendo como eixo analítico o conceito de coronelismo e sua potencial renovação para o chamado “coronelismo eletrônico". Inicia-se a pesquisa analisando ... more

Download (0)

The Politics of Impunity and the Shifting Media Landscape in Kenya

Philip Onguny

Athens Journal of Mass Media and Communications, volume 7, issue 1 (2021), pp. 61-78

"This article focuses on state-media relations and the shifts in the overall media landscape in Kenya. Drawing on a political economy approach to media operations in Kenya, it argues that while there are competing meanings over what constitutes "news values", "editorial independence", and "critical ... more

External Link (9)

Google Scholar (9)

WorldCat (9)

Media and Politics in the Southern Mediterranean: Communicating Power in Transition After 2011

Roxane Farmanfarmaian (ed.)

Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge (2021), xv, 426 pp.

"This edited volume presents ground-breaking empirical research on the media in political transition in Tunisia, Turkey and Morocco. Focusing on developments in the wake of the region’s upheavals in 2011, it offers a new theoretical framework for understanding mediascapes in the confessional and h ... more

External Link (11)

Google Scholar (11)

WorldCat (11)

Digital Transformations of the Public Arena

Andreas Jungherr, Ralph Schroeder

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (2021), 75 pp.

"Digital technologies have changed the public arena, but there is little scholarly consensus about how they have done so. This Element lays out a new framework for the digitally mediated public arena by identifying structural changes and continuities with the pre-digital era. It examines three count ... more

Download (0)

Media Influence Matrix: India. Funding Journalism

Vibodh Parthasarathi, Simran Agarwal

Budapest: Center for Media, Data and Society (CMDS) (2020), 40 pp.

"The largest players in terms of funding spent in the media are commercial advertisers. In 2018 advertising contributed €7.8bn to the media funding in India, an annual growth rate of 11.5%. Advertising makes the largest cut in the operating revenues of the news media. Subscription revenue does not ... bring in enough. The biggest advertising sectors across all news mediums include fast moving consumer groups (FMCG), services, automobiles, and banking and finance. Top advertisers include both domestic and international players such as Hindustan Unilever, Reckitt Benckiser, Amazon Online, Paytm, and Maruti Suzuki. In 2016-17, the advertising sector experienced a slump due to the implementation of the currency demonetization policy. However, multiple sports events, national elections in May 2019, and a significant contribution from political advertisements, from both regional and national political parties, boosted the sector’s revenue in 2017-18. Two large investors in the Indian news media include Mukesh Ambani and Subhash Chandra. Media is not their primary business. They run Reliance Group and Essel Group of industries, respectively, which are spread across a myriad of industries including petroleum, refineries, telecom, chemicals, textiles, packaging, oil and gas, precious metals, retail, infrastructure, digital services, to name just a few. Ambani ventured into broadcasting in 2011 when he took complete control over the Eenadu TV (ETV) network, broadcasting in numerous regional languages. In 2014, the Reliance group gained control of one of India’s largest news and entertainment television networks, Network 18. This included taking over of Network 18 Media and Investments Ltd and its subsidiaries TV 18 and Viacom 18 (a joint venture between TV 18 and ViacomCBS in India) in a €513mn deal. In 2016, he also started what has become one of India’s three largest mobile operators, Reliance Jio. Such vertical expansion was furthered in 2019 when he entered the television distribution segment by acquiring a majority stake in two of the three largest cable companies in India, DEN Networks and Hathway for €661m. Chandra, an MP, owns the Essel Group which runs one of India’s oldest and largest television networks with 14 news channels across eight language markets, operated by the Zee Media Corporation Limited, besides 35 entertainment channels across 19 languages, operated by Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited. This conglomerate is also vertically integrated through its subsidiaries in Direct-to-Home (DTH) and Cable distribution, Dish TV India Limited and Siti Networks Limited respectively, and horizontally integrated through its subsidiaries in print and film production, Diligent Media Corporation Ltd and Zee Studios, respectively. Politicians and their affiliates are major players in the regional news media. The Sun Group in the state of Tamil Nadu is owned by Kalanithi Maran, nephew of former chief minister of Tamil Nadu, M. Karunanidhi, and brother of current MP Dayanidhi Maran. The Sun conglomerate owns 33 television channels across six languages, 67 FM radio stations, three daily newspapers and numerous other publications. Also, vertically integrated, it owns Sun Direct, one of the largest DTH operators, and Sumangali Cable Vision, a prominent regional cable network. Similarly, in the state of Orissa, the Panda Family runs the Odisha Television Limited, cable networks through Ortel, and digital news assets. Baijayant Panda is a former MP, currently a member of the ruling party, Bharatiya Janata Party." (Executive summary, pages 4-5) more

Download (0)

Media Influence Matrix: Georgia

Giorgi Jangiani

Budapest: Center for Media, Data and Society (CMDS) (2020), 86 pp.

Download (0)

News Literacy and Democracy

Seth Ashley

Routledge (2020), xi, 206 pp.

Strings Attached: Sustainability and Dependence in Five Models of Local and Community Media Top Insights

Strings Attached: Sustainability and Dependence in Five Models of Local and Community Media
Top Insights