Is private ownership of the media incompatible with a well-functioning public sphere?

Résumé du document

According to J.Curran, "adequate media system should enable the full range of political and economic interests to be represented in the public domain and find expression in popular fiction."(Curran, 1991) In our societies, media have grown against the absolutist states and their policies to subordinate their subjects. The call for Freedom of the press was seen as an act of emancipation in the process of enlightenment. It is in this way that liberals have formulated their theory and the role of the media as a watchdog. For them, "it is important to establish a critical distance between the media and the government system through private media ownership."(Curran, 1991) And this independence goes through a free market of media.

Extraits

[...] p.11-20 in Telerama _ Domenach Nicolas 2-09-2002 La télé est-elle coupable . d'avoir enterré le débat démocratique? in Marianne.p.52-53 _Milot Olivier Vol au-dessus d' un nid de profit.p.14-17 in Telerama nº2715, 23-01-2002 _Laurent Neumann, Avec Dassault L'express restera-t-il L'express? In Marianne 9-09-2002. this sentence has been used by Carl Boggs in THe end of politics: corporate power and the decline of the public sphere, in page sentence uses by J. Curran page 123 in Rethinking media and democracy idem 4 idem 1 CSA: Conseil superieur de l'audiovisuel. [...]

[...] The rules of the media acquisition and cross-media ownership have become more conciliatory. This encouraged a number of “non-aggression pacts” as the tacit understanding between Tony Blair, leader of the Labour opposition in Britain, and Rupert Murdock in the mid-1990s.(Curran, 1991) Moreover, for the French case, the formation of the elites by the system Politechnique-ENA engenders narrow links between the economic elite and the public officials and politicians. The last minister Vivendi-Universal, was the chairwoman of the board of directors of Canal horizon, a subsidiary of Canal+ and of Vivendi, all as Hervé Bourges, the ex-chairman of the CSA1 before her. [...]

[...] And even in their demand of information, they do not conceive that to be informed is not consume information, but rather have a critical regard on this information, confront information and commentaries in order to make their own opinion. But all this needs a complete reform and revision of our conception of citizenship. Civic attitude is also to have the duty of being informed. Today, free market does no more go with the well-functioning public sphere because of the new relationship of power in which media are taken. [...]

[...] It is possible too journalists are less fussy about corporate issues rather than public bureaucracy abuse, because they belong to corporate business sector. (Curran, 1991). Secondly, the way media are generally funded restrict their independence and liberty. Indeed, the advertising predominantly finances media. This destroys the independent and radical press. ( Curran, 1977). This fact is well illustrated in France with the newspaper Le nouvel observateur that by criticizing the policy of a big enterprise has lost a contract of advertising of some millions of euros last year. [...]

[...] Must not we reconsider our perception of the role of media, private or public, in the public sphere and the attitude of the different actors of the public sphere? Private media are not so incompatible with a well-functioning public sphere, if we considerer them as means of information and not as means of entertainment and of political manipulation, and if we gave them the means of their editorial independence. First, we must admit that when private media are not subjected to the pressure of free market, they exercise well their role of means of information. [...]