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April 23, 2018 / C H Thompson

Social construction of the news – conclusion

  • Chomsky argues the news is socially constructed in order to adopt a propaganda model of the media
  • This means, news stories are shaped by the powerful. Structural factors, like ownership and control, market forces (free-market), profit motive and reliance of advertising revenue creates a network of shared interests who coalesce to shape news content.
  • Edwards and Cromwell argue journalists/editors are nothing more than puppets of a ruling elite
  • Therefore as Althusser points out the media industry is one of the ideological state apparatuses because it serves the interests of ruling-class

Evalauation

  • Clearly pluralists would argue the above points are wrong
  • We have a pluralist press/media as there’s a variety of newspapers, The Sun, The Times, The Guardian, The Daily Express etc. who report different views
  • We also have multi-channel TV, which means there’s different views/ideologies communicated in the media
  • We also have competing TV news outlets, BBC, Sky, Channel 4, ITV, Channel 5 etc. communicating different view points
  • Therefore hegemony can’t be achieved by a ruling-class elite
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