Communications and Economic Structures

In Unit 2, we considered the need for analyses that take into account the complexities of media development in societies. These areas of inquiry include ways in which developing nations actually experience and apply imported media systems. The authors whose works we considered in this unit suggest that post-colonial developments include shifts toward more homogeneous structures of broadcasting across national boundaries. This development would seem to support some of the rhetoric about globalization of cultures through the mass media. However, we have also read about movements toward the building of new connections among developing nations themselves.

We also continue to follow the theme of the relationships between communications and economic structures. These relationships are another area in which we must be careful to consider specifics of context. For instance, we have read that Latin American broadcasting did not develop in a regionally homogeneous way; note, for example, the differences between the experience of Brazil and of Peru in their relative initial emphases on cultural or commercial broadcasting. There are also similarities that support the suggestion that developing nations do adapt media systems to their own needs and interests. The Peruvian government rejected the American model in favour of one adapted to local ideologies and conditions. Brazil also instituted structural changes involving greater government involvement and centralization, weakening the power of commercial interests considerably. However, in other Latin American countries, commercial dominance remains strong.

Despite the negative aspects of external cultural and technological dominance, it would be a mistake to believe that local involvement and organization necessarily mean that media systems develop in the public interest. The state may have its own agenda, serving the economic interests of elites. In both South and Central America, broadcasting has developed from a pattern of many small commercial radio stations owned by independents, toward concentrated, elite ownership by family empires. Government involvement and centralization, and even the terms "the public" or "the people," have different connotations in different jurisdictions.

Here again, the trend in the development of mass media systems from cultural to economic applications is obvious. The North American model of broadcasting, particularly the dominant US version, also consists of multiple private institutions subject to minimal public control. Although the case is somewhat different in Canada, current trends here also indicate movement toward the American model.

As part of our study of the importance of political, economic and social context to the nature of media systems, we now turn to the next major section of the course.

In Units 4 through 8, we consider media development in the United States and Canada—"the North."