Pluralism

• Pluralism (wide range of views in media, blames consumer)


  States media reflects values and beliefs of society

  • cultural products you buy and consume help make up your identity in modern society
  • postmodern pluralists argue since people choose to consume a selected opinion, media outlets produce content they think people want to read
• Audience chooses what media to consume

  Argues a certain group can't push their views on society since there's alternate views > gives normal people consumer power over media outlets > if people don't like what they're consuming they can choose a different source > causes old outlet to lose money

  • owners of media organisations want to stay in business > publish stories that won't offend readers meaning extreme views often don't get published
• Journalists

  Can choose what media content they're going to publish

  • postmodern pluralists = this limits power of media owners and creates more media diversity, e.g. Twitter means people can post their opinions
• Journalists

  Journalist integrity = have to follow professional codes that ensure they're reporting in a professional, unbiased, honest way

  • neo-pluralists = may be hard for some journalists to be impartial and stick to these codes
• State restricts power of media owners

  UK = lots of groups who regulate media > groups ensure media owners don't have too much power and journalists act in a responsible manner

  • e.g. BBC = publicly funded, media it produces has to represent as many views as possible by law
• Criticism of pluralism

  • Curran = owners still interfere with production of media for many reasons, also states UK media has been controlled by small group of individuals for a long time, 4 people control over 50% of media
  • Miliband = owners who favour capitalism have ultimate control > issues that show capitalism in bad light are rarely mentioned in media like existence of inequality and poverty