Global Flow lecture - Global Flow lecture

The 21stC mediascape is characterised by multi-vocal, multimedia, multi-dimentional flows of information and communication
In today´s digitally connected globe, flows of all kinds of info. Circulate around the world at a speed unimaginable even a decade ago
A shift from state-centric & national views of media to one defined by consumer interests and transnational markets:key factor in expansion &acceleration of media flows

1. GLOBAL FLOWS OF
COMMUNICATION
Theoretical Approach 3
MEVIT3220/ 4220
Media and Globalisation
Carol Azungi, 25 November 2007

2. Introduction:The lecture in a nutshell
The 21stC mediascape is characterised by multi-vocal,
multimedia, multi-dimentional flows of information
and communication
In today´s digitally connected globe, flows of all kinds
of info. Circulate around the world at a speed
unimaginable even a decade ago
A shift from state-centric & national views of media to
one defined by consumer interests and transnational
markets:key factor in expansion &acceleration of
media flows
What does this mean?
Explanation of main concepts
Counter arguments
Theoretical extrapolates
Examples from the curriculum

3. Ponder during lecture
Has globalisation increased western
cultural influence or triggered the
possibilities of other flows?
What is the role of media ownership
in determining the flow of
information and communication?

4. Introducing some of the Concepts
Mapping out the main concepts that
have characterised global flow of
communication studies over the past
30 years.
Some of the the concepts and
arguments developed in the 1970s
and 1980s still influence current
debates in global flow/ globalisation.

5. Media Flows
Media Flows- concept developed by a
series of empirical studies in the 1970s and
80s. The research claimed the existence of
unbalanced, unidirectional flows of TV
programmes and foreign news from the
“centre” to the “periphery” (Kaarle,
Nordnstreng & Tapio Varis 1974 study “TV
Traffic- A One-Way Street: A survey and
Analysis of the International Flow of
Television Programme Material. UNESCO

6. Cultural Imperialism
Cultural Imperialism- popularised by
Jeremy Tunstall who described this term as
a situation in which “authentic traditional,
local culture…is being battered out of
existence by the indiscrimate dumping of
large quantities of slick commercial and
media products, mainly from the US “The
Media are American: Anglo-American Media
in the World (1977: 57).

7. Media Imperialism
Media Imperialism-developed within a
broader analysis of cultural imperialism and
dependency theories. Oliver Boyd-Barret
defined it as “the process whereby the
ownership, structure, distribution of content
of the media in any one country are singly or
together subject to substantial external
pressures from the media interests of any
other country or countries without
proportionate reciprocation of influence by
the country so affected (1977: 117)

8. US film imports % (1998)
Isreal 80
India 72
Australia72
Germany69
Hong Kong 66
Italy64
Japan 60
Mexico 59
Russia 59
France 57
Spain 55
Ecuador99.5
Barbados97.8
Costa Rica95.9
Gabon 94.5
Zimbabwe90.2
Cyprus 88.8
Sri Lanka88.5
Syria86.1
Madagascar 84.2
Lebanon83.0

9. Feature film exports (UNESCO)
Country 1968 1978 1988 1998
France 117 160 137 183
Germany 107 57 57 119
Spain 117 104 63 65
UK 88 54 40 108
Poland 22 36 30 14
Mexico 90 63 112 7
Brazil 47 101 88 40
Indonesia 8 81 84 15
Hong Kong 156 135 139 92
Japan 494 326 265 249
South Korea 219 117 87 43
Thailand 64 150 - 30
Egypt 40 51 60 16
South Africa 12 19 52 10
USA 180 240 617 661

10. Read about responses
EU Media Policies and Structures
Television without boarders
Support for film industry
Challenges
Hollywood hegemony
Language
Nationalism
Regionalism

11. Counter Arguments / Concepts
Contra-flows - countries once thought as major
“clients” of media imperialism such as Mexico, Canada,
Brazil have successfully exported their programmes
and personnel into the “Centre”. Mexico (Televisa
Group), Brazil (TV Globo), Canada (CanWest) now
export TV programmes and music to the countries all
over the world.
Regionalism- there is now greater exchange of news,
TV programmes, print media, music between regions,
e.g. DSTV (South Africa), Nollywood (Nigeria),
Bollywood (India), Star TV (Hong Kong), Al Jazeera
(Qatar), EuroNews (EU). Exchange of cultural products
has also increased in Scandinavia.

12. Counter Arguments / Concepts
Localisation - local programmes remain popular
and attract large audiences. People prefer to watch
their own locally made programmes.
Glocalisation / Hybridity- term popularised by
British sociologist Roland Robertson in the 1990s
and later developed by Zygmunt Bauman. This is
characterised by the global-local interaction, by
cultural fusion as a result of adaptation of Western
media genres to suit local cultures and languages.
For example, US generic models (e.g. soaps, sitcoms,
action movies) have invited domestic imitation
based on the country´s cultural and social realities.

13. Counter arguments contd...
Alternative media
community media: from the margins to the cutting edge
Address the digital divide: access, voice for the
voiceless
Platform/spaces for civic engagement and
expression
Internal flows of communication (devcom:
endogenous community, local culture, indigenous
knowledge etc)
Internet as alternative media enabling reversal of flows
(see youtube.com, myspace and other people-
centric channels, suggestions?)

14. Determinants of reversal of
global flows
Post-Fordist mode of production
New technology (satellite, internet)
Changing patterns in geo-politics
Deregulation of the media
Growth of “diasporic communities” in the West see India´s
Zee Tv watched by second generation British Asians,
Chinese TV channel Phoenix and the pan-Arabic
entertainment network MBC are examples of media
representing what may be labeled as geo-cultural flows
aimed at largely a diasporic pop.(Thussu, 2007, 14)

15. Dimensions of Global Flow
Another influential study on global flows is one
developed by Arjun Appadurai in the early 1990s
He identified 5 different dimensions of global flows:
Ethnoscapes - landscape of people who constitute
our shifting world, e.g tourists, immigrants,
refugees,
Technscapes - the fluidity of technology (similar to
the network society concept)
Finascapes- movement of currency markets and
money, across boundaries
Mediascapes - distribution of electronic capabilities
to produce & disseminate news
Ideascapes- movement of political ideas and
images, e.g. “freedom” “rights” “democracy”.

16. Theoretical Approaches influencing
international communication
-Concerns of the times
-Emergence of theories of communication parallel to socio-
economic changes of the IR
-Communication part of the ”organic Society” where each
part played a role in the functioning of the whole (Road
infrastructure, credit system and communication-postal,
telegram, press) the nervous system, channel for the centre
to ”propagate its influence” to the outermost parts (Thussu,
2000, 54).
-20th C, theories reflected the political, economic,
technological developments of the time and their impact on
the social and cultural…
-The critical theories have also dwelt on the patterns of
ownership and production in the media and communication
industries (particularly the commodification of
communication and its impact on inequalities

17. Some of the theoretical approaches
Free Flow of Information
Modernisation theory
Dependency theory
Structural imperialism
Hegemony
Critical theory
IS and discourses of globalisation

18. Free Flow of Information
After the second world war and the establishment of a
bi-polar world of free market capitalism and state
socialism, theories of international communication flows
became part of the new cold war discourse
The concept Free Flow represented western, especially
US antipathy to state regulation, censorship and the use
of media for propaganda by its communist opponents
The free Flow was a liberal, free market discourse that
championed rights of media propriators to sell where ever
and what ever they wanted.
The free flow therefore served economic and political
purposes. Here, media organisations of rich countries
could dissuade other from erecting trade barriers to
their products or from making it difficult to gather news
from their territories
Their arguments drew on premises of democracy, FOX,
media role as watchdogs and their assumed global
relevance.
For their compatriot businessmen, “free flow” assisted
them in advertising and marketing their goods in foreign
markets through media vehicles that championed the
western way of life, capitalist values and individualism

19. Modernisation theory
(see Lerner 1958, Schramm, 1964)
Complementary to the doctrine of ”Free FLow” was the
view that international communication, key to
development in the third world
International mass comm could be used to spread the
message of modernity transfer economic, political models
of the west to the newly independent countries of the
south
Western ways (power, wealth, skill, rationality etc) seem as
a stimuli for development and a bridge to a wider world
Critism:
Top-down approach
Narrow approaches
Media are not neutral force (they have economic, political,
social attachements and political power in hands of few)
Modern (western) and traditional are not mutually exclusive
(see Freira 1970)

20. Dependency theories
Emerged in Latin America in late 1960s
early 1970s in opposition of
modernisation theory, need for
alternative approaches, from the south
Cultural imperialism/media
”imperialism” from dominance of
western cultural products especially
hollywood (Schiller, 1976)
Critism
They offer no tangible solutions

21. Structural Imperialism (Galtung 1971)
Notions of centre and periphery
Forwards Castells notions of space of
flows i.e. harmony of interest between
the core of the centre nations and the
centre in the periphery nations (p83)
The centre-periphery relationships are
maintained and reinforced by
information flows and reproduction of
economic activities. These create
institutional links that serve the interests
of the dominant groups.

22. Hegemony (Gramsci 1891-1937)
The role of ideology and state power in
the capitalist society
The dominant social group/nation has
the capacity to excercise intellectual and
moral direction over society or others
and builds a new system of alliances to
support its aims-Gramsci-this happens
when this group excersise control over
mass media, schools, religion etc
The dominant class then coersively
imposses its will on subodinate classes

23. Critical theory (Adono, 1903)
”Cultural Industries” production of
culture as a commodity by the capitalist
societies as enmass
This lead to standadization resulting into
mass culture leading to the deterioration
of other cultures
Forum for propagating capitalism
ideologies and thinking among
recipients
These debates have greatly influenced
debates of thee Global flow of
information and communication

24. Theories of the IS
Innovations in ICTs especially computing
and their rapid global expansion has led
to claims that this is an IS
Speed, volumes, costs influencing global
flows
Covergence of telecoms with computing
creating new infomation and
communication flows between states,
between business and among (ordinary)
people

25. Cases from the curriculum
“Miss World Going `Deshi`: Addressing an Indian
television audience with a global media product” by
Nobert Wildermuth (in Media in a Globalised
Society ed. By Stig Hjarvard, pp 207-253
“National Prisms of a Global `Media event`” by Chin-
Chuan Lee et al (in Mass Media and Society ed
James Curran et al, pp 320-333
“The Whole World is Watching: Online Surveillance
of Social Movement Organizations” by Sasha
Costanza-Chock (in Who Owns the Media? Global
Trends and Local Resistance ed by Pradip Thomas
et al, pp 271-292)

26. Case Study 1
Miss World 1996 in Bangalore
http://edition.cnn.com/WORLD/9611/23/miss.world/miss.world.28sec.mov
Controversial tv program: Cultural assault Vs
foreign capital flow, show casing Indian culture
Events:
Four bombs weeks before the contest
Calls for boycott
Peaceful demonstrations
Feminists promise to set themselves on fire
15 Nov-8 days before the show, Kumar Suresh
committes self-immolation

27. Beach wear round (Nov 6-11) moved to
Seychelles
Miss Personality (Nov 9) moved out of
Bangalore for security purposes
Appeal to High court to ban show (culture
and heritage)
Karnataka Supreme Court asks show to be
mornitored to ensure conditions are met
(alchohol and decency, laws of the land
etc)-only after an affidavit from organisers
Final day (Nov 23) 24hour Bangalore bandh
(general strike by BJP

28. Despite the strikes:
2.5 billion tv viewers world wide
200million Indians (poll results)
120 countries

29. Article explores the following issues:
Protesters misjudgement and reflections on
paternistic media consumption
Process of hybridisation as part of India´s
glocalisation efforts
Conflicts between the local and the global
Ideological “fights” over the meaning of
India´s culture (cultural imperialism)
Competing visions of national identity
Contested representation of gender (the
traditional Indian woman vs. the “modern”
Indian woman).

30. Case Study 2
Coverage of the handover by the UK of Hong
Kong to the People´s Republic of China in 1997.
1842-1997 marking the end of 150 colonial rule
Media spectacle: 8000 journalists, 776 media
organisations and several national ideological
struggles between east and west, capitalism
and socialism, democracy and authoritarianism
etc

31. Western media and national ideologies
(fear and doubt)
US representing itself as the guardians
of democracy (Tiananmen crackdown,
question of Tibet and HK seen as a
target of abuse and negative influence)
Britain: Imperial nostalgia
Australia/Canada: significance of HK to
china, defence of America
Japan: Economic interests

32. Chinese media and national ideologies
(chinese jingoism)
3 major media giants, common policy, access to
pro-china HK sources
Patriotism, emotions
(common ancenstry, family centredness and the final
process of reunifying Macao and Taiwan)
End of 150 years of national humiliation (Deng
Xiaoping, the paramount leader and ingenious author
of the “one country, 2 systems” and how chinese
heroes beat British imperialists villains. Ignore
China´s military-national strength

33. Hong Kong media
Identified with chinese culture but rejects their
communist system.
Reminiscence of the positive British presence
especially cultural but not the political
Taiwan media
Endorse British decolonisation while rejecting
China´s nationalism branding it as hegemonic
and expansionist

34. Articles raises the following:
International news-making (foreign news)
still determined by “domestic” and “national”
interests.
Promotion of “national interests” in a global
news story
Discursive struggles in international news
making
What it means to be Chinese - cultural and
national meanings of identity (global
Chinese communities)
National triumph vs. Western imperialism

35. Case Study 3
Social Movements and new communication technologies
USA Patriot Act 2001 allows:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glTzekPGLCo&feature=PlayList&p=E8356527487842BA&index=0
Expanded wire taps
Secret searches
Information sharing among agencies
Access to voice mail
Interception of electronic communication (like e-mails)
Credit card numbers, Tel. numbers
IP addresses
Search warrants for emails
Access to records of meetings, sessions etc

36. Some examples...
US
Seattle Protests
Palestine.indymedia.org
Somalian Internet

37. Consequences
Vulnerability to selective prosecution
Persistant data
Chilling effect
Delegitimation of social movements
Climate of fear
Disruption of work
Deterrrence of legitimate political
expression and activism

38. Article raises the following issues:
Use of internet for broader movement
coalition building across national
boundaries.
Multidimensional flow as opposed to one-
way diffusion of information (social
movement interaction)
US surveillance of social movements
organisations (Big Brother watching?).
New technologies also curtails the SMOs
(U,S govt uses different kinds of surveillance
techniques).

39. Questions for Discussion /
Reflection
In light of new developments in global and
national media, is the concept of “media
imperialism still relevant?
What forms of “glocalisation” / “Hybridity” can you
perceive in your own country?
Despite the reversal of cultural flows from the
North to the South, why do you think US cultural
products (TV, Films, books) still dominate?

40. Announcements
8 November: Dag´s lecture on Hollywood
and Globalization
Undelivered term papers should be
delivered to Sarah today after the lecture
Lin Prøitz PhD Defence
 trial lecture on the 1st of Nov., 17:15, auditorium
4, Eilert Sundts hus, A.
Disputas 2. november 09:15 i theologisk
eksamenssal, domus academica, sentrum