In a democracy, fair and equal rights government, we need a space to allow discussion for the public to access different views, opinions and exchange information. This space is called the Public Sphere.
Since the decrease of autocratic ruling {A single person in charge e.g. The Monarch}, the rise of individuality and rights of speech have spread, leading to the construction of democracy. Democracy possesses the need for people to be educated and informed for them to therefore make an reliable decisions as part of the Public Sphere.
In modern days the media, such as the newspaper and radio industries and news broadcasts, has become the center of the Public Sphere. For this to work, the media must abide by five functions as follows:
1. The Media needs to inform the public in an unbiased manner
2. The public needs to be educated in a fair manner.
3. The Media must act as a platform for political discourse, where people can discuss and debate political issues.This can be seen on television programmes such as Question Time.
4. Give an equal amount of publicity to political parties and organisations. This means making these groups visible but not supporting them. This also refers to exploiting them if need be in the interest of the public. For example: UK MP Expenses scandal and the USA Nixon Watergate controversy.
5. Acting in advocacy for political stance and view points. This media will serve as a channel.
For the previous five functions to occur, impartial reporting is needed, however this does not always happen. The BBC has been previously critisized, as well as Rupert Murdoch's newspaper The Sun openly acknowledging strong right wing views. Because of this reporting, some people say the public are not able to make reliable decisions and opinions as we do not know what is actually happening.
Journalists exposing governmental controversies has led to the fall of TV journalists, leading to my next question, should we rely on the internet moreso than television and what does the internet contribute towards the public sphere? {Curtis, 2007}
Internet applications such as Facebook and Twitter are used as platforms for gaining news by many members of the public, meaning millions can reach global news. Even though this seems like the ultimate way to access international broadcasts, anyone can put information on the internet so we cannot ensure that this information is reliable either. Applications such as Wikileaks could potentially lead to the end of privacy, where in numerous cases governmental or organisational conversations have been revealed. {Greenwald, 2010}
Finally, should TV news and the interner be relied on as much as they are and should the media be more strictly regulated and filtered to ensure the information presented is accurate? I think so.
Resources Used:
Curtis, Adam. 2010. {WWW} From:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9FaIyc4vpU
McNair, B. {1995} `Chapter 2: Politics, Democracy and the Media' in An Introduction to Political Communication, London, Routledge. {Most of the information above was taken from this and the source below}
Greenwald, G {2010} The Wikileaks Afganistan Leak {WWW} From:
Http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/07/25/wikileaks/index.html
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