Reclaiming the Media: Communication Rights and Democratic Media Roles

Annotation It hardly goes uncontested anymore that media organizations play an important role in democracy. The main questions have now become whether the contemporary media conjuncture offers enough to our democracies, how their democratic investment can be deepened and how our communication rights can be expanded. This book aims to look at four thematic areas that structure the opportunities for democratizing (media) democracy. The fi rst section is devoted to citizenship and the public spheres, giving specialattention to the general theme of communication rights. The second section elaborates further on a notion central to communication rights, namely that of participation. The third section returns to the traditional representational role in relation to democracy and citizenship, scrutinizing and criticizing the democratic efforts of contemporary journalism. The fourth section moves outside of the (traditional) media system, and deals with the diversity of media and communication strategies of activists.