Full Description
This book attacks the conventional history of the press as a story of progress; offers a critical defence and history of public service broadcasting; provides a myth-busting account of the internet; gives a subtle account of the impact of social media; and explores key debates about the role and politics of the media.
Power Without Responsibility has become a standard textbook on media and other courses, but it has also gone beyond an academic audience to reach a wider public. Hailed as a book that has 'cracked the canon' by the Times Higher Educational Supplement, it has been translated into five languages. In 2019, it was awarded the International Communication Association's Fellows Book Award. This ninth edition is based on a major overhaul of its content to take account of new developments (such as generative AI) and new scholarship in the field. It also contains a new chapter on the transformed opportunity for a reformed and buccaneering public service broadcasting in the face of automated misinformation and social division, locally, nationally and internationally.
This trailblazing text is essential reading for all students and scholars interested in British media and contemporary media and society.
Contents
PART I
Press history
JAMES CURRAN
1. Press history as political mythology
2. The struggle for a free press
3. Janus face of reform
4. Industrialisation of the press
5. Era of the press barons
6. Press under public regulation
7. Post-war press: fable of progress
8. Press and the remaking of Britain
9. Moral decline of the press
PART II
Broadcasting history
JEAN SEATON
10. Reith and the denial of politics
11. Broadcasting and the Blitz
12. Public service commerce: ITV, new audiences and new revenue
13. Foreign affairs: the BBC, the world and the government
14. Class, taste and profit
15. Managers, regulators and broadcasters
16. Public service under attack
17. Broadcasting roller-coaster
PART III
Rise of new media
18. New media in Britain
JAMES CURRAN
19. History of the internet
JAMES CURRAN
20. Sociology of the internet
JAMES CURRAN
21. Social media: making new societies or polarisation merchants?
JEAN SEATON
PART IV
Theories of the media
JEAN SEATON
22. Metabolising Britishness
23. Public service understanding: moonshot time for the BBC and public service broadcasting
24. Broadcasting and the theory of public service
PART V
Politics of the media
25. Industrial folklore and press reform
JAMES CURRAN
26. Contradictions in media policy
JAMES CURRAN AND JEAN SEATON
27. Media reform: democratic choices
JAMES CURRAN
