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Showing 1 - 6 of 6 matches in All Departments
No longer preoccupied with the East-West divide, contemporary foreign policymakers now have to confront regional conflicts, peace-enforcing and humanitarian missions, and a host of other global problems and issues in areas such as trade, health, and the environment. During the Cold War a widely-shared consensus on national interest and security in the United States and western Europe affected news reporting, public opinion, and foreign policy. But with the end of this Cold War frame of reference, foreign policy making has changed. As we enter the new century, the question is how and to what extent will the new realities of the post-Cold War world_as well as advances in communication technology_influence news reporting, public attitudes, and, most of all, foreign policy decisions on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. In this volume, American and European scholars examine change and continuity in these important aspects of the foreign policy process at the beginning of the 21st century.
This book explores the changing nature of democracy in light of dramatic changes in the media of mass communication: the Internet, the decline of network television news and the daily newspaper; the growing tendency to treat election campaigns as competing product advertisements; the blurring lines among news, ads, and entertainment. It explores such questions as: Does the Internet make it easier for citizens to find political information? Do today's highly competitive old and new mass media serve the needs of democratic citizenship? Does the new media environment produce public opinion that is more or less manipulated, or manipulated in new ways?
Living in a segregated society, white Americans learn about African Americans not through personal relationships but through the images the media show them. "The Black Image in the White Mind" offers the most comprehensive look at the intricate racial patterns in the mass media and how they shape the ambivalent attitudes of Whites towards Blacks. Using the media, and especially television, as barometers of race relations, Robert M. Entman and Andrew Rojecki explore but then go beyond the treatment of African Americans on network and local news to incisively uncover the messages sent about race by the entertainment industry - from prime-time dramas and sitcoms to commercials and Hollywood movies. While the authors find very little in the media that intentionally promotes racism, they find even less that advances racial harmony. They reveal instead a subtle pattern of images that, while making room for Blacks, implies a racial hierarchy with Whites on top and promotes a sense of difference and conflict. Commercials, for example, feature plenty of Black characters. But unlike Whites, they rarely speak to or touch one another. In prime time, the few Blacks who escape sitcom buffoonery rarely enjoy informal, friendly contact with White colleagues - perhaps reinforcing social distance in real life. Entman and Rojecki interweave such astute observations with candid interviews of White Americans that make clear how these images of racial differences insinuate themselves into Whites' thinking. Despite its disturbing readings of television and film, the book's cogent analyses and proposed policy guidelines offer hope that America's powerful mediated racial separation can be successfully bridged.
To succeed in foreign policy, U.S. presidents have to sell their
versions or framings of political events to the news media and to
the public. But since the end of the Cold War, journalists have
increasingly resisted presidential views, even offering their own
spin on events. What, then, determines whether the media will
accept or reject the White House perspective? And what consequences
does this new media environment have for policymaking and public
opinion?
"The free press cannot be free," Robert Entman asserts.
"Inevitably, it is dependent." In this penetrating critique of
American journalism and the political process, Entman identifies a
"vicious circle of interdependence" as the key dilemma facing
reporters and editors. To become sophisticated citizens, he argues,
Americans need high-quality, independent political journalism; yet,
to stay in business while producing such journalism, news
organizations would need an audience of sophisticated citizens. As
Entman shows, there is no easy way out of this dilemma, which has
encouraged the decay of democratic citizenship as well as the
media's continuing failure to live up to their own highest ideals.
Addressing widespread despair over the degeneration of presidential
campaigns, Entman argues that the media system virtually compels
politicians to practice demagoguery.
To succeed in foreign policy, U.S. presidents have to sell their
versions or framings of political events to the news media and to
the public. But since the end of the Cold War, journalists have
increasingly resisted presidential views, even offering their own
spin on events. What, then, determines whether the media will
accept or reject the White House perspective? And what consequences
does this new media environment have for policymaking and public
opinion?
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