Globalisation: A Comparative Analysis of Media Cultures in Australia, America and China - Research Paper Example

Globalization: Media Cultures in the United States, Australia and China 2008 Introduction In the age of globalisation, media has essentially come to be linked with the capitalist economic system in which the market is the ultimate arbitrator. Modern western democracies vouch for the free market in all sectors in which players have competitive freedom. Hence, most western economies, like the United States and Australia have been engaging in media reforms that enable greater competition in the sector (Hitchens, 2007). However, as it has turned out, in most sectors of the economy – including the media – the markets continue to be ruled by the conglomerates, aided by the deregulated business environment that supports oligopoly behaviour. As McChensey (1999) notes, such democracies are closer to the libertarian democracies of the 18th century, when the political system was ruled by the rich elite and not by the common citizens. In such a system, media reforms that promote the market-based system of concentrated media provide content that is also dictated by the rules of the market. As a result, the audience is provided with a flood of information through the market but the subjectivity of the information depends on the business interests of the conglomerates. Neo-liberal proponents of free media assume that the commercial market-driven media system is fundamentally efficient and does not require to be regulated by the state. This neo-liberal stand is similar to that which is advocated for free markets for industries. It goes unnoticed that the commercial media feeds the audience content that it wants to. The core problems of media reforms in western democracies, according to McChensey (1999), are the result of “a profit-driven, advertising-supported media system: hypercommercialism and denigration of journalism and public service”. Media reforms that result in a commercial, concentrated and global media have crucial implications for the nature of the media itself. While the traditional approach to the role of the media considers it as a channel between the citizens and the government, in which the media is used to voice citizens’ opinion, the more radical approach harps on its association with partisan and investigative journalism (Dahlgren, 1993). In a situation that media becomes a tool for business interests, neither of these roles remain valid any longer. In the traditional sense, the media becomes a channel of information flow between the business and the consumer. In the radical approach, a business-associated media has no interest either in public service content or in investigative journalism. In this scenario, the commercial media market can be classified as the content market, the advertisement market and the consumer market. The classification runs across the value chain of the media industry, through investment, production, distribution to end users and consumers. The end-use consumer looks for interesting content that the program houses provide the distributor. The advertiser also looks for the same interesting content on which it can advertise its products and impress the consumer (China TV Report, 2003-04). Hence, content provides the key competitive advantage to the market dynamics of the media market. In this paper, I will discuss the effects of globalisation and the commercial market-driven media in two western democracies – the United States and Australia – and that in a state-controlled but liberalizing country – China. The comparison of the three countries aims to show that globalisation has to some effect homogenized the media cultures despite the differences in the regulatory environment. In particular, the media in Australia and China follow the trends set in the United States both in the ownership trends as well as media content. This is more evident in the broadcasting segment of media than in the publishing industry, the latter able to some extent retain regional characteristics. The broadcast industry – comprising of television and radio - is driven by the advertisement-oriented culture that results in cloning of programs across countries, predominantly in the sphere of entertainment, rather than news or public service oriented programs. This is driven by the trans-national media companies’ urge to follow profits through advertisements. After discussing the media cultures in the three countries, I will also discuss the global media organizations, an offshoot of globalisation in media, that have resulted in standardisation of media products across countries on the lines of American media. United States In the United States, public service media has always been subservient to private media, which is considered to be the unbiased representation of public opinion. Yet, since the 1980s, growing concentration in the media industry has provoked criticism of oligopoly of media firms and greater business-media connections. The number of corporations that control the media industry in the United States, including newspapers, magazines, television, radio, books, music, wire and photo service and film production has steadily decreased since the 1980s, particularly after the Telecommunication Act of 1996 that further reduced the barriers to cross-ownership. In 2004, only 5 large American companies controlled the entire US media market in contrast to 50 in 1983, 29 in 1987, 14 in 1992 and 10 in 1997 (Jolly, 2007). Concentration is pronounced most in radio broadcasting. While no single company owned more than 40 radio stations in the US before the passing of the Telecommunication Act of 1996, Clear Channel Communication owned 1200 radio stations in 2006 and had an audience of 1100 million (Jolly, 2007). Local interest programs, the mainstay of radio communication, has been eroded in the process. In the television market, 10 companies owned 299 stations in 2003, compared to 105 in 1995 (Jolly, 2007). As in radio, local programming content has been reduced also in television, with greater focus to reality shows, soap operas and docu-features. Broadcasters vie with each other to draw mass audience, particularly the youth who contributed a major share of the market. Various techniques have been used to attract audience, from subcontracting programming to independent producers, re-use old ideas by making new programs on traditional formats, innovate new formats and pushing related merchandise like books and DVD with programs (Sparks, 2007). Reality shows have emerged as an useful tool to capture audience interest as a result of the constant drive towards innovation since these could be made with little investment – actors and writers had to be paid minimum fees, at all; there were no need for rehearsals and elaborate sets; and there were no need for rights acquisitions. These have been projected as an alternative to the traditional drama and soap operas. Since independent companies produced these programs after test marketing in smaller markets, producers could bargain hard with the broadcasters. As a result, these are relatively more expensive than the previous types of reality shows. Even in news, commercialisation of media has meant that trivialities are sensationalised in order to remain politically safe. In an interview in 2005, Larry Bienhart, author of the book “Wag the Fog”, describes fog facts as the news that are trivia and should be highlighted actually disappear in the fog while the more important news get hidden (Holland, 2005). This is not any accident, according to Bienhart, but deliberately done as an exercise in media spin. In the sections that follow, I will discuss the media cultures in Australia (where the regulatory framework clones the American model resulting in increased market focus and integration with global media) and in China (where despite the state control, the media has tilted towards an American market-style advertisement-driven media). Australia The Australian media is controlled by seven major media organizations, most of which are global. The largest, News Ltd, the Australian subsidiary of the Asia-Pacific company, News Corporation, owned by Rupert Murdoch, which has interests also in the United States, Canada, Latin America and Asia, owns shares of more that a hundred local and national newspapers as well as pay TV and online media. John Fairfax is the other major publishing group in Australia. Publishing and Broadcasting Ltd (PBL), owned by James Packer. It owns over half the market share in television in Australia, besides holding interests in newspapers, magazines and internet media. The ownership of the broadcast industry in Australia is complex with some of the stations having as many as 50 shareholders (Sheehan, 2002). The major Australian media companies are PBL, Channel 7, Rural Press, Village Austereo, Prime, McQuarie Radio, WA News, Fairfax, Southern Cross and APN (Giesecke, 2006). News Limited is a foreign company, not listed in the Australian Stock Exchange. Most of the print media organizations have associated television and radio licenses (Sheehan, 2002). Till recently, the Broadcasting Services Act, 1992 controlled media ownership rules in Australia. In 2007, media reforms relaxed many of the rules, particularly those with respect to foreign ownership and cross-ownership. The Foreign Acquisitions and Takeover Act was also removed for media although the sector was retained as a “sensitive sector” under Foreign Investment policy. Thus, the Australian media, which was to some extent shielded from foreign competition earlier, has now been opened up. At the same time, cross-media transactions, which had earlier been restricted on the basis of the number of audience reached by an organization and the number of media types owned by a company, have now been allowed for Australian media reforms in 2007 (Australian Government, 2006). The government claims that with the advent of the Internet, the ownership of traditional media establishments has become irrelevant as news travel faster through the internet than through television or newspapers. But analysts argue that the most popular websites in Australia are those owned by the traditional media (Giesecke, 2006). The media industry in Australia, including Rupert Murdoch, owner of Australia’s largest media company, has criticized the 2007 media reforms saying that it continues to give undue advantage to free-to-air media channels to cable operators. However, the industry welcomed the cross-ownership legislations stating that it would make the industry more competitive (SMH). It claims that opening up the sector to foreign ownership would result in foreign companies taking up most of the ownership, as it has done in New Zealand where major programming is foreign (Alliance). In contrast, the earlier Broadcasting Services Act of 1992 ensured “that Australians have effective control of the more influential broadcasting services” (Alliance). Cross media transactions would limit the number of cities that commercial media players would be permitted in to five. Maximum of two radio licenses and one license would, however, be given to each player in a region and 75 percent for those that have national reach. China Till 1978, when economic liberalization was begun, the media in China was strictly regulated and funded by the state. The first attempt at commercialisation occurred in the country in 1979 when Shanghai TV station ran a 1.5 minute advertisement on medicine wine and China Central Television (CCTV) began to run 5 minute ad spots (China TV Report, 2003-04). Although the media industry in China, particularly television, remains controlled by the state, its commercialisation began with government policy shifting towards a socialist market economy in all spheres since 1992 (Bai, 2005). Spiralling advertising revenues resulted in a change in the institutional and journalistic mind-set that became more market-oriented than a mouthpiece of the Communist Party, as it had been so long. It was realized that the media had a commercial value besides the political one. Although the basic institutional structure of the Chinese media remained the same till the late 1990s, with the state polity ruling the shots, television stations by then depended more on advertising revenues than on state funding. The administrative structure of the media industry in China had always been fragmented, with the national organizations under the control of the party and the rest under the provincial or local governments. By the late 1990s, the number of media organizations had proliferated and there was intense competition between the national and local organizations. The large number of satellite stations, cable operators and over-the-air stations ate into the advertising market, which was growing but at a less speed than the media industry. The government felt that the media industry needed consolidation to achieve scales of economy. The Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s that eroded the advertising market to some extent as well as China’s entry into the World Trade Organization in 2001 that opened it up to foreign competition boosted the need for consolidation even further. Also, it was thought that commercialisation and privatisation, as in other sectors, could bring in dynamism into the Chinese media establishment. As a result of the consolidation, the media industry, including television, radio and film production, in China became concentrated into a handful of conglomerates that was closely affiliated to the state machinery. By the end of 1998, 2400 of the 4147 broadcast organizations were shut down and 2216 were re-licensed. In 2002, there were 357 television stations, including CCTV, 33 provincial stations, 27 provincial capital city stations and 296 regional city stations (Bai, 2005). The newly created conglomerates had business interests in terrestrial, cable and satellite television, radio, film production, newspapers and magazines, distribution of cultural products, advertising, real estate and so on. Hence, by the new millennium, the media industry in China became akin to those of western democracies in which business interests of the owners dominated. The only difference was that this structure was created through government fiat and not entirely through the market mechanism. It was the new agenda to reduce the barriers to market-formation in the media industry through contracting out programming to private organizations, remove geographical barriers and ownership barriers. Media capitalisation was also launched as media houses were allowed entry into the sock exchanges. Although the local governments continue to be the virtual owners of the media conglomerates – though this mechanism is also on its way out – private organizations are increasingly being roped in. Television stations are allowed to spin off programming companies that can associate with private organizations or enter into joint ventures with foreign companies. At the same time, with consolidation, the Party’s central propaganda system rather than the provincial governments regulates the media industry. Hence, curiously in China, the media industry follows the market dictates to attract advertising revenues yet is controlled by the political superstructure. As a result, the programming innovation has remained concentrated in the entertainment segment while news is still regulated. Also within the news segment, the focus has been on human-interest stories that are less controversial and also are potentially advertisement attracters. The fallout of this has been a rush towards entertainment programs that are more often than not copied from American or European television programs. Although Chinese television programming always had a fair share of entertainment even in the pre-1978 period, it was more in the nature of “high art” that focused on Chinese traditions. Today, there is a daily dose of soap operas that include Chinese versions of American soaps like “Survivor”, “Who Wants to be a Millionaire”, “Oprah Winfrey” shows and so on. Reality television and call-in programs, like in western countries, has been as big hit in China. Even the boundary between entertainment and non-entertainment is fading, with newscasters and weather forecasters sharing glamour quotients in looks and attitudes to attract consumers. However, despite the commercialization of media in China, the dominant ideology of the ruling Communist Party is evident in the selection of official news, particularly crime news, the representation of the police and officials (Xiao, 2003). During the days of Mao, the media was used as a persuasive tool for propaganda. Since the late 1970s, the economy of China has been successively been liberalized although the political regime continues to be a regulated one. While on the one hand, the media is still regulated, its use as a propaganda machinery has been reduced. This is to some extent the result of change in the cultural environment that has been affected by economic liberalization. Yet, the media is far from achieving democratic principles in China. The political stranglehold remains and the public service broadcasts are more in the nature of propaganda (Zhao, 1998). Global Media The most significant element of global media scenario is perhaps the emergence of trans-national media organizations Typically, the trans-national companies are the main drivers of globalisation in all industries. Theodore Levitt who coined the term ‘globalisation’, in the seminal article, “The Globalisation of Markets”, published in the May-June, 1983 issue of the Harvard Business Review, distinguished between multinational companies and global companies by saying that the former adapted to the local preferences in the countries that they operated while the latter "operates with resolute constancy . . . as if the entire world (or major regions of it) were a single entity." Hence, according to Levitt, global companies strive for a standardized product. As a corollary to this theory, global media companies like Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation have produced standardized programming content with little adaptation of language and culture according to the countries. Five major players – News Corporation, Disney/ Cap Cities, Time Warner, Viacom and TCI – control global free market media (Shah). In China, of course, the ownership of media conglomerates still rests with the state although private, including foreign companies, are increasingly associating with programming business. Thus, the concentration and privatisation of media in countries like the United States and Australia, and to some extent also in China, as well as commercialisation of news and other culture products aligned to the advertisement market in almost all countries, have resulted in “soft” media content that are generally uncontroversial and politically conservative (Shah). The content generally follow the US model of entertainment that is least controversial. Reality shows modelled on American shows are telecast in almost all countries, including Australia and China. There is usually very little in the content that challenges the social, political and cultural status quo Alternate views and opinions are suppressed in the urge to present neutral – often read as official – version of facts. Hence, the audience is left with politically safe yet titillating and sensational news and subjects.   Conclusion Thus, globalisation has entailed a larger involvement of private enterprises in global media, both in the western democracies as well as in emerging economies like China. Private involvement necessarily results in a higher concentration in the media industry, thereby the media representing a narrow class interest (Herman and McChesney, 1999). Also, full or partial privatisation of the media also necessitates dependence on advertising revenues. Together with ownership concentration, advertisement dependence makes the media organizations politically conservative. For example, Proctor & Gamble, the largest media advertiser closely monitors the media content that it sponsors across the world to ensure that there is no conflict of interest with its business in the programming on television (Herman and McChesney, 1999). Hence, the media cultures in most countries have tilted towards entertainment, following cues from the American media market, giving way to controversial programs, political debate, discussions and documentaries that are hard hitting and thought-provoking. The principal objective of media has become to present affluent consumers to advertisers rather than a platform of independent communication between citizens. Rarely does the commercial media broadcast programs that criticize the corporate or advertisers’ abuse of power. Therefore, commercialisation of media is seen as antithetical to promotion of democracy in all countries. Works Cited Australian Government (2006). Meeting the Digital Challenge: Reforming Australia’s Media in the Digital Age, March. Retrieved from http://www.dbcde.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/37572/Media_consultation_paper_Final_.pdf McChesney, Robert W (1999). Rich Media Poor Democracy; Communication Politics in Dubious Times, University of Illinois Press Sheehan, Paul (2002). Media Ownership in Australia, 20 May. Retrieved from http://www.tmc.org.au/Sydney/documents/Media%20Ownership%20in%20Australia.doc Giesecke, Terry (2006). The Federal Government's Media Reform proposals, do they address key media issues? April. Retrieved from http://members.pcug.org.au/~terryg/media3.html Dahlgren, Peter (1993). Communication and Citizenship: Journalism and the Public Sphere, Routledge China TV Report, 2003-04. Retrieved from http://www.the-dma.org/international/articles/TheChinaMediaMarket.pdf Sparks, Colin (2007). Reality TV: the Big Brother phenomenon, International Socialism Journal, Issue 114, April 9. Retrieved from http://www.isj.org.uk/index.php4?id=314&issue=114 Bai, R (2005). Media Commercialization, entertainment and the party-state: The political economy of contemporary Chinese television and entertainment culture, Global Media Journal, Vol 4, Issue 6, Spring Jolly, Dr Rhonda (2007). Media ownership deregulation in the United States and Australia: in the public interest? Parliament of Australia, 24 July. Retrieved from http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/RP/2007-08/08RP01.htm Xiao, Li (2003). Ideologies of Crime News in China in an Era of Commercialization, Thesis for the fulfillment of Master of Science at the Texas A&M University Levitt, Theodore (1983). Globalization of Markets, Harvard Business Review, May-June Shah, Hemant (n,d). Journalism in an Age of Mass Media Globalization. Retrieved from http://www.idsnet.org/Papers/Communications/HEMANT_SHAH.HTM Holland, Joshua (2005) Reality and Spin in the Media, Alter Net, December. Retrieved from http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/29278/ Zhao, Yueshi, Media, Market and Democracy in China: Between Party Line and Bottom Line, University of Illinois, 1998 The Alliance and Media Reforms, http://www.alliance.org.au/images/stories/fact_sheet3_the_alliance_and_media_reform.pdf Read More

In a situation that media becomes a tool for business interests, neither of these roles remain valid any longer. In the traditional sense, the media becomes a channel of information flow between the business and the consumer. In the radical approach, a business-associated media has no interest either in public service content or in investigative journalism. In this scenario, the commercial media market can be classified as the content market, the advertisement market and the consumer market. The classification runs across the value chain of the media industry, through investment, production, distribution to end users and consumers.

The end-use consumer looks for interesting content that the program houses provide the distributor. The advertiser also looks for the same interesting content on which it can advertise its products and impress the consumer (China TV Report, 2003-04). Hence, content provides the key competitive advantage to the market dynamics of the media market. In this paper, I will discuss the effects of globalisation and the commercial market-driven media in two western democracies – the United States and Australia – and that in a state-controlled but liberalizing country – China.

The comparison of the three countries aims to show that globalisation has to some effect homogenized the media cultures despite the differences in the regulatory environment. In particular, the media in Australia and China follow the trends set in the United States both in the ownership trends as well as media content. This is more evident in the broadcasting segment of media than in the publishing industry, the latter able to some extent retain regional characteristics. The broadcast industry – comprising of television and radio - is driven by the advertisement-oriented culture that results in cloning of programs across countries, predominantly in the sphere of entertainment, rather than news or public service oriented programs.

This is driven by the trans-national media companies’ urge to follow profits through advertisements. After discussing the media cultures in the three countries, I will also discuss the global media organizations, an offshoot of globalisation in media, that have resulted in standardisation of media products across countries on the lines of American media. United States In the United States, public service media has always been subservient to private media, which is considered to be the unbiased representation of public opinion.

Yet, since the 1980s, growing concentration in the media industry has provoked criticism of oligopoly of media firms and greater business-media connections. The number of corporations that control the media industry in the United States, including newspapers, magazines, television, radio, books, music, wire and photo service and film production has steadily decreased since the 1980s, particularly after the Telecommunication Act of 1996 that further reduced the barriers to cross-ownership. In 2004, only 5 large American companies controlled the entire US media market in contrast to 50 in 1983, 29 in 1987, 14 in 1992 and 10 in 1997 (Jolly, 2007).

Concentration is pronounced most in radio broadcasting. While no single company owned more than 40 radio stations in the US before the passing of the Telecommunication Act of 1996, Clear Channel Communication owned 1200 radio stations in 2006 and had an audience of 1100 million (Jolly, 2007). Local interest programs, the mainstay of radio communication, has been eroded in the process. In the television market, 10 companies owned 299 stations in 2003, compared to 105 in 1995 (Jolly, 2007). As in radio, local programming content has been reduced also in television, with greater focus to reality shows, soap operas and docu-features.

Broadcasters vie with each other to draw mass audience, particularly the youth who contributed a major share of the market. Various techniques have been used to attract audience, from subcontracting programming to independent producers, re-use old ideas by making new programs on traditional formats, innovate new formats and pushing related merchandise like books and DVD with programs (Sparks, 2007).

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