The Organisation of News

Abstract

What needs to be examined specifically in light of the debate on how the media has developed is the extent to which the media does in fact operate according to the understanding of it outlined in the previous chapter, explicitly and implicitly, in the literature on ‘global civil society’ (GCS). As such, it needs to be asked to what extent the media can be regarded as ‘global’ as it is seen among advocates of GCS, providing a common ‘global moral order’ to frame the operations of GCS activity. Furthermore, what needs to be addressed is the way in which the media provides a ‘global public sphere’ that facilitates the public deliberation that GCS claims to be a manifestation of, and indeed it must be addressed whether developments in news media, including developments with the internet, may be seen to represent or express this ‘global public opinion’ as a key influence on the governance of the global system. Of course, as has already been alluded to, these understandings of the media are closely related and overlap, but they do highlight different dimensions of the way in which GCS has emerged as a concept.