c h a p t er
13
Politics and Media
Sociology Now
1st Edition
Kimmel/Aronson
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Politics: Power and Authority
– politics art and science of government
– government and authority
• Class, Status, and Power
– authority
– situational/contextual limits of authority
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2009
Politics: Power and Authority
• Traditional Authority
– legitimacy drawn from tradition
• Charismatic Authority
– personal characteristics of leader
• Legal-Rational Authority
– voicing a set of laws
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Politics: Power and Authority
• Power/Knowledge
– Strategies used by authorities to limit
our own power/knowledge
• Hierarchical observation
• Normalizing judgment
• Examination
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Political Systems
• Authoritarian Systems
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Monarchy
Oligarchy
Dictatorship
Totalitarianism
• Democracy
– participatory democracy
– representative democracy
– universal suffrage
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Political Systems
• Problems of Political Systems
– Corruption
• Outside interests donate large sums of
money
• Obey special interest groups instead of
the people
• Misuse of government funds for personal
gain
– Bureaucracy
– Class, Race, Gender, and Power
• Citizenship
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2009
The Political Systems of the
United States
• political parties
• American Political Parties
– two-party system
• Federalists
• Republicans
• Party Affiliation: The Politics of Race,
Class, and Gender
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Class
Education
Race
Gender
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The Political Systems of the
United States
• Interest Groups
– a.k.a., special interest groups,
pressure groups, and lobbies
– protective groups
– promotional groups
– political action committee
(PAC)
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The Political Systems of the
United States
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Political Change
• Social Movements
– further common interest
– secure common goal
– “outside” established institutions
• Revolutions
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attempt to overthrow/replace existing social order
immiseration thesis
relative deprivation
coup d’état
political revolution
social revolution
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Political Change
• War and the Military
– root causes of most wars (Wright)
• Political objectives
• “Wag the dog” rationale
• Perceived threats
• Moral objectives
• Absence of alternatives
• Terrorism
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Everyday Politics
• Being Political: Social Change
– “personal problems are political
problems”
• racism, sexism, and homophobia
• friendships across social lines
• social labels
• support/non-support of worker
exploitation
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Everyday Politics
• Civil Society: Declining,
Increasing, or Dynamic?
– civil society
– new forms of political activism --> civic
engagement
• Shift to the marketplace
• Preference for hands-on activity
• Preference for supportive activity
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Everyday Politics
• Politics and Media: Interdependence
– public opinion and media coverage
– Do media shape or reflect the political scene?
– Do they create or reflect the public opinion on which
political decision-making is based?
– In what ways do the media shape or reflect our
society?
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What Are the Mass Media?
– media (plural of medium)
• ways of communicating with each other
– mass media
• press, radio, television, computer
• Types of Mass Media
– Print Media
• printing press – 8th century China, 15th
century Europe
• newspapers and magazines
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What Are the Mass Media?
– Blogs: Online Print
Journalism
• short for “Weblog”
• 39% of all Internet
users read blogs
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What Are the Mass Media?
– Radio, Movies and Television
• average U.S. households have more
television sets than people
• world is brought closer together
– Video Games, Gambling, and Porn:
Guy Media
• replacement of social interaction
(boys) versus
• changing patterns of social interaction
with others
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What Are the Mass Media?
– The Internet
• change from computer as business
tool to mass medium
• Internet has transformed mass
media and is a new form
• increased social isolation or new
form of “community”?
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What Are the Mass Media?
• Saturation and Convergence:
The Sociology of Media
– the average American has:
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3 TVs
1.8 VCRs
3.1 radios
2.6 tape players
2.1 CD players
1.4 video game players
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Media Production and Consumption
• Culture Industries
– culture industries
– “the logic of safety” (Gitlin)
– some mass media producers do have
artistic vision, challenge
preconceptions, stereotypes, and
ideologies
• Multicultural Voices
– mass media as tool to pass along
cultural traditions
– gay youth connections
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2009
Media Production and Consumption
• Media Consolidation
– media consolidation
• smaller number of companies
• huge conglomerates
• The Importance of Advertising
– association with product and
desirable qualities/activities
– engine of media production
– relationship between producers and
consumers?
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Media Production and Consumption
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Media Production and Consumption
• Celebrities
– celebrity stories sell magazines and
products
– mass media created celebrity
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Consuming Media, Creating Identity
• goals of consumption of media
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Surveillance
Decision making
Aesthetics
Diversion
Identity
– interpretive community
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Globalization and the Media
– global village
• What is Media Globalization?
– instant communication over vast distances
– availability of cultural products
• Cultural Imperialism
– cultural control of one country over another
• New Media, New Voices
• Politics and Media in the 21st
Century
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Globalization and the Media
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2009