ECREA16-Abstract

144

Friday, November 11

1 6 : 0 0 – 1 7 : 3 0

CLP06

Media Change and Policy Responses

PP 360

The Media Welfare State in the Digital Age – Structural Changes in Danish Media Policy

S. Flensburg

University of Copenhagen, Deparment of media- cognition and communication, Copenhagen, Denmark

Technological, economic and cultural changes are affecting media systems world wide but especially in small states and language areas (Puppies 2009). In

Denmark the direct competition between traditional, national media institutions and global media companies challenges market structures, media content

and production and the institutional and political frameworks. Various agents are currently criticizing the existing regulatory structures, and reforms seem

inevitable in the near future. The various debates raises fundamental questions of how to sustain a national media system and which role the political

system should play in protecting it. The paper will present a number of examples of political debates and conflicts reflecting these structural changes and

discuss the impact of various types of regulation. In doing this I will apply a broader understanding of the media political field than Danish research has done

so far emphasizing the convergence between data and it policy and traditional mass media regulation (van Quilenburg & McQuail 2004, Braman 2004).

Thus I will discuss how various types of legislation developed for different sectors influence on the overall development in the media system challenging

the fundamental structures and logics of media policy. As an example the public broadcasting company, DR, is currently under attack from both the news‑

paper, TV and distribution industries claiming that DR holds a too dominating position in the market. Debates like this indicate that the traditional sector

specific regulation is no longer sufficient for regulating the digital media ecosystem. The Danish media system is seen as a representative of the Nordic me‑

dia welfare state and the democratic-corporatist model (Syvertsen et al. 2014, Hallin & Mancini 2004). The paper will discuss how the current changes can

be understood in relation to the characteristics traditionally associated with these systems, namely: that media policy is dominated by a cultural political

regulatory regime, a corporatist political environment and a strong tradition for state regulation combined with a high degree of press freedom. The paper

discusses whether the current changes are challenging or strengthening these characteristics and if the media political development supports the hypoth‑

esis that we are entering a new phase in media history (van Quilenburg & McQuail 2004, Willig 2007). The debates mentioned above give some indication

that the traditional balance between public and private media is under pressure and that the traditional co-existence and cooperation could be threatened

(Søndergaard & Helles 2014). Also recent amendments of the media subsidy system suggest a tighter degree of state involvement in the private media

(Flensburg 2015). However we still know very little about the rest of the media sector such as the digital media and distributors. The paper will analyze

debates and policy documents related to ongoing discussions about the role of the state in regulating the media system and identify the key stakeholders’

positions, interests and strategies across traditional sectors. Thereby I will also address questions of how global media actors such as Apple, Netflix and

Google change the market structures of the national media system and challenge the regulatory schemes.

PP 361

Subsidizing Media Innovation

A. Kammer

, E. Hobel

University of Southern Denmark, Centre for Journalism, Odense, Denmark

When the Danish Parliament revised the media-subsidy framework in 2013/2014, one of the new initiatives was the introduction of a pool of funding ear‑

marked to establishing and developing new news media – the so-called “innovation fund”. So, as the news industry struggles to keep journalism a viable

and economically sustainable activity, the institutionalization of financial support for media innovation constitute one way for policy makers to bring (parts

of) the journalistic environment up-to-date with the digital age, thereby improving the conditions for an informed citizenry in the future (Kammer, forth‑

coming/2016). Theoretically, the paper draws upon the normative foundation of the social-democratic welfare state (found in the Scandinavian countries;

cf. Esping-Andersen, 1990) to provide a framework for measuring the ambition, implementation, and impact of the innovation fund. So, this paper scruti‑

nizes the practical administration of the innovation fund in the first two years of its existence, analyzing all applications for innovation subsidies in 2014 and

2015 as well as all acceptance and rejection letters. With this empirical material and a combination of quantitative and qualitative analytical approaches

(inspired by the methodology of "qualitative media analysis", cf. Altheide & Schneider, 2013), the paper analyzes to what extent the administration reflects

a support of the welfare framework the subsidy scheme exists within. It asks (1) which types of news-media innovation gets subsidized, (2) what charac‑

terizes the successful applicants’approaches to innovation, and (3) which patterns exist in this connection, and it measures each of these three dimensions

against the welfare framework that the national context provides. References: Altheide, D. L., & Schneider, C. J. (2013). Qualitative Media Analysis (2

Ed.).

Los Angeles: Sage. Esping-Andersen, G. (1990). The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism. Cambridge: Polity Press. Kammer, A. (forthcoming/2016). Market

Structure and Innovation Policies in Denmark. In H. v. Kranenburg (Ed.), Innovation Policies in the European News and Media Industry: A Comparative Study.

Berlin: Springer.

PP 362

The Politics of Media Plurality: A Case Study of Political Expedience and Consolidation of Power

S. Barnett

University of Westminster, Media Arts and Design, Harrow, United Kingdom

While politicians and policy makers have spoken eloquently over the last 20 years about the fundamental importance for democracy of a diverse media,

the direction of travel throughout the developed world has been towards consolidation of media enterprises and further relaxation of ownership regimes.

This trend has been exacerbated by a worldwide recession and structural shifts in the business models of journalism, thereby enabling politicians conve‑

niently to marry the realpolitik of not confronting media power with industrial arguments around liberalisation and deregulation. If the future of newspa‑

pers and their online counterparts are at risk, goes the argument, we cannot afford to frustrate further consolidation which might help to sustain the fourth

estate. More recently, there was evidence that the political wind had started to change. In the UK, following public outrage in response to the phone-hack‑