Concept
Media democracy is a democratic approach to media studies that advocates for the reform of mass media to strengthen public service broadcasting and develop participation in alternative media and citizen journalism in order to create a mass media system that informs and empowers all members of society and enhances democratic values. Media democracy is both a theory and a social movement. It is against concentration in the ownership of media, and it champions diversity of voices and perspectives within the news system. Media democracy focuses on the empowerment of individual citizens and on the promotion of democratic ideals through the spread of information. Additionally, the approach argues that the media system itself should be democratic in its own construction, shying away from private ownership or intense regulations. Media democracy entails that media should be used to promote democracy and that media itself should be democratic. For example, it views media ownership concentration as undemocratic and as being unable to promote democracy, and thus, as facet of media that must be examined critically. Both the concept and the social movements promoting it have grown in response to the increased corporate domination in mass media and perceived shrinking of the marketplace of ideas. It understands media as a tool with the power to reach a large audience with a central role in shaping culture. The concept of a media democracy follows in response to the deregulation of broadcast markets and the concentration of mass media ownership.[citation needed] In the book Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, authors Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky outline the propaganda model of media, which states that the private interests in control of media outlets shape news and information before it is disseminated to the public through the use of five information filters. Media democracy gives people the right to participate in media. It extends the media's relationship to the public sphere, where the information gathered can be viewed and shared by the people.
