Aim:
The impact of globalisation on the world and the environment and the medias role in perpetuating this unstable globalised system
Notes:
- Media is a propaganda device
- Globalisation as a concept as the whole world coming together in a unified system - a concept shared by socialists and capitalists for different reasons
- For capitalists globalisation increases the amount of markets
- For socialists globalisation is desired for people to share resources and redistribute wealth, unified and working together
- Globalisation - another definition - dominance of one culture over other cultures, like the westernisation of all cultures
- Expansion of communication technologies such as the internet, so we are connected more than ever, theoretically unified
- In fact we are on the verge of 'Mcdonalidization', not so much a shared culture as a model of culture dominated by America, as their interests get forced on to the rest of the world
- Increasing all different cultures start to think and act and operate businesses in the same ways
- Extending our senses with technology - we can see further hear more
- We can now quickly see events on a global scale
- We can now see images of our forces bombing villages - doesn't integrate us, distances us
- The media can de-sensitise us but also brings us together
- We are still an individualist society, still not independence between first and third world businesses for various political reasons
- We are moving further away from a unified culture everyday
- America wants to spread capitalism and its values to the rest of the world largely so it can dominate the global market
- Causing a split that is tearing the world about
- Anti-capitalist ideology is emerging
- People aren't working together
- Who controls the global system? And why should they be allowed? Do we lose the idea of difference and community and national identity?
- Does globalisation make people more alike or more different?
- Expected to live up to these cultures
- Cultural imperialism - creating an empire, dominating other countries through cultural terms not by a military, making them think in the way that you do and making them value the things that you do
- The most powerful tool is the mass media, the vehicle for cultural imperialism, it legitimises it and allows it to develop
- Increasingly the global village is not a unified culture, other countries are turning into 'western' countries
- Every single media organisation is effectively one part of a giant part of an oligopoly - ultimately lots of magazines and newspapers are owned by just a few companies, such as Timewarner owns hundreds of companies such as AOL; HBO; New line cinema; Time Inc; magazines such as NME, Instyle; Warner Brothers; CNN
- These media oligopolies divides the world in to importance based on the amount of money they can make
1. North America
2. Western Europe, Japan and Australia
3. Developing economies and regional producers (India, Brazil, Eastern Europe)
4. The rest of the world
Link everything back to American companies
- Media power can be thought of as a new form of imperialism
- The dominate culture of America forces its way of life on other societies that can't afford it
- The dominate culture of America forces its way of life on other societies that can't afford it
- Spreads the message of capitalism and perpetuates that in societies where people could never afford it, so they have this idea that that is what they should be doing
- Big Brother - the idea that to be on tv and be a celebrity is desirable and how you can get money by doing practically nothing - is a western programme that is now spread across the world and repeated in different ways
- Western culture imposed on places like Africa, from the reporting of the news, magazines, internet, sitcoms...
- The effect of that is cultural assimilation
- Skin whitening cream is sold in India very popular, because they are bombard with images of the west as the culture that they are aiming for
- This media system functions like a giant system of propaganda for western capitalism
- The news is not neutral, even the BBC, and Chomsky & Herman write that there are five categories you can compare to companies which proves that they aren't completely honest and there is an agenda behind them
1. Ownership
2. Funding
3. Sourcing
4. Flak
5. Anti Communist ideology
- Rupert Murdoch is one man who has taken it upon himself to start influencing governments, famous boast that it is the Sun that choses who is elected by who they write about, this seems to be true
- He owns many companies across the world, and this means he can reach many of the world through the newspapers and tv channels he owns
- One man can set the agenda
- News stories aren't screened on air if they contradict the gender of this person
- Owner has an agenda so he is biased
- Government secretive, only allowed to know certain things, the public take, flaw in the neutrality of the news
- Most media organisations are funded by advertising and need to keep companies happy
- Media organisations are subject to flak
- US based global climate coalition - pressure group funded by Exxon, Texaco and Ford to 'cut through the myth that we are destroying the planet' - directly try and contradict
- These videos to protect the interest of these corporate companies at the expensive of our planet
An Inconvenient Truth
- Al Gore says this isn't a political issue but a moral one
- Al Gore's solutions:
1. Release less CO2 Plant more vegetation
2. Try to be CO2 neutral
3. Recycle
4. Buy a hybrid vehicle
5. Encourage everyone you know to watch this film!
- The solution to this problem seems to be to buy more things such as a new car and this film!
- America and China refuse to limit carbon emissions - still ruining our planet no matter what the rest of the world is doing
- How can you meet the needs of the present (businesses) and the needs of the future generations (sustainability), seems to be contradictory
- Capitalism is a system which needs profit to keep on going
- The world is not infinite - only so much space and resources
- Sustainable capitalism example - biox diesel factory created, for pollution free diesel - but factory is polluting - air, noise, water - so actually this factory is causing even more problems for the people who live around the area especially
- Greenwashing phenomenon - companies brand themselves as caring and eco friendly to get themselves a good public image and improve sales, using the media to promote this
- Mcdonalds rebrand to make them seem like a greener company
- A sustainable system is impossible under a capitalist model, as by its nature, capitalism is unsustainable as it has to keep expanding
- Environmentalism - want to save the planet but keep the system as it is
- Ecologism - the only way to save the planet is to totally overthrow the worlds system that we have
- Socialism/communism
- Most things are not designed for the needs of the people but for the needs of the manufacturer
- Interesting activist group who understand how the media works and are organising protests - the internet in a peculiar way has brought people together who want to resist
- No one controls the internet
- We are the 99% slogan that makes people understand about the average incomes
- The media is a system we can use for ourselves as well such as with the extension of social media - people tweeting about protests etc...
- The media skews events so need to read things with a pinch of salt
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