Media and Democracy: Normative and Empirical Perspectives

Media and journalism are undergoing what many observers are describing as a profound structural change. How we view the consequences of this change for democracy depends on what we normatively expect from the relationship between the media and politics in the first place. Hence we shall start with basic questions about this relationship and critically examine previous transformations and what were perceived as crises in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We finish with a closer normative and empirical look at the role of social media and attempts transnationally to re-shape media landscapes. There will be a number of guest speakers.