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culture and cultural value-relativism. McQuail (1992: 4) summarizes, referring to
Harvey (1989):

Its political implication is that the ‘Enlightenment project’ of rational social
progress has drawn to an end, especially in respect of applying bureaucratic
means to achieve socially planned collective objectives. As a social-cultural
philosophy ‘post-modernism’ stands opposed to the traditional notion of
a fixed and hierarchical culture. It favours forms of culture which are
transient, superficial, appealing to sense rather than reason. Postmodern
culture is volatile, illogical, kaleidoscopic, inventive, hedonistic. It certainly
favours the newer, audiovisual over the older, print media.

It puts an end to several old certainties, without offering a new, normative basis
to replace them. This applies to both (ideas on) politics and culture in general
and more specifically to journalism. In today’s culture, for example, politics
occupy a less prominent place, the significance of norms and values is more
relative, and the borders between once divided domains (such as information
and entertainment, high and low culture) are being blurred.
At the same time, there are fewer objections to commercial exploitation – once
widely held in the field of the media – and less fear of monopolization, so that
there is also less justification providing public amenities to the media. Solutions
based on liberal ideas and market conformity apparently provide the
foundations for an emerging ‘new consensus’ on new media policies, both in the
United States and in Europe (McQuail, 1993: 196). This (post)modern (media)
culture may also have implications for the special social status and protection
upon which the profession of journalism has always been able to count.

Will journalism remain?

Now that technology has rendered journalistic intervention less necessary, the
future of the profession will depend more than ever on other social factors and
considerations. The development of a global system of communication and
growing ‘communication autonomy’ of the citizen outlined above, offer new
opportunities, but also create new dilemmas and problems. Against this back-
drop, these developments and their significance remain, to a certain extent,
questionable – both empirically and normatively.
First, it should be noted that the advance of CNN – which indeed prompted
many a sombre thought – seems to have passed its zenith. The original agitation
around CNN is reminiscent of the unease that accompanies each new
technological development upon which new and more direct forms of reporting
are based. We may expect the new direct and global television reporting to carve
itself a niche alongside – and not primarily instead of – existing forms of
journalism. More international news stations will join CNN in providing the
daily menu of television. At a national and local level too, comparable news
stations will emerge, as has long been the case in the United States.