Page 43 - Communication Theory and Research

McQuail(EJC)-3281-03.qxd 8/16/2005 11:58 AM Page 32

32 Communication Theory & Research
a ‘new’ NWO unfolded with dramatic swiftness: the Moscow ‘coup’ of August
1991 and the rapid disintegration of the Soviet Union that followed.
Both the old and new versions mesh with an earlier triumphalism about
the end of history (Fukuyama, 1989). This thesis is essayed on the premise that
‘Western liberal democracy seems at its close to be returning full circle to where
it started: not to an “end of ideology” or a convergence between capitalism and
socialism, as earlier predicted, but to an unabashed victory of economic and
political liberalism’ (Fukuyama, 1989: 3).
The notion of history having ended is connected to the end of the
Enlightenment in postmodernism and to our having fallen over the edge of
modernity into an uncertain void (see, for example, Harvey, 1989; Gitlin, 1989),
one characterized by shifting lines of political sovereignty that exceed the
bounds of the nation state (see, for example, Bauman, 1990). [...]

Mythology, Ideology and Television
Verité – Towards Further Discussion

This article attempts to address the problematic notion of globalization by exam-
ining the mythology within its discourse and associated problems of meaning,
evidence and evaluation. Important as it is to recognize these myths, it is also
important to acknowledge the empirical reality of a more interconnected world
political and cultural economy.
However, this does not infer any consequences of a hegemonic global meta-
culture or a supranational boardgame controlled by powerful states or transna-
tional corporations. Throughout I have stressed the importance of scepticism
towards ideas that a ‘global ecumene’ is emerging on the basis of any media
reductionist or technological determinist assumptions. Globalization, defined
either as a journey or a destination, demands a critical approach.
Nor are any lines of cultural causality clear as to who is globalizing whom:
British media barons buy New York newspapers, Hong Kong billionaires buy
Vancouver’s waterfront, Germans buy RCA Records and Japanese buy Radio City
Music Hall. Moreover, similar kinds of questions can be posed as to who is deglob-
alizing whom, given the inconsistencies and hostilities of ethnic, religious and other
forms of localism within developed and lesser developed countries alike, e.g. Spain,
Canada, the former Soviet empire, Sri Lanka, India. The list is long and growing.
A more fruitful area for debate, I suggest, is examination of the resurgent
economic determinism at the heart of the globalization rhetoric emanating from
postmodernists, media imperialists and corporate publicists alike. Are we
witnessing not only an historical process and phenomenon but also the emer-
gence of a new determinist philosophy of world history and social change?
Although these are ultimately empirical questions, the ideological overtones
are heavy with normative, determinist implications of historical inevitability.
The result is that globalization is being promoted both as a means and an end.
Two propositions follow from this. First, it is clear that whether the context is
political, cultural or economic, this notion and its attendant myths function as a