Page 93 - Comparing Media Systems THREE MODELS OF MEDIA AND POLITICS

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Media and Political Systems and Differentiation

organized social groups; some have histories of strong segmented plu-
ralism. In the first half of the twentieth century (except in Austria and
Germany, where its introduction occurred after World War II) demo-
cratic corporatism emerged as a system that integrated these groups
into the political process. They are characterized today by moderate
pluralism (though with greater ideological diversity than the Liberal
counties) and by consensus politics. The welfare state is strong, though
with significant variations in its extent. Rational-legal authority is also
strongly developed. Under this model we will discuss Austria, Belgium,
Denmark, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and
Switzerland.
The NorthAtlantic or LiberalModel, similar to the Democratic Cor-
poratist Model, is characterized by early development of press freedom
and the mass-circulation press, though newspaper circulation today is
lower than in the Democratic Corporatist societies. Commercial news-
papers dominate, political parallelism is low, and internal pluralism pre-
dominates – with the important exception of the highly partisan British
press. Professionalization of journalism is relatively strong, though with-
out the kind of formal organization that prevails in the Democratic Cor-
poratist countries. Journalistic autonomy is more likely to be limited
by commercial pressures than by political instrumentalization, though
the latter is more common in Britain. Information-oriented journal-
ism predominates, with a bit stronger commentary tradition in Britain.
The role of the state is limited, though more so in the United States
than in Ireland and Canada, where concerns about national culture have
given the state a large role, and Britain, where public broadcasting and
the regulation of commercial broadcasting have both been very strong.
Public broadcasting and broadcast regulation is organized according to
the professional model, with relatively strong insulation from political
control.
Liberal institutions of course developed relatively early in these so-
cieties, where the role of the market is traditionally strong and the role
of the state relatively limited, though more so in the United States than
the others. All are characterized by moderate pluralism and tend toward
majoritarianism, and none have the strongly organized social groups
that are often important in continental Europe, though again Britain
does to a larger extent than the United States. Rational-legal authority is
strongly developed in all the Liberal countries.

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