Page 103 - Comparing Political Communication Theories, Cases, and Challenge

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Comparing Mass Communication Systems

stories. It is fascinating to see how differently our familiar technologies
are used in the geographical and cultural periphery (e.g., by Inuits in the
arctic region [Greenland, Canada, Alaska]) (Perrot 1986).
Even within the Western world, the interpretations and metaphors
of new technologies differ considerably. The idea of establishing an In-
formation Superhighway in the form of a national and digital informa-
tion infrastructure, as it was proclaimed in American politics in 1993,
has wandered through many states and has been furnished with com-
pletely different accents. In the United States, the term metaphorically
transported a claim of state regulation of private investors, parallel to
the construction of the real highway that is regimented by the police; the
Canadians were above all careful to add their “Canadian content” to the
infrastructure; and Australians hoped to reduce the geographical dis-
tance between their country and the world markets (Kleinsteuber 1996).
In Europe, the picture of the Autobahn (in German) or Autostrada (in
Italian) for data was above all filled with economic meaning, the chances
offered by e-commerce were praised highly and emphasis was laid on the
creation of new jobs in a Europe expected to grow together in electronic
networks (Kubicek et al. 1997).

CONCLUSION
Apart from the individual aspects of comparative procedure described
here, this field in general has a particular task in the scientific analysis
of the media and communication. It is about – generally speaking –
processing world knowledge, the insight into foreign cultures, discov-
ering different approaches to different subjects and gaining a different
kind of experience of similar objects in distinct cultures. Without excep-
tion, the relationship between the familiar and the foreign lies behind the
comparative analysis. This underlines that sound comparative research
can only be achieved with great multicultural sensitivity. It is a ques-
tion of scientifically corroborating “Border Crossing” (Dallmayr 1999).
Stereotyping therefore is an archenemy of any comparative procedure;
even worse is the construction of prejudices. It is neither true that the
United States is the land of neoliberalism, that the Japanese are copycats,
nor that the Germans are perfectionists. Comparative research attributes
great importance to avoiding stereotyped simplifications and the fabri-
cation of clich´ es, which often suit political purposes nicely.
An overwhelming trend can be subsumed under the term globaliza-
tion.When this catchword is examined more thoroughly, very different

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