Page 146 - Comparing Political Communication Theories, Cases, and Challenge

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Pippa Norris

ratings are expressed as a 100-point scale for each country under com-
parison. Evaluations of press freedom in 186 nations were available in
the 2000 Freedom House survey.

The Map of Media Systems
Figure 6.2 shows the distribution of 135 nations across these di-
mensions. The scatter of societies in the top right-hand corner shows
that in many older democracies, as well as some newer democracies
such as the Czech Republic, Thailand, the Republic of Korea, Jamaica,
and Venezuela, liberal patterns of press freedom are strongly related to
widespread media access. Some of these societies are among the most
affluent around the globe, yet only moderate levels of human develop-
ment characterize others such as South Africa, El Salvador, and Poland.
In contrast, in societies located in the top left-hand corner of the map,
exemplified by Singapore, Belarus, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Russia,
there is relatively widespread access to most modern forms of mass me-
dia such as television and yet limited freedom of the press, suggesting the
greatest potential for domestic news channels to be used by government,
official agencies, and established interests as an agency of partisan bias,
or even state propaganda, with a scope that reaches large sectors of the
population (Hachten 1989, 822–7).
Media systems in countries such as India, Botswana, Namibia, and
the Philippines, located in the bottom right-hand corner of the scatter
plot, are characterized by a flourishing independent press and yet limited
publicaccesstonewspapers,television,andtheInternet,duetoproblems
of literacy and poverty. In these countries, the media can be expected
to have a positive impact on pluralism and government accountabil-
ity, especially through competition among elites in civil society, but to
exert only limited influence on the general population because of its lim-
ited reach. Lastly, most low-income nations are scattered in the bottom
left-hand corner, such as Angola, Rwanda, Cambodia, and Bangladesh,
where there are major restrictions on the freedom of the press as a force
capable of challenging government authorities, and yet the role of the
media is also limited as a channel of state propaganda because of re-
stricted levels of mass access to newspapers, television, and the Internet.
In these nations, traditional forms of campaign communication such
as local rallies, posters, and community meetings, and grassroots party
organizations, are likely to be more important in mobilizing political
support than mediated channels.

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