Media Control: Open communication technologies as actors enabling a shift in the status quo

Evident from Gitlin’s and Schiller’s arguments is their emphasis on the necessity of free and open communication among the masses if there is to be any deliverance from the ‘claws’ of the media. On the contrary, it is the one-way communication (radio, TV, cable) utilized by the elites to achieve the subordination and dissemination of the hegemonic ideology. Fiske (1996) further elaborates this in his argument that surveillance technology is also used as means to discern the norms and regulations necessary to maintain the hegemony ideology: "Norms are crucial to any surveillance system, for without them it cannot identify the abnormal. Norms are what enable it to decide what information should be turned into knowledge and what individuals need to be monitored" (Fiske 1996, p. 220). Fiske’s technologised surveillance of the physical goes hand-in-hand with surveillance of the discourse (what issues are raised on TV, radio, etc.) “because unequal access to those technologies ensures their use in promoting similar power-block interests" (Fiske 1996, p. 218). The important point brought forth here, directly or indirectly, is the identification of the closed, unidirectional (with masses on the receiving end) and restricted access of communication technology.

These aspects are identified as necessary characteristics for the maintenance and reproduction of the hegemonic ideology, enabling the elites to set the form, format and content of the public discourse (broadcasting, TV, radio, press, etc.), and as importantly decide who can participate. Therefore, it can be argued that this manifestation of communication technologies, entangled in the web of one-way communication and used by the elites for power control and dissemination of material in support of the hegemonic ideology, has shaped the traditional scholarly and public discourse, as well as their practical use, to view communication technology as intrinsically embedded with features, characteristics and functionalities, for reinforcing and aiding the hegemonic ideology.

This biased view, that communication technologies are inherently suited to help media control, is troublesome and factually wrong. For example, the scholarly and public discourse on early cable technology shows that cable access was intended for use unlike it is being used today (for dissemination popular consumer culture through its various formats with the aims of making profit). Streeter (1997) argues that cable "had the potential to rehumanize a dehumanized society, to eliminate the existing bureaucratic restrictions of government regulation common to the industrial world, and to empower the currently powerless public" (Streeter 1997, p.228). He further notes that the cable system had the potential to enable two-way communication and interactivity, but apparently failed to do so due to the social (un)response on the part of the audience: "Cable television was something that could have an important impact upon society, and it thus called for a response on the part of society; it was something to which society could respond and act upon, but that was itself outside society” (Streeter 1997, p. 225). And then adds that cable should not be viewed as an “autonomous entity that had simply appeared on the scene as the result of scientific and technical research" (Streeter 1997, p. 225). Here we see a distinction between the current social status of cable as profit making machinery and its potentials to have become socially responsible technology that would have empowered the audience with two-way open communication.

The above suggests that the communicative aspects of the production and reproduction of the dominant ideology, including the production of consent in the audience/consumer or citizen, are identified by media and communication technologies characterized by closed, one-way communication. This provides the elites with the ability to control the public discourse by selectively choosing the issues of discussion, and at the same time is able to control the access to the discourse: "But communication and information technology does not merely circulate discourse and make it available for analysts, it also produces knowledge and applies power" (Fiske 1996, p. 217). This process ensures conformity with the accepted cultural, social, economical, and political norms of the dominant ideology: "focus on communication technology both as ways of engaging in discourse struggles and, through their surveillance capability, as ways of producing a particular form of social knowledge and thus of exerting power" (Fiske 1996, p. 217)

That the various media and communication technology exhibit characteristics of closed systems with one-way communication can be hardly argued. However, the proper question to ask is: why is the communication technology so restrictive and a closed system that can be so easily controlled (deliberately or otherwise) by the elite? First, lets ask the following question regarding how does media fit in the economic system. Do the existing media/communication technologies exhibit characteristics that make them a better fit for the capitalistic free market (economy whose ultimate goal is the bottom-line, i.e. profit), rather than empowering the publics/audiences with information to better participate in representative democracy? Second, are the exhibited characteristics intrinsic to a particular technology embedded in the technology itself, or they are a result of the features and functionalities which designers embellished a particular technology?

To answer the above questions, I first turn to Schiller (1996) who argues in favor of original purpose and design: "When military or commercial advantages are the motivating forces of research and development, it is to be expected that the laboratories will produce findings that are conducive to these objectives. If other motivations could be advanced, the common good, for instance, different technologies might be forthcoming" (Schiller, p.71). Schiller's idea of the original purpose is also supported by the adaptive structurations theory (AST) that differentiates between technology's spirit (the original intent as thought by the designers who might be operating ‘outside’ of the hegemonic control, relatively speaking) and its subsequent functionality due to the appropriation process as the technology becomes embedded in institutionalized social structures. As such, more then often the existing socially and politically brokered power structures reflect themselves in the structure of the technology: "Information technology is highly political, but politics are not directed by its technological features alone"  (Fiske 1996, p. 219).  The AST might appear in contradiction to Schiller's argument that the social use of technology is determined by the original purpose: "What the evidence here demonstrates is the strong, if not determining, influence of the original purpose that fostered the development of each new technology. The social use to which the technology is put, more times that not, follows its originating purpose" (Schiller, p. 71). The seemingly contradictory arguments need to be scrutinized in light of the social constructionist theory and technological determinism applied together. Neither one can explain the interplay of communication technology and society alone. The argument is that if a particular technology was designed to serve the corporate interest, most of its features will be driven to maximize the profits. In contrast, if a group of people designs technology for open communication and democratic access to information, the technology in question will have such features as to enable ease of access to information and make it hard for that technology to be used for restrictive purposes. But again, it is not the technology per se; it is the social structures that tilt the design, development, and subsequent use of the technology for particular purposes. Unfortunately, most of the communication technology in use today has been built and appropriated for profit making activities and perhaps is unfit to support activities related to participatory democracy.

For example, the development of cable as medium of communication was relatively uneventful until the media corporations saw potentials for profits via advertising. As the fight of discourses got under way between government officials, media corporations and the liberal progressive forces, the elite elements appeared on the scene controlling and moderating the discourse: "The talk about cable … was characterized by a systemic avoidance of central issues and assumptions, and by a pattern of unequal power in the discussion of its outcomes: the discourse of the new technology was shaped not so much by full fledged debate as by the lack of it" (Streeter 1997, p.222). Thus, the future of the cable technology was affected by the social structures and institutions, striping away from its technological potential the ability to become a technology that could link the masses and bring them together.

The communication's technological determinism and social constructionism are interrelated in circular and iterative nature. It is hard to conceptualize isolated technology that is not being affected by the social structures, but constantly affects the same:

"As Raymond Williams has shown, this assumption of autonomous technology is characteristic of much though about television and society, and constitutes a false abstraction of technologies out of their social and cultural context" (Streeter 1997, p.225)

"Such speculations naively assumed that telecommunication could magically resolve the power relations among people that caused racist, poverty, and international strife" (Streeter 1997, p.227)

Even when a particular communication technology changes the social structures, it does not necessarily mean that such changes will be progressive and liberating. Streeter argues that relations in social structures are created by people and can only be changed by the people themselves, suggesting that even if technology has changed some structures, the changes have been appropriated by the elite and incorporated in the production and reproduction of the dominant ideology: "The constrains were not caused by old technological limits, nor can they be eliminated by new technologies: they were caused by relationship between people and can be overcome only by changing relations between people" (Streeter 1997, p.240). Or, as Fiske has put it very succinctly: "Technology may determine what is shown, but society determines what is seen" (Fiske 1996, p. 221).

If technology's role in the society is determined both by its own characteristics and by the moderating characteristics of its social surroundings, what might be there that causes a particular technology to become a closed system, one-way communication, disseminating content which is controlled by the stakeholders whose primary concern is to advertise to the consumers or in the case of the government control its citizen through selective and strategic communications?

Arguing that one way communication by media companies (TV, cable, radio, movies) is a very important ingredient in the process of reproduction of the dominant ideology, because it is able to control the discourse by controlling the content and restricting the access to the discourse, Gitlin suggests that the centrally controlled one way communication (one-to-many) must disappear and be replaces by many-to-many communications if we wish to empower the masses (Gitlin, 1972, pp. 363). He further contends that a possible “revolutionary movement must aim to transform mass media by liberating communications technology for popular use (Gitlin, 1972, pp. 363). Apparently, Gitlin believes and posits the open communication (many-to-many) as a possible antidote to the hegemonic ideology.

Therefore, it can be argued that the communication technology, which is constantly modified and affected by the social structures in which it is embedded, while at the same time influencing and modifying those same social structures,  has the potential to shift or displace the center of gravity (i.e. the status quo, the habitus) through its characteristics of open communication, which  can induce mass communication amongst the masses themselves empowering them with many-to-many communication relatively outside of elites’ controls.

Constrained by the historical discourse and practicality of most of the communication technology used for one way communication and for profit making purposes, Schiller is skeptical that such technology can be of any benefit to the society: "The customary argument that commerce and profit seeking go hand-in-hand with social benefit, is still to be demonstrated after hundreds of years of contrary experience" (Schiller, p.71).

At this point I would like to argue that the newest media technology, the communication facet of the Internet, exhibits characteristics of open communication that could position it as potential antidote to hegemonic ideology. As it has been argued above, whoever controls the content can control the scope of the public discourse, and whoever controls the access to the mass communication technology can practically control the voices that can debate the already restricted content/discourse. Unfortunately, TV, radio and cable technologies have been socially (various social and institutional structures) constructed such that both content and access control are in the same hands.

However, the Internet, especially the website portion of it (ability to publish) and the email discussion lists exhibit characteristics contrary to those of earlier technologies (as shaped by the social structures). For example, almost anyone can publish anything on the Internet, relatively speaking, without the fear that the server hosting firms might block the website (apart from criminally related material). In addition, the masses, can freely organize into groups of citizens, consumers, special interests groups, hobbyists, etc., and advocate their causes openly. This is partially enabled by the ability to establish many-to-many communication via email discussion lists. These two examples show that the content is not necessarily controllable by corporate power, and that the access to that content is not restricted by any corporate power. As matters of fact, both are subject to the ability to pay for Internet access, however, many libraries provide free Internet access for interested individuals. From the traditional technologies, public cable access channels resemble the above cases. However, most communities seldom use public cable access channels. When used, they are marginalized by not being included in programming listings (e.g. TV Guide) with the rest of cable and broadcast channels.

What social conditions and circumstanced led to the development of the Internet technologies which seem to exhibits open content and open communication properties, unlike the TV, radio and cable that have remained one-way communication channels? Why haven’t then the same social structures and forces restricted various Internet technologies to be used for one-way communication only?

The apparent power to reach the masses, as well as the ability to interact with them, could not have escaped the elite. All of a sudden, as the number of Internet users increased manifolds each year, previously uninterested media corporations (there were repeated public claims that profit cannot be made with this new technology) invaded the Internet landscape, using it not much different than the TV: “Whether deceptively labeled as ‘entertainment,’ ‘news,’ ‘culture,’ ‘education,’ or ‘public affairs,’ TV programs aim to narrow and flatten consciousness—to tailor everyman’s world view to the consumer mentality, to placate political discontent, to manage what cannot be placated, to render social pathologies personal, to level class-consciousness” (Gitlin, 1972, pp.345). The obviousness of the above is that almost all commercial sites support their Internet presence by online advertising. Yes, one can choose to visit a web site only to be bombarded by advertising, similar to TV advertising. However, studies have shown that web site visitors are increasingly becoming aware and do not necessarily get influenced by advertisements. This is a bit different from the TV. A visitor can still view the page without wasting time, whereas on TV you either watch the commercials or need to switch the channel.

In other words, the Internet, fueled by the open content and open communication, in its infancy and during its development until mid 90s, before it become obvious that it can be used by corporation for making profit, was truly the liberating technology alluded by Gitlin.

To think that the elites were so naive to overlook Internet’s potential as mass medium is at best naivety itself. They could not have also overlooked the potential for the masses to utilize the Internet to organize themselves outside elite’s control, however, perhaps the elite thought that any such conflict should be domesticated as Gitlin suggests: “What permits it to absorb and domesticate criticism is not something accidental to the liberal capitalist ideology, but rather its core” (Gitlin, 1980, pp. 256). Then, it seems that the inevitable happened, as many times before: “The hegemonic ideology changes in order to remain hegemonic; that is the peculiar nature of the dominant ideology of liberal capitalism” (Gitlin, 1982, pp. 450).  The elite moved to utilize the open communication technology, taking control over various aspect of it. Internet users still have to access the Internet via commercial entities that use online advertising as a profit stream. Various mergers and acquisition have occurred between traditional media and online industry, successfully trapping the masses to a particular content. Yet, it is still easier to escape the online advertisers than those on TV.

Corporations find this very problematic, as it is hard to centrally control a technology that was build to be managed in distributed fashion. Therefore, they have turned more than ever before to manage the access to the Internet technology and control the Internet visiting habits (through content portals) of the masses. Despite these attempts by corporations, if a group of people wants an Internet presence, with potential readership/viewership of all who have access to the Internet, it can do so with minimal cost. The same cannot be said for the TV, the radio or cable. Whether the possibility for inexpensive presence on the Internet and its potential mass viewership will remain so, only the future will tell.

What could change? The unimaginable could happen. Governments can for example restrict who publishes what in their country by requiring licenses to operate a website. Obviously, for it to be effective the entire world has to enact the same laws since it is easy to move website servers around the world. Next, imagine that by some ‘strange’ imagination a judge rules that a US firm that provides Internet access can be held responsible for the content published by its customers. If such ruling is to be enforced, it could require that a corporation first approve each websites’ content. This could potentially lead various Internet access and Internet hosting providers to utilize their central role to their advantage.

Why was the Internet build with open communication in mind? Adherents of the theory of hegemony could argue that this is contrary to the theory. If the Internet contains such power that can be used as an antidote to hegemony, why did the elite allow it to be developed in the form it is?  Did they intent it or is it an unintentional byproduct of government's action to create communication network that can sustains nuclear attack by creating a very distributed communication network?

Conclusion

The Internet and its open communication and open content technologies and principles are still in the infancy. Whether the open concepts will remain part of the Internet in the future remains to be seen. If previous communication technologies are any indication, we might expect the same with the Internet. However, as I have attempted to show in this paper, the Internet communication technologies have more or less embedded in their technology some characteristics that lend themselves to be used for open communication where the masses can communicate amongst themselves without the corporate media’s oversight.

Claiming that there are embedded characteristics in a given technology sounds like technological determinism. That would be an oversight. One needs to look at the social, political, economical, and cultural factors that have helped construct those characteristics in the first place so they could be embedded in the underlying Internet technologies. Further, as time goes on, the social situatedness of the Internet technology could change and the social structures of the future might modify, change or even restricts the initially acquired and embedded open communication and open content characteristics of the Internet. Alternatively, if the open characteristics of the Internet take strong hold in society and overcomes the already entrenched hegemonic forces as they are embedded deeply in various social structures, it might empower the masses to shift and displace the status quo and thus bring forth more representative democracy.

References:

Bourdieu, P. (1990). The Logic of Practice. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. (pp.25-29, 52-65)

Fiske, J. (1996). Media matters: Race and Gender in U.S. Politics. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press

Gitlin, T. (1972). Sixteen Notes on Television and the Movement. In. G. White & C. Neuman (Eds). Literature in Revolution (pp. 335-366), NY: Holt, Rinehart, & Winston.

Gitlin, T. (1980). Chapter 10, “ Media Routines and Political Crises.” In Gitlin, The Whole World is Watching (pp. 249-269). Berkeley: University of California Press.

McLuhan interview, Playboy, March 1969, 53-74

Schiller, H.I. (1996). Information Inequality: The Deepening Social Crisis in America. New York - London: Routledge

Streeter, T. (1996). Selling The Air: A Critique of the Policy of Commercial Broadcasting in the United States. Chicago: University of Chicago press

Streeter, T. (1997). blue skies and strange bedfellows: the discourse of cable television. (In: The Revolution wasn't Televised, ed. Lynn Spigel and Michael Curtin: NY: Routledge)