The Mediation of Power

The Mediation of Power investigates how those in positions of power use and are influenced by media in their everyday activities. Each chapter examines this theme through an exploration of some of the key topics and debates in the field, including: - theories of media and power - media policy and the economics of information - news production and journalistic practice - public relations and media management - culture and power - political communication and mediated politics - new and alternative media - interest group communications - media audiences and effects. The debates are enlivened by first-hand accounts taken from over 200 high-profile interviews with politicians, journalists, public officials, spin doctors, campaigners and captains of industry. Tim Bell, David Blunkett, Iain Duncan Smith, Simon Heffer, David Hill, Simon Hughes, Trevor Kavanagh, Neil Kinnock, Peter Riddell, Polly Toynbee, Michael White and Ann Widdecombe are some of those cited.

Aeron Davis is a Senior Lecturer in Political Communication in the Department of Media and Communications, Goldsmiths College, London. He has published in the areas of political communication, media sociology, promotional culture and financial markets, and is the author of Public Relations Democracy (2002).

1. Introduction: Critical Engagements with Mediated Power 2. Media Policy: Communications and the Economic Inefficiencies of Market Liberalisation 3. Media Production: Discursive Practices, News Production and the Mobilisation of Bias in Public Discourse 4. Media Management and Public Relations: Public Media, Inter-Elite Conflict and Power 5. Culture, Discourse and Power: The Rediscovery of Elite Culture and Power in Media Studies? 6. Mediated Politics: The Mediation of Parliamentary Politics 7. New and Alternative Media: The Internet and the Parliamentary Public Sphere 8. Interest Groups and Mediated Mobilisation: Communications in the Make Poverty History Campaign (by Nick Sireau and Aeron Davis) 9. Media Audiences and Effects: The Question of the Rational Audience in the London Stock Exchange 10. Conclusions