Research traditions in dialogue: Communication studies in Latin America and Europe

COMMUNICATION STUDIES IN LATIN AMERICA AND EUROPE RESEARCH TRADITIONS IN DIALOGUE COMMUNICATION STUDIES IN LATIN AMERICA AND EUROPE RESEARCH TRADITIONS IN DIALOGUE EDITORS FERNANDO OLIVEIRA PAULINO GABRIEL KAPLÚN MIGUEL VICENTE MARIÑO LEONARDO CUSTÓDIO RESEARCH TRADITIONS IN DIALOGUE COMMUNICATION STUDIES IN LATIN AMERICA AND EUROPE Title: Research Traditions in Dialogue – Communication Studies in Latin America and Europe Editors: Fernando Oliveira Paulino, Gabriel Kaplún, Miguel Vicente Mariño and Leonardo Custódio Editorial Team: Fernando Oliveira Paulino, César Bolaño and Gabriel Kaplún (ALAIC) Miguel Vicente Mariño, Leonardo Custódio y Nico Carpentier (ECREA) Advisory board: César Ricardo Siqueira Bolaño and Nico Carpentier Published by: media XXI – Publishing, Research and Consulting Copyright reserved. This publication can be reproduced, transmit, totally or partially, by any electronic, mechanical means, photocopying, recording or other process without prior permission. 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Traseiras, 4000/291 Porto, Portugal Telephone: +351 225 029 137 1st Edition 2020 Printed ISBN: 978-989-729-214-9 e-ISBN: 978-989-729-215-6 RESEARCH TRADITIONS IN DIALOGUE COMMUNICATION STUDIES IN LATIN AMERICA AND EUROPE Table of contents A Transatlantic Dialogue for Future Communication Fernando Oliveira Paulino and Gabriel Kaplún..................................................9 Part 1: Functionalism...................................................................15 The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions Tanius Karam Cárdenas................................................................................17 The Functionalism in Communication Studies in Europe: its Functional Role in the Critique and its Attempts towards Perpetuity Antonio Castillo Esparcia and Alejandro Álvarez-Nobell....................................45 A Necessary Challenge for Communication: Thinking the Functionalism and Functionalists Pedro Russi..................................................................................................67 Part 2: Critical Theory......................................................................73 Critical Theory: The Bridge between the Political Economy of Communication and Cultural Studies Ruth de Frutos.............................................................................................75 The Political Economy of Latin American Communication Javier Torres Molina......................................................................................95 Notes on Political Economy and Critical Thought in Communication Studies in Europe and Latin America César Bolaño.............................................................................................107 Debate on Critical Theory and Political Economy of Communication Javier Torres Molina, César Bolaño and Ruth de Frutos......................................115 Part 3: Cultural studies..................................................................121 History, Debates and Primary References of Cultural Studies in Europe Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández Pérez and Filipa Subtil............123 Communication In, From and To Culture. Notes for an Assessment on Cultural Studies (in Communication) in Latin America: Trajectory, Themes and Critiques Marta Rizo.................................................................................................153 The International Nature of Cultural Studies Leonardo Custódio, Miguel Vicente Mariño, Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández Pérez, Filipa Subtil and Marta Rizo.............................179 Part 4: Alternativism.....................................................................189 A Historical and Comparative Perspective on the Studies on Alternative and Community Communication in Europe Alejandro Barranquero and Emiliano Treré...................................................191 Complexities of the Alternativism: Theory and Practice of the Alternative Currents in Communication in Latin America Lázaro M. Bacallao-Pino.............................................................................215 Alternative Communication in Europe and Latin America: So Far Away, Yet So Close Gabriel Kaplún, Alejandro Barranquero and Emiliano Treré...........................229 Part 5: Postcolonialism..................................................................241 Post-colonial Currents in the European Communication Studies. A Chance for Renewal? Sarah Anne Ganter and Félix Ortega............................................................243 De-Westernizing Communication Erick R. Torrico Villanueva...........................................................................255 A Debate on Post-colonialism and De-coloniality: Latin American and European Perspectives on Change and Hope Nico Carpentier, Sarah Anne Ganter, Félix Ortega and Erick Torrico.................275 Part 6: Feminism...........................................................................295 Gender and Communication: Advances and Setbacks in a Iberian Peninsula in Crisis Juana Gallego Ayala and Maria João Silveirinha............................................297 Gender Studies within the Communication Field in Latin America: A Brazilian Perspective Cláudia Lago, Mara Coelho de Souza Lago and Monica Martinez.....................321 Nuances of Feminism and Gender Studies in European and Latin American Communication Research Juana Gallego Ayala, Leonardo Custódio, Cláudia Lago, Mara Coelho de Souza Lago, Monica Martinez and Maria João Silveirinha...............................................341 INTRODUCTION 17 The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions Tanius Karam Cárdenas5 “Functionalism” is recognised as one of the traditions of thought in academic communication, sometimes referred as “functionalism in communication” or “functional perspective in communication”, or it is recognised as an “administrative current” or, at best, for its denotative component in English ‘mass communication research’. We may also recognise it as one of the “classic” currents within the communication or better described as “media communication” or “mass communication”. “Functionalism” was frequently a sort of cast in which one pours components, ideological features or interpretations of other matters, which as has resulted in a system not often clear, or integrated for that matter, and frequently would give room to confusion which would join together aspects that hadn’t a straight connection between them, or a theoretical structure that would contest other considerations. We will proceed with four tasks: firstly, we problematize some aspects of functionalist currents. For this, we will review some conventional handbooks about communication theory so that we can compare them with the fundaments of the functionalist paradigm in humanities and social fields. Also, to refer to some “classics” within the so-called “functionalism in communication”. Finally, we intend to pose a series of specifications on the presence of such paradigm within communication, as well as approach some notes to think about its update in our world of ideas about the media and new technologies nowadays. Even though social functionalism is no longer a fundamental reference, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t need contributions that might be useful covers from an empirical and psycho-social perspective on collective communication effects, what we consider as the central object in contributions for the “functional perspective” in studies on collective communication, or as it was once known “mass communication”. 5 Professor at the Autonomous University of Mexico City, Mexico, [email protected], [email protected] 18 Tanius Karam Cárdenas Presentation: what is functional and “functionalism in communication” in theory books. The first group of researchers of collective communication in the U.S. organized themselves as something known as Mass Communication Research (MCR) which would define what they were: researchers of the social and political psychology concerned with this new emergent object within the context of the industrial society, especially since the first world war (1914-1918). To get to know the history of “functionalism in communication,” we must make a brief review on Mexican theory books (even though we might believe this characterization appears in books on analogue goals at the time). In the seventies, there were two books in circulation that were highly used, from professor Florence Toussaint, in 1975, and Antonio Paoli (1990/1977). They have entitled their chapters “functionalism in communication” and have disseminated, in this decade, a tricotomic vision of communication: functionalism, Marxism, structuralism as clearly distinct currents, distinguished to explain communication and focus on different contexts of the so-called “communication process”. We must say, on another problem ahead, that we don’t know any updates these authors might have done on the first edition. We must say that this kind of books provided a disadvantage and a virtue. The first refers to its extensive generalization and schematization, not giving enough attention to details or explanation; thus, not binding the authors’ contexts, terms and goals. Some might defend that these books are undergraduate and, therefore, the educational commitment might explain the lack of precision, explanation or detail. As for virtue, it was the first organization principal of an object that still seemed limited (mass communication and mass media). Sometimes one wants to bind with other dimensions of communication (interpersonal, institutional, intercultural); offer a list of fundamental references, homogenize in some way the education on communication theories in some schools. In the eighties, there is an interesting version of an important disseminator of theories within the Ibero-american field, the Catalan Miquel de Moragas (1981), probably the first European author to give attention to the academic knowledge in Latin America, as well as having pursued with regional and historical criteria that allowed to organize theories not from rigid conceptual differences however from wider social and historical procedures. In what refers to mass communication The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 19 studies in the U.S., Moragas (41) involves Harold Lasswell, who favours the demarcation of the object and its components (resumed in the unequivocal “Lasswell paradigm” from the late forties), virtues of those we now point out its defaults: having only focused on the effects and from “an interpersonal communication model”. Nonetheless, the previous name “functionalism” appears in one of the subtitles, linked to Roberto K. Merton – who, becomes the bridge between the social theory and collective communication –, and the best expert in communication, as said by Moragas, must be integrated in the “functionalist current of North American sociology” from the forties. In the paragraph dedicated to Merton, Moragas mentions the guidelines of “functionalism of the media”, synthesized in two “classic” functions: to grant prestige or status, impose social norms; and a dysfunction: the narcotization, or dormancy that mass media might suffer from. Here we wore about one of the “contributions” that we might recognize in this current, precisely the establishment of such functions (and dysfunctions) as a means to recognize more than what the media are, what they do. In the nineties, at least in the Mexican case, we must mention José Carlos Lozano’s (1996) book. It is the most quoted author on Mexican bibliographies of theories (CF. Galindo, 2008c: 94). He says the same about positive focused and “functional analysis”. Lozano elaborates a sociological perspective of communication, and he starts with a very common educational question which puts the positivist before the critique and the quantitative before qualitative. Lozano uses the word “Functionalist” to refer to the communication theory in the U.S.. However the difference to books in the decade before is that he includes more layers, he makes an overview more socially focused, and looks to bind the basis of functionalism with its applications in communication, concluding in a basic operation: to identify functionsdysfunctions in institutions in general and in mass communication in particular. We also must mention that the term “functionalism in communication”, or these researches’ phase (between the thirties and the sixties), is frequently used to identify communication “models”. For instance, in her book, Claudia Benassini (20-24) – which in reality is an anthology of key texts introduced and anthologized by her – establishes in each chapter a particular and specific model, has it was one of the explanatory goals and an anchor in comprehending the specificity of each author. The problem is that these chapters were very brief and constrained; there is not a proper reading with sources, nor do we see the author’s evolution. Unfortunately, this is a constant with the Mexican books. 20 Tanius Karam Cárdenas Neither Benassini nor Lozano, in the quoted books, make references to Lasswell or Wright, nor do they a critical and contextualized reading of them. However, they generally refer them from other authors, AngloSaxon disseminators – whose role is not lesser – Dennis McQuail and Melvin DeFleur, which they tend to refer to as the central authors of the supposed functionalism, and it wasn’t supposed to relate to the work of McQuail and DeFleur. Once again, we must consider the educational and pedagogical intent of Benassini and Lozano’s texts. However, it is important to highlight that certain discursive strategies in these texts might result in conceptual and epistemological impressions. Late in the past century, there is another book that will be highly quoted (Mattelart and Mattelart, 1997), in which the famous Belgium couple, who have a great historical presence in Latin America, make a decomposition of positivism and functionalism in the book’s first chapters: they highlight the biological conception of the world in the nineteenth century, as well as talk about their ties with the capitalist entrepreneurial spirit at the time, and of the development of the rail network, and a strong lineal vision of progress as a total. From the 20th century, they explain what is considered by the “new world’s empiricism”, including the famous Chicago School and the MCR, thankfully not called “functionalism”. The Mattelarts point the origin of MCR in Lasswell and his text of 1927, Propaganda Techniques in Word War, where we see the famous image of a hypodermic needle, the first contemporary “theory of mass communication”. Of this century, it is interesting to mention Juan José Igartua and María Luisa Humanes’ (2004) text. This book, certainly one of the most complete, dedicated to the study of the media and with a clear psycho-social perspective (more than social). This book is divided into four sections, of which the most important is the second, dedicated to the study of social communication effects, firstly from a general perspective and secondly from applying the psycho-social to the network of effects of the media and the distinct consequences that might happen at an individual level as well as in group. Within the theoretical reviews of the first section, the authors entitle a subchapter (2004: 112) «functionalist sociology of the mass communication». These authors from Salamanca elaborate a useful synthesis: First, it’s recognized that the functionalist sociology of collective communication, besides being a theory in general, is sociology and MCR is, in fact, an aspect of the functionalist analysis of the social structure. To this “sociology” is granted an instrumental vision, in the sense that it’s intended to solve problems of the groups in power. Mass media are The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 21 «procedures according to which groups of specialists resource to technical fabrications to disseminate a symbolic content to a vast, heterogeneous audience and geographically disperse audience» (Janowitz and Scholze quoted by Iguarta and Humanes, 112). They consider the main object to be the effects, and those further elements of the communication process are thought as to how they may better the impact of communication. The methodologies used are empirical to know most objectively and systemically about how media are an influence. To close this chapter, we now analyze two of the most famous books, both written by English speakers: British professor Dennis McQuail (1997/1985), author of a prolific repertory in English even though his bibliography in Spanish is comparatively smaller6. Without a doubt, the most known in the Latin American academic field is the theory text we’re observing. On the other hand, the North American Melvin DeFleur together with Canadian Sandra Ball-Rokeach have written Theories of Mass Communication (2001/1983) and have made this one of the most important books on communication theory7. But we certainly cannot take the importance and presence of these authors’ texts in our knowledge of media communication. When one read the indexes of both books, we see the term “structural-functionalism” appear in McQuail text and are quoted by Robert K. Merton and Charles Wright. When presenting the approach on “structural functionalist”8 (McQuail, 98-101), one recognizes the bind with the functionalist sociological vision that is wider in terms of explaining the recurrent and institutionalized activities using social necessities. The media needs are related to social needs in terms of continuity, order, integration, etc. the importance of media lies on the contribution they make to these wider and general goals for social 6 According to the database Infoamérica (http://www.infoamerica.org/teoria/mcquail1.htm) there was edited in Spanish, within an extensive bibliography in English, the following: Sociología de los medios masivos de comunicación, Paidós, Buenos Aires, 1969; Modelos para el studio de la comunicación de masas, Paidós, Barcelona, 1991; La acción de los medios. Los medios de comunicación y el interés público, Amorrortu, Buenos Aires, 1998. 7 Once again, according to Infoamérica (http://www.infoamerica.org/teoria/defleur1.htm), it was elected in 1999, at a query of AEJMC (Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication), the most influent text of the author ‘Milestones in Mass Communication Research’, and one of the ten most influent books of the twentieth century on communication. However, DeFleur is better known for other books. According to Infoamérica, this is the only book of the Canadian author that has been translated into Spanish. 8 In theory it is important to make precise and be careful to not call in the same way similar words, terms or concepts. Such is the case with “functionalism” and “structural functionalism”. Ritzer (2002: 116) clarifies that usually, structural and functionalist appear together. In the case of communication theory, we don’t know any case of using the expression “communicative structural functionalism”, perhaps, among other reasons, because structuralism is considered a tradition with certain characteristics. Meanwhile, Ritzer’s comment allows us to see how the expression “functionalism” and “structuralism functionalism” require an explanation and adjustments, for instance, one can study the social structures without considering the functions for other structures. Likewise, 22 Tanius Karam Cárdenas stability, which is the main focus. The structural-functionalist theory, according to the British author, doesn’t have to count on the ideological orientation of the media; the media, as said by McQuail, are described as self-managed and self-corrective, with some negotiated politically institutionalized rules. He also highlights some of the problems with the focus on the concept of “function” itself, sometimes associated with purpose, consequence, requirement or expectation. Hence the expression “function of information” may refer to different things. On the other hand, at the end of the text written by the North American authors is also mentioned the structural-functionalism (McQuail, 409) to compare with the “paradigm of the conflict”. The axis of collective communication theory seems to move between the “magical bullet” and theories from the “selective influence” (McQuail, chapters 7 and 8), concepts which gather some of the theories we know as “Cultivation theory”. Uses and gratification and Agenda Setting, to which we’ll dedicate some lines at the end of the text. When we refer to the analysis functional-structural by the authors (McQuail, 407), they point to an organic vision of the social, because media are a necessary product of the mass society, of a complex society that can no longer manage its interactions from the interpersonal communication, as it happened, for instance, in pre-industrial societies or less developed and less specialized in its productive efforts. Until now, we can say that there is a connection between English and Latin American books. We haven’t visited detailed references to the original authors. In a general way, the books from the seventies are certainly able to reconstruct a stage in the investigation and the theory that there wasn’t an academic community that would allow to establish agreements or bind the knowledge under well-defined lines. Also, frequently the difficulty on establishing agreements or consensus has been strengthened by this immense effect, referred by Galindo (2008c) as a structural imbalance of knowledge between the production of academic knowledge, what is produced by researchers, what teachers read and then teach so that we can finally conclude the process in which the student community may identify, recognize and use9. A network of professors of communication theory (Cf. Galindo, coord. 2008) has synthesized knowledges or traditions within the history of thought, as well as problematized basic aspects in each scientific and academic thinking source within the history of communication one can examine the functions of several social processes that might not adopt a structural form. Structural functionalism presents Ritzer many ways societal functionalism (italics in Ritzer’s original) worry with the study of great structures and social institutions of society, its interrelations and influence on the actors. 9 Even though this is another matter, we must mention that the education-dissemination- The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 23 ideas. This group postulated one of the hypotheses for the reading of functionalist sociology in communication, in which we intend to resume and fundament the idea of the misunderstanding or confusion between “functionalism” and what has been called “functionalism in communication”, especially in some of the theory books10. One of this confusion’s main components has a strong ideological context, which for two or three decades has promoted an interpretation of knowledge, social sciences, its methods and applications within the Latin American field of communication. From the consequences of this phenomenon, in reality, during this time there have been little reading, and often in a distorted way, of the North American authors, especially the functionalist tradition of the U.S., in which to meet the pertinence of its ideas, these were considered through its critique and reaction against its illustrative place, in which was intended to find a relationship between what was ideologically represented in the U.S. and the content of these and other theories. On the other hand, there were other theories or currents (Marxism in Latin America, for instance) that were given greater recognition during the sixties and seventies. They’ve been more disseminated and worked as a filter or an interpretive frame to evaluate any academic or scientific production of knowledge with a paragon sometimes almost exclusive of Marxism or materialism dialectical-historical. One of the effects of these misunderstandings, which were partly being solved, was to concede synonymy to concepts that didn’t have it. Or form wide clusters where was mediated diversity and heterogeneity, for instance, see in the ‘Agenda Setting’ theory a functionalist expression, or constrict the Spiral of Silence by Neuman (which is not even a theory from the U.S.), frequently without mediating clarifications on what is proposed. Another extreme example of what we want to say was the case of some lethargic professor (of theories) that didn’t hesitate in locating, for lack of better location within the famous triparty division that was made for communication theory in the seventies, the famous reception of theories as part a more complex system, for instance: first, the curricular subsystem: the placement of theories and how we engineer plans and programs, as well as the conditions to create these programs. Second, an institutional subsystem where we could problematize institutions with certain characteristics that value this kind of subjects and value its profile of outflow. One more subsystem of distribution that sometimes explains it, not by academic criteria as we find in every other book, even though some publishers have greater prestige or are more successful in putting their books in the main university bookshops or the city. 10 We may mention, for instance, two very important books of the seventies: Toussaint, Florence, Crítica a la información de masas, 2nd ed., Mexico: Trillas, 1ª ed., 1975; 2ª ed., 1981); and Paoli, Antonio, Comunicación e información. Perspectivas teóricas, Mexico, Trillas; the first three editions are respectively of 1977, 1979, 1983. Which correspond with the once classic triparty division of the communication theories (“functionalism”, “structuralism”, “Marxism”). One can find both book covers and indexes in the Mexican data base for communication studies by professor Raúl Fuentes Navarro: http://ccdoc.iteso.mx/ 24 Tanius Karam Cárdenas Marshal McLuhan in “functionalism”. Why? Because he would write in English, speak of technology and had a particularly distinct speech, to be considered necessary in Latin America. Furthermore, his famous aphorisms were an easy target for any speech against what knowledge had to be in this region in these critical years of the Cold War. Once not being possible to bind with “Marxism in communication” or with “structuralism in communication”, the only location left for McLuhan was this hotchpotch which was sometimes revealed as “functionalism in communication” where was located the undesirable from the north and the imperialist country. It was part of a story in which we want to believe. Some part of it has restored these excesses, generalizations and bigotries. On the functionalist paradigm in humanities and social sciences Beyond communication or the specific context of MRC, “functionalism” is a “paradigm” in the classic sense of the term which crosses several sciences as it is anthropology, sociology or linguistics, and that one might share some premises, many times its differences in usage are strong and noticeable, for instance, between what we know as “anthropological functionalism”, “social functionalism” and “linguistic functionalism”, even though all functionalisms are debtors of the development of biology in the nineteenth century, its explosion in social sciences was given in the thirties and forties. One must revise what is a paradigm under Kuhn’s (1971) vision: a reference and an allusion to the establishment of a criteria on what is understood as knowledge, and which is endorsed by specific communities, which recognize as best principal for adaptation for the gathered premises in this “paradigm”, and which has a historical, social and cultural component, since it can be replaced by a better one. This paradigm is a conundrum and a way to organize it and has implications to whom decides to move towards or away from this convention. The first setting established in functionalism is the same foundation of sociology and its trajectory in the nineteenth century, in authors as of classics like Augusto Comte, Herbert Spencer and Emile Durkheim, who refer and develop the idea of society as an organism. Comte is more than a sociologist. He is a social philosopher who concerns about the negative consequences of social exchanges and transformations drawn from the industrialization. Spencer, as the biologist he was, The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 25 highlights the idea of necessities and its way of satisfaction, which seem like a principle of biological functionalism. He was also concerned with the difference between structure and function, which might help to understand social behaviour. Durkheim also worried about the negative consequences and will be looking to overcome the tension between the conservatives of his time, who proposed to return to more primitive ways of organization, and the radicals, who revendicated as the only way of a total revolution able to introduce a new system. In The Division of Labor in Society (1893), Durkheim already presents an idea that can be considered as “functionalist” to establishing a difference between societies of ‘mechanical solidarity’, cohesion by the participation of individuals and societies of ‘organic solidarity’, of a higher complexity, higher specificity, for each individual has to develop a more specific task. Furthermore, this book defines the social division of labour according to the level of specialization (Cf. Ritzer, 201: 228-9). Changes in labour have had heavy implications for the social structure and where it is most felt is in the types of solidarity mentioned before. In the case of anthropology, the names associated with functionalism and also to the relationship with structural-functionalism are those of Bronislaw Malinowsky (1884-1942) from Poland and the British A.R. Radcliffe-Brown. Malinowsky is considered the “founder” of Functionalism as well as the developer of Ethnography as a science per se. He has contributed with the idea that anthropologists would go to the “place” of origin of the societies studied. He has developed, in his anthropological work, an approach to try to bind the most quantity of features, as at the same time highlighted that the immediate features of observation had to be connected to other structural data as kinship systems. He also associated his work with psychoanalysis, particularly with the Freudian Oedipus Complex, of which he claims that one can’t define it in general and had to object of its interpretation in specific cultural contexts, as he mentions in Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1992). On the other hand, anthropologist Radcliffe-Brown is considered to be the creator of Structural-Functionalism. Influenced by Durkheim’s work, he has generated several concepts having in mind to establish some scientific status to Ethnography. In his work, he has dedicated to particularly to the establishment of generalities within the social order, in an analogue way, as the organs of our body work in all for the functioning of the organism. The Structure is seen as an organized disposition of parts or components, a sort of people considered not only as an individual organism but also, and above all, as someone who 32 Tanius Karam Cárdenas investigation” (v.b. Pineda 2010; Lozano 1996). When one reads the work of Schramm14, whom the academic universe wouldn’t hesitate in calling him a “functionalist”, we see, in fact, concerns about the effect of the collective communication that doesn’t follow Parsons’ method, nor do they necessarily follow up with a “functional’’ program. Hence, perhaps Schramm has been responsible for helping to disseminate an imaginarium of a thought on communication in the United States through anthologies, articles, etc.. This doesn’t mean Schramm didn’t know functionalism, but that it is imprecise the way one calls him this epithet merely because he is from the United States, wrote in English or because he mentioned a descriptive vision of the media. Another component of the misunderstanding “functionalist in communication” is when one intends to qualify it as a synonym of mass communication in the U.S. we see how easy it is (especially in the sixties and eighties) to extrapolate or do bias readings bound to the production in English and/or from the U.S. with ideologies, attitudes and mainly in opposition to production in the region and objectives, supposedly, found between the U.S. and the region’s necessities. Here we must point out – quickly remembering the linguistic and narrative structuralism – that the signification is a logical operation focused on the opposition, which for this case can be represented as <left–right>, <capitalist– socialist>, <bourgeois–proletariat>, <North American sociology– Latin American sociology>. Once again, to Galindo (2008: 17-18), the Latin American Field hasn’t dialogued with sociological functionalism, but with a series of images and over-representation, at a level that was never understood what the functionalist proposal was and was, or by chance, disqualified. “Functionalism” – in its broader sense – as worked as a lure, a reference to speak of other things and matters, a way to build not from an existing proposal, but the opposite of an existing one. There wasn’t any interest – at least by communication of the sixties and seventies – by a systemic construction to analytically build a study program, because an also comfortable and clear opposition, though highly imprecise, was replicated. Many scholars in the region wanted, particularly by these decades, to see in communication an element to perfectly oppose to what was interpreted in the representation of “functionalism in communication”. There wasn’t a formal dialogue with 14 We’ve synthesised a part of the sheet from the Infoamerica site that is dedicated to the author: “Analyses, for instance, the effects of violence in media (Television in the Lives of Our Children, 1961), the ethical dimension of the journalistic communication in practice (Responsibility in Mass Communication, 1957) and participates in the current of thinkers that includes Rogers, Lerner, etc., which formulates the basis for theories disseminators of development, that are the embryonic state of theory of the Latin American thought on communication for development (Mass Media and National Development, 1964”. (Free translation) The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 33 Parsons, Merton, nor with some functional reverberations of authors who have had dialogued with the matrix of thought as happens with Habermas, who equivocally is called of “critic” just because he studied with the parents of the Frankfurtian thought and let’s not forget his revision on Parsons in the first volume of his very interesting The Theory of Communicative Action; or as happens with Luhmann, unprecedented and unique though also a debtor of Parsons line of thought. We cannot deny the importance of Parsons in communication, though not media communication bound to the idea of mass communication research, but the broader theory, as happens with these two German philosophers who place the action in the center of the reflection. Communicative action, or communication systems and what they do is not to observe the effects or the uses and gratifications of media, but it offers us a much more complex and open theory than the perspective of those social theories on media communication. The concept of media we take from Luhmann, has a very distinct configuration and a very particular conceptual framework: for instance, Luhmann establishes a difference between ‘society’ and social system, somewhat broader and holds other features as is ‘organization’ and ‘interaction’. Society is a specific type of social system; the social system comprises internally all communications; there is no communication outside the city, which demarks the limits of this complexity. (Cf. Corsi, Esposito and Baraldi, 1996:152 and ss.). To Luhmann, society is pure communication, in this sense, he has a more communicological vision, not reduced to a sociological vision of the media. Luhmann doesn’t think it is possible to keep on permanently bargaining (as Habermas ants), nor does he believe in the theories coming from society as a contract or an agreement between human beings, because these theories don’t realize the social complexity. Human beings don’t depend on each other (as in a pre-industrial society), but they depend on a “superior order” which is precisely the communication system called society. It concedes it a certain appeal that might be considered “cynicism”, a set of operations looking to self-reproduce. What matters is the system, that flux of information, beyond the personal decision of individuals. Communication is not just a matter of “intention” or moral compass (good communication versus bad communication), but configurations, positions and relationships within the system. It is inevitable to detect a parsonian influence in Luhmann, though not functionalist nor as a sociologist of communication, thought derives from this area. Thus, we believe that one of the consequences of the reduced “relative” visions – as Vidales relentlessly calls them –, which intends to be 34 Tanius Karam Cárdenas highly “educational”, is that they lose these nuances and allow, at a theoretical level at least, a less differentiated comprehension of the phenomena bound to communication. It is down to the discussion to understand if part of what we can criticize about the academic thought can be explained within this pretension that narrows it down and in which to obtain an immediate knowledge of something that one needs to present as “practical”, it’s deprived of its density and context, of its contradictions and its specific internal dynamics, as in the case of functionalism. On some “classic” authors. Reinterpretation on the communication perspective in the U.S. The “functionalist” current, or more precisely the social and psychological tradition in the study of the effects of media, is considered as a historical tradition. More than a beam of Communication Theory, its context is more restrained and specific: at the level of communication (the social), of a more specific object (the media) and a type of study (the effects). Within these directions, not those of Communication in general, one must bring upon unique authors who afterwards, in the official report, disseminated by authors such as Wilbur Schramm (1980), rise under the status of “founding fathers”. We do not detract from whoever we mention. We intend to always place them within the most specific study area, rather than the general one. Harold Lasswell certainly has his merit in so to be called as a “founding father”. He proposes his famous “paradigm” in his famous text of 1948, and with it, he brings upon the first contemporary “program” for the study of communications: complete, succinct and visionary, according to perspectives at the time and with great potential for development. This author, more than a “functionalist author”, is a social analyst of some phenomena new at the time, as that he made on propaganda, in 1927. Being born in Illinois, he hadn’t followed the dominant tradition of Chicago School, though it represents the empirical investigation of the social and begins to emerge from the sociological functionalism since it is more structural, theoretical and abstract. It is what disseminators of the seventies, like Paoli Bolio or Toussaint would equivocally call “functionalism in communication” and in reality is the beginning of the empirical tradition on the effect of media, not intending to form general theories, but theories validated by the empirical analysis. Lasswell begins developing theories based on data to describe the way The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 35 the media functions but under a psychological or sociological concern. Here the main study object is not the media per se, but the public opinion which, though related to the effect of media, is not a synonym. It’s important to notice that the recognition of the structuralfunctionalist theory presumes the implication of social media as sociological and political actors within the public sphere, though subjected to the descriptive and not to the processes intervening in the capitalist logic of creation of the media and the entry barriers that presume media to be exposers of social elite as control instruments and, so, must be controlled. This aspect will become important and reprehensible from the Latin American end, which clouds its advantages and contributions to a perspective also important of the social knowledge on the media. Another author of undeniable merit on his contribution is Paul Lazarsfeld. He takes part in the project that, in some way, origins the investigation of collective communication in the U.S., the Princeton Project in 1939, where radio audiences are known through empirical methods. Its pretension is not theoretical, though it generates theories based on data. His contribution is also methodological. Lazarsfeld immigrated into the U.S. already baring a very strong education which included maths and physics (which do not reflect much on his reading of communication). The largest part of his academic work was made when he was a professor in the University of Columbia (1940-1970) when he kept a strict collaboration with Robert K. Merton, with whom he wrote joint articles on communication. Thus, not being called a “founding father” he would certainly fit the parameters, is one of them. From his several types of research, the most quoted on books are The People’s Choice15, where he studies the electoral conduct during the seven months previous to the Presidential commissions. In his research, the authors (given the research is pursued alongside Berelson and Gaudet) used very extensive and stratified panels on public opinion for successive consultation. In this study, they associate the voters’ personality, their education, criteria and the influence of the media to their decision. This author has everything to be canonized and justifies the appliance of the functionalist label since among his contributions he establishes characteristics of the functions and dysfunctions of media, which we see in every book on communication. The name Lazarsfeld 15 There was a translated version of this book in Spanish (El pueblo elige. Cómo decide el pueblo en una campaña electoral, 1962, Buenos Aires. Ediciones 3), which unfortunately wasn’t published again in Spanish. The book is a “focal study” on the decision making process during a Presidential campaign in the U.S.. in this book the authors look to find empirical support to study the direct influence of media in voters’ intention of the vote. 36 Tanius Karam Cárdenas is also associated to one of the classic theories on communication, the famous ‘two-step flow of communications’ or ‘double-flow’, about the process of influence, which derives from his book, written in 1955, together with Katz, Personal Influence: The part played by people in the flow of man communications. This book is also a product of empirical research where the mechanisms of analysis of the influence of media on opinion leaders and the assembly of public opinion are reasserted and perfected. These authors break with some precedents and limit the value of the media influence, which gives it an unorthodox perspective on a vision that is optimistic typical of “functionalist” thinkers. We depart from an assumption that the expression “functionalism in communication” has tried to gather under the same term different phenomena. On one hand, the development and academic success of functionalism (which doesn’t imply either communication or media). On the other hand, the development of a tradition on collective communication research, which hadn’t formally dialogued with functionalism (neither sociological nor anthropological). At last, a “field”, or better said, a few universities that make a considerable effort to justify, legitimize, substantiate, make visible or give it a higher consistency than that of an object of knowledge, to the development of mass media after the Second World War, as happens with Schramm. Communication researchers in the U.S., have known “functionalism” without a doubt, though as an atmosphere or environment, but not as a “communication school”. The term “functionalism” was a way to name what came “from the outside” to justify a field or, as in the case of Latin America, to generate a principle of identity of something that didn’t exist, though it was thought this was the academic field of communication, or the Communication Theory, as the title of the book we quote from Schramm (The Science of Human Communication) which has a greater pretension than that it offers: a vision towards the comprehension of one of the levels of human communication (the social) and a set of phenomena, certainly scientific, though based on very specific scientific subjects as it is sociology and psychology. Wilbur Scharmm (1982: 6-8) considers Kurt Lewin and Carl Hovland – who, unlike those mentioned before, are psychologists– to be also founding fathers. These authors didn’t mention the media, nor claimed a functional theory of media. Lewin made considerable approaches to the process of influence within the groups. Instead of seeing in his objects as contexts of the appliance, he wants to see them from the media. On the other hand, Hovland was interested mainly in persuasion phenomena in small groups, the processes of forming individual The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 37 opinion within interactions. His work has, among other purposes, that of knowing what makes one change opinions and its conduct. The author realized the method limitations which forced him into making research on more or less homogenous groups (soldiers, men, women, youngsters, in cantonment) and was aware of these slants in his measurements. We owe him the ‘sleeper effect’: the effects of a message can be more persuasive or weaker in its reception and after a certain time. One of the most important to these classic references is a text originally in the prestigious Public Opinion Quarterly (Nº 24), in 1960, where the author, Charles Wright (1985/1960) makes one of the clearest and expectable contributions of the “functional perspective” in collective communications, as it was an inventory of such functions-dysfunctions in different plans and levels. It is perhaps the most emblematic text for collective communication. In the 1960 text, he mentions Merton and uses a more precise referent to speak of functional analysis. Furthermore, there is a theoretical and methodological intend in the text which articulates wider levels of the reflection with specific aspects. This text does not only intends to make a theoretical contribution as it also questions about the possibility to empirically validate the basic question that presents (1985:77): “What are the functions and dysfunctions, manifested and latent of mass communication, vigilance (news), correlation (publishing activity) between society and sub-groups, transmission of culture and entertainment to the individual and cultural systems?”. We’ve said here that what some disseminators called “functionalism in communication” is, in fact, a non-systemic gathering by who wanted to see similarities or proximity to authors to whom the only thing in common was that they were from the U.S. and wrote originally in English. We can understand the educational intention – especially in Mexican books, which gave little attention to details and minutiae and thought of audiences of undergraduates or introducing to who wanted to share the knowledge of the most important in communication. However, as we’ve also understood, it is not possible to find similarities between functionalist sociologists and anthropologists already mentioned, the so-called “founding fathers” and other authors such as Everett Rogers and Maxwell McCombs, Jay G. Blumer and Elihu Katz, Michael Gurevitch or George Gerbner and his “Pennsylvania School”. For instance, the famous chain of uses and gratifications, as says Galindo (2008:21) “is closer to the individual functionalism of Anthropology, and in more than one sense to psychology than to functionalist sociology. But 38 Tanius Karam Cárdenas in anyhow they all fit under the same label: it is functionalist”. (Free translation) And the problem is not just in labelling in general, but in misunderstandings and inaccuracies within groups of functionalists. We highlight two: first, the case of professor Everett M. Rogers (19312004), creator of diffusionism, gives the example of the tension between the academic speech on what was politically incorrect and what is not. Rogers doesn’t speak of “functionalism in communication”, some disseminators include it. Diffusionism would give elements to a critique on a certain “functional”, “administrative” perspective of communication, because it was of interest to associate it to an idea of “development”, though it was bound to capacitation, cultural imperialism, etc. In this situation, contextual or cultural questions were not very much considered, as it was thought of a homogenous success which could by itself bring upon the myth of development and economic growth. Even though there could be reasons to criticize diffusionism, the emblematic Luis Ramiro Betrán16 (an equivalent founder of this line of thought in Latin America), one of its most important disciples, had, within time, to make some revendications and adjustments in favour of his master not to be tossed in the old idealizing conception of technology, and advocate that Rodgers had a broader idea of development and technology not strange to the idea of social change. Beltrán dedicated some texts towards these nuances and recognized, perhaps for the first time, the importance and pertinence of Rogers’ objective. One year after Raúl Fuentes Navarro’s (2005) perishing, a sort of non-official chronicler in the academic field of the Mexican communication also dedicates a text to nuances and reservations to this paradigm on development, and what at a time was anathematized (neutrality, objectivism, empirical data) is now recognized. Perhaps the most extreme case of misunderstandings and overinterpretations “in favour of” or “against” a “functional” vision, where for instance one would encapsulate everything technological, was that we gathered against Marshall MacLuhan. Some lethargic professor of the eighties (whose name, for obvious reasons, we’ve omitted), who by the lack of qualifications and a frame, and since spoke of technology and wrote in English, had no problem in putting the author of The Gutenberg Galaxy in the discursive pool of functionalism. 16 We try to synthetize a review on the contributions and readings of this important author in “Variantes en la comunicación para el Desarrollo. A propósito de Luis Ramiro Beltrán”. In Metacomunicación, Year 3, Nº 5, July-December 2013. Puebla. Mexico: BUAP, pp. 36-64. http:// revistametacomunicacion.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/revista-metacomunicacic3b3nnc2b042.pdf The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 39 It is an extreme case where it is necessary for the component of precision, history revision and the analysis of processes of the ideas’ (editorial, curricula, congress, etc.) circulation and diffusion as a necessary component under a conceptual light. Beyond the equivocal and an example on the pertinence Once the equivocal theme is resolved, it is important to place the meanings not only of “functionalism in communication”, but also of specific traditions for the study of collective communication which may be integrated within a paradigm that is more than “functionalist” which can be associated to an epistemology (a positive one), (empirical) methods and particular subjects that contribute with a solid knowledge to the study of some objects within the collective communication. The sociological functionalism and the structural functionalism as focal subjects begin to lose strength in the seventies and there is a significant ascension of qualitative methodologies, which will become a great study current towards more economical and political, or cultural aspects of communication. To close our work we want to propose one of the focal subjects of “the second generation”, that is the tradition on studies that developed a more complex vision of the effects of media, though surely one of the most important in its dissemination and development, where we see a way to upgrade the movement of a classic theory in sociology of collective communication, which explains some other aspects associated to social communication as it is public opinion. The theory of Agenda Setting embeds within “functionalism in communication” on empirical studies for the study of the effects of media. This theory is “based” on the known research made by Maxwell McCombs and Donald Shaw on the role of media in the elections of 1968 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where they’ve studied what voters better knew or better located. It came, in 1972, in the prestigious Public Opinion Quarterly (Vol. 36, 1972). In that same year, Shaw and McCombs developed the study methodologies according to modifications to the sample and the type of information treatment. The original aim of this theory consisted in analyzing the cognitive effects of the electoral campaign on public opinion. Hence, they studied a dimension of the analysis of the effects, the cognitive dimension. In its approach, the theory explained the correlation between the range of media coverage, and if people see history as being important or not. 40 Tanius Karam Cárdenas This research was based on a query to indecisive voters. Since then, this theory has been the basis for the development of hundreds of studies to prove this “agenda effect” which consists precisely, as mentioned in theory, not in telling what to do, but what to think and talk about. We can exemplify the contribution of studies about the effects with what happened with the theory of Agenda Setting, which turns out to be not only a theory on collective communication, as it is, above all, one of the effects or environment that is Public Opinion (another of the most important terms within these focal subjects), to which is also associated other components of information production, as it is the processes of news selection. It is to say that with development, there have been integrated several focal aspects and accentuations to this theory, that demonstrates a degree of effectiveness in the collective communication theory. There are several levels in this theory, from the strict study of the cognitive effects (about what one must “think”) to more valued and affective situations oriented within the characteristics of an object or matter. The famous key-definition of this theory has been equally paraphrased in different ways, as this version suggested by McCombs and Estrada in 1997 (quoted by Kiousis, S. and M. McCombs, 38): “perhaps the media don’t just tell us what to think, but also about how and what to think about something, including what to do about it”. (Free translation) Since the theory emerged, there have been protocols, designs that put to the test theories or axioms that origin it, one of the most emblematic experiences within the psycho-social tradition for the study of the media effects. Iyengar and Kinder (quoted by Iguarta and Humanes, 253), for instance, have done different experiments in the eighties to find that the cognitive effects in political campaigns could be transferred to the media, or more specifically speaking, to the theme of credibility of the information on news programs on TV. The theory has gained a certain theoretical flexibility, as Cecilia (1999) assays in her reading, not only oriented to questions of the public’s perception but also to the possibility to bind it with the sociology of news production and seeing the effect of agenda, not only in audiences, as well as in the news producers. Also, to different readings that highlight some variables (Cf. Stefaan Walgravel and Peter Van Aelst, 2006). Or still yet to applications beyond the specific study of media, like that of Rodríguez Díaz (2004), with a prologue of McCombs and in which is suited the transference or prominence of a type of agenda or another. We don’t want to conclude here the complex and the details of The “Functionalist” Currents: From Misunderstanding to Second Reading of their Contributions 41 the Agenda Setting which complete the mention references, but to demonstrate from where we want to see a distance between the simple expression “functionalism” or a detailed proximity shown by these studies of empirical nature which, generally, reveal a massive work and approach particular and specific aspects of the message or effects of the media. It is what we see in theories such as the Agenda Setting, an example not only of continuance, but also of a necessary presence anchored to the tradition of the empirical study of the effects of psycho-social or sociological nature and that keeps some relationship with “functionalism”, but to merge them would mean a confusion which doesn’t bring justice to neither of them. We believe that the tradition here commented takes satisfaction on keeping up with its continuous appreciation, adjusting variables that explain the different processes (social, psychological, cognitive, behavioural, etc.) to see what happens to people, relationships, groups, interactions associated to the technological mediation. For instance, in the case of new media, the presence of the tradition of effects continues to be necessary, however, perhaps due to these misunderstandings, frequently, instead of finding the latest advances in communication journals, one finds them in academic journals like Journal of Adolescent Health, International Journal of Cyber Behavior, CyberPsychology & Behavior or Psychology and Learning, among others. No area “owns” the concepts. The studies on communication offer, as mentioned by Inmanuel Wallerstein (ed.) (1995) in his famous report more than 20 years ago, where he answers at once in a complex way to these new realities, which we believe can be theoretically considered whenever some conditions are observed like those mentioned throughout this text. Surely not all that was disclosed was imprecise, though frequently the dominant speech to simplify theories was full of imprecisions and, in our own experience, for instance, we listened to these restrictions in classes so that we would contrast them with our reading experience which we intended to share in these lines. Finally, we recognize that though there was an advance in the organization of knowledge, not reversing completely the dispersion, we have more historical tools and analytical to make more precise groups, specify concepts, locate and draw traditions, identify the evolution of the research’s goals and based on that disseminate knowledge about media in particular and communication in general, in a clearer way, where we can also recognize such advances, never forgetting about the limitation or the challenges ahead. It is possible to understand that to the media user, the specialized analyst of the processes, the marketer, 48 Antonio Castillo Esparcia and Alejandro Álvarez-Nobell richness. Hence, this period sees the emergence of new concepts (public predisposition, self-selection and selective perception) alongside with the assignment of potential values in the participant subjects (emitter not as powerful nor unidirectional and a more active and singular public). The great theoretical richness of the period, which gives way to a new stage of the communicative research, have been highlighted by Schramm (1978: 243): This evolution of the Magic Bullet Theory to the study of the Stubborn Public and since then to the concept of Active Public constitutes one of the most interesting and important chapters of modern science. Furthermore, the showcase of new analytical techniques, associated with applied social investigation, give way to the perception of studies that reveal the existence of mediating entities placed between the communicator and the receptor: social groups, intersubjective influence, the leadership of opinion, the singular attitude of the receptor. These entities gather the information issued, acting as primary receptors constituting communication. Later on, at an emitting function, the gathered information is emitted. This new situation allows to establish that the information follows an active process which reaches social entities possessing a double feature: they act as receptors and emitters at the same time. To Klapper (1974: 9-10), the stage limiting the effects of the media has a series of features: a) The communicative consequences depend on multiple factors and social interconnections, not merely as a singular cause that achieves, with certain normality, a predictable eschatology on the public. b) These factors emerging between communication and the receptors limit significantly the retribution since communication is converted into an adjuvant factor to preestablished pretensions. c) The communicative theology is limited by aspects related to the media, the individuals either through the communicative channel or way, by the intensity or frequency and other factors. These variables make efficiency hardly quantifiable since they can be prioritized or damaged by multiple conditionings, which no participant subject has the power to control it. The variables intervening in communication have been grouped by Wolf (1987: 38 and ss) in two groups: 1.- Factors affecting the messages’ receivers. The media are no longer a necessary or sufficient cause within communication when individual The Functionalism in Communication Studies in Europe: its Functional Role in the Critique and its Attempts towards Perpetuity 49 intervene actively. This way, the vital experience of each social subject stands out, since it will participate in the election of the media one desires to consume. The individual factor manifests in two versions: - the public’s interest for the communication that rises singular motivations since, as Klapper (1974: 19) mentions, individuals tend to expose to that kind of communication, which synchronizes with their interests and attitudes. A person, conscient of it or not, avoids communication that goes against one’s thoughts or perceptions. Though, when it is not possible to avoid the message, there is a kind of selective memory which gathers, modifies or eliminates the information, according to the synchronization of their one perception. - to change an individual’s opinion is necessary to call for its attention in light of the multiplicity of messages of all kinds of characteristics. People keep a selective exposure19 which allows to choose or select that information assumed to Triandis (1974: 157): a) increase of comprehension and which helps individuals to organize the complex entrance of communication. b) no attack to self-esteem or that presumes the revelation of unpleasant truths. c) give help to emerge in a complex world. d) an opportunity to express individual values in a more persuasive way to our peers. 2.- The nature of communication, factors such as the type of message or the credibility of what is released limits the exegesis made by the receiver of what is communicated. The communicator’s credibility depends significantly on the image the receiver has of the entity generating and creating the message. One must have present that the premises the receiver demands to accept the communication of the emitter are the competence the emitter possesses over the issue, the information’s veracity and the accuracy of the data transmitted. Without these conditions, the receiver will hardly concede reliability to the emitter. As for the message, one must analyze the style, the structure and the content as main characteristics of all kind of communication. The style concerns all matter of ornaments embellishing, in a certain way, 19 The selective exposure has interested psychology, though D.O. Sears and J.L. Freedman (“Selective Exposure to Information: A critical review”, in Public Opinion Quarterly, 1967, nº 31: 194-213), have analyzed how this is very close to ‘information-seeking’, focusing in two aspects: a) the selective exposure happens only under certain conditions, that is when information is taken as necessary to support an important decision. b) when information is understood to reduce cognitive dissonance. Sears and Freedman claim that these researches should study deeper the voluntary exposure to information and not as much the exposure through unconscious predispositions. 50 Antonio Castillo Esparcia and Alejandro Álvarez-Nobell the content. It connotes the affinity between the communicator and the receiver by motivating action, passiveness, adverting to situations. Under this limitation vision of the media, that are framed within the network of social intersubjective relationships, it is attributed value and dominance to the many social groups that are now part of the hermeneutical factor of the individual. Through the group, individuals socialize norms and values, understand better the exegesis of the reality that involves them and create connections between ideas and common feelings. These social groups act as protectors of the communicative messages filtering and reducing the possible effects of the media. Hence is eliminated a direct, unilateral and all-powerful process of the media of a previous era, becoming a two-layered communication or with a communicative double flow, explained by the ‘Two-step flow of communication’ theory. This minimizing theory of the influence of media was an approach from the bottom, especially considering the researches made by Lazarsfeld, Berelson and Gaudet20, by realizing the individual participates in many groups, informal or formal, interacting with different individuals and establishing reciprocal influences. In these intersubjective deductions, there is a certain individual categorization of the so-called opinion leaders, who develop a role as intermediaries between the media and people. This affinity creates a communicative double-flow: media→ opinion leadersa→ individual subjects. As claimed by Lazarsfeld, Berelson and Gaudet (1944: 151), ideas “usually go from the radio and press to opinion leaders and, from these to the less active sectors of the population”. To be classified as opinion leader does not imply an a priori individual connotation since there are only a few suggestions to be one, such as they should be people trying to convince others about their thoughts, or those people to whom one asks for their opinion about certain topics. His/her effectiveness depends on four factors: the competence on the issue, the trust from others, the degree and type of personal contact and the possibility to immediately reward people who meet his/her appreciations and suggestions. In a minimizing environment of the communicative effects, the communicative flow is transferred from the media→ individuals of the past situation, to a present one of individualsa→ media, hence concentrating the studies on people instead of the media. 20 Research that studied the motivations and ways to form political attitudes known to the public through the book The People’s Choice, Voting. A study of Opinion Formation in a presidential campaign, Columbia University Press, New York, 1948. Later on, it was published Public Opinion, in 1953 nº 53, reproduced by Moragas Spa, M: Sociología de la Comunicación de Masas, Gustavo Gili, Barcelona, 1979: 303-318, a synthesis that explained the main claims. The Functionalism in Communication Studies in Europe: its Functional Role in the Critique and its Attempts towards Perpetuity 51 The unexpected activity at the moment of consumption on the communicative products allows us to realize that it is the receiver which selects, nominates the product to be consumed. This idea is included in the selective exposure, that is that all people distinguish the media they wish to consume. Furthermore, the complexity of the communicative process is explicit, in which there are multiple interacting variables that might change the communicative act. Among the participating actors is manifested the communicator and the recipient (limited by the used media). In respect to this multifactor complexity of communication, Maletzke (Rodrigo 1989: 71) builds a communicative model that tries to establish affinities within a dynamic process characterized by dependencies and interdependencies of competing factors among participants of communication. Such model (see picture) emphasizes that either the emitter as the receiver are interwoven through exogenous and endogenous constraints that confine and structure one’s participation in the communicative act. To this Polish researcher, the intervening actors in the process keep a priori certain positions that confine ways to manifest and interconnect. The reasoning of a communicative direct relation between the emitter and some disperse and disaggregated members of the receiving audience becomes obsolete, since it gives way to a highly active and selective audience, so one must “correct, complement and enhance the unilateral, passive conception through a functional way of thinking” (Maletzke 1976: 185), that allows scrutinizing those realities containing 52 Antonio Castillo Esparcia and Alejandro Álvarez-Nobell a significance for the individual, that is, that have a function. Furthermore, this active individual doesn’t manifest isolated, but it appears as a complex entity socially interacting keeping opinions, images, attitudes, personalities that influence decisively in its election. These generic influences come true with the interconnections between communicator and receiver, depending on the image or role of the recipient has of the communicator towards the prestige of the communicator. The mutation of some factors that confine this affinity might presume a variability when establishing its actions. All these individual constraints aren’t merely intrinsic as they’ve settled for multiple exogenous influences, like the type of and degree of pertinence in social groups, personal situation, imperative norms in its ecosystem. Furthermore, the entity creating, setting and transmitting the messages – the communicator – is also constricted by a series of individual elements (personality, norms, values, behaviour guidelines) and collective ones (degree and type of situation in social relations, the flow with other communicators, social image). Finally, the two participating actors are constricted by the very own media used in communication since the type of channel influences over the way to generate and receive the message. The uncertainty about the effects of media In the light of the emergence, at the first stage of functionalism, of the powerful effects of media and the consequent reaction of the minimal effects of media, by the sixties, there is a conception of moderated effects, which sits on an equidistant point of the quoted extremist and polarized taxonomies. In this new stage of researching about the effects, it is intended to overcome the approaches exclusively focused on the effects, to deepen and insist on other issues and actions of the media, such as the cognitive aspects of communication which affects culture, traditions, guidelines and values, behaviour. The perception that the media produces several types of effects is supported by the creation of studies on new investigation centers specialized in communication, which begin to appear in the late fifties and early sixties. These innovating centers step back from the administrative goals proposed by the departments of applied psychology, financially aided by dominant social institutions, to compose interdisciplinary studies fed by the assemble of social sciences. The Functionalism in Communication Studies in Europe: its Functional Role in the Critique and its Attempts towards Perpetuity 53 Under these emergent and new centers of investigation, the study of social psychology and the analysis of the individual effects in the short term, are substituted for studies that highlight the potential influence of the media during the medium and long term maturation of the cognitive effects (influence on the environment of the social opinion, of the cultural values or politics). The studies ensued by Philip Converse (1962, 1964) suppress the psychological perspective of persuasive effects, individual in the short term, by an accentuation of those generic, persistent, cognitive effects, and in the long term of the general process of making the public opinion. These investigation guidelines give way to new and more complex studies on communication. The different investigations have in common the study of several situations and attitudes maintained by individuals when consuming communicative products. Hence, some studies emphasize the social differences of individuals that restrict the effect, while others emphasize the individual activity when searching for media that will be able to satisfy certain necessities: a) An amplifying vision on the two-step-flow, which allows to add or take elements from the communicative process. From this point of view, Kraus and Davis (1976: 116-131) note that it is possible to increment the communication stages affecting, in the beginning, a few influent individuals, later on, the most integrated into relevant social circles and, finally, affecting the most isolated and less integrated. On the other hand, they also assume the influence of the media might be direct; in other words, with no intermediates. b) A position a priori of the consumer that constricts the effect of communication on him based on the many levels of individual knowledge. Tichenor, Donohue and Olien (1970: 159) claim that the more intellectually capacitated individuals have greater and better comprehension: When the mass media information dissemination increases within the social context, the population segments with higher socioeconomic status tend to acquire this information faster than the segments of lower status, for the knowledge gap among them tends to increase instead of decrease. Under the same perspective, DeFleur (1970) adds that all messages resonate in different ways in each individual, according to his/her singular 54 Antonio Castillo Esparcia and Alejandro Álvarez-Nobell and specific psychological, cultural, cognitive, etc. characteristics. The different usage of information hence produces a detachment between social groups adjuvated by a series of constrictions associated to the social structure, the structure and configuration of power, the use of technology, the cultural habits or the receivers’ interests21. Among the most significant and important factors that drive this detachment, Monzón (1992: 290) states the following: - socioeconomic status, since the lower layers of society, manifests a reduced level in acquiring knowledge, mainly political. - educational level: the higher the educational level, the higher the implication in the intention to increment knowledge. In this sense, the personal level of education establishes a differentiating line between individuals when it is time to use information. - personal motivation as a factor that, when informed, allows a better cognitive acquisition. - a personal sequence that allows the least motivated actors to have higher possibilities to know a subject, the longer the exposing time to the media. In light of this situation, McHale (1981:51) has established a taxonomical criterion between those who have and those who don’t have information. The characteristics of those detaining information is their belonging to centers of social power, high social mobility, the progressive acquisition of more knowledge in an easier way and a higher capacity to organize. Those not detaining information, act as if they don’t know how to use the information, show very little social and labour mobility, less capacity to confront changes in society, a certain tendency to self-resignation and hostility towards those detaining information. c) The predominance of characteristics intrinsic to the individual over the characteristics of messages, which is noticed in the communicative influence on the way to use and consume the media. The genesis of this thought is the article of Katz (1959) which highlighted the way of using and of selecting communications and, consequently, investigations must dedicate less attention to what the media do with the people and more about what individuals do with the media. This current demarks the public’s activity and the selection it makes of the means to reach certain goals. The person chooses the 21 To Tichenor, Donohue and Olien (1970) we are before a social situation in which the communicative flow increments itself more and more allowing to infer that the population in an all is more and better informed. Though, it is produced relative privatization of information since there is a minority possessing a great amount of information in detriment to a majority not having it or not knowing how to use it. This situation causes the increase of information to increment cognitive distances among people instead of bringing the individuals closer. The Functionalism in Communication Studies in Europe: its Functional Role in the Critique and its Attempts towards Perpetuity 55 mean and the message more adequate to its interests, according to his/her necessities, then retributing gratification or satisfaction to the necessity. d) Powerful effects of the media over structural aspects of society. Since the sixties, communicative theories enhance the extent of effects, more than the individuals, of the society’s ensemble. The change has been adjuvated by the convergence of three different fields in analysis, though interconnected: the analysis of the role and of the effects of media, the analysis of the journalistic function and the analysis of the mechanisms of forming and development of public opinion. All these changes allow amplifying knowledge and contexts of communication effects in a world characterized by its increasing complexity. This investigative congregation allows the making of numerous studies on several topics: - Individual connotations about the usage made and received gratifications by the receptors of media (Blumler and McQuail, 1968). - Group actions explaining the detachment produced by media within the groups (Tichenor, Donohue and Olien, 1970). - Construction of reality, as do studies about the establishment of the social agenda (McCombs and Shaw, 1972). - Making of an environment of opinion within the society’s ensemble, intergroup or intragroup (Noelle-Neumann, 1974). - Specific studies on certain media, as it is with influence and importance detained by television in the making of a societal public place (Lang and Lang, 1984). Under this multiplicity of investigations emerges the feedback on the strength of media, eliminating the old Law of Minimal Effects, explained by Noelle-Neumann (1978: 67): After three decades of continuous rejection of the idea of the power of mass media, the Conference received a series of reports insisting that there should be a return to the idea of the powerful action of media, though not under the previous conventional conception of influences and effects of a direct nature. There is a tendency to focus on the analysis of the indirect and subtle way the media confront our reception of the context. The factors confining this perceptive change can be endogenous and exogenous to the investigations on communication made by 56 Antonio Castillo Esparcia and Alejandro Álvarez-Nobell theorists. Among the first, Saperas (1987: 29-48) places the emergence of the hegemonic role of television and the adequacy of the political speeches to the characteristics of the media, to better reach, and in an easier way, to the citizens. Among the second, the passage between an investigative perspective focused on persuasive effects and one focused on cognitive effects, the extent of the field of studies to the society’s ensemble and the consideration of cognitive effects, indirect and accumulative, in the medium and long term, that condition the social distribution of public knowledge. In this situation, the communicative investigations have a study object the knowledge obtained by the audience on its exposure before the media. It is no longer a matter of studying persuasion processes, but cognitive processes that determine the way the media represent and construct reality. The sociological prevalence of functionalism in communication The functionalist approach, which some say comes originally from France, in 1919, in the context of the First World War, is distinctive of anthropology and the organicist-positivist sociology. Among the most significant displays developed in Europe one must highlight the “absolute functionalism” of Malinowski, who considered each society as a closed and coherent system; the “relativized functionalism” of Merton; and the “structural functionalism” through which Durkheim, its greater proponent constitutes a foundational perspective as much to sociology as to anthropology. The structural-functionalism emphasizes the relationship between functions and the parts of a whole that develops them. Their main statements which intend to explain the development of social life establish an organic analogy of life; a specialization of the functions made by social groups; and social mobility and function caused by conscious and unconscious actions of individuals, which consent a series of functions that make an individual within a society. In the light of this, the contributions of the American sociologist Parsons, a doctorate in England, were the key to the dissemination, in 1937, of the concept of “Social Action” (or Action Theory). Together with Merton, they were the most influential in sociological functionalism and responsible for formulating the systemic theory of human behaviour; the deepening of the comparative analysis of social structures of The Functionalism in Communication Studies in Europe: its Functional Role in the Critique and its Attempts towards Perpetuity 57 Durkheim and Malinowsky; the method to the comparative study of social institutions of Weber; and the contributions of other European authors such as Pareto, Marshall, Durkheim. The development of functionalism in the field of communication in Europe is a consequence of the search for an explanation, according to doctrine, of the norms and roles, the interactions and consequences of these in institutions and of an empirical strategy to study the phenomena of social systems. Hence, functionalism attributes to communication the premise of adaptation, primarily developed by social sciences, by Spencer, and inspired in the classification of the organs concerning the functions performed by them. Therefore, each “component” of the communication process will abide and be defined by its function: emitters, receivers, social functions, media. As a consequence, the communication model of functionalists “neither takes, nor uses, nor confirms informational postulations” (Piñuel and Gaitán, 1993: 47). Its concept of a message comes from a function of adjustment and readjustment between social actors of communication. It is a system of action and reaction with constant feedback between the “social action system” and the “values system”, both subsystems within the “social system” as context. Sociologies of knowledge and mass media From the American perspective, Merton, in his text “Social Theory and Social Structure” (1965) fundaments the “communicative functionalism” by confronting it with the “Wissenssoziologie” or the European “Sociology of Knowledge”. Both ways of investigation, as Merton (1965: 79) says, have become an essential reference when describing not only the type of topic as, mainly, the different methodology used in each: The mass media open way to a new stage between knowledge and society, but only now is possible to study new models and ways of interconnection between collective knowledge and technological means of dissemination of the masses. Ultimately, the European Knowledge Sociology proposes as a central problem the analysis of the role of the “media” and its culture from the cognoscitive and symbolic classifications provided to the social groups. 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La investigación de la comunicación de masas, Paidós, Barcelona, 1987. 67 A necessary challenge to Communication: Think Functionalism and functionalists Pedro Russi22 The following chapter intends to articulate three interpretative spheres; on one hand, the articles «Functionalism in communication studies in Europe: its foundational role to the critic and its intents for continuity», «“Functionalist” currents: from misunderstandings to a reinterpretation of its contributions» and, on the other hand, contributions of the interpretative synthesis itself. That is, this text proposes to proceed inferentially and not just be an occasional synthesis, it must consider the mentioned text as provocative to the thought of Functionalism and also understand it as an epistemic and political movement which crosses the interpretative history of communication until these days. If we consider every argument as a logic relation, then this text is a conceptual resume on functionalism/functionalists, seen from today as a mediatized scenery. In this sense, we walk over the proposed ideas of the authors, not in a sense of systematize, but of accepting the challenge proposed in the texts before this. This way we look to push forward analyzing in a theoretical way of the referential with the two chapters, which allows us to revisit the concepts of functionalism, knowing they keep characteristics of theories before and after in constant resignation. We know that to think is to look in movement conceptual relations, in this case, of thinkers and a certain theoretical movement. To take an intellectual stand, in this sense, is also to question and understand what we are saying when discussing «cultural industry», «the message as a mean», «diffusionism», «hypodermic», etc. because it is not just what we say, but what the theories, as conceptual dynamics, propose. When passing through this type of questions, we make a chain of words until there is a relation between concepts, where the main goal is to problematize the functionalist theories. It is the reason why we must ask: what are we and what are we doing while we think the theories? Thinking on the current communication processes demands to «make a memory» and to know the previous epistemological dynamics which have been the basis for what we know now as more contemporary or complex theories on Communication. When we say «make a memory» 22 Professor at the University of Brasilia, Brazil, and Republic University of the Republic, Uruguay. Email: [email protected]om 68 Pedro Russi we don’t mean to make historiography, but to understand the marks, the imprints of meaning that allowed to give new meaning to analytical operators and also politicians related to communication. In this sense, to reflect on functionalism, functionalists and mass communication research, as well as on the different moments and reinterpretations made, is to recognize oneself, from an area in the origin of the investigations on the several mediatic communicational phenomena in these days. This situation of a highlighted centrality – called mediatization – might seem obvious in our twenty-first century, but it wasn’t so to those who began their designs on analytical paths (19th and 20th centuries) about this new form of cultural reorganization in which the media were the protagonists. It was necessary to understand what was happening to establish different levels of action, from the political to the economic, educational, propaganda and more. A comprehension also demanded by the society in the broad sense. We can foresee the question: And now what do we do with all this that seems to progress unspeakably? The books, formulas and models were the first way to or attempts to establish parameters of action and interpretation as a way to visualize and organize, put an order to functions. Society as a gear, a body that must be read from these relations and defend it from the aberrations or noise not allowing the free passage or, better yet, clean so that information transit with no deviations. It is one of the core operators, to eliminate not only deviations but also the possibilities of them. For this, the transit channel is unique, unidirectional, and one might say step-by-step. The deviating strategies have no place than that of being conceptualized as anomalies in functions or functionality of the communicational processes. It is important to understand the media or communicative processes (something that came later within the functionalist theories) are understood under such optic, a chain of functions to the well-being of the organization. Well-Being consistent with the establishment, the guardian of the good functioning. Rationalizing from this perspective allows us to proceed and understand that the theoretical and methodological processes are not automatic nor automate, but valuative selections of those investigating and acting (individuals, collectives, institutions, States), for this one, must understand the intellectual scenery where we find the options made related to the media, in this case, when thinking about functionalism, as a knowledge and a dynamic from interpretative theories and action proposals. When one model is transferred into another, there are periods A Necessary Challenge for Communication: Thinking the Functionalism and Functionalists 69 of reflection, adjustments in which there are supplementary and complementary realizations (transverse thoughts) that intervene in the relation between models. During this period, there are advantages and disadvantages (misadventures) intervening when it is time to conceptualize communicational processes (media). What once is understood as a model as necessary operators, then it is not permitted the desired strength. It’s at this moment when decisions must be understood as contextual results. Communication theories must be understood as dynamics to comprehend reality, which also means to discuss and reflect upon communication and its epistemic models. Therefore, we realize there is a necessity to systemize and explore, deepen and understand concepts, propositions, arrays and ideas of the reasoning configure in the respective communicational theories, to disappoint clichés. In the light of this, to transfer and employ the epistemic and methodological logics of functionalism to our times (the 21st century) is not realizing totally that the historicity of knowledge and actions is not detached from the respective socio-political environments. The North-South hegemony doesn’t follow the same parameters; they can be similar in some aspects, however not the same as in the initial circumstances of the functionalist models. Though the hegemony intends for the contrary, much water has passed and will pass under the bridges of resistance, and this cannot go unknown when one must understand the functionalist typologies of politic and interpretative action. Understanding the transition between theories is more than to know the schemes or models, it is to know that more than one theory surpassing a previous one, that one does not disappear for it has left imprints that allow comprehensive progress. A theoretic understanding that is more refines that a previous one doesn’t eliminate the last. This point interlocks with a methodological provocation related to the communication theories that go beyond functionalism itself, and these cannot be treated as models but as actions deliberately conceptual. We would pass by innocents if the functionalist formulations would be understood as simple contacts of letters and lines deprived of a political sense proposed as «place of speech» to build relations. When we propose to go beyond the two texts that allow this synthesis, we realize the previous one allows for sharpening a more activist reading. This previous knowledge allows us to switch places epistemically, that is, resume to the discussions that put on tension on the diffusionist processes that are the functionalist basis of 70 Pedro Russi communication. Design strategies and read between the lines of the analytical diffusionist models of intervention. The functionalist way to understand communication is through the intervening matrix. It appeals to several epistemic aspects so that the device and its gear of the hegemonic power function in an accepted way. We must mention that in Latin America for some time (the latter half of the 20th century) it was optioned, as an answer to the hegemony, to use the same tactics, manual and models of the functionalist proposals. Though afterwards, through other more critical currents (called alternatives) from, for instance, the educational spheres (edu-communication), the use of the same epistemic arrays were reviewed and resignified. From this, other lines of action to contrast with the North-South array began to form. It’s important to remember, as an illustration, the book by Paulo Freire «Extensão ou Comunicação?» written in 1979. Freire sees in the extension the transmission without any barrier of sense by the subjects – just as the hypodermic theory, the magical bullet –, where information is completely absorbed, and the reflection or counterpoint of ideas are absent. Freire opposes extension to communication as an exchange of knowledge among the counterparts; to be with others, potentiate the come and going of the communicative processes, that is, not functionality but the potentiality of interpretative possibilities. The polysemy of relations and not their gear. Therefore, communication is understood as an educational character (dialogical) and not diffusionist or of welfare (extension), hence liberation is being drawn within the dialogical in the resistance to the intervention of the supremacy in the superior-inferior axis, North-South. With this epistemological and methodological option in the education of theories and the theoretical, there is a conceptual construction on the processes of ‘conceding’ a certain culture of investigation related to what is understood as theoretical thought. It is important to comprehend that this dynamic provides the principals to understand the communicational phenomena to learn with the theories. From these readings, we can propose to think of a triad: epistemological and methodological theory, that potentiates a profound comprehension of the knowledge (dynamic of concepts) on communication. As a way to answer and leave the restriction proposed by the models (moulds) very present within the academic scenery in relation to the communication theories, where there is an excess of reasoning tied to the dichotomy 0/1. A Necessary Challenge for Communication: Thinking the Functionalism and Functionalists 71 References BACHELARD, G. A formação do espírito científico. RJ: Contraponto, 1996. BRUYNE, Paul. HERMAN, Jacques; SCHOUTHEETE, Marc de. Dinâmica da pesquisa em ciências sociais: os pólos da prática metodológica. RJ: F.Alves, 1991. FREIRE, Paulo. Extensão ou Comunicação? 17. ed. São Paulo: Paz e Terra, 2015. POPPER, K.R. Em busca de um mundo melhor. SP: Martins Fontes, 2006. RUSSI, Pedro. Por que ensinar Teoria (da Comunicação)? In: Teorias da Comunicação. Trajetórias investigativas. Porto Alegre: EdiPUCRS, 2010, v.1, p. 95-115. RUSSI, Pedro.; AIRES NETO, Lauro Maranhão. Líderes de Opinião no ambiente mediático: uma abordagem teórica no campo da Comunicação. Porto Alegre: ENTREmeios, 2010. 02 CRITICAL THEORY 80 Ruth de Frutos school of PET and the interaction problems among active audiences that have been approached by cultural studies and must settle the basis for Communication studies. Finally, to rethink the dialogue between the PEC and cultural studies, paying special attention to public communication policies also emphasizes the necessity for a social change in which the processes and social relations have a fundamental role, also the traditional tendency of the political economy in the study of social and institutional structures. Political Economy of Communication, the border-subject The Political Economy of Communication is a «border-subject» (Marques de Melo 2011: 54) or a theoretical-methodological structure developed from Marx’s formulations and that as settled academically in late 20th century under the environment of the studies on media as a structural hub of the critical thought in communication (ibídem: Simis and Sardinha, 2010). On his turn, Vicent Mosco defines the PEC as «the study of social relations, especially of power relations that those producing, distributing and consuming media keep» (Mosco, 2006: 17) (free translation). Such formulation has practical significance, as said by the author himself (ídem 2006: 59), since it emphasizes the importance of how communication business works before the producing, distributing and consuming actors. Communication and culture are more pertinent than ever since through them are possible to analyze the complex logics of hegemonic and counterhegemonic organization of communication. According to Ann Cvetkovich and Douglas Kellner (1997), politics and economy are the starting point for the communication study which means that cultural production and distribution have a place in a particular economic system, within a specific way of production and reproduction. Precisely this is one of the original hypotheses that brings the study object closer to such theory since, to analyze a certain media ecosystem, we must analyze the social production and reproduction made, as well as the role of media as producers and distributors of culture. The media are related to the material conditions that bring to light the production and reproduction of society’s imaginarium and can only be conceived, as explained by Bolaño and Britos, within the internal and structural dynamics of capitalism, society and State, and Critical Theory: The Bridge between the Political Economy of Communication and Cultural Studies 81 the constrictions of those symbolic goods (Jambeiro, Bolaño and Britos, 2004: 13). The study of economy-related to communication, information and culture detain a strategic function associated to development processes and economic growth, such as the current situation of «economy-world» globalization, where large media companies have a fundamental role. Using the didactical resource propose by Marques de Melo (2011: 54 and ss.), one can identify two tendencies of the PEC: one pragmatical one, catalyzing the approaches related to the preservation of the hegemonic economic system in society and another one, more critical, concerned in making critical analysis of prevailing structures, associated to, according to the critical theory, the first cultural studies, much more compromised with the economic and political constrictions of communication. The approach of the author, though merely pedagogical, doesn’t allow to see the layers of PEC within the mould of the critical, Marxist or heterodox thinking. As explained by Bolaño, Mastrini and Sierra (2005: 150), the political economy of communication comes from the «necessity to find an answer in the functionalist orientations predominant in communication studies of the fifties» (free translation). In this sense, the matter of democracy and its relation to the media isn’t resolved with the «liberal appearance» they had before (Dantas, 2013: 24). Nowadays, debates can’t be limited to if the internet must be free or not, but, for instance, it must look to understand what is the role of the providers of access to the network of networks and the guarantees of rights to the citizens within the digital context. In other words, the main goal of the examination must reflect the asymmetries of political, economic and symbolic capital possessed by each individual or group (Mattelart and Vitali, 2016; Ramonet, 2016; Mattelart, 2015a; Bolaño, 2013: 29; Sierra, 2013b). The studies of the observed communicational processes under an economic view emerge in the seventies of the 20th century when there is a concern with the phenomena of commercialization of press. However, it is only after Dallas Smythe, within the context of the ‘International Association for Media and Communication Research’ (IAMCR), that the studies on Political Economy of Communication are in vogue. The critic to such research group, from the reinterpretation of the political economy of capitalism, focusing on the «symbolic goods industry, which most evident feature is its transactional profile and which defiant enigma remains as the imperialistic vocation» (Marques de Melo, 2012: 16), is fundamental to the examination of such current. 82 Ruth de Frutos The academic relevance of the valorization of economy for the comprehension and management of communicational processes is taken over by Armand Mattelart and Herbert Schiller, among others, generating numerous studies and research groups, some of the more significant of which are those made in the nineties of the 20th century by César Bolaño in the Work Group of Political Economy of Communication within the framework of the Brazilian Society for Interdisciplinary Studies of Communication (INTERCOM). The novelty brought by Bolaño, along with other scholars, is the «emphasis on what we could call the epistemological fight for the reconstruction of the critical field of Communication» (Bolano, 2012: 28 and ss.). We must mention the economist Harold Innis (1951, 1950) within the configuration of this perspective of the PEC, for being the first author that associates economy with communication, paying special attention to the international informational flows and how these influence politics. His line of thought has influenced his disciple Marshall McLuhan and his image is still central to the comprehension of the critical theory. Specifically, to what concerns the current approach, Innis thinks the media are the key to social change (Fernández Vicente, 2010: 86, Preston: 2001: 105). Moragas claims that the modern PEC in Latin America, Europe and the United States «presents significant differences, though evermore convergent in their institutional positions and academic networks» and that they «coincide at a point: sign their moral commitment, as intellectuals, with the democratization of communication» (Moragas 2011: 217) (free translation). Hence, though there are important exceptions, the American, European and Latin American approaches are different «in such way as they must get a distinctive treatment» (Mosco 2006: 62 and ss.) (free translation). The concern with the size and the increasing power of multinational communication companies constrain the American PEC, namely in works of names such as Dallas Smythe and Herbert Schiller. The two scholars, of the University of Illinois, influenced several generations of political economists, turning their work towards the social class and the imperialism of the media. Furthermore, the American stream of thought is different due to its concern related to the political activism to change the dominant media and create alternatives (Wasko 2003), which includes defending a new international economic, informational and communicational order (Mosco 2006). According to Dantas, the great revelation by Smythe was to consider the audience as a commodity, which builds the first bridge with cultural Critical Theory: The Bridge between the Political Economy of Communication and Cultural Studies 83 studies, which refers to the interaction between the audience and the media: In the capitalist enterprise of communication, using its artists’, journalists’, communicators’ work, it produces an audience that, in abstract quantitative terms, negotiates with announcers and their advertisers. At what price? (Dantas 2013: 26) The Canadian sociologist Vincent Mosco (2011; 2009) claims that if in North America the concern is on the cultural industry and the increment of power and the influence of multinational communication companies all around the world, in Europe they’re more concerned with defending the public communication systems before the tendencies for liberalization, commercialization and privatization programed by the conservative governments. Nonetheless, the European school has been less connected to the «specific founding figures» though it stands out for its zeal to defend the public media systems (ídem: 63), as opposed to the American school. Among the most influential works, there is those of Garnham (2000), concerning the power of the class, and those of Raymond Williams (1975), on the integration of communication institutions within the capitalist economy. The second European view could be led by Armand Mattelart (2016, 2014a, 2014b, 2012, 2004), who understands communication as one of the main resources to the resistance to power (Mosco 2006: 63). Concerning works on media industries, Bernard Miège and Peter Waterman developed several approaches deserving attention. Finally, the research in Latin America on PEC has developed in different areas, though priority has been to theories associated with the emancipation of other world powers (Bolaño 2013; Bolaño and Mastrini 2001, 1999; Marques de Melo 1999; 1998). Before the creation of the Unión Latina de Economía Política de la Información, la Comunicación y la Cultura (= Latin Union for the Political Economy of Information, Communication and Culture) – ULEPICC – there was already previous movements such as groups like INTERCOM or ALAIC, the network EPTIC and its journal EPTIC online. The rise of this sort of research is not only a consequence of the vigour charged by ULEPICC but also of the increasing number of publications and analysis of Latin American cases. We can’t talk about this reference on the Latin American critical school without mentioning the most important figure at the time of 84 Ruth de Frutos NOMIC, Antonio Pasquali (2011, 2002, 1991, 1978), who, along the first distinction between informing and communicating, criticizes viewing the receiver as a mere passive actor, placing him in a merely objective or instrumental position to the interests of persuasion and rentability (ideological, economic and political). The critical studies were developed in the eighties in Latin America, led by Muraro, Portales, Arriaga or Bolaño himself. This era is marked in this region by civic-military dictatorships, the economic instability and, in the communicational field, the political defeat of NOMIC, which has caused a fundamental effect to the development of mass media and its posterior analysis in the region. In this sense, it is important to highlight the Primer Encuentro de Economía Política de la Comunicación del MERCOSUR (=First Encounter of Political Economy of Communication of MERCOSUR), developed in May 2001, from which emerges the Buenos Aires Letter24. This manifest will be the starting point to the III Encuentro de Economía Política de Comunicación (= III Encounter of Political Economy of Communication) celebrated in Seville and which founded the ULEPICC two years later. Among the most predominant Latin American authors of these days, there are the Argentinian Guillermo Mastrini and the Brazilian César Bolaño, and we still must remember the works of Valerio Britos and Rui Sardinha, who end up building, along with the work of Bolaño, the main current of the Brazilian PEC. To finish the approaching to the Political Economy of Communication, one must highlight: Overall, studies on Political Economy of communication represent a rupture with certain a Marxist analysis which, from a non-problematic acceptance of the base/superstructure model, understand the media as instruments within the domain of those classes in power. This reductionist view of the media role in society was contested from the political economy which, though assuming the importance of the economic structure in the functioning of media and, especially the need to analyze it, insisted I am not committing the error of a mechanist transference of the media. On the other hand, studies on the economy of media maintain the distance from the theories proclaiming an excessive autonomy from the ideological or political layers, eliminating any influence of economic relations in the process of significance. (Herscovici, Bolaño and Mastrini 2010: 158). Concerning PEC in Spain, the first studies also appeared in the eighties and among today’s Spanish authors we have Enrique Bustamante (2011, 2004), Ramón Zallo (2011a, 2011b, 2010) or Francisco Sierra, author 24 http://www.ulepicc.es/recursos/46-carta-de-buenos-aires. Retrieved el 27 de Diciembre de 2012. Critical Theory: The Bridge between the Political Economy of Communication and Cultural Studies 85 of the historical-critical of educational communication (2006), who demonstrated, right in the beginning, a concern for Spanish cultural industries (1988) and afterwards continued with communication I the digital era (2002, 2003), while Marcial Murciano wrote about the structure of international communication (1999) or Quirós about the media power in the era of globalization (2006, 1998). Having the political economy of communication as a theoretical frame were we fit different perspectives to study communication and culture; it seems obvious to think in the relationship between mass media and studies of public politics on communication to rethink such fundaments of the PEC, according to the respective necessities of public authorities of citizenship and media in the economy-world today. What’s more, these instruments must be able to combine the world communicological thought, observing the enunciated critics from peripheral countries, such as the uneven exchange of information, already announced in debates and reports of NOMIC, but also the content production of media in hegemonic power cores, able to see in national policies of communication in certain countries. The necessity to transcend the traditional fragmentation of scientific knowledge in distinct currents places the PEC in a privileged situation that inspires sociological functionalism of Mass Communication Research, though also the social theory of information and the reinterpretation of cultural studies according to an opening to the creation of bonds with other theories. In this sense, the transversal logic of communication studies, when it is the instruments that analyze the contemporary informative processes, it promotes a new theoretical stand which breaks all frontiers between systems and brings the PEC closer to the cultural studies according to the critical theory. Dialogue between the PEC and the CS Cultural studies have been a fundamental source to studies in communication in general, and to the Political Economy of Communication in particular, providing diverse epistemological frameworks to understand communication and media which, unlike PEC, have supported an approach focused on subjectivity or on how people interpret the world (Mosco 2006). Before synthesizing the characteristics standing out the most of this synergy in its whole, one must analyze diachronically the main currents of cultural studies, paying special attention, by the influence 86 Ruth de Frutos of the European PEC, to the approaches of the CS of the old continent. During the past century, these studies expanded. The British School of Cultural Studies reinterprets the previous postulations, through the idea that the development of capitalism and the industrial scheme of production of cultural goods has a pernicious effect on traditional ways of culture, either within the academic culture, of elite or popular. To the first cultural studies, culture didn’t depend on economic relations, but it is directly influenced by political-economic relations, a reflection of the dynamics of production within the political structure. This current focus its interest in the reactions among individuals and gives them a core role, making them the study object in their works. Therefore, it examines the cultures typical of specific groups, such as young people and workers; the contents and the reception of media, to consider social structures and historical contexts as essential factors to comprehend mass media, granting great importance to the global structure and the specific circumstances of each context. The investigation from the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies (CCCS), will come from the works of founder and director of the center, Richard Hoggart and of the reflexive sensitivity of a world suffering of several mutations in the same moment of its description and theorization (Owen 2008). The work of Raymond Williams, The Long Revolution, steps away from the precious tradition, and it concerns the importance of culture in relation to the remaining social practices. To understand the dialogue among the PEC, one must emphasize some issues, such as the challenge presented by the study of popular cultures. Williams or Thompson knew how to give attention to the dominated cultures, without being taken away by the acritical indulgence. From 1980 this sort of studies saw themselves expanding considerably, and notions such as «genre» and «ethnicity» began to be studied. It enhances, in theory, comes with the revalorization of the subject or individual, associated mainly to the media (Mattelart and Neveu, 2004) and ignoring the critic to structural reasons that originate processes of social inequality, which are also approached in the PEC. This concern for the opinion of individuals and its interaction with the audiences sets the basis to, years later, begin to worry about issues that until the moment were considered lesser, such as genre, race and ethnicity, as well as the relation between these factors and the social class and power relations. In this sense, the media act upon the psychological processes in the sense that it creates images, representations and models of the social reality. This modification, in the early eighties, is the beginning of a study Critical Theory: The Bridge between the Political Economy of Communication and Cultural Studies 87 field about media reception trying to make operational models like that of codification-de-codification of Hall. For him, researchers display a great motivation into the search for observation and comprehension methods of real publics, namely with ethnographic techniques. It was precisely this employment of Hall’s postulations that caused the emergence of the ethnography of audiences, a new methodological current, centred in the practices of reception by spectators. This change in the theory is inseparable from the imprint left in Great Britain by other phenomena at the time, namely the role of Margaret Thatcher in the conservative twist of politics, primarily in what concerns privatizations and deregulation, what as caused confrontations with syndicates, the modification of economic variable, etc. (Bauman 2015b; Acemoglu and Robinson 2012) and that affects studies on media systems, property, building hegemonies, etc., typical issues of the PEC directly. Globalization and, above all, the use of new technologies causes great interrogation marks in cultural studies due to the uncertainty created by the extent of the institutional development of such studies and the way they might be affected by an intellectual movement originally controversial (Mattelart and Vitalis 2016; Ramonet, 2016; Bauman, 2015a; Días Nosty, 2012). In the nineties, there was an international diffusion of anglophone researches in matters of culture. This expansion presents differences depending on the country of origin which, through a special dialogue between the European PEC and CS, deserve attention. In France, Germany or Central Europe, joining the uneven influence of the idiom and English culture, there is a level of diffusion of cultural goods proper of these countries, as well as a structuring of the intellectual field. As soon as this dialogue between the Political Economy of Communication ad European Cultural Studies is framed, it is necessary to approach this last current from a critical perspective, to observe the controversies set associated with the PEC and that are useful to build the theoretical context in common according to the critical theory. Using the description by Méndez Rubio (2004: 143 and ss.), the main proposals of the cultural studies can be grouped considering two defining variables. First, from a non-elitist perspective of culture, which has allowed the authors of this current to make an exhaustive analysis of popular culture. Hence, «the job of the first cultural studies was to explore the potential of the resistance and rebellion against certain domination powers» (Barker and Beezer, 1994: 15) (free translation). One of the 88 Ruth de Frutos main criticisms made to the contemporary cultural studies is, precisely, that they’ve lost this critical essence (Mattelart, 2011). Second, this theoretical current is characterized by «epistemological inclusiveness», that is, by the use of multiple approaches and methods to interpret social reality. Before we delve into this critic, it is fundamental to undertake the challenge presented by the cultural studies – that has also impregnated the Political Economy of Communication in some aspects – and that consists of the theory of the active audience. It is supported by the double premise that, on the one hand, the receiver is active in a nontrivial sense and that, on the other hand, the content of media is open and polysemic, in the sense that it depends on the interpretative and dialogical reception (Méndez Rubio, 2004). From this point of view, Ariño points out: We can’t attribute effects a priori, vilify the consumption of popular classes, subsume all sorts of effects in only one (it see important to distinguish between the short and long term), consider that its distribution is even within the social ensemble and deny the active role of audiences (Ariño, 1997: 177). The double dimension of the audience is fundamental to the investigation of the media in cultural studies and also to propitiate the counter-hegemonic empowerment of the citizens in the approach of PEC. One must claim that the confrontation of the critical and dialogic attitude of cultural studies has converted them in a meeting point between different theoretical positions, which has turned them into a reference to the social movements and to the organizations that, since the civil society, have been observing the work of media. For this reason, authors like Grüner demand a revision on social studies according to the critical theory of culture, distancing them from «a reproduction modelled from a ambiguous cultural logic of the late capitalism» (Méndez Rubio, 2004: 147) (free translation), therefore, directly associating to the spirit of the PEC. In conclusion, the main inconvenience of cultural studies these days is the ethnographic spin that disintegrates culture, stepping apart from any systemic critical perspective, which had unified certain currents at the beginning (Mattelart, 2011). For this reason, it is relevant to establish synergies to observe the PEC and CS from the perspective of the critical theory, observing the active role of audiences in the core of Critical Theory: The Bridge between the Political Economy of Communication and Cultural Studies 89 these studies, especially thanks to ICT, which revalues another series of studies within these currents about cultural industries, ideology of the media, etc. Within this context, the best solution to save the dispute between Political Economy of Communication and Cultural Studies is its redefinition from the Frankfurtian critical theory employed on the challenges typical of the 21st century. References ACEMOGLU, D. and ROBINSON, A. J. (2012), ¿Por qué fracasan los países? Los orígenes del poder, la prosperidad y la pobreza. Barcelona: Grupo Planeta. ALSINA, R. M. (2001), Teorías de la comunicación. Bellaterra-Castellón de la Plana-Valencia-Barcelona: UAB-UJI-UPF and UV. ARIÑO, A. (1997), Sociología de la cultura. La constitución simbólica de la sociedad. Barcelona: Bosch. BARKER, M. and BEEZER, A. (Eds.), (1994), Introducción a los estudios culturales, Barcelona: Bosch. BAUMAN, Z. (2015a), Ceguera moral. Barcelona: Paidós. BAUMAN, Z. (2015b), ¿La riqueza de unos pocos nos beneficia a todos? Barcelona: Paidós. BOLAÑO, C. (2013), Industria cultural, información y capitalismo. Barcelona: Gedisa. BOLAÑO, C. (Org.) (2012), Comunicación y la crítica de la economía política. Perspectivas teóricas y epistemológicas, Quito: Encuentros, Ediciones CIESPAL. BOLAÑO, C. and MASTRINI, G. (2001), “Economía Política de la Comunicación: un aporte marxista a la constitución del campo comunicacional”, Revista de Economia Política das Tecnologias da Informação e Comunicação, No. 3, pp. 58 – 78. BOLAÑO, C., MASTRINI, G. and SIERRA, F. (2005), Economía Política, comunicación y conocimiento, Buenos Aires: La Crujía. BOLAÑO, C., and MASTRINI, G. (1999), Globalización y monopolios en la comunicación en América Latina, Buenos Aires: Biblos. BUSTAMANTE, E. (2011), “¿La creatividad contra la cultura?”, in L. ALBORNOZ (Coord.), Poder, medios, cultura. Una mirada crítica desde la economía política de la comunicación, Buenos Aires: Paidós. BUSTAMANTE, E. (2004), La televisión económica. Financiación, estrategias y mercados, Barcelona: Gedisa. COMPTON, J. (2004), The Integrated News Spectacle: A Political Economy 96 Javier Torres Molina From an Iberoamerican perspective and from a critical reading of the informatization context and colonization of life places, where inequality and the international division of intellectual work intensifies, the authors César Bolaño, Guillermo Mastrini and Francisco Sierra (2005) point out that the field of studies emerges dues to the necessity to find a replica of the functionalist orientations that prevailed in communication studies in the fifties. The author make a historical overview on the development of the field of studies, where they express that North American authors have presented the economic problem of cultural industries – instead of the autonomy of the ideological devices of the State – (Smythe) and what is more, have analyzed the international economic structure of media, insisting in the binding between the North American government, big communication companies and industrial and banking corporations (Herbert Schiller). According to the British authors contributions they sustain they focus on understanding how mass communications participate in the social stratification process and the reproduction of relations of class (Murdock and Golding) and in working on the media as economic entities, which purpose is to create surplus values through the production of program goods (Nicholas Garnham). Furthermore, they point out that in France, it stands out the works led by Bernard Miège and Patrice Flichy, who have studied the work processes and valorization of cultural products and its specificities. This school has influenced Spanish authors such as Enrique Bustamante and Ramón Zallo, who have discussed and reviewed their primary concepts26. The authors we’re referring to point out the field of Political Economy of Communication as having implicated in a rupture with some Marxist analysis: From a non-problematic acceptance of the base/superstructure model, they ended up interpreting the social function of media exclusively from the control and classist structure of property which determines the information system. This reductionist vision of the role of public media in society has been contested from the political economy, since though the importance of the economic structure in the functioning of media is assumed and, especially, the necessity to analyze it, they’ve insisted in not falling for the mistake of making a mechanist transfer of the effects of the media (Bolaño, Mastrini and Sierra, 2005: 20). 26 Zallo (2011: 18) concerning the founding authors of the study field we’re analyzing – including those already mentioned and Mattelat–, expresses that they had the mission to report the communicative system and redefine paradigms. The Political Economy of Latin American Communication 97 The critic on “dependents” Meanwhile, on the emergence of the field in Latin America, Bolaño, Narváez and Lopes (2015: 384) sustain that the same happened autonomously and in dialogue with the critical current of the thought in the communication of the region: the theories on dependence or the cultural imperialism. It was an internal critic also made to the founders of the original Marxist analysis and the incorporation of intellectual tools of the economy together with the sociological theories of imperialism or the cultural dependence. In this sense, we believe it’s important to focus on the analysis made by Heriberto Muraro (1987), who sustains that in communication studies in Latin America since the origin of the subject, have been approached global economical problems, emphasizing the analysis of the media in the sector of economy controlled by private executives, besides having an interest in the formulation of proposals concerning the use of media as instruments to promote the economic and social development if in the hands of the State or under the management of entities of public welfare. About the first of the aspects mentioned, investigations have been related to the interests of transactional monopoly groups that control big news agencies and the dealing with political information, the private communication networks, the production of electronic equipment, the circulation of film material and the advertising agencies. This current of “dependent” authors have contributed to the communication studies their analysis on “the close ties existing between the development of the monopoly capitalism and the modern mass communication system and the transmission of information”, besides considering “that the monopolized media contribute to that conservation of the international status quo instead of promoting a more balanced economic development” (Muraro, 1987). This type of analysis has insisted on “the magnitude and the repressive character of the empire of communications built by transnational corporations” explaining the development of cultural industries through what theorists have denominated “cultural invasion”, a concept that, according to Pal Freire (1981), puts these industries at the service of the conquest and oppression, where is imposed a conception of the world, its values and the “superiority” of the invader and the “inferiority” of the invaded. Muraro considers that the cultural invasion category has had a vast acceptance due to, among other factors, the fact that investigators themselves have auto-assigned the responsibility to report this 98 Javier Torres Molina repressive character of culture and media in the hands of the transactional power, besides the speed that television has “implanted” in the Latin American cultural body, imposing the “visibility of the dominator”, in an international context that has implied a reconfiguration of the international division of work and the relations of dependency between core and periphery, an issue that has resonated within the “mass consumption”. Within this type of analysis made by Latin American authors, there is a relevance of the concept of manipulation: how much and how media can shape the ideology and the ways of behaviour of the individuals (Muraro, 1987). The model presented by the “dependents” analyzed the role of the national states of Latin America arguing that the same had been unable to control the investment of transactional companies in cultural industries, an attitude corresponding to the developmental economic policy that intended to introduce foreigner capital in the region through economic and legal stimuli. The critics made to this type of investigation were bound to two kinds of matters: the category of “cultural invasion” and the analysis of the economy of communication. On the first issue, Muraro says that the authors on this current, by accentuating the dominion imposed by the media controlled by transnational companies, recover the old thesis that made references to the omnipotent character of media that could easily influence the masses. To the author is due to mention a convergence of interests, exemplifying through the case of the Latin American woman and that of the poor urban people in the scheme presented by the “dependents” with its limitations. It is also analyzed the existence of a “national culture” that has remained isolated from “strange elements”, not minding, for instance, that these idealized forms of culture have been a product of relations of dependence. Related to the “national culture”, César Bolaño (2013: 151) claims that the effectiveness of mechanisms of ideological domination through cultural industry depends on its capacity to produce national contents that guarantee its greater acceptance. Furthermore, and as a fundamental critic to the theories of dependence, Bolaño sustains that the problem is to mistake the characteristic of any capitalist society for what is given as the particular situation of a society in the international division of work, that is, this The Political Economy of Latin American Communication 99 sort of plans puts aside that social domination happens in terms of class and not externally. What is more, the Brazilian author claims that the dependents’ plans that “transfer all discussion from the outside” can be used to hide the real contradictions present in capitalist societies, by prevailing the concept of a nation over that of class27. Concerning one of the aspects referred by Muraro – concerning the analysis of the relations between communications and economy –, critics have pointed out that the investigations have strictly explored fundamentally the relations of the property of companies in the sector and the flow of exchanges of messages to prove the asymmetry present between central and peripheral countries. These analyses haven’t considered the cultural activities to constitute an integrated industrial complex, where the capacity to control production and circulation of messages, besides the introduction of new technologies, can’t be explained by analyzing only the relations of property28, but these would be matters to be intervened by relations of power (Portales, 1981), (Muraro, 1987). In the light of this, Diego Portales (1981) says that: “the sphere strictly economically appears farther. It would only provide the key to understand the hidden reality within the content of the message. It would be an economic determinism of the last resource, though not from a context requiring the incorporation of the economic analysis on the cultural phenomena”. The Chileno author claimed the imperious necessity to develop an economy of communications, since, despite the transcendence of the economy as a discipline, the study of the production and distribution of the communicative material was absent. The agendas in the investigations Before these analyses, Muraro provides a memorandum destined 27 Here, Bolaño speaks based on statements by Ingrid Sarti and makes the following quote of the author in is critic to authors of the theory of dependence mentioned in a paper in 1979: “(…) in its simplistic interpretation, one emphasizes in such a way the character of dependence that keeps the distance from the essence of the problem, that is, its capitalist nature. As dependence becomes the essence and not the complement, one considers the entire aspect of capitalist ideology as the opposite to the interests of Latin America in a way that dependence is reinforced and opposes to the natural course of the Latin American Development” (in Bolaño, 2013: 155) (free translation). 28 However, Muraro sustains that the hypothesis proposed by these authors on the constant increase of the concentration of cultural industry, and the continued shrinkage in the margin of operations led by local producers of dependent countries that has been noticed, though it is not an even and lineal process in the entire region. 100 Javier Torres Molina to the researchers in communication aiming to stimulate the debate on the economic implications, specifying some gaps little explored by studies of communication. The issues proposed are: 1. The analysis of the cultural industries as technically integrated complexes and following economic rules specific to this productive sector. 2. The examination of the correlations and mutual determinations present between macroeconomic processes and communicational. 3. The occurrence of the new technologies in the technical organization, financing or administrative of economic activities. 4. More generally: the role of transmission of information and other communicative activities in the day-by-day organization of economic activities. 5. The role of the mass media, or restricted circulation, in the decision making of the economic agents before government policies to promote the development or economic control of the juncture. 6. The elaboration of a broader model of rational action within which fits the processes of transmission of information and communication (Muraro, 1987:70). Facing this program and investigation proposal, we pose the question: how was the development of this field in that region from those formulations? Without making an exhaustive collection of the total of investigators, besides the papers by Portales and Muraro, among the approaches to the field, we can point out those of the Brazilian authors of the University of Campinas, which under the Marxism, have thought the specificities of the capitalist production manner implemented in the region. Patricia Arriaga also proposes to employ the distinction by Marx between productive and nonproductive work, and Bolaño, under other perspectives, proposes the necessity to elaborate a critic of the political economy of knowledge, within the context of a discussion on the subsumption of intellectual work and the role of technologies of information and communication (Bolaño and Mastrini, 2002). In its turn, some of the topics addressed by the authors that discussed the theories of dependence had to do with the hegemonic and ideological character of the communication devices (Javier Esteinou), the role of the transactional companies in cultural industries of the The Political Economy of Latin American Communication 101 sub-continent (Rafael Roncagliolo), the alternative communication as a process to the social exchange (Fernando Reyes Mata), the dynamic of audiovisual industries and its relation with globalization (Enrique Sánchez Ruíz). Already at the turn of the century, the Argentinians Luis Albornoz, Martín Becerra and Guillermo Mastrini have analyzed the impacts of global capitalism in cultural industries and of information, the economic concentration of the different multimedia groups, the revision of policies on communication and culture within the region (Gómez García and Sánchez Ruíz, 2011)29. Following Muraro’s considerations and having passed more than two decades after the initial elaboration of this text, Martín Becerra and Guillermo Mastrini (2006) update that collection, where they claim that with the turn of the century we see a revival of studies from economy of communication and culture in that region: “a process that follows the necessity to produce information, knowledge, reflections and propose debates on the structure and movements of the dynamic sector of information, communication and culture” (2006: 111). The authors present an update and an expansion of Iberoamerica of the agenda proposed by Muraro counting on the transformations in the sector of cultural industries, though always based on pioneer works of the political economy of communication. • The correlations and mutual determinations are existing between macroeconomic processes and communicational processes. The media (mass and niche), the socialization and the behaviour of economic agents. The information and its influence in the economic-financial framework. 29 Furthermore, these Mexican authors offer a program of investigation transcribed as follows: Historic structural studies on the Cultural Industries and Telecommunications; Conceptual debate on the Cultural Industries versus Creative Industries; Industry of CopyRights; the Role on Cultural Industries in local, national, regional and global economies; the role of Cultural Industries in the process of globalization (not only in its economical dimension, but also political and cultural); Pertinence and a theoretical-methodological scaffold to build a Political Economy of the Audience; Problematization of the commercialization of the cultural and informational products and their sociocultural impact; Analysis of the international flows of cultural products between central and peripheral countries, as well as regionally and interregional; a Generation of empirical investigation that copes with the organizing and labor dynamic of cultural production, especially in what happens in organizations related to cultural industries, to the idea of characterizing creative work and worn its contradictions in a Global capitalism context; Identification and characterization of distinct ways of communication and cultural production present in the margins of cultural industries (community media, independent producers, alternative media); Critical analysis of the social consequences of technological innovation, as the digital convergence process and its correlation with the processes of concentration and integration of economic groups; Analysis of the impact of marketing in the communicative and cultural systems, namely to what relates to access to consumption and cultural production; Analysis and recommendations of communication policies and cultural that are counterweights to then logic of the free market; Justification and defense of systems of public radio broadcast as democratic, cultural and identity vectors. 102 Javier Torres Molina • The incidence of new technologies in the technical, productive, financial or administrative organization of the economic activities (including namely the labour issue). • The incorporation of socio-economic dynamics into the cultural, as well as the socio-cultural constraints of the economic. • The cultural industries (either economic complexes and technological integrated) beyond the analysis of property relations. • Politics and legislation on cultural industries within the context of the technological convergence and the economic concentration (Becerra and Mastrini, 2006: 117). The authors analyze different works and a diversity of authors that have dedicated time to problematize this, and they’ve concluded that there has been an advance in the production of knowledge on the relationship between economy and communication and that it has “overcome the instrumental approximation of the communication studies to the economic structure of cultural industries to infer the intentions of messages” (free translation) and that the studies “show an increasing expansion that includes the traditional study of the structure of cultural industries, the transformations in the productive system and the media policies, though also look to inquire on the incidence of the technological developments and how general tendencies of economy impact specifically culture” (2006: 124)30 (free translation). Parallel to the production by different authors individually. There are groups and associations that, articulated between them, also develop a scientific work that provides the field of studies with new productions and promotes the exchange between researchers in congresses and collective works. Hence, we highlight the workgroup of the Latin American Association of Investigators of Communication (ALAIC=Asociación Latinoamericana de Investigadores de la Comunicación) and the Brazilian Society for Interdisciplinary Studies on Communication (INTERCOM=Sociedad Brasilera de Estudios Interdisciplinarios de Comunicación), which at the beginning of the nineties, in the last century, being both groups under the coordination of César Bolaño, gave away to the origin of the Political Economy of Technologies of Information and Communication (EPTIC=Economía Política de las Tecnologías de la Información y la 30 They also point out that the works are referring to “socialization of economic agents, changing forms of production, dissemination and appropriation of convergent technologies, the incidence of such changes in the governmental agenda and the strategic behaviour of cultural industries and the production of knowledge from empirical and comparative studies” are scarce. The Political Economy of Latin American Communication 103 Comunicación) and the e-journal EPTIC On-Line in 1999, besides institutionalizing studies in different centers in several universities of the region. Though there is o doubt that there was a great leap ahead with the creation, in 2002, of the Latin Union for Political Economy of Information, Communication and Culture (ULEPICC= Unión Latina de Economía Política de la Información, la Comunicación y la Cultura) which goal was to develop scientific studies on the media, culture and information and to cooperate with the organizations compromised with democracy and social transformation31. A field in expansion In this text we’ve already mentioned, the authors Bolaño, Mastrini and Sierra, point out within the context of the ULEPICC, that the Political Economy of Communication has as basic tasks “to recover discussions made on property of media, work on the definition of democratic politics of communication and to fight for an international framework that is more just in the distribution of information”, instead of advocating the systematization of the theoretical analysis of the functioning of cultural industries, since we see “the media as systems of production, distribution and consumption of symbolic ways that require the use of scarce social resources that are distributed from the restrictions presented through the capitalist manner of production” (free translation). Furthermore, they contemplate this field of studies “must be an intervention program that is once again bound to the academy with the practices and the organizations” (Bolaño et al., 2005: 25). In its turn, in the also quoted work of Bolaño, Narváez and Lopes (2015: 384) they claim tendencies in the investigation of the PEC in the region – which develop as part of the history of studies in communication and the Marxist thought – include a diversity of topics, that cross the analysis of the concentration of media, the organization of work processes, the production and distribution of cultural and informative products, the communication policies and numerous interfaces with studies on communication and education, popular and alternative communication, among others. Furthermore, they mention that the field of studies constitutes a 31 In Bolaño, Narváez and Lopes’ text they consider the different collective productions made within the frame of the studies we’re analyzing, either specialized journals, books, congresses, etc., either in Spanish or Portuguese and English. 104 Javier Torres Molina true epistemological alternative while building its object, not from the autonomy of media and technology, but its insertion within the development of capitalism. They also highlight the commitment of its researchers to the different political and social alternatives interested in questioning the communication policies or the relation between media and democracy. They also call the attention to the cultural projection the field has had through the ULEPICC as academic and cultural community within the Latin world, hence concluding that: “in this triple epistemic, political and cultural dimension, the PEC represents a genuine product of the Latin American critical tradition of communicational thought” (Bolaño, Narváez and Lopes, 2015: 396) (free translation). In the end, this is a field of studies that has been consolidated within the past decades in the region, and that collects the discussion not only under the scientific point of view of communication studies but has also contributed with multiple tools to the social debate on the structure of media, knowledge and culture, capitalism its transformations and alternatives. References BECERRA, Martín and Guillermo MASTRINI (2006), “Senderos de la economía de la comunicación: un enfoque latinoamericano”. In Cuadernos de Información y Comunicación, vol. 11, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Madrid, pp. 111-128. BOLAÑO, César and MASTRINI, Guillermo (2002) “Economía política de la comunicación: un aporte marxista a la constitución del campo comunicacional”. In Oficios Terrestres Nº 11-12, La Plata, Facultad de Periodismo y Comunicación Social (UNLP). GOMEZ GARCIA, Rodrigo, and SÁNCHEZ RUIZ, Enrique (2011). “La economía política de la comunicación y la cultura. Tradiciones y conceptos”. Portal de la Comunicació InCom-UAB. BOLAÑO César, MASTRINI Guillermo, SIERRA Francisco (Eds.) (2005): “Economía política, comunicación y conocimiento: una perspectiva crítica latinoamericana”. La Crujía, Buenos Aires. BOLAÑO, César (2013): Industria Cultural, información y capitalismo. Gedisa, Barcelona. BOLAÑO, César; NARVÁEZ, Ancízar, LOPES, Ruy Sardinha (2015): Economía política de la información, la comunicación y la cultura. In BOLAÑO, César, Crovi Druetta, Delia y Cimadevilla, Gustavo (coords.): The Political Economy of Latin American Communication 105 “La contribución de América Latina al campo de la comunicación. Historia, enfoques teóricos, epistemológicos y tendencias de la investigación”. Prometeo, Buenos Aires. MATTELART, Armand and Jean-Marie PIEMME (1982), “Las industrias culturales: génesis de una idea”, in VVAA, Industrias culturales: el futuro de la cultura en juego, Fondo de Cultura Económica, México, pp. 62-75. MOSCO, Vincent (2006), “Economía Política de la Comunicación: una actualización diez años después”, in Cuadernos de Información y Comunicación vol 11, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, pp. 57-79. MURARO, Heriberto (1987) “Economía y comunicación: convergencia histórica e inventario de ideas. Con especial referencia América latina”. In Muraro, Heriberto. Invasión cultural, economía y comunicación, Legasa, Buenos Aires, pp. 67-131. PORTALES, Diego: “Poder económico y libertad de expresión”, IletNueva imagen, Mexico, 1981. ZALLO, Ramón (1988): “Economía de la comunicación y la cultura”. Akal, Madrid. ZALLO, Ramón (2011): “Retos actuales de la economía crítica de la comunicación y cultura”. In: Albornoz, Luis (Comp.) “Poder, medios y cultura. Una mirada crítica desde la economía política de la comunicación”, Paidós, Buenos Aires. 112 César Bolaño great influence over the Spanish one and that of Quebec. It is clear in the work of Ramón Zallo, who I’ve classified, next to Alain Herscovici and Gaëtan Tremblay, as belonging to the second generation of the gresequian tradition with which the author dialogues directly in its founding work. But if we broaden the horizons, as did Ruth de Frutos, to include the Spanish field with greater detail, we’ll find other influences, such as the mentioned before. In the case of Englishspeaking countries, the range of the field and its influence over an ensemble much more extensive of countries throughout the world, make the question more complex. 5. Meanwhile, if we focus on the broad dialogues and confrontations which historically bind the different theoretical perspectives condensed in the board with other lines of work, which go from the Keynesianism to the heterodox microeconomy, going through Weber, Schumpeter or the American sociology itself, the French structuralism, including the School of Regulation, the different Marxism and a wide etc., we realize that the PEC, by being part of a transversal paradigm such as the historical materialism, can with effect represent a critical and holistic alternative, so to speak, to the entire field of Communication, as I’ve explained in other occasions. To a non-eclectic articulation in that direction, the PEC represents a point of convergence from which one could – considering its situation in the field of Communication and assuming its affiliation to historic materialism – also look for new frontiers in knowledge, directed to, for instance, the theories of language, as suggested by, in my opinion, the possible and necessary dialogue with the approach to the homologies of Ferrucio Rossi-Landi. Going through with an ambitious collective project as this implies two important problems, among others. First, the ongoing unification of the PEC since the nineties, as mentioned before, internationally– given the asymmetries built-in history and that make part of the scientific fields (and the complex and permanent power games towards them)–, tend to revolve around the central axis of the Anglo-Saxon tradition. The problem is that this can reduce the complexity of the ensemble, not realize contributions, forget topics and homogenize problematics favouring preoccupations which, being a critical field, assumes a hegemonic position. To contradict this tendency, which does not depend on good or bad intentions in play, is necessary to have in mind the functioning of the relations between the center and periphery and know where the great challenges and innovations come from. Notes on Political Economy and Critical Thought in Communication Studies in Europe and Latin America 113 The agreement ALAIC-ECREA and the project Connecting Paradigms are attempts to coordinate actions oriented to the common and conscient construction of the international field. Other actions developed by ALAIC between 2009 and 2014 within IAMCR, looking for an articulation between the other regional associations, very focused, though not exclusively, on the perspective of dialogue south-south, being part of this gain of conscience. Is the responsibility of PEC and the critical thought in general, in its distinct currents, to understand its part in this international dialogue and the epistemological struggle. 6. The second problem mentioned in the previous point is that of relations between the PEC and Cultural Studies that Ruth de Frutos has dealt with in her text, referring exclusively to what occurs in the European field. Here there is a central epistemological issue, related to the concept of mediation that I’ve dissed on different occasions, especially in the past few years. What follows is based in Bolaño (2015b). Communication is the mediation science, which is very clear in all definitions of the distinct theories of communication, from the mass communication research to the founding contribution of Martín Barbero and his disciples, in Latin America. Martín Serrano had already proposed it, in some way, in this sense and under a perspective also Marxist, though not of Political Economy. The founding work of Barbero represents a break in the paradigm by moving the problem to the moment of reception, giving priority to the aspects of psycho-cognitive nature of the relation between the public and the mass media, according to a perspective essentially anthropological. The planning is defined, in principle, as Marxist, better yet, as a contribution to the renovation of the Marxist thought in Communication. The dialogue between Anthropology and Marxism is not new; Marx himself has taken a position in the matter, his papers on the pre-capitalist economic formations are part of the critical spectrum assumed by first-class anthropologists, such as Darcy Ribeiro. However, the tendency for Latin American Cultural Studies in the field of Communication soon departed from this perspective, adopting, especially in the nineties, a post-modern vision. In my own most known theoretical proposal, integrated within the field of the PEC, though it is better considered as a “Marxist theory of communication”, mediation emerges attached to the Marxist concept of subsumption and to the double contradiction (capital-labour; economy-culture) of capitalism. In most recent texts I’ve made sure I’d 114 César Bolaño point out the concept can articulate either the political-institutional determinations or those of psycho-cognitive nature, though I haven’t worked I general with this second aspect of the problem, which is the core of concerns of the CS. Though, nevertheless, the issue is considered in terms that within the Marxist literature is defined as the subjective factor. The possibilities to dialogue and exploration of this vast horizon of knowledge are obvious, though they couldn’t happen within the context of bourgeois theories of post-modernity. The solution I propose, in opposition, goes in the direction of recovering the concepts of mediation and the community of the Hegelian-Marxist matrix. Nevertheless, there is nowhere here to go further with it. The purpose of this commentary, as said before, is sole to purpose these half a dozen reflections for the dialogue between the authors of the “critical theory” axis of the ALAIC-ECREA project, Connecting Paradigms. References BOLAÑO, César Ricardo Siqueira (2000). Industria Cultural, Información y Capitalismo. Barcelona: Gedisa, 2013 (Spanish edition). [English edition: The culture industry, information and capitalism. London: Palgrave, 2015]. __________ (2010). Economia política da comunicação e da cultura. Breve genealogia do campo e das taxonomias das indústrias culturais. In: BOLAÑO, César; GOLIN, Cida; BRITTOS, Valério (2010). Economia da arte e da cultura. São Paulo: Observatório Itaú Cultural. ___________ (2015 a). O conceito de cultura em Celso Furtado. Salvador: EDUFBA. ____________ (2015 b). Campo Aberto. Para a crítica da epistemologia da comunicação. Aracaju: SEGRASE. [e-book format for free in: https:segrase.se.gov.br/ecommerce.htm] BOLAÑO, César; CROVI, Delia; CIMADEVILLA, Gustavo (2015). La contribución de América Latina al campo de la comunicación. Historia, enfoques teóricos, epistemológicos y tendencias de la investigación. Buenos Aires: Prometeo. ZAROWSKY, Mariano (2013). Del laboratorio chileno a la comunicaciónmundo. Un itinerario intelectual de Armand Mattelart. Buenos Aires: Biblos. 115 Debate on Critical Theory and Political Economy of Communication Javier Torres Molina César Bolaño Ruth de Frutos Javier Torres Molina (JTM): Taking into consideration the texts presented here, I undertake that it can emerge different plans to establish a dialogue /discussion. The first plan is the motive to the open invitation to the making of this collective work, and specifically to what refers to this section, in what concerns establishing a dialogue between the European and the American continents to what relates to the Political Economy of Communication. A dialogue which intends to share the same study object and the same current concerns, though, clearly, the emerging of this discipline in each region has obeyed to particular and specific circumstances under the theoretical point of view. Indeed, we can’t be talking about of schools within the same specific study – the European and the American – since there are multiple approaches in different points of both continents, as we’ve mentioned. Though we believe that this dialogue has acquired a greater insight within the Iberoamerican countries lately through the ULEPICC. A dialogue that transforms into production of knowledge and specific practice to build another kind of communicational system. César Bolaño (CB): Perfect. I would only add something to problematize. On one side, there is the tendency to unify the field of the PEC globally, which began, in my opinion, in 1992. Janet Wasko believes the same. It seems to me it begins with the IAMCR in Guarujá, Brazil. The same year, a few days before, the second group of PEC was organized in the region. The first one was that of INTERCOM, both coordinated by me at the time. From these two groups was created the network EPTIC in the OBSCOM/UFS and the journal EPTIC Online. These were the institutions that summed the seminars of Buenos Aires, Brasilia and Seville, which created ULEPICCc, in 2002, which I had the pleasure to preside over for the first time. Ruth de Frutos (RdF): It’s true. As mentioned by Javier, the ULEPICC has had a fundamental role but is also noteworthy the role of INTERCOM, EPTIC or that of ALAIC in the process of recognizing and making visible this epistemological current. 116 Research Traditions in Dialogue – Communication Studies in Latin America and Europe CB: In other words, ULEPICC represented the culmination, at that moment, of a tendency to the Iberoamerican unification (despite the pretension for a Latin organization, in order to include the French and especially the Portuguese-speaking countries of Africa). The unification of the global field is slower, therefore, and occurs within the context of the Political Economy Session (PES) of IAMCR. There are two important problems to the future: (1) the necessity that unification happens symmetrically, thus avoiding hegemonic positions. An example has been the initiatives me and Janet Wasko have been coordinating, either when we coordinate a seminar in the Museum of Art of Rio de Grande del Sur, at the congress of IAMCR in Porto Alegre, or in the special number of EPTIC Online that we’ve organized at a time, this was the only journal on the field of the PEC worldwide, since the session on Political Economy of IAMCR only created its journal afterwards. The problem is that there is an inexorable tendency in these processes of disciplinary unification, after the primary romantic period, for different reasons, towards the hegemony of the thought produced in the global North and, more specifically, in English. (2) The other problem we must think of concerns the possible asymmetries within the Iberoamerican world and in ULEPICC itself. In both cases, we must avoid the ingenuity of not considering that there is an epistemological struggle in the different scientific fields, which also articulates with the class struggle, with the hegemonies, etc. JTM: And the second plan of dialogue to which I was referring to is the relation between Cultural Studies and the Political Economy of Communication, a relation that immediately remits to the English debate which different relevant authors in each field have kept in previous years. Since the vision of Garnham (1997), which counters the issue of class when is time to analyze the cultural practices, to Grossberg (1997), who, besides presenting the perspective of the previous author as being deterministic and reductionist, establishes that both fields have their study object, going over Kellner (1998), who proposes the necessity to an interrelation between both theoretical perspectives including the analysis of class, sex, race, nationality and ethnicity among other types of representation to the analysis of the culture and communication. Therefore, it is not a matter of resolving this tension – if there is one – between both perspectives nor of outline, which is the study object for each other. But it is a matter of point out that both come from a questioning of the dominant ideology to capitalism, and that these are fundamentally inserted – or aspire to Research Traditions in Dialogue – Communication Studies in Latin America and Europe 117 – in the process of social transformation. CB: Agreed. Indeed, I believe the debate in the Anglo/international field has gone much further, though Latin America has an interesting specificity that could contribute to the international dialogue: the debate around the concept of mediation. My point is that the PEC, when conceiving the mediation made by the mass media, or the cultural industries, should define it in terms of subsumption of the cultural, intellectual work and ask if on the other hand is another mediation possible. Besides, it is important to understand that the social mediation process goes through two stages, one political-institutional, and another cognitive one. With this is possible to articulate and generalize the concept within the context of dialectical materialism (Bolaño, 2015). I don’t believe that in the Anglo/international field the debate has ever followed that path, for the impact of Barbero wasn’t as great there as in Latin America. RdF: I agree with you in the sense that we can’t generalize according to Manichaean approaches to the epistemological realities of both sides of the pond, but we must make an effort to individualize in the crucible the authors that have generated important debates in theoretical terms on the matter charged to us. In the light of this, some of the points made by my colleague, and that refer to the reflections of the nineties, have been treated in texts ten years later (Mattelart, 2011; Méndez Rubio, 2004; Mosco, 2011). The search for the intersections between the PEC and CS have been approached from distinct perspectives, in particular, which deserve to be taken into consideration. To quote an anecdote, Marque de Melo (2011: 54) himself already talked of the Political Economy of Communication as a “border discipline”. CB: I disagree in part with this idea of the PEC as a border discipline. It is surely in a crossroad, dialoguing with many of the fields and subfields of Social Sciences and Communication. Though, moreover, it is said that it is in the border to say that it is not part of the core of Communication. I would say the opposite: that by being part of the historical materialism (that goes beyond the Political Economy), it is presented as an alternative paradigm to the ensemble of the field, in dispute with other paradigms. I am undertaking the PEC as a critical Political Economy, or as the Critic of the Political Economy, which is the same. Marques thinks the Political Economy as more or less a synonym of tout court Economy. JTM: I agree. Indeed, if we go back to the definition of PEC we’ve quoted from RdF in our papers – also taken from texts where CB participated – 118 Research Traditions in Dialogue – Communication Studies in Latin America and Europe we see that the discipline dialogues and feeds from others necessarily. It is, there is a relation with other fields that empowers it. In its turn, and reaffirming what was recently said, the emergence and consolidation of the PEC as also helped to reinforce the field of Communication in a broad sense, not only incorporating its tools and analysis – that is, its specificity – but it has also been able to establish dialogues and debates with cultural studies, for instance, about a variety of concepts that has had as a result a deeper insight in reflections. RdF: Among the most significant synergies, the way I see it, is the analysis of commercialization of culture, the concept of the domain within the social organization and the very own critical perspective of the communication studies not alien to the asymmetries of political, economic and symbolic capital. The original contribution to this joint reflection sets precisely on the will to create a productive dialogue between the critical school of the PEC and the problems of interaction of active audiences, that have been approached by cultural studies and that must be the basis to the Communication studies. CB: Precisely, my perspective is more in the sense of questioning the idea of “active audiences”, which has generated all kinds of errors, from the technological optimist determinism of the most naïve, to the equivocal of a Christian Fuchs, who inherits the worst of DallasSmythe, as it is the “work of the audience”, completely alien to the thought of Marx. The solution I propose, of thinking the mediation in terms of subsumption of the intellectual/cultural work and other possible mediation, could clear up these problems. RdF: Finally, rethinking the dialogue between the PEC and the cultural studies, paying special attention to the public policies of communication, also emphasizes the necessity to a social change in which the process and the social relations play a fundamental part, on top of the traditional tendency of the political economy, based on the study of the social structures and institutions. CB: Agreed. From that, we see the necessity to deepen the dialogue of the PEC with the studies on popular and alternative communication, of journalism, including labour press, communication and education, social movements, etc. That is the task ULEPICC-Brazil proposed from the beginning, for instance. Moreover, in this historical moment in particular, in which the neo-populist or neo-developmental experiences, give way, in Latin America, to a right-wing that threats to promote setbacks related to the little advances conquered in matter of communication politics, the observation of Ruth is important, for the role of the PEC becomes fundamental in the sense that it informs the Research Traditions in Dialogue – Communication Studies in Latin America and Europe 119 critical evaluation that the communicational field surely will make on those experiences. JTM: I would add matters bind attached to the cultural identity and diversity, plurality of voices and opinions, the access and the participation, all matters that constitute the democratization of communication and the right to communication that have been taken in account in these little advancements in communication politics. In this sense, the contribution of the PEC has been important when to define the media concentration and analyze the different actors that have been part of these processes, including the State. Before the current juncture that crosses the region, the contribution of the PEC is fundamental to intervene in the debates relating to the concentration, convergence and re-regulation, debates and discussions that go beyond the academic context, since we are ultimately discussing communication and also about social relations, capitalism and power. References BOLAÑO, C. (2015), Campo Aberto: para a crítica da epistemologia da comunicação. Aracaju: SEGRASE. GARNHAM, Nicholas (1997), “Economía política y estudios culturales: ¿reconciliación o divorcio?”, in Causas y Azares nº6, Buenos Aires, pp. 33-46. GROSSBERG, Lawrence (1997), “Estudios culturales versus economía política, ¿quién más está aburrido con este debate?”, in Causas y Azares nº6, Buenos Aires, p. 47-60. KELLNER, Douglas (1998), “Vencer la línea divisoria: estudios culturales y economía política”, in Ferguson, Marjorie and Peter Golding (Eds.) Economía política y estudios culturales. Bosch, Barcelona, p. 185-212. MARQUES DE MELO, J. (2011), Brasil democrático: Comunicação e desenvolvimento. Brasília: Ipea – Instituto de Pesquisa Economía Aplicada. MÉNDEZ RUBIO, A. (2004), Perspectivas sobre comunicación y sociedad. Valencia: UV. MOSCO, V. (2011), “La economía política de la comunicación, una tradición viva”, in L. ALBORNOZ (Coord.), Poder, medios, cultura. Una mirada crítica desde la economía política de la comunicación. Buenos Aires: Paidós. MATTELART, A. (2011), “Estudios, comportamientos, hábitos y prácticas culturales”, in L. ALBORNOZ (Coord.), Poder, medios, cultura. Una mirada crítica desde la economía política de la comunicación. Buenos Aires: Paidós. 03 CULTURAL STUDIES 128 Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández-Pérez and Filipa Subtil less deserving of academic interest. This is the reason why they started an ongoing dialog with other European research centers. Since its foundation, the CCCS developed a critical analysis, with a certain influence from French neo-Marxist philosopher Louis Althusser, around the notion of ideology, the construction of sense and the image of reality through complex symbolic processes. The legacy of Antonio Gramsci must also be acknowledged, especially his concept of hegemony. The British culturalist approach adopted an extended definition of culture, which was considered as an open process, in permanent construction and – without being paradoxical – also in systemic deconstruction, as was clearly inferred in many of these studies. Hence, culture is not understood as a practice, nor as a simple description of the habits and costumes of society, but as something transversal to all social activities and to the sum of their interrelations (Hall, 1980). In the 1970s, after overcoming the difficulties of integration in the university and the training/teaching of the first students, a favorable environment contributed to the increasing visibility of the center. In 1972, working papers started to circulate, which were later compiled in a volume and where the best production of a vast generation of young researchers can be found, including Andrew Lowe, Angela McRobbie, Charlotte Brunsdon, Cas Critcher, David Morley, Dick Hebdige, Dorothy Hobson, Paul Gilroy, Paul Willis, Phil Cohen, Simon Frith, and Tony Jefferson. The young subcultures were one of the analyzed fields where researchers of the CCCS were more political and inventive. This is the case of the well-known work of Hebdige on punks and mods (1979). The social and identity differences, symbolized by the immigrant communities, as well as racism, also occupied a prominent place in the The Empire Strikes Back collection (CCCS, 1982). The interest in social practices, without an elitist bias, led the CCCS researchers to pay attention to the cultural products consumed by the popular classes. The Birmingham group was one of the first to use social sciences in order to analyze advertising, rock music, and soccer. An interest in the audiovisual media followed, when a difference was made between informative programming and entertainment. We must also refer to a text from then that today is considered “canonic” (Gurevitch & Scannell, 2003: 231-247) in media research: “Encoding/decoding”, by Stuart Hall (1980). It is well-known that Hall developed an innovative hypothesis at that time which placed an emphasis on the production of messages, since the functioning of the media could not be limited to a mechanical transmission between the sender and the receiver. History, Debates and Main References of Cultural Studies in Europe 129 The subjects of study implied favoring research methods capable of capturing common lives with greater precision: ethnography, oral history, and analysis of written documents (legal, industrial, and parish archives). These studies mapped cultures, learned their coherence, and showed to which extent going frequently to pubs, soccer matches, and other popular events can constitute a set of coherent practices. Gender issues was another one of the matters that was greatly developed, via the feminist sensibility of Charlotte Brunsdon, Dorothy Hobson, and Paul Willis. Ultimately, the activities of the popular classes were analyzed as a way of resisting and challenging social domination. Historically speaking, it is worth highlighting the interaction between the English and the French culturalist approaches with the appearance, in 1975, of Pierre Bourdieu and his journal Les Actes de la Recherche en Sciences Sociales. This publication followed the same line as cultural studies, that is, it challenged the political implications of culture. Furthermore, this journal published the first translations into French of texts by Hoggart, Williams, Thompson, and Willis41. At that time, Hoggart and Thompson were invited to Paris by Bourdieu, which coincided with Williams’ visit in 1976. There, his book, The Country and the City, was presented at the École Normal, within the context of a seminar organized by Bourdieu on “Sociologie de la culture et des mondes de domination”. However, cooperation among the investigation centers was rather limited. 3. The Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish cases Besides the exchanges indicated in the previous section, the CECMAS had a great influence within the intellectual circles in Italy and Portugal and, to a lesser degree, in Spain. In Italy, one of the bestknown names of the culturalist turn, Umberto Eco, had a close relation with CECMAS. He regularly attended its seminars and published in the journal Communications42. After completing his PhD in 1954 in medieval aesthetic philosophy at the University of Turin, the young Eco published articles and essays about pastiches et postiches in the journal I Verri, collaborated with the Italian national television (RAI) in cultural programs, continued his reflections about art in the Rivista Estetica, and 41 See issues 2-3 of 1976 and 17-18 of 1977 and 24 of 1978. In France, Passeron was the main disseminator of the works by Hoggart (1999). 42 It is important to remember that, in Italy, the reflection on mass culture goes back as far as the Nobel prize winner Luigi Pirandello, who said harsh words against Americanism and cinema products, as he accused them to be at the service of money. 130 Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández-Pérez and Filipa Subtil edited collections of essays in philosophy, sociology, and semiotics via the Editora Bompiani publisher (Gritti, 1999: 38-40). Some of the books Eco published as a young man in the 1960s and 1970s dialogued with the work on semiotics by Barthes (Eco 1962; 1964; 1973). Apocalypse Postponed (Apocalittici e integrati) was a collection of texts produced in the early 1960s that fired up a debate in social sciences and communication sciences in Europe. The book proposed a media research program, advocating that media had to be seriously researched and understood and for that, it was fundamental to use the different instruments of analysis from sociology, anthropology, and the new developments in semiotics. Like Barthes, Eco found in semiotics a unified method to study the mass media (EscuderoChauvel, 1997: 256). With regard to his subjects of study, Eco focused on the issues of consumption, music, comic-books, and kitsch aesthetics. The arguments he developed were supposed to overcome the trends that had dominated the analysis of culture and communication of American liberal nature (integrati) and the German Marxist perspectives (apocalittici). Eco continued in the 1970s to research radio, television, and Chinese comic-books, and in the 1980s he devoted himself to analyze Italian porn artist and parliamentarian Cicciolina but also the movie Ginger and Fred by Fellini (Eco in Escudero-Chauvel, 1997: 245). A work, influenced by Eco, of great importance in communication sciences in southern European countries was Teorie delle Comunicazioni di massa (1985), by Mauro Wolf, a disciple of Eco. Despite Eco’s importance, cultural studies in Italy is not limited to his work. Authors such as Paolo Fabbri (who also studied with Barthes), Franco Fabbri, and Tullio de Mauro, among others, also deserve to be taken in consideration43. As for the British variety of cultural studies, it would only reach Italy in the late 1970s via literary studies and of some fringe areas of cultural sociology. This perspective would definitely be adopted by communication and media studies (De Blasio & Sorice, 2007). On the other hand, the Portuguese case was characterized by a context of dictatorship and repression in academia, particularly in the case of social sciences, at least until April 1974 with the reinstauration of democracy. Nevertheless, European culturalist tendencies (French and English) began pushing in since the early 1960s. The field of cultural studies began to take shape with the contribution of literary studies, due to the influence of culturalist French currents. University exchanges contributed to this cultural pollination, via three routes: 43 On the reception of cultural studies in Italy see Forgacs & Lumley (1996) and De Blasio & Sorice (2007: 3-28). History, Debates and Main References of Cultural Studies in Europe 131 the Portuguese students’ stays in France, where they would attend seminars with Barthes or Kristeva, among others; the translation and publishing of French authors in journals and books/collections; and the arrival of French authors to Portugal to give conferences44. Despite the French presence being practically hegemonic, the work of Williams and Hoggart is not completely unknown in Portugal (Carmo, 1964). Among the most prominent academic and non-academic intellectuals in the reception of French culturalism we find Eduardo Prado Coelho, Eduardo Lourenço, Vergílio Ferreira, António Ramos Rosa, Maria Alzira Seixo, José Augusto Seabra, and Arnaldo Saraiva45. After the instauration of democracy in 1974 and the development of social sciences, the sociological study on daily life and culture was established, having the work of Bourdieu and Certeau as the main reference (Santos, 1998). The cultural studies of Anglo-Saxon and German root were only institutionalized in the 1980s and 1990s, largely due to the impulse of communication sciences. It is in this moment when the main universities in the country began to create degrees, masters, and doctorates. One last note on cultural studies in southern Europe relates to the development of this current in Spain. Generally speaking, Spain has been little permeable to contributions from the culturalist perspective (Palacio, 2007; Tarancón, 2014; Balibrea, 2010). There are several explanations for this. First, the plug on international communication trends research during the Franco dictatorship (1939-1975) set the country back from a scientific growth perspective. Communication studies at university reached Spain in the 1970s (particularly the academic year 1970-71), that is, decades later than in countries such as Germany, the United States, or Mexico. The Frankfurt School and mass communication research were studied for the first time in Spain in the 1970s and 1980s when these currents had already lost their influence and had given way to other approaches. Second, Palacio (2007) also points out at the lack of interest in popular culture in Spain. Gender studies, the representation of minorities, or identity processes stimulated by media text consumption, so relevant in cultural studies, have occupied “a fringe position” (Palacio, 2007: 70). We could add here the Spanish research of functionalist, empirical, and quantitative perspectives against studies carried out from culturalist and critical 44 In the early 1970s, Julia Kristeva gave conferences in Portugal (at the Faculty of Letters of the University of Lisbon and to the Portuguese Society of Writers). 45 Maria Alzira Seixo, José Augusto Seabra, and Arnaldo Saraiva attended, in the late 1960s, the CECMAS seminars. The first two were co-supervised by Barthes in their doctoral theses. 132 Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández-Pérez and Filipa Subtil positions. Tarancón (2014) also points out that the disciplinary rigidity, the interdepartmental restricting limitations, and the hyperspecialization of the Spanish university created an environment providing little support to tackle an eclectic, interdisciplinary, and heterogenous field such as cultural studies. Nevertheless, this incompatibility should not have been an obstacle if we consider that cultural studies emerges, among other matters, precisely as a challenge and criticism to disciplinary immobility. Ultimately, the Spanish university has its own idiosyncrasy that makes it rather inflexible and close to the culturalist perspectives we are describing. Martín Alegre (2009: 11) claims: “In Spain, the work is based on a very intensive, very territorial specialization that makes any attempt to open to the multidisciplinary to be seen as a threat”. Finally, we can also note the limited knowledge of the key foundational texts, which often have not been translated into Spanish. It is extremely significant, for instance, that out of the twenty-five works of reference of the European cultural studies that we have analyzed in section four, at least 15 of them have not been translated into Spanish, which, without a doubt, has influenced the limited knowledge and handling of this by the Spanish epistemic community. The presence of cultural studies in Spain has been attached, mainly, to the departments of English philosophy and from there it extended to “communication sciences, sociology, and anthropology,” (Martín Alegre, 2009: 3). Within academia, Palacio (2007: 71) highlights the following authors: Chantal Cornu Gentille D’Arcy, Celestino Deleyto, Luis Miguel García Mainar, and the members of the working group known as “Ciento Volando.” Balibrea (2011) assessed the departments in Spain that work in cultural studies such as the department of English Philology at the University of Zaragoza, the Department of Journalism and Audiovisual Communication at the University Carlos III, the Department of Journalism at the University Rovira i Virgili, and the UNIA Art and Thought Department at the International University of Andalusia. With regard to journals, the majority of the Spanish publications specialized in communication have a generic nature, so they collect diverse perspectives and methodologies. Even so, it is possible to identify some of the journals that are paying the most attention to this analytical perspective, such as Revista I/C. Revista Científica de Información y Comunicación (University of Seville); Comunicar (University of Huelva); Catalan Journal of Communication and Cultural Studies (University Rovira i Virgili); Torre del Virrey. Revista de Estudios History, Debates and Main References of Cultural Studies in Europe 133 Culturales (independent production); Scripta Nova (University of Barcelona); Anàlisi. Quaderns de Comunicació i cultura (Autonomous University of Barcelona), or Redes.Com (University of Seville). Ultimately, as we can see, communication cultural studies in Spain is still at a very undeveloped stage, despite the fact that, generally speaking, the context of the communications research is at a high point, with more than 50 university faculties sharing these studies and more than 50 specialized journals, according to the DICE index (Dissemination and Editorial Quality of Spanish Journals on Humanities and Social and Legal Sciences). Incidentally, Balibrea (2011) points out that cultural studies in Spain is mainly present on the fringes of academy, in art and education initiatives in museums, and in cultural and political activism, but this is beyond the scope of this chapter. 4. Directions and debates of European cultural studies In general terms, the internationalization of cultural studies must be considered as a reflection of theoretical debates and not as the simple transposition and/or translation of texts. Furthermore, to interpret that its origins are exclusively within the Birmingham group is a distorted narrative of its development (Stam & Shohat, 2005; Wright, 1998). In fact, today we find important developments within European cultural studies works with a lesser critical imprint –they are important to understand popular culture in its capacity for identity construction– but in which the most purely critical or neo-Marxists questions fall in a secondary plane: this would be the case of the so-called “fan studies,” which are more focused on the processes of identification than those of domination (Kustritz, 2015). But even if we are limited to the canonic report of the origins of cultural studies (Hall, 1990), as we saw in the first chapter, it cannot be argued that CS has always been characterized for its multiculturality, reflected as much in the variety of its themes as in the origin of its interlocutors. Quite a different issue emerges when we discuss the influence that these international voices have had in the debate around CS in terms of the leadership role of the English hegemony. It is not accidental that one of the most enthusiastic debates about this was precisely whether it was necessary or not to gain some distance from the British core. It has been noted that, despite its radical and anti-elitist origins, CS is on its way to become a “Eurocentric way of Anglo-Americans staring at their navel” (Stam & Shohat, 2005: 481), in part due to the pressure they 134 Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández-Pérez and Filipa Subtil exert by means of the influence of their academic institutions and the extended use of English as a scholarly language. However, despite all the above, in the history of the movement from a wider international perspective, maintaining certain ties with Birmingham seems to be a constant. In this section, therefore, we present the main debates and current directions that are currently being discussed with regard to the classic body of French and British Cultural Studies: Marxism and its influence. Between Theory and Social Action Either as a criticism to his determinism or by revisiting his terminology and ethos, Marx cast a shadow over CS. At its heart, culture is bound to power and control, the only mechanisms that can sustain the asymmetries among social groups (Williams, 1977). Once again, the narrative of CS determines the emergence of new debates. While in Europe Williams’ cultural materialism has a strong influence, this aspect is hardly touched upon among American authors, who do not participate in the “sense of community of the working class” which William so celebrates (Martínez Guillem, 2013: 195). Marxism is in the middle of many other (dis)agreements, such as the conflicting relation between CS and political economy. For instance, in the CCCS texts, cultural manifestations are understood as superstructure, also referred to as ideology, and political economy is assimilated in the concept that is the basis of these relationships (Castle, 2007: 72). As time passed, there has been some distancing from these postures. On the one hand, the one defended by those who support political economy to be incorporated in media studies (Garnham, 1979; 1995). On the other hand, the one defended by those who consider separation necessary to avoid the influence of economic reductionism. Ultimately, it is necessary to leave the Marxist vocabulary behind in order to safeguard the study of culture since “one can’t differentiate inherited compatibility between the basis and the superstructure” (Grossberg, 1995: 79). Despite being an open discussion, more recent positions have been defending an articulation based on a materialistic vision of meaning. Away from the ontological distinction between economy and culture, we conceive “the social world as a dialectical field of the practical human activity and the materialization of such activity” (Pack, 2006: 120). Uses of Power and Symbols One of the requirements for a relation of power and subordination between individuals to exist is the presence of a shared system of codes History, Debates and Main References of Cultural Studies in Europe 135 and symbols. It could be argued that all cultural elements participate in this power relationship through its political dimension since, as Bourdieu (1994: 161) points out: “the symbolic power that imposes the principles of reality construction –in particular, social reality– is the primary dimension of political power.” Cultural studies is the direct heir of this premise, exemplified, for instance, with Stuart Hall’s classic distinction between Culturalism and Structuralism (Hall, 1980: 72). This distinction supposes the articulation of influences and theoretical debates between power structures, the definition of culture and the methodologies of proximity to the text. The entire cultural process is subordinated to the status of social relations, in turn influenced by gender, race, age, and social class. Nevertheless, social action can be considered as an expression of a social condition, for it is encrypted and endowed with meaning, culture being the ultimate manifestation of the ensemble of social actions (Hall, 1997: 208). Cultures, much as individuals, establish relations of power and subordination. Here, Gramsci’s interpretation by the British has been criticized for being considered almost exclusively structuralist (Martínes Guillem, 2013: 199), as well as being the basis for the wellknown Encoding/Decoding model proposed by Stuart Hall. To analyze the relations between the upper classes and the hegemony of cultures, Hall uses the term “regulation” (Hall, 1997: 227), and assumes that in one way or another all cultures are regulated (or “reregulated,” “deregulated,” etc.); in other words, submitted to a political power even though this power is not always exercised directly by the state but from the hegemonic position of the upper classes. Nor is it always manifested explicitly as would be the case with censorship, propaganda, or messages of protest. On the opposite side and always under the suspicion of falling into populism and banality, popular culture (its consumption, its production, its recycling by its fan audiences) is celebrated as an opposition act. One of the great questions that CS tries to answer is to define which cultural manifestations are to be considered relevant and which ones could be left outside since the classic distinction between low and high culture seems to have been completely abolished. The concept of Identity Culture, for the original group of cultural studies, is not self-sufficient nor a finite field of study but a stage for debate (Johnson, 1987: 39), which can lead to confrontation. In light of this, the political sphere is 136 Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández-Pérez and Filipa Subtil determined by theories and manifested in the protests of the minority social movements. The group plays a fundamental role in the study of multiculturalism and approaches the issues related to immigration and diaspora (Castle, 2007: 75). By supporting the feminist sectors and the fight against race discrimination (CCCS, 1982; Hall, Critcher, Jefferson, Clarke & Roberts, 1978), CS motivates the so-called new social currents, which are not based on class but on another identity feature. With the passing of time, we can differentiate two very distinct groups. The first refers to individual identity such as sexual orientation, sexual identity (queer studies), and ethnic origin. This category also includes women’s studies, which has finally developed by incorporating perspectives on masculinity and identity, also covered by gender studies. The second group constructs its discourse around the making of collective projects including community life, the environment, and aid to developing countries. The relation between social action, including (or not) political corporatism, and academia in CS is an unchallenged fact, perhaps erroneously. This would be the case of the ties between the movement and the anti-capitalist left (something particularly contrasted in the case of Stuart Hall). This interpretation would not be fair to the vast political spectrum and when comparing all protest movements with an extremely specific answer within the available socialist options. Furthermore, the freedom to carry out and support a public political option should not be exclusive of CS but of the personal beliefs of the researchers (Gilbert, 2006: 185). On the other hand, the way identities mix up, merge, or transform is a subject of study in this interdisciplinary theoretical framework. Simon During refers to this as a non-rigid way of identity, based on the concept of “hybridization” and defined as “the performative acts that build identities” (During, 2005: 150). Identity is a complex construct that can be discussed at all levels. Although the term globalization did not emerge with CS, the paradigm that the exploration of the concept itself means has enjoyed great popularity in CS. The term creates debate around its existence, its scope, and its historical development. Numerous other terms have emerged from this discussion such as the global/local dichotomy or the articulation with other terms of the CS lexis (diaspora, identity, and culture). The alternative formula, under the concept of “transnational flow” (Iwabuchi, 2002), entails the adaptation to the diverse nuclei of influence and exchange worldwide. History, Debates and Main References of Cultural Studies in Europe 137 Self-definition of Cultural Studies Cultural studies is an extremely reflective and self-critical body of work. Its history has produced several episodes of debate, including the movement’s origin as an object of discussion (Stam & Shohat, 2005; Wright, 1998). This idiosyncrasy might be due not only to its recent history but also to the evolution of the institutions and the development of an increasingly connected worldwide academic community that has allowed a more fluid interaction. It is therefore difficult to talk about homogeneity either in its subjects of study, the relevant disciplines, and their theoretical approaches. If the different discourses shared a common thread, this would probably be self-defense. This justification is made by applying it to the real or political world, regardless of the level of theoretical abstraction and the political leaning, not necessarily to the left, which, ultimately, is an exercise of “self-criticism” (Hall, 2006: 48). We could theorise whether it is possible to talk about CS as a well-defined dialectical community. Certainly, it seems to share the same language, and proficiency in it (e.g. command of Marxist or deconstructionist terminology), is a pre-requisite to participate in its conversations. On the other hand, the way institutions have become big managers of knowledge has not followed any other logic than that of pure evolution, in a Darwinist sense. In each country, the disciplines show a different scenario of influence and the connections with the state’s power, which ultimately differentiates them in terms of the adopted interdisciplinary approaches and the existence of powerful lobbies promoted by a single academic subject. Following this metaphor, cultural studies, just as expected, has mutated by adapting to environments that differ in hostility and levels of competence. Together with communication and media studies, for instance, CS has formed attractive symbiosis with different degrees of success. Ultimately, CS arose as an answer to an academic and political environment the crisis of which had been represented by one only discipline: humanities. As years went by, the contributions of the movement have turned into the creation of new disciplines and collaborations. One should expect that some of these schools face a similar crisis to the one faced by the British humanities. Fortunately, that was not the end of humanities and this will not be the end of cultural studies; we might see, however, the mere addition of new species in the academic ecosystem. 144 Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández-Pérez and Filipa Subtil 1970s and the 1980s that are more influential, and the general-holistic approaches bring most reference studies in this context. It is equally necessary to note the balance between the critical and interpretative thought, and the presence of classic foundational texts from the Birmingham School (more precisely, by Hall and Williams), CECMAS (Bourdieu), the Frankfurt School (Adorno and Horkheimer), and the sociology of journalistic knowledge (Gaye Tuchman). It is clear that among the biggest challenges of European cultural studies is a theoretical and methodological innovation that responds to the social changes deriving from the current sphere of the media, communication, and technology. 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(1998). “Dare We De-centre Birmingham?” European Journal of Cultural Studies, 1(1), 33-56. doi: 10.1177/136754949800100103 Yúdice, G. (2002). “Contrapunteo Estadounidense/Latinoamericano de los Estudios Culturales” in D. Mato (Ed.), Estudios y Otras Prácticas Intelectuales Latinoamericanas en Cultura y Poder (pp. 339-352). Caracas: Universidad Central de Venezuela. Appendixes TABLE 1. MOST CITED REFERENCES IN THE MEDIA, CULTURE AND SOCIETY JOURNAL (1979-2013) Type of publication Idiom Reference book English Anderson, B. (1991) Imagined Communities: Reflections of the Origins and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso. book English Bourdieu P (1984) Distinction. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. book English Adorno, T. and M. Horkheimer (1972) The Dialectic of Enlightenment. New York: Herder and Herder. book English Gitlin, T. (1980) The Whole World Is Watching. Berkeley: University of California Press. book English Fiske, J. (1987) Television Culture. London and New York: Routledge. book English Habermas, J. (1989) Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere. Cambridge: Polity Press. (Orig. pub. 1962.) book English WILLIAMS, R. (1974). Television: Technology and Cultural Form, New York, Schocken book English Curran, J. and J. Seaton (1988) Power without Responsibility, 3rd edn. London: Routledge. book English Ang, I. (1985) Watching Dallas. Soap Opera and the Melodramatic Imagination. London: Methuen. book English Morley, D. (1980) ‘The Nationwide Audience’, Television Monograph, 11, British Film Institute. book English Glasgow Media Group (1976) Bad News. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. book English Tuchman, G. (1978) Making News. London: Free Press. History, Debates and Main References of Cultural Studies in Europe 149 book English Gans, H. (1979) Deciding What’s News. New York: Pantheon. book English Dahlgren, P. (1995) Television and the Public Sphere: Citizenship, Democracy and the Media. London: Sage. book English Giddens, A. (1991) Modernity and Self-identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age. Cambridge: Polity. chapter English Hall, S. (1980) ‘Encoding/Decoding’, pp. 128-38 in S. Hall. D. Hobson. A. Lowe and P. Willis (eds) Culture, Media, Language. London: Hutchinson. book English BARAN P A and SWEEZY, P M (1968) Monopoly Capital, Harmondsworth, Pelican book English Downing, J. (1984) Radical Media. The Political Experience of Alternative Communication. South End Press. paper English Tuchman, G. (1971) ‘Objectivity and Strategic Ritual: An Examination of Newsmen’s Notions of Objectivity’, American Journal of Sociology 77(4): 660-80. book English Billig, M. (1995) Banal Nationalism. London: Sage. chapter English Garnham, N. (1986) ‘The Media and the Public Sphere’ in P. Golding, G. Murdock and P. Schlesinger (eds) Communicating Politics. Leicester: Leicester University Press. book English Tracey, M. (1998) The Decline and Fall of Public Service Broadcasting. New York: Oxford University Press. book English Williamson, J. (1978) Decoding Advertisements: Ideology and Meaning in Advertising. London: Marion Boyars. book English Thompson, J. (1995) The Media and Modernity: A Social Theory of the Media. Palo Alto, C’A: Stanford University Press. book English Herman, E. and N. Chomsky (1988) Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. New York: Pantheon. TABLE 2. ANALYSIS OF A SELECTION OF THE MOST CITED TEXTS IN EUROPE Publication year original edition Author Subjects Study object Media Perspective Comunidades Imaginadas 1983 Benedict Anderson Politicalhistorical Policy Holistic-general, society: the social construction of nationalism Nonmedia nature Acritical-History and political theory La Distinction 1979 Pierre Bourdieu Sociology Holistic-general: French culture and how the sector population with higher capital defines taste (a way of symbolic violence) Mediatic nature CriticalStructuralism 150 Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández-Pérez and Filipa Subtil Dialéctica de la ilustración 1944 Theodor Adorno y Max Horkheimer Critical-Marxist philosophy Holistic: capitalist society and alienation processes from the use of instrumental reason Media in general CriticalFrankfurt School The Whole World Is Watching. Mass Media in the Making and Unmaking of the New Left, With a New Preface 1980 Todd Gitlin Communication Holistic: media and journalism Media in general Critical and interpretative. Symbolic interactionism (Goffman) and hegemony (Gramsci) Television Culture 1987 John Fiske Communication Holistic: text and audience (active) Television Critical and semiotic Historia y crítica de la opinión pública 1962 Jurgen Habermas PhilosophyTheoretical policyCommunication Holistic: building the public sphere in modern societies Media CriticalFrankfurt’s School Television: Technology and Cultural Form 1974 Raymond Williams Communication Text: compares the British and North American television contents Television Critical Marxist Power without Responsibility 1981 James Curran and Jean Seaton Communication-Media studies Holisticdevelops press, television and Internet history, in the United Kingdom. Includes the review of laws on the media (political economy) Media (Press, television and Internet) Noncriticalimportant historical aspect Watching Dallas. Soap Opera and the Melodramatic Imagination 1985 Ien Ang Communication and Culture Audience: how the audience interprets the Dallas series Television Criticalfeminist studies The Nationwide Audience’, Television Monograph 1980 David Morley Communication and media Audience: How the audiences interpret the television show Nationwide Television CriticalBirmingham’s School History, Debates and Main References of Cultural Studies in Europe 151 Bad news 1976 Glasgow Media Group Communication and media Text: analysis of television messages, more precisely, news from BBC1, BBC2 and ITV Television Critical La producción de la noticia 1978 Gaye Tuchman Sociology Emitters: journalistic routines and processes of news construction in newsrooms Media (press, television and communication departments) Noncriticalsociology of knowledge – constructionism Deciding What’s News A Study of CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, Newsweek, and Time 1979 Herbert J. Gans Sociology Emitters: journalistic routines and constrictions in news selection processes Media (television and weekly information magazines) Noncritical Television and the Public Sphere: Citizenship, Democracy and the Media 1995 Peter Dahlgren Communication and journalism Holistic-general: public opinion and democracy Television Critical Modernity and Self-identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern AgeModernidad e Identidad 1991 Anthony Giddens Sociology Holistic: contemporary society and the processes of building the self Nonmedia nature Noncritical Encoding/Decoding 1973 Stuart Hall Sociology Audiences Television CriticalBirmingham’s School El capital monopolista: ensayo sobre el orden económico y social de Estados Unidos 1966 Paul Sweezy and Paul A. Baran Economy Holisticsociety: on how the capitalist economy works Nonmedia nature CriticalMarxist 152 Leonarda García-Jiménez, Manuel Hernández-Pérez and Filipa Subtil Objectivity and Strategic Ritual: An Examination of Newsmen’s Notions of Objectivity’, 1972 Gaye Tuchman Sociology of knowledge Emitters Media Noncritical: constructivism (Alfred Schutz) Nacionalismo Banal 1995 Michael Billig Social psychology Economyholistic, society and nationalism Mediatic nature Critical The Media and the Public Sphere’ 1986 Nicholas Garnham Communication – Media Studies Holisticpublic opinion and public sphere. Building the public sphere and inequities in the access from economic constrictions Media Critical The Decline and Fall of Public Service Broadcasting 1998 Michael Tracey Media Studies Emitters: role of public television in democratic societies Television Critical Decoding Advertisements: Ideology and Meaning in Advertising 1978 Judith Williamson Film studies Text-Messages: advertising from the perspective on image Written media CriticalMarxist Los media y la modernidad 1995 John B. Thompson Sociology Holisticsociety, media and culture. How the media influence modern societies, a longterm influence that includes the building of the self, the experience and the public place Media Noncritical Los guardianes de la libertad 1988 Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky Economymedia Emitters Media Critical 153 Communication in, from and for culture. Notes on a balance of Cultural Studies (in Communication) in Latin America: Trajectory, subjects and critics. Marta Rizo García46 1. Presentation The text proposes a brief overview through the trajectory of the Cultural Studies in Latin American and emphasizes the influence of them in the investigation on communication developed in the area. It is not only the exploring the way the Latin American Cultural Studies are built and developed if we can call them that way, but also establish some crucial points to understand the debate around the relation between communication and culture, that can be considered as a “distinctive mark” of the studies on communication developed in Latin America since the eighties and, with peculiarities and changes, until now. To begin with, there will be presented some primary features of Cultural Studies in general, originated in the late fifties of the twentieth century in Great Britain. In this approach to the historical context, we give emphasis to the concept of culture that emerges from Cultural Studies on the one hand and the other within the link between the intellectual project and political project. Secondly, we expose the particularities of Cultural Studies in Latin America. We’ll explore the focus of the proposals of Jesús Martín Barbero and Néstor García Canclini, considered to be the main exponents of Cultural Studies in the area. We’ll provide some guidelines for discussion to understand the relation and articulation between Cultural Studies and Communication Studies. The text finishes by exposing some of the critics to Cultural Studies. Here, apart from offering elements to understand the critics better, the reach of the intellectual and political project of these studies is emphasized to complexify the analyses of the media processes, always understood as socio-cultural processes. The transfer from media studies to social and cultural mediation studies implicated in the building of sense by the subjects; the consideration of culture as something dynamic, subjected to exchanges and permanent discontinuities; the focus or emphasis put on the processes of media reception as places from which and where 46 Professor at the Autonomous University of Mexico City, Mexico, [email protected] 256 Erick R. Torrico Villanueva asymmetric relation with the United States of North America, which started already in the 19th century. In the course of the last 25 years, the other category they proposed is that of coloniality. It relates to the pattern of power originated in the colonial ages whose principle is the establishment and the “(…) naturalization of territorial, racial, cultural and epistemological hierarchies” (Restrepo & Rojas, 2010: 15) that enable the maintenance of domination relations. Consequently, with some exceptions83, there was not the mere mechanical transference or application of the analytical tools or of the post-colonial language to the Latin American circumstance, but the prevalence of a process of meta-reflection that led to the pertinent recovery of the Latin American historicity and of the regional critical thought to establish its own parameters of interpretation, which represent one of the most relevant points of disagreement between de-coloniality and post-colonialism. In this sense, in 2006 Fernando Coronil sustained that “there is no set of works in Latin America which can be considered post-colonial” (cited in Goujat 2007:1), while Eduardo Restrepo and Axel Rojas emphatically affirm that “one cannot mistake the de-colonial inflexion with the post-colonial theory” (2010:23).84 However, it is possible to find positions like the one of Estela Fernández (2004) who, from a Marxist perspective, pointed at the Latin American studies of culture as “post-colonial” and put them in question because they talk of “subaltern” rather than of “class” and because its locus of enunciation, in her perception, would exclusively be of the Latino migrant in the United States of North America. She considers that the migrant cannot comprehend and reveal Latin America’s reality, arguments that lose validity if one warns that the de-colonial thought has overcome the classicist reductionism, problematized the comprehension of domination, made evident Karl Marx’s “blindness” about serious problems such as the coloniality and has reached important developments at the region’s heart and not simply “outside” it. One can, therefore, indicate that if there was any meaningful debate about the differences between post-colonialism and de-coloniality, it was those who internally revealed the members of the conversation 83 Peris (2010) talks about two methodological options in the Latin American studies of culture: the ahistorical use of the concepts developed by post-colonialism and the critical reflection about the colonial historical experiences and their interpretation. Decoloniality is a clear expression of the second. 84 For these authors, there are three main aspects that set the difference: 1) the space of problematization, the coloniality on the one hand and the colonialism on the other; 2) the historical context: the first modernity (15th century) for decoloniality and the second modernity (18th century) for post-colonialism; and 3) its genealogy: the history of subordination in the first case and the French post-structuralism in the second (Restrepo & Rojas, 2010:23-24). De-Westernizing Communication 257 community (Restrepo & Rojas, 2010) to avoid and overcome any conceptual de-historization85. And it was recently, in the second half of the 2000 decade, that Latin American communication scholars started to be interested in this new critical perspective, even though the influx of the cultural studies had already been present at least since the mid-1980s. Today, the challenge is to think communication in a de-colonial manner and contest its westernization. To Overcome the “Western” Communication As it happens in practically all fields of knowledge, the assumptions, objectives and criteria that predominate in Communication86 are those of the science of the “modern” and “western” world. That is, those established under the racialized hierarchization and the dualist reason87 that became a norm after Europe converted itself into the economic and political center of the planet after controlling the Atlantic since the end of the 15th century and conquering the “New World”88, a territory that it soon proceeded to colonize. The tangible result of this situation is a European-North American (USA) conception of the communicational process. The “dominant paradigm” sees communication primarily as an instrumental resource supporting power interests (of senders and/or their sponsors). That gives its investigation an immediately practical function instead of the capacity to generate autonomous social knowledge that can be both scientifically and socially relevant. As a consequence, Communication emerged in the West during the first third of the 20th century with the mark of empirical, measurable and applicable knowledge. Since its beginnings, the Communication was tied to the political and economic interests of capitalism as their initial developments happened under liberal investigative initiatives by the government and some business foundations or private corporations 85 This appears, for example, in the body-politics [corpo-política] and the geopolitics of knowledge (Mignolo 2003; 2004) that talk about epistemic materialization. That is, of its embodiment in concrete subjects and their historical insertion, respectively. 86 The capital letter (Communication) will be used to refer to the field and the small letter (communication) will be used to refer to the object of study of the field, that is, the observable process. 87 On the one hand, the racialization refers to the adoption of the idea of race to biologically and culturally differ the “superior” from the “inferior” peoples. On the other hand, dualist reason is the one that operates with this kind of binary classifications and is also connected to the emergency of the so-called “two cultures”. That is, the separation and specialization between the search for the truthful (science) and the good (philosophy). 88 Also known as “West Indies”, the geographic space found by the expedition of Cristopher Columbus in 1492 and named America in 1507. 258 Erick R. Torrico Villanueva from the United States of America.89 In addition to referring to the west geographically, the West is a historical metaphor in terms of knowledge that emphasizes the founding condition and the supposedly superior capacities of imperial Europe and its North-American extension in the “New World”. It is also the ideological metaphor of some cultures (the European and the Europeanized) that self-identify as the universal civilizing standard marked by the ideals of individual freedom, economic accumulation, and the endless material progress. Consequently, all the knowledge elaborated in and by the West adopted the assumptions of the modern science and inserted in the limits of its self-referential linear look centred on the profiles, developments, problems and teleology of the societies with capitalist and industrial development. That led them to treat with a subordinating and even despising tone the other peoples and their ways of conceiving, knowing and interpreting the world. This way, with a frame, constituted first of all by the positivist epistemology, the empirical-quantitative investigative strategies and the functionalist sociological theory, the Communication structured its scientific profile according to the modern procedural demands as well as the objectives for expansion of the civilizing model in which it was born. From this comes its “westernism”, that is, its correspondence with nature, the characteristics and the ends of the Western science, but with both the purposes of the supremacy of the “western culture” and its global capitalist design (cf. Mignolo, 2003). This western-centric90 look at the phenomenon of communication (the communication) and its study (the Communication) is inscribed in the epistemological space of Modernity. Both its scope (what it permits thinking) and its conditioning (the way it directs what is thinkable) are those installed in the general social theories or the theoretical matrices that serve as its reference91. Despite the prolonged “western” predominance and the custom of epistemological, theoretical and methodological “loan”, from the 1960s Latin America generated a critical-utopic vision in Communication that, without being homogeneous or coordinated, has demarcated an alternative analytical route that today faces the challenge of dewesternization and, consequently, of its emancipation. It is a new option given that it arises for the first time, within the “de-colonial turn” started at the end of the 1990s (Castro-Gómez y 89 See Pooley (2008). 90 Westcentric in the original version of Gunaratne (2011:475). 91 About the characteristics of these matrices, see Torrico (2010:25-59). De-Westernizing Communication 259 Grosfoguel, 2007), the possibility of reinterpreting the world history and of dismantling with it the eurocentric logics with which the explanation of this trajectory had been written. It also implies that an opportunity arises to overcome the constraints of the scientific paradigms that established the West to guarantee its oligopolistic advantages of power. It is neither a matter of replacing all the existing knowledge nor of dreaming of autochthonous illusions, but of critically re-evaluating what is known and channel another understanding of communication that is more human, social, communitarian, inclusive, humanizing and democratizing than one of the “dominant paradigms”. De-westernizing, therefore, implies stopping seeing communication and its field with the eyes of technocracy, the free trade, the blind faith and the political domination to recover the liberating content of its meaning and praxis. And this is the goal of which the debates are starting in the Latin American space. Western communication thinking Throughout almost nine decades, an accumulation of knowledge was formed around communication. It can be identified as the communication thinking, obviously, of western grounds92, that constitutes the previously referred predominant conception. It consists of a group of concepts, approaches and theoretical models about the communication fact developed specially by authors from the USA and Europe, first and foremost related to the so-called “mass communication” and recently also to the “information society”, which has also led to the existence of an academic culture93. That is, to a “group of premises which most of the members of the scientific community unconsciously share and that are rarely up for debate” (Wallerstein, 1999:14). This thinking – and despite its fragmentation and the evident disagreements related to the nature and the definition of the object of communication studies – consequently works as a de facto doctrine in the processes of university education, in the tasks of specialized research and, of course, in the strategic definitions of the area. The unidirectionality, the technical mediation, the instrumental purpose and the generation of effects are, as it is known, the distinctive features of the predominant western way of understanding and making 92 See Torrico (2014). 93 See Torrico (2007). 260 Erick R. Torrico Villanueva communication which is translated in the approaches of a group of North American-European authors considered references94. The postulates of the so-called Mass Communication Research are the ones which mainly sustain and express the core of this “dominant paradigm”. Feasible of being articulated in four great theoretical approaches (pragmatic, critical, socio-technical and political-cultural)95, the concerns of the communication thinking are intimately connected since their origins to the objectives and the implications of modernization that lead to a dynamic and to a teleological route of economic growth, commercial expansion, deployment and intensive incorporation of technologies, urbanization, and formal democratization of societies. This thinking is, finally, tributary of the modern instrumental rationality. That is, of the identification, the calculation and the usage of the most efficient means to reach certain goals because, in this understanding, communication becomes a resource subject to these types of operations. From the cultural industry to the Latin American utopic critique Despite the preeminence it has reached since its birth, the western theoretical and practical instrumentalization of communication was put into question in different scenarios and various ways, although with repeated emphasis on the technologically mediated processes. In this sense, the famous article “The Cultural Industry”, by Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno96, written in the middle of the 1940s, reached both great diffusion and repercussion about a decade later, disqualified from the Frankfurt School the fabrication and the massive sales of standardized cultural products, defended the traditional works of art and literature, in addition to the harsh criticism to the mediated entertainment (amusement) for its alienating consequences. This way, mass communication was seen as an industry at the service of the reproduction of capital and its social domination. Since the end of the 1950s another important critical perspective – the cultural studies – appeared with Richard Hoggart and his analysis of the changes of the traditional values in the British working class 94 In this respect, see Peters and Simonson (2004), Pooley (2008), Katz et al (2008) and Torrico (2015). 95 cf. Torrico (2010). 96 cf. Bell et al (1985:177-230). De-Westernizing Communication 261 resulting from the interaction between the urban workers with the “mass media”97, particularly the “popular press”, considered by the author to be a fundamental factor for the construction of modern culture, a “culture without class”. Hoggart himself came to find the Center for Contemporary Cultural Studies in the University of Birmingham from where the influence of other relevant thinkers such as Raymond Williams, Edward Thompson and Stuart Hall irradiates. The Political Economy of Communication emerged in the north of America with Dallas Smythe in 1960 to put in evidence the cultural control exerted by monopolist capitalism, to denounce the commodification not only of cultural products but also of the media audiences and to raise the need to understand the economically productive role of the communication as well as its consequent contributions to the reproduction of capital98. From this line of reflection also rose the studies about cultural imperialism. In Latin America, during the “rebel decades” (1960 and 1970), the critical-utopic current was formed. It put the predominant technical concept of communication under scrutiny, denounced the situation of theoretical and cultural dependency of the region, demanded the democratization in a framework of rights and proposed alternative forms of conceiving and executing the communication process to reach “another development”99. The paths by which the criticism transited show that the common interest centred especially in mass communication and above all wereput to question both the instrumental and commodifying view of communication and the character of the capitalist logic and reproduction. Nevertheless, there was nor a display of preoccupation for the nature of Eurocentric modernity neither for its implications in the configuration of the communicational structures and the corresponding field. To the de-coloniality Although Marxism generated tools for the criticism of domination within capitalism, it did not demonstrate how to confront itself with its intra-modern nature. Neither did it manage to use its scalpel to account for colonialism. Then, it was only with the impulse of the subaltern studies originated in India at the end of the 1970s that the 97 It concerns his book The Uses of Literacy. Cf. Hoggart ([1957]1990). 98 For these aspects and others, see the doctoral thesis of Bolaños (2000). 99 Cf. Pasquali (1977), Martín-Barbero (1987) and Beltrán (2000). 262 Erick R. Torrico Villanueva critical thinkers started to perceive another cognitive horizon, the one who set the bases for a general revision of the historical processes lived by colonized peoples and of the established stories about them. This initial approach focused on the cultural history of that Asian country subject to colonization to re-examine it at the same time that it observed the recurring representation of the subaltern – that is, the subjugated and marginalized – in the nationalist and colonial versions of the Indian history. It dealt, therefore, as a political and intellectual project, with reestablishing the condition of subjects of history for these subaltern groups which had also been confined by the official narrative to a situation of “primitivism” and “pre-politics”100. The consequences of the colonizing imperial action over the culture of the colonized and the stereotyped construction of the otherness of the West were later analyzed by the postcolonial studies. The starting point is in the book Orientalism, by Edward Said ([1978] 2010), that explains the discursive operations developed by travellers, writers, philosophers, politicians and intellectuals from the West to build the image of the “eastern” Other and thus define the European identity101. Orientalism, therefore, creates a mode of relationship, a game of representations, and a type of “knowledge” that institutionalizes itself, a classifying and figurative modality that has equally been applied to the subaltern of other latitudes102. With this general background and inspiration, in the beginning of the 1990s, it was formed the Latin American Group for Subaltern Studies (Grupo Latinoamericano de Estudios Subalternos) consisting of intellectuals from Latin America affiliated with elite universities in the United States of America which proposed to study the structural presence of the Latin American subaltern as a subject in and against hegemonic practices103. A little later the group converted into the Grupo Modernidad/ Colonialidad because its debates identified this last category – related to the internalization of the subordination by the colonized peoples – as an inseparable component of the configuration of modern history, whose beginning happened amid the European colonial expansion in the “New World” in the 15th century rather than at the occasion of the 100 See “Una pequeña historia de los Estudios Subalternos” by Dipesh Chakrabarty in Saavedra (2009:319-343). 101 About it, Said said: “(...) the European culture gained in strength and identity by setting itself off against the Orient as a sort of surrogate and even underground self”. (22). 102 Extending the reach of this assertion, Fernando Coronil argues that “the Europeans need the Mesoamericans to discover who they are. Consequently, the discovery and the conquest of America is fundamentally the discover and the invention of ‘Europe’ and of the western ‘I’”. Cf. Castro-Gómez y Mendieta (1998: 137). 103 See the “Manifiesto Inaugural” of the group in Castro-Gómez y Mendieta (op. cit.). De-Westernizing Communication 263 rise of illustrated rationalism, that more adequately corresponds to the notion sustained by the classic Western historiography. However, perhaps more important than that is the fact that the Grupo considers Modernity and coloniality to be constitutive elements of the world standard of capitalist power; the former is its visible face, and the latter is its “hidden face” (Mignolo, 2007: 18). The coloniality, which survives in the subjectivities and the institutional devices of control and political management of politics in Latin America, is consequently different from colonialism, that is, from the local government in charge of foreign agents, and manifests itself in three levels: the power, the knowledge and the being.104 This triple phenomenon suggests the persistence of structures of domination, exploitation and discrimination inherited from the colonial period. That maintains the secondarization (secondarización), the folklorization, and the invisibilization of all knowledge that does not fit to the western pattern of intellectual production. At last, it remains as vital everyday life experience the de-humanizing belittling of important peoples – the indigenous and those of African origin – that do not adjust themselves to the “westerncentric” model of a human being (cf. Restrepo & Rojas, 2010). The coloniality appears, therefore, in political, epistemological and ontological dimensions. The struggle against it does not refer to the search for the de-colonization since it was reached during the independence period which culminated in the creation of the Latin American republics at the beginning of the 19th century; rather, consequently, the confrontation of coloniality demands a decolonizing intervention105. That is, a multileveled actionable to dismantle the complex scaffolding on which the contemporary subordination sustains itself. This belief led to the update of the Group’s denomination dedicated to those studies. It became known as Grupo Modernidad/ Colonialidad/Decolonialidad. The de-colonial thinking adopts, therefore, the perspective of subalternity to question the plot of domination established by the capitalist Modernity and to propose a multidimensional liberation. Nevertheless, it does not appear as a new paradigm in sequence to existing ones, but rather as “another paradigm” or “of disruption” (Mignolo, 2003:22) that has risen from the modern limitations and aims to surpass them away from violent reason. 104Cf. Lander (2000) and Castro-Gómez & Grosfoguel (2007). 105 The concept of “decolonial” was proposed by Catherine Walsh in a forum at the University of Duke in 2004 (cf. Walsh, 2005:26). 264 Erick R. Torrico Villanueva The (pre) Latin American Sources Authors that make up the “community of conversation” about decoloniality recognize a series of sources that fed the anti-hegemonic criticism in Latin America and consider them as necessary antecedents of their elaborations. These sources are of two types: the ones that correspond to the colonial period and the ones that belong to the stage of structuration and projection of the Latin American anti-imperialism (latinoamericanismo antiimperialista). The first case takes as reference Bartolomé de Las Casas, a Dominican monk that in 1552 (1991) denounced the atrocities of the conquistadores against the native peoples of America to Prince Felipe, who was in charge of the affairs concerning the Indies; and especially to the Inca descendent chronicler Felipe Guamán Poma de Ayala, who in 1615 wrote a long letter – that was never delivered – to the king Felipe IV of Spain denouncing the arbitrary actions committed by the Spanish in Peru and also made proposals to create a “good government with differentiated territories and authorities for the Spanish and the indigenous peoples.106 In any case, these defenders of the rights of the colonized in the times of the Spanish colony were not equal. One was a Catholic devout interested not only in giving human treatment to natives but also primarily in evangelizing them, is, therefore, part of the strategy of colonial power. The other expressed, in conciliatory terms, the direct point of view of the subalterns. However, he did not propose decolonization either. In the second case, the sources refer to a constellation of creators of the social and political thinking of Latin America since the second half of the 19th century, including for example José Martí, José Enrique Rodó, Manuel González Prada, José Vasconcelos or José Carlos Mariátegui, but first of all, recover the concerns and the influence of the Latin American critical intellectual production of the mid-1900s. They are included in this more contemporary period the Pedagogy of the Oppressed (Paulo Freire, 1970), the Theology of Liberation (Gustavo Gutiérrez, 1970), the Philosophy of Liberation (Enrique Dussel, 1979) and the Dependency Theory (Fernando Cardoso and Enzo Faletto, 1988). Even though each of these currents had a thematic particularity, it is possible to say that they have in common the diagnosis of the Latin American subjugation as well as the ideal of the individual, social and regional emancipation. The de-colonial thinking collects these founding ideas together with the need of the subaltern to express themselves, to be heard, 106 Cf. Carrillo (1992). De-Westernizing Communication 265 and that they reconstitute themselves as agents of history. At the same time, it proposes the overcoming of coloniality and thus, as indicated, the liberation at different levels. Latin American criticism and the Communicology of Liberation Although the members of the Grupo Modernidad/Colonialidad/ Decolonialidad have not yet gotten involved with the field of Communication – the main among them come from and work in sociology, philosophy, anthropology, and semiology – it is indispensable to highlight that it is possible to find significant antecedents of the de-colonial perspective in some of the representatives of the Latin American critical-utopian current. Here only three of the most renowned as well as the only regional activity that marked the history of the specialized thinking. An initial approach to the criticism of the imposed constraints to sociological research in Latin America -these criteria were also applied to Communication Research that was then perceived under the same structural and functionalist approacheswas conducted in 1968 by Eliseo Verón, who defended the scientific autonomy and deplored that in this region, on the contrary, heteronomy was predominant in the field, so to say, a “cultural dependency regarding the imperialists centres” (Maldonado, 2001: 73). In September 2013, the International Centre of Journalism Superior Studies for Latin America (Centro Internacional de Estudios Superiores de Periodismo para América Latina, CIESPAL) carried out a workshop in Costa Rica about “Communication Research in Latin America”, turning into the first meeting oriented towards defining own criteria for Latin American Communication Research production. Criticizing the dependency was the central argument, and its final report stated that: The communication theory and research methodology developed in the metropolitan centres is not always related to the reality and the research necessities of the underdeveloped and dependent countries, although they are applied, without any criticism, to the situation of the region, with obviously inadequate, and sometimes distorting, results. Its use has been inducted by the assumption that social theory is universal, and its validity falls beyond the frame of cultural spaces and historical processes (CIESPAL, 1973:13). 272 Erick R. Torrico Villanueva ciencias sociales. Perspectivas latinoamericanas, Clacso, Buenos Aires, 2000. Maldonado, Efendy, Teorias da Comunicação na América Latina. Enfoques, encontros e apropriações da obra de Verón, Unisinos, Porto Alegre, 2001. Martín-Barbero, Jesús, Procesos de comunicación y matrices de cultura, G. Gili, México, 1987. Mellino, Miguel, La crítica poscolonial. Descolonización, capitalismo y cosmopolitismo en los estudios poscoloniales, Paidós, Buenos Aires, 2008. Merquior, José, El marxismo occidental, Vuelta, México, 1989. Mignolo, Walter, Historias locales / diseños globales, Akal, Madrid, 2003. Mignolo, Walter, La idea de América Latina, Gedisa, Barcelona, 2007. Mignolo, Walter. Desobediencia epistémica. Retórica de la modernidad, lógica de la colonialidad y gramática de la descolonialidad, Ediciones del Signo, Buenos Aires, 2014. 2ª edic. Pasquali, Antonio, Comunicación y cultura de masas, Monte Ávila, Caracas, 1977. Peris, Jaume, “La aparición del debate postcolonial en América Latina: Posiciones, contradicciones y problemas”, en EPOS, Revista de la Facultad de Filología, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, Madrid, 2010, Nº 26, pp. 247-256. Peters, John; Simonson, Peter (Edits.), Mass Communication and American Social Thought. Key Texts 1919-1968, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Maryland, 2004. Pooley, Jefferson, “The New History of Mass Communication Research”, en The History of Media and Communication Research: Contested Memories, Peter Lang, New York, 2008, pp. 43-69. Restrepo, Eduardo; Rojas, Axel, Inflexión decolonial: fuentes, conceptos y cuestionamientos, Universidad del Cauca, Popayán, 2010. Saavedra, José Luis (Comp.), Teorías políticas de descolonización y decolonialidad, Verbo Divino, Cochabamba, 2009. Said, Edward, Orientalismo, DeBolsillo, Barcelona, 2010, 4ª edic. Torrico, Erick, “Acercamiento a la Comunicación como cultura académica y a sus proposiciones teóricas generales”, en Punto Cero, 14, Universidad Católica Boliviana, Cochabamba, 1er semestre de 2007, pp. 41-48. Torrico, Erick, “Emancipar la Comunicación para sustentar la paz”, en Comunicação & Sociedade, 54, Universidade Metodista de São Paulo, São Paulo, julho-dezembro, 2010ª, pp. 173-190. Torrico, Erick, “La Comunicología de Liberación, otra fuente para el De-Westernizing Communication 273 pensamiento decolonial. Una aproximación a las ideas de Luis Ramiro Beltrán”, en Quórum Académico, Vol. 7 (1), pp. 65-77, Universidad del Zulia, Maracaibo, 2010b. Torrico, Erick, Comunicación. De las matrices a los enfoques, CIESPAL, Quito, 2010c. Torrico, Erick, “Luis Ramiro Beltrán y la Comunicología de Liberación”, en Memoria Académica 2012, ABOIC, Sucre, 2013, pp. 54-58. Torrico, Erick, “Más allá del pensamiento occidental”, en Arancibia, Juan; Salinas, Claudio, Comunicación política y democracia en América Latina, Gedisa, Barcelona, 2014, pp. 17-38. Torrico, Erick, “Luis Ramiro Beltrán, pensador canónico de la Comunicación latinoamericana”, Ponencia inédita, Córdoba, 2015ª, 19 pp. Torrico, Erick, “La Comunicación ‘occidental’”, Oficios Terrestres (N.° 32), pp. 3-23, enero-junio 2015. FPyCS | Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Available on: http://perio.unlp.edu.ar/ojs/index.php/oficiosterrestres Torrico, Erick, “La Comunicación ‘occidental’. Eurocentrismo y Modernidad: marcas de las teorías predominantes en el campo”, en Journal de Comunicación Social, Universidad Católica Boliviana, La Paz, 2015b, Nº 3, pp. 41-64. Walsh, Catherine (Ed.), Pensamiento crítico y matriz (de)colonial, reflexiones latinoamericanas, Abya-Yala, Quito, 2005. Wallerstein, Immanuel, El Legado de la Sociología, la promesa de la ciencia social, Nueva Sociedad, Caracas, 1999. 275 A Debate on Post-colonialism and De-coloniality: Latin American and European Perspectives on Change and Hope Nico Carpentier111 Sarah Anne Ganter Félix Ortega Erick Torrico Villanueva Nico: Thank you for agreeing to engage in a dialogue about the postcolonial paradigm in media and communication studies, based on the two chapters you contributed to this book. These chapters have many differences, but it also struck me that both chapters refer to Eduard Said. It is where I want to start: How important would you see his work for communication studies in Latin America and Europe? How to trace his influence? Erick: Edward Said’s sharp analysis of the imaginary construction of the East by the intellectual, literary, and artistic discourse of the West is not only the principle of postcolonial criticism but also a basis on which it is indispensable to settle the examination of the “Western subaltern”, the Latin American, because what the “old” Europe did in terms of discursive representation, and political and economic control with the Arab and Asian peoples was reproduced in practice in the process of conquest and colonization of America. In this sense, the critical studies of communication also find a source of inspiration in the work of Said, since it provides—by analogy—consistent elements to rethink the accepted ways of conceiving and materialising communicational relations. However, the influence of this author in Latin America’s Communication Studies has been rather indirect; it came partly through Cultural Studies and, in fact, is just starting to find some specific applications. Sarah: Many thanks for the introductions and the interesting starting point for this dialogue. Edward Said is one of the leading thinkers when it comes to analysing and understanding postcolonial perspectives and practices. His main work, Orientalism (Said, 1978), was controversial, widely discussed and is considered one of the founding documents 111 Extraordinary Professor at the Charles University, Czech Republic, and president of the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR), [email protected] 276 Nico Carpentier, Sarah Anne Ganter, Félix Ortega and Erick Torrico of postcolonial thinking. Hence, Edward Said needs to be mentioned in both the Latin American and the European Communication Studies’ context. Turning to the second part of your question, how to trace the influence of one single thinker within a certain cultural, academic context is an intriguing question. Today, we would probably turn to google scholar or similar metrical measures we have, but the work we are talking about dates back from before the times of highly quantified academia. It allows for a more complex definition of “influence”. Said belongs to the row of academics that are deeply linked to Literature Studies. I am thinking here for an example of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak or Jacques Derrida who are each important contributors to analytical perspectives in postcolonial schools of thought. Edward Said developed, with his conceptual approach towards otherness, one of the central anchor points in postcolonial studies. I refer here to the concept of orientalism. Born in Jerusalem, his academic home was in the USA, and his work was translated into over 20 languages, so my guess is, his work would be mentioned as influential by scholars from other geographical contexts, too. Much of his thinking is based on Foucault and his analysis of power relations through studying discourses. I think, what makes Said´s work so relevant for communication scholars is its universality and own embedding into a global scholarly perspective, as well as a common line of thought concerning the question of representation in communicative practices and their consequences for everyday realities. Félix: I agree with the description indicated by Sarah on Said´s universality and with her perspective on the role of representation in communicative practices. I would also like to point out that there is still a need for Latin American Communicational Studies to work on a more scientific methodological “theoretical framework” of analysis. References associated in the mainstream approach to decolonialisation in Latin America, which go as far back as the XVth or XVIth century (originating from the Dominican Order) do provide a historical context for our analyses, but they do not provide paradigmatic support for the key issues at stake. As Erick wrote in his chapter in this book: “There are some differences, but not antagonist, ways to communicational de-coloniality that are being walked in Latin America” (Torrico Villanueva's chapter in this book, p. 267). These new pathways may consist of new analytical scenarios and new global communicational perspectives. Currently, the work cementing A Debate on Post-colonialism and De-coloniality: Latin American and European Perspectives on Change and Hope 277 some of the analyses still lack a grounding in contexts, in-depth research and divergence from the mainstream hypothesis. The new “Latin American critical and communication thought is shaping up without renouncing either to the modern contesting tradition or to the regional desire for liberation” (Torrico Villanueva's chapter in this book, p. 267, emphasis removed). However, Latin American thought lacks direct access to the global traditions and schools of thought that use the language of Shakespeare — the mainstream — in order to further contextualise their analyses. The still isolated schools of thought in Latin America Communication— keeping some exceptions in Chile, Brazil and Mexico in mind — must be integrated into the mainstream scientific community. We should also be careful which concepts to use. For instance, liberation is certainly a term which does not explain the de-colonialization process of the former colonies, since liberation is no longer on-going, on the contrary. There are also other terms which I consider problematic: Erick wrote the following in this book chapter: “If Westernization can be understood as political or discursive action by which Western countries control historically (by elimination, absorption or marginalization) to the non-Western world, the intellectual and political challenge that encourages de-coloniality logically consists in de-westernize to take some steps towards the post-Westernization (Fernandez, 1978) that destructure definitively the colonial power matrix.” (Torrico Villanueva's chapter in this book, p. 268). If I may respectfully disagree: Maybe this analytical framework may work to analyse the XXth century, but if we use the new Communicational Paradigm of Analysis of the XXIst Century, it is partially outdated, or it just no longer exists. I would agree that “communication, as a field and practice, is a central space in this contest” (Torrico Villanueva's chapter in this book, p. 268) as Erick indicated. However, this context is paradigmatically “out of frequency” with the research reality outside the Latin American (and even Spanish) schools of thought. Allow me to explain this more clearly: There has been a strong change in the Paradigmatic Discourse and Method of Communicational Studies which no longer applies to “the research reality” still under discussion in the mainstream Latin American schools. Changes in authors and references may come with the progressive increase of the relevance of a series of “new” XXIst century scholars from both sides of the Atlantic. A new generation of “modern communicational researchers” awaits, and they are renovating the discourses, methods 278 Nico Carpentier, Sarah Anne Ganter, Félix Ortega and Erick Torrico and analyses of our field. We now find ourselves in a situation where the Western countries no longer control the non-western world, as Erick wrote in his chapter (Torrico Villanueva's chapter in this book, p. 255), and we need to analyse and scientifically investigate the communicational processes in our worlds, using a global perspective. Unfortunately, the Latin American political and communicational discourse on the “liberation from the power matrix” has to come to terms with the paradigmatic change that took place in the late XXth century. “Liberation” has prevailed in Latin America, which implies that there is a need for a discursive renewal, to describe the new situations, and research them with updated scientific methodologies. Nico: This then raises the question of whether communication and media studies has one only paradigm? Is there such a thing as a “Communicational Paradigm of Analysis of the XXIst Century”? Would we be able to agree on that? Or is our field characterized by a multiparadigm logic, similar to George Ritzer’s (1975) analysis of sociology? Félix: No, there is not only one paradigm but many in construction. And there is a continuous renewal of existing paradigms. Is there such a thing as a “Communicational Paradigm of Analysis of the XXIst Century”? There is not one, but there is a need to (re)construct new paradigms with maybe regional peculiarities and to build on the novel foundations of the digital and interconnected world, where all markets and individuals are or will be, connected in continuous interactions. Big data, neural networks, advanced economic analysis, media psychology, audience research are fields where Communication Studies must intensely engage with. Are we able to agree on that? We may or not agree..., this is not relevant, but we must push forward and do not base our analyses primarily in outdated, or no longer fundamental, postulate pre-digital proposals. It is the trajectory and the scenario for all schools of thought in Communicational Studies, and in particular for those that are primarily working in key scientific languages like Spanish. Is our field characterized by a multi-paradigm logic, similar to George Ritzer’s analysis of sociology? Yes, since all fields in science and in particular in communication studies must breed from a multiparadigm logic, and, of course, these logics must push frontier studies into maturity. Let’s stand on the shoulders of the gigantic academies of science. Let’s build a new and respected communicational paradigm A Debate on Post-colonialism and De-coloniality: Latin American and European Perspectives on Change and Hope 279 that is, of course, adapted to regional peculiarities, if needed, and that is also based on science, data and debate. Let’s build bridges and open those regional academies to the new paradigmatic era of a renewed communicational research academia where, in particular in the case of the Spanish-speaking academia. They should rise, meet other academies, and exchange knowledge and methods in fair and equal ways, no longer complying to the only English-speaking “colonial science” scenario112. The objective is possible. However, all academies must have reasons to meet and to exchange knowledge in an equal, mutual, beneficial “intercoursive”, if I may use a provocative term ... Possible ... yes ... but maybe not yet feasible. The job is harder on the Cervantian side, but our Latin American colleagues in the USA — given some time — may put the “intercourse” between academies (and the construction of new paradigms) into practice. Let’s work on this utopian scenario. Erick: There cannot be a single paradigm and less something that comes to be considered “the paradigm of the twenty-first century”. In communication studies, as in other areas of social knowledge, there has always been and will be more than one way of approaching social phenomena. However, assuming the concept of paradigm in the broadest sense of conceiving science, research and social reality as objects of study, the number of paradigmatic options decreases. And it is there, precisely, where emerges what can be called the “modern Eurocentric paradigm”, which is the one that Félix seems to reproduce with remarkable enthusiasm. When he says that Latin American communicational thought lacks scientificity, that it is anchored in a past that has been overcome, that it is not connected to the mainstream of knowledge and that it does not understand the digital world, besides using a secondary language (this means Spanish), Félix is simply expressing an old mentality that Latin America is questioning for decades. It is in this kind of rhetoric that differences between the postmodernist technocratic fashion and the current Latin American de-colonial proposal become more evident. Latin America does not want to formulate a new 112 See the JCR and Scopus Indexes, and the importance they attach to publications from the different regions of the world, as illustration of the differences between the Academies in the world. 280 Nico Carpentier, Sarah Anne Ganter, Félix Ortega and Erick Torrico paradigm but rather wishes to leave the sequence of (post)modern ethnocentric paradigms based on the logic of Western thought. The new technocentrism is only a variant of twentieth-century mediacentrism. The utopia for Latin America does not consist in joining the illusion of the digitally interconnected world without social, economic and political structural changes. That must be clear. Félix: My thoughts and opinions are based upon the content and methodological analysis which has been undertaken in the last decade at the Spanish communication association AEIC, in particular in the Methods section, and to a certain extent at ECREA, ... in particular within the Mapcom.es project and others. If you consult the results and conclusions, if you revise the impact and scientific quality of the Spanish speaking academia in terms of methods and of the professional management of journals, funding for research or presence in the global International fora,... it is emerging but resources, methods, quality global journals, ... are still lacking. My thoughts are broadly not based upon feelings or emotions but on hypothesis-driven science. Like a surgeon detecting cancer: Yes, we have a problem and we must first detect and then act, ... It is not spread everywhere,... it is not present in all research groups, or PhD programmes, master programmes, etc. ... but we certainly need new genes... Unfortunately, science impacts factor ratings, JCR, Scopus, Google Scholar, research impact analysis with its H-indexes and similar tell us this. They are no absolute truths but the tendencies of these scientific scans tell us where we are. Apologies for being maybe a little too politically incorrect, ... but facts and analysis reveal the diagnostic. We may still not agree, and this is again not relevant. Sarah: We all agree on the diversity of paradigms, I guess. But this is not about several paradigms, it is about what Jensen and Neuman (2013) have described as “paradigmatic aspirations” and how these are being shaped and how they are taking into account the different perspectives of the different regions, countries and localities in the world. Digitalization and globalization are challenging us as researchers every day, the world is becoming more complex, precisely because we can see and study cases from within different cultural, socio-political and economic contexts. And this is a huge opportunity and a huge responsibility at the same time. Some paradigms have been more dominant than others, a circumstance given by the structural foundations of academia. It also A Debate on Post-colonialism and De-coloniality: Latin American and European Perspectives on Change and Hope 281 means that some concepts are better understood than others, some regions and countries better studied. I would argue that many European scholars do not even consider that elsewhere there might be a different dominant paradigmeven when they study the particular region or country context attached. I am surprised by how many colleagues that compare different country contexts are not familiar with the literature available from these contexts. This disequilibrium is a problem. We need to be able to consider different perspectives — country-wise, method-wise, theory-wise — and we need to be able to study concepts from different paradigms. Speaking from my perspective, being European, I would like to have better access to a more diverse scholarship. I think when (de)fin(d)ing paradigmatic aspirations. We can only make them accountable, reliable and effective by constructing them through a dialogue with colleagues representing different perspectives. To illustrate my argument, let me borrow Jensen and Neuman´s metaphor of a paradigm as a set of puzzles. We all carry our puzzle set, the shape of each particle is determined by our concepts, questions, a hypothesis that underlies our research. Once the puzzle is put together, the question is how to make sense of what we see, as even if we carry similarly shaped particles, the overall image might differ. And we can only make sense of the image that the puzzle shows to us by looking at other puzzles to determine commonalities and differences and to start dialoguing about possibilities of interpretation and further questions that arise. I need access to a diversity of puzzles to understand my own results and to give them credibility. If I always look at similar images, my understanding will remain limited. Félix: I fully subscribe to Sarah’s analysis and thoughts. My understanding will remain isolated, limited, and in the “cavern” if I do not explore at the frontiers of knowledge to construct those puzzles of knowledge, in between academies. Nico: Erick, your text tends to see Western communication studies as homogeneous, while Sarah’s and Félix’s text emphasizes the heterogeneity of European communication studies? Would you agree with my analysis? And if so, which strategy works? Homogenization or heterogenization? Or both? Sarah: I would guess that the three of us share the understanding that the future lies in a more diverse scholarship. I agree with Erick in the sense that European communication studies could need more 288 Nico Carpentier, Sarah Anne Ganter, Félix Ortega and Erick Torrico disagree with his last sentence “Only...” , since it reduces the academic debate to a frontier debate between good and bad, with the European, North American and Asian academies at the centre ... Mainstreams vs marginalities, to a certain extent — not in all cases, I do not generalise— with the latter, marginalised and marginal academies, located south of the Río Bravo, with poor access to research funding, poor access to the frontier research in communication studies that are written in English, ... The resulting scientific production is then also seen as a byproduct and symptom of a precariously funded, largely pre-data and pre-science academia, ... It is a discourse associated with baddies and goodies, with white and black... There is certainly greyer than a so bi-polarised world, ... In Spain, we find ourselves in a situation where we are trying to strengthen our field, inspired by what the German academia and other non-English research groups did 15 years ago, ... closing the gap and moving forward from our own marginal — to a certain extent — misery. Nico: Thank you all for these clarifications. I find the contextualization very helpful and constructive. Still, I’m not sure if I agree with the idea that post-colonial thought excludes the construction of new horizons of intelligibility, though. My reading of your interventions, and both theoretical traditions, is that there are different projects of hope at work. I would claim that post-colonial theory argues that these new horizons of intelligibility will always incorporate the nightmares (and dreams) from the past, but that re-articulation, re-workings, and re-constructions into novel ways of thinking remain perfectly possible. De-colonial theory seems to be more hopeful in believing that a clearer rupture with the past is possible. Does this reading make sense to you? And are you (we) simply working within different projects of hope, that at the same time contain a shared vision on the need for social change, grounded in more social justice, etc. ... Félix: I fully share your arguments and projects of hope, Nico, since otherwise, I would find myself, as an empirical scientist, in a primarily irrational position. I am only debating on methods, science and facts concerning the fundamental differences between academic realities ... sometimes reality and facts bite. Sarah: This is a very important observation, Nico. Obviously, utopian A Debate on Post-colonialism and De-coloniality: Latin American and European Perspectives on Change and Hope 289 hope has had a stance in post-colonial thinking. I am thinking here of “The Quest for Postcolonial Utopia” by Pordzik (2001), for example. Postcolonial thinkers emphasise the relevance of the past — the memory for the present and for some post-colonial thinkers this new present is set up to be an improved past However, it is important to recognize that re-evaluations of what has become of the utopian dreams are equally important. In literature, this evaluation is expressed in terms like “social dreaming” (Sargent, 2000) and the recognition of a new pragmatic worldview as criticized by Jameson (1971). I would say that whatever these frustrated utopias might have been, or whatever they are, they form part of the post-colonial and we need to consider them in our analysis. Therefore, I also think we should have more thick descriptions of contemporary communicative post-colonial practices, contexts and situations to bring to the fore the frustrations and the new (or repeated) conceptualizations. Erick: Latin American thought had at least four utopian horizons: anti-colonialism (against Spain and Portugal), anti-imperialism and the socialist revolution (against the United States), development and democracy. All this happened between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Decolonial thinking brings a new and different utopia: epistemological liberation, which can then give rise to other liberations in the economic, political and socio-cultural areas. In this scenario, full connectivity, electronic democracy or global citizenship, for example, are not the most important part of the Latin American utopia. So, I think the project of hope of de-colonialism is different. And if we return to the field that interests us, the communication field, we must see that re-humanization is the horizon for Latin America. In other words, it is the change of the dominant techno-centric paradigm that began with the mass media and now appeared with a new face: new information and communication technologies. Nico: I think this brings me to my last question, and I want to return to one of Sarah’s earlier comments, when she wrote: “I think, however, that the dialogue between the continents, between the different paradigms, should be open.” How should this dialogue be enabled and facilitated? I must confess that I think that this conversation, with all of us locked in our conceptual and paradigmatic trenches, arguing for the uniqueness of our own concepts and paradigms, does not give that much cause for optimism. So, how would an intellectual project that looks for both commonalities and differences — what I have called a 290 Nico Carpentier, Sarah Anne Ganter, Félix Ortega and Erick Torrico sqridge elsewhere (Carpentier, 2014) — look like in actual academic practice? Erick: Dear Nico, your final question seems to go back to an old debate in the field of communication, which Paul Lazarsfeld (2004) mapped in 1941, distinguishing between “critical” and “administrative” research, which in the 1980s reappeared in some way in the confrontation described by Umberto Eco (1988) between “apocalyptic” and “integrated”. In the early 2000s, Armand Mattelart (2006) reflected on the contrast between “technophobics” and “technophiles”. In a way, this has also been expressed in some of the criteria we have exchanged in this dialogue, considering the current situation of communication studies from the Latin American and European perspectives. However, I want to point out two central differences concerning this conflicted past: The first is that the new Latin American critique, based on de-colonial thinking, does not only question the theoretical nucleus from which communication is studied, that is, the traditional “paradigms” and their pertinence. Instead, it proposes a revision of the epistemological bases of knowledge, established in the understanding that science is the product of a historical moment when was imposed the domination of the point of view of colonial empires and its civilizing project of modernity. So, we are talking about two different levels in the application of criticism. It is not only a question of opposing the “theoretical revolution” (what Karl Marx did, according to Louis Althusser (1965)) to the functional establishment, but of moving towards “epistemological independence” which opens another horizon of understanding of historical reality itself. The second is that, in spite of what has been said, it is not about throwing it all away, but of recovering the elements already existing in the different fronts of research and theory that can contribute to the development of a new knowledge, based on plural, guided by purposes of re-humanization and community building. A key component in this sense is the search and legitimation of the common aspects that, for example, are found in the general theoretical propositions that share the different visions about communication and that make up the “academic culture” of our field (see my article on this topic - Torrico Villanueva, 2007). It is not only necessary that “dialogue be open” but also that we A Debate on Post-colonialism and De-coloniality: Latin American and European Perspectives on Change and Hope 291 have an “openness to dialogue” so that the agonistic management in the academic world can become a reality. Lazarsfeld had already suggested the possibility of collaboration between “critics” and “administrative”, but today it is necessary to go further and exercise “epistemological reflexivity” that distances us from prejudices and ethnocentrisms. It is here that Nico’s proposed metaphor (the sqridge) perfectly fits, as it combines the meeting represented by the bridge with the open space of the square. I want to thank Nico, Sarah and Félix for this conversation, which has been a piece of evidence that it is possible to get results from these interchanges. Félix: The dialogue in science should and may always be open of course, ... Optimism will come with resources, the free flow of researchers between Academies, proper funding for avant-garde research, ... We have no interest, on our side, to remain on the marginal and peripheral side of methods in science, ... English, professional scientific journals, technology and scientific software, stable funding for RD in communication studies and stable grants for preand postPhD researchers are part of the recipe for change, ... A new generation of researchers awaits a much-needed renewal of the Spanish academia in communication research, in both sides of the Atlantic ... they will provide a proper flexible osmosis between academic concepts and puzzles, ... I hope. We have to inspire our hopes in copying what the Danes and Swedish have undertaken in the last 30 years, or so, in their academic projects within universities and research institutions, ... Otherwise Winter … Science will not be coming to the Latino-academic world, or it will arrive later in time, through the “spanification” of North American universities and research institutions ... Hopefully, Summer and Science may prevail and flow into our diverse and varied academic scenarios, ... I remain positive. Changes are already taking place in Spain and also on the other side of the Atlantic ... Let’s move forward and not sideways or alongside the same old narratives. Have a nice Summer. Sarah: Thanks Nico, Erick and Félix. Scholars from different disciplines have called in the past for a cosmopolitan approach to research. I think here, of course, of Ulrich Beck whose idea of cosmopolitanism has been reflected over the past decade in writings by Sonja Livingstone, Silvio Waisbord, also by Kathrin Wahl-Jorgensen and Pablo Boczkowski. Each of these communication scholars actively includes notions of cosmopolitan thinking and practice into their disciplines within 292 Nico Carpentier, Sarah Anne Ganter, Félix Ortega and Erick Torrico communication studies. Having said that, striving for open dialogues is not new, and academic cosmopolitanism is not a naïve way of seeing research. Cosmopolitan researchers look across and share disciplinary, cultural, geographical, linguistic and structural borders, accepting the challenges that this imposes. Of course, dialogue can only be open, if we ask questions beyond definitory issues, looking into the implications of our paradigmatic belongings—in cases when we strongly identify with a particular paradigm. Academic cosmopolitanism firstly starts with the little things we can do such as reading, thinking about and quoting scholars from outside Europe and the US, for example (Ganter & Ortega, 2019). Again, I am surprised to see how many colleagues write about countries or regional territories without including work from scholars from those countries and territories. So, inclusion is an important point here. Again, this does not mean to “homogenize” or to debate away conflicting perspectives and approaches. On the contrary, inclusion also means recognizing differences and to ask what we can learn from those differences and where they provide us with points of connection. Academic cosmopolitanism, secondly, depends on structural conditions. Facilitating academic cosmopolitanism means sensitizing funders, editors, publishers and administrators about the importance of cosmopolitan approaches to research. As mentioned above, access to diversity of contents is pivotal to improve the contextualization and interpretation of results and to trigger further questions, in short: to keep vitality inside our subject. As Erick said, openness to dialogue and an open dialogue are critical to achieve this exchange. It is in line with the calls for cosmopolitan approaches issued by Ulrich Beck and others. I think this book is a great starting point of how to pursue this in a more formalized way and I hope many more initiatives will follow. Nico: My warm thank you to all three of you, for this investment, which probably needs much more time and energy. I look forward to its continuation. References Althusser, Louis (1965) Pour Marx. Paris: Francois Maspero. Carpentier, Nico (2014) “On Walls, Squares, Bridges and Sqridges A framework to think about North-South dialogues in communication A Debate on Post-colonialism and De-coloniality: Latin American and European Perspectives on Change and Hope 293 and media studies”, Journal of Latin American Communication Research, 4(1): 12-29, http://alaic.org/journal/index.php/jlacr/article/view/88. Eco, Umberto (1968/1988) Apocalípticos e integrados. 9a edición Barcelona: Lumen.Halloran, James D. (1998) “Social science, communication research and the Third World”, Media Development, 2: 43-46. Ganter, Sarah A., Ortega, Félix (2019). The Invisibility of Latin American Scholarship in European Media and Communication Studies: Challenges and Opportunities of De-Westernization and Academic Cosmopolitanism.”International Journal of Communication, 13(2019), 68-91. Jameson, Fredric (1971) Marxism and Form: Twentieth Century Dialectical Theories of Literature. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Jensen, Klaus Bruhn, Neuman, W. Russell (2013) “Evolving Paradigms of Communication Research”, International Journal of Communication, 7: 230–238, http://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/viewFile/1960/851. Lazarsfeld, Paul F. (1941/2004) “Administrative and Critical Communications Research”, John Durham Peters and Peter Simonson (eds.) Mass communication and American social thought: Key texts,1919–1968. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, pp. 166–173. Mattelart, Armand (2006) “Realpolitik and Utopias of Universal Bonds: For a Critique of Technoglobalism”, Angharad N. Valdivia (ed.) A Companion to Media Studies. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, pp. 548-564. Nayar, Pramod K. (2015) The Postcolonial Studies Dictionary. Chichester, John Wiley & Sons. Pordzik, Ralph (2001) The Quest for Postcolonial Utopia: A Comparative Introduction to the Utopian Novel in the New English Literatures. New York: Peter Lang. Ritzer, George (1975) “Sociology: A Multiple Paradigm Science”, The American Sociologist, 10(August): 156-167. Said, Edward (1978) Orientalism. New York: Pantheon. Sargent, Lyman Tower (2000) “Utopian traditions: Themes and Variations,” in Roland Schaer, Gregory Claeys, and Lyman Tower Sargent (eds.) Utopia: The search for the ideal society in the Western world, an exhibition at the New York Public Library, October 14, 2000 - January 27, 2001. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 8-17. Torrico Villanueva, Erick R. (2007) “Acercamiento a la comunicación como cultura académica y a sus proposiciones teóricas generales”, Punto Cero, 12(14): 41-48, http://www.scielo.org.bo/pdf/rpc/v12n14/ v12n14a05.pdf 06 FEMINISM 297 Gender and Communication: Advances and SetBacks in an Iberian Peninsula in Crisis Juana Gallego Ayala113 Maria João Silveirinha114 1. Introduction Gender in communication and the media is a consolidated field of study, with numerous publications on different national realities, from Margaret Gallagher’s first studies for UNESCO (1979, 1981, 1987) to name one of the pioneers in the field, to numerous other studies since these earlier works. At a transnational level, the work by Carolyn M. Byerly (2011), in collaboration with the International Women’s Media Foundation contained important data on the situation of European women in news organizations, and this research was completed in 2013 in the The Palgrave International Handbook of Women and Journalism. Likewise, the updated version of Journalism, Gender and Power (Carter et al., 2019) deals with enduring issues on gender and the news. Also to be mentioned at the European level, Padovani and Ross (2016) provide key analysis and complement particular projects on important aspects of feminist media production by European women (Zobl and Drüeke, 2012) or key indicators on gender equality and women in decisionmaking decisions in European media (EIGE, 2013). These studies gave us useful and important information on empirical aspects concerning gender in European media. The research by the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE, 2013) for example, presented comparable data on the levels of gender inequality in the European media landscape, including issues of employment, representation and institutional policies. However, the EU has rarely addressed global gender equality commitments or produced measures on women and the media, nor was the media referred to as a priority in the Commission’s Strategic Engagement for Equality gender 2016-2019 or in the documents of the EU Council for equality between women and men 2011-2020. Nevertheless, the Audiovisual Media Services Directive of 2018 marked some development in updating the EU legal framework on media, calling on Member States to eliminate discrimination based on sex in audiovisual commercial communications (EIGE, 2020). 113 Professor at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain, [email protected] 114 Professor at the University of Coimbra, Portugal, [email protected] 304 Juana Gallego Ayala and Maria João Silveirinha Portuguese academy an increase and public recognition of the epistemic status and the relevance of feminist research”, though “the general public mood of higher acceptance of the WGFS coexists with the non-official regular devaluation of the feminist academic career and its scholars: often (…) are assertions are made in an informal and humoristic manner that WGFS cannot be ‘adequate’ knowledge” (Idem). Hence, the general position of Gender Studies in Portugal is still marginal and precarious (Pereira, 2016). Augusto et. al (2018: 124) also agree: “although important changes have occurred, the field still suffers from a scientific underestimation (…) understood as a matter of women or minorities which can influence the current vision of this field as less effective, less competitive and less important”. Furthermore, in the field of communication, which has seen a clear growth in publications in Portugal, gender issues still have little presence in the curricula of communication and media studies, despite the evident growing interest in the issue. 5. Main research focus Bearing in mind the previous background and the idea that neither Spain nor Portugal has yet won the battle of academic prestige of Gender Studies, the specific context of communication has been one of the most researched fields. Thus, much work on gender in the news media, for example, has been done in Spain since the early works of Fagoaga and Secanella (1984), Bueno Abad (1996), Bach et. al. (2000) or Moreno et. Al (2007) or the Portuguese research by Silveirinha (2004), Peça (2010), Cerqueira (2012) or Simões (2014). Another field that received some attention were women magazines, with contributions by Spanish authors such as Gallego (1990), Menéndez (2006) or Garrido (2012), and Portuguese researchers such as Marques (2004) or Alvarez (2012). Television has also been of interest to researchers, as seen in the work on Portuguese news television by Lobo and Cabecinhas (2010), the State’s Portuguese television (Alvares, 2014) or its memory by female audiences (Carvalheiro, 2014). Radio has been the least studied media outlet, though in Spain López Díez (2005) for example has included it in several reports and studies. The issue of gender representations and stereotypes is possibly the most thoroughly studied issue in both countries, although often lacking a perspective that allows an understanding of how gender differences are created and produced and how they relate not only to Gender and Communication: Advances and Setbacks in a Iberian Peninsula in Crisis 305 media economy and culture but also to employment policies, namely in decision making (Subtil and Silveirinha, 2017a). An emerging field (Kivikuriu, 1997) is that of new digital media, where early contributions such as those of Mateos de Cabo et al. (2007), Cerqueira e Cabecinhas (2009), Ganito (2012), and more recently Álvares (2018), Silveirinha (2017), Silveirinha et. al (2020), Puente et. al (2019) as some relevant contributions. In terms of communicative modalities, advertising has been one of the most analyzed, namely because the field has presented the most flagrant reoccurrence of stereotyped representations of women: PeñaMarin (1990) or Martín Serrano (1995) in Spain were the two pioneers to whom as been jointed most recently the works of Sánchez Aranda (2002) and Mota-Ribeiro (2002) or Pinto-Coelho and Silvana MotaRibeiro (2012). Other key work has been made in Spain by the different Observatorios de la Publicidad (Advertising Observatories) sponsored by the Institutes of Women and other institutions that make annual reports on citizen’s complaints on commercials and ad’s campaigns. In Spain, the reports by the Women’s Institute has made since 2000 until 2014 show an evolution line of these complaints. In Portugal, only Entidade Reguladora para a Comunicação Social (Regulatory Authority for Communication) (ERC) produces policy advice within the field. Fiction in cinema or television has given to the field some very significant titles in Spain, like those of Aguilar (1998), Arranz (2010), Sangro and Plaza (2010), Gallego (2012), or Tous and Aran-Ramspott (2017). Other work addressing gender and communication in general in Spain are those of Plaza et al. (2007), Gallego (2013), or Bernárdez (2015), and in Portugal special issues of journals such as Media & Jornalismo, Comunicação e Sociedade and Ex Aequo. Also to be mentioned is the work on media, women and politics in Portugal (Martins, 2015) and on media policies (Álvares and Veríssimo, 2016; Álvares, 2019; Cerqueira and Cabecinhas, 2012; Subtil and Silveirinha, 2017b). 6. Approaches and recurrent issues One of the first communication models by Lasswell (1948) is summed up in five questions: Who, Says what, In which Channel, To Whom, With what effect? These would revolve around elements that have been being analyzed since then: a) production; b) contents; and c) reception. 306 Juana Gallego Ayala and Maria João Silveirinha Even though this is a limited and problematic model, it allows us to see in the references we mentioned previously, that most studies had been centred on contents – namely the gender representation in the daily press, magazines, television programs, TV shows or the movies, as well as advertising. Indeed, in her early mapping of feminist studies of the media Van Zoonen (1994) soon identified the representation of women as a core field of research. Perhaps it was media content’s accessibility and visibility that have led researchers to take it as a study object as “the what”, and much less “the who” and lesser still, the “what effects”. Given the public funding system, which in both countries is not all generous in terms of number of grants for social sciences, the submitted projects are usually prudent when asking for funds they know they are not going to get. It is not within the reach of most to make population survey to analyze the possible effects of media content, or study professional routines in situ, but it is more feasible to establish a representative sample of contents and proceed to its analysis. Since quantitative methods have to gained more credibility among the scientific community than qualitative ones, most studies have opted for the former methods, even though in recent years the qualitative methods such as focus groups, interviews or participant observation became more popular. Ethnography of media organizations, though not many in number have also provided some good results, giving relevance to inequalities in gender and the media. Yet, research in Spain focused on news producers and professional routines are scarce: those of Gallego and Del Rio (1994) and that of CIS (2000) are focused on who produces information in Catalonia and Spain, respectively, and Gallego (2002) analyzed the professional routines of the general information daily newspapers through a direct observation of the media, in a detailed ethnographic analysis of a complex organization such as daily newspapers. In Portugal, the specific work on women journalists is also quite scarce, with a few exceptions such as the quantitative analysis of women journalists by Subtil (2009) and Miranda (2014), as well as the qualitative analysis of the gender experience in Portuguese press rooms by Lobo et. al. (2017). Other research on reception through to focus groups is that by Garmendia (1998) and Bernárdez (2007) in Spain (introducing intersectionality through the variables of gender and immigration), and Lobo and Cabecinhas (2010) or Carvalheiro and Silveirinha (2015) in Portugal. Among the issues that have captured most attention is the news media representation of violence against women, in particular since the Gender and Communication: Advances and Setbacks in a Iberian Peninsula in Crisis 307 Law against Violence of Gender in Spain (2004) as there was a priority line of research for public organisms. Among a large number of titles, there are relevant contributions on this issue such as those of Fagoaga (1999), Fernández (2003) and García González (2008). The Association of Women Journalists in Catalonia (ADPC) began a monitorization of news media on gender violence aiming to find if the recommendations proposed by different institutions have any effect in the media. Annual reports have been published since 2009 up to 2014, coming to general conclusions that although there is a decrease in inadequate coverage, there is an increase of violence 2.0, on the Internet, by aggressive groups towards women’s gains (Carrasco et. al, 2015). One of the most recent contribution in this field is the collective work Gender and Violence in Spanish Culture. From Vulnerability to Accountability (2018) deriving from the theoretical notion of ‘ethical witnessing’ by Kelly Oliver (2004). These references are obviously not exhaustive, for there has been much research in the last years in the form of contributions to conferences, journal articles or other publications in collective volumes, that we were unable to include in this brief review. 7. The relationship between gender/feminist studies and social movements The relationship between feminist/gender studies and social movements gave visibility to the work produced in both countries analyzing the development of those movements, including feminist and gender activism in the Peninsula. As many have observed, this was at least in part a result of the changing communications environment, including not only the changes in the information distribution, but also in mobilizations and most of all, the articulation with multinational movements and the “transnationalization of the public sphere” (Fraser, 2007). Social movements in Portugal and Spain weren’t immune to these processes, namely in their connection with transnational feminist networks (Moghadam, 2005). Despite this observable connection, for instance in how websites of feminist networks of both countries transnationalize their issues, they don’t seem to make full use of the internet for activist’s purposes. In Spain, Sonia Núñez Puente et. al. (2017) show how both institutional websites and virtual feminist communities on violence against women do not go much beyond debates and governmental policies, providing little participation or interaction by the victims. 308 Juana Gallego Ayala and Maria João Silveirinha Portugal, on the other hand, has a considerably lower level of activism than that of its neighboring Spain, reflecting on the use of networks. Hence, the conclusions by Portuguese researchers on the analysis of social networks of Portuguese feminist groups: despite the significant number of websites promoting the dissemination of ideas and the public discussion around women’s rights, its popularity is low as are the numbers of followers and their participation (Marôpo et al., 2017). In previous sections we mentioned historical aspects that have shaped our two countries. However, cultural issues also need to be considered when we analyze the issues at hand. One such aspect is the conservative view in both countries that, following the roman catholic church, establishes the dangers of the so-called “gender ideology” which a Portuguese church document describes as not “a simple intellectual hype. Rather, it refers to a cultural movement reflecting on the understanding of family, in the political and legislative public sphere, in education, in the media and in current language itself” (Carta dos Bispos Portugueses) (Letter of the Portuguese Bishops, 2013). In Spain, the catholic church also insists that “the human person exists as man and woman, which means that it was created to live in a community. Sexual diversity leads to complementarity that allows a solid married and family life, permanent in time, composed by father, mother and some children” (Asamblea de los Obispos del Sur de España) (Assembly of Bishops of South Spain, 2018). The background of conservatism in both countries is even more exacerbated when the far right-wing uses this idea. It is what happened in Spain in March 2017, when a bus carrying the ultra-catholic group Hazte Oír went through Madrid carrying the transphobic message: “Boys have penises, girls have vulvas. Don’t let them fool you. If you’re born a man, you’re a man. If you’re a woman, you will continue to be so”. It was precisely to confront these attacks articulated as popular misogyny and as a moment to hide and devalue feminisms, that Spanish activist got together not only through huge street demonstrations but through important actions in social media (Puente & Gamez, 2017). Besides the striking differences in the levels of activism, there are other differences between Portugal and Spain. First, we must stress that in 2019 Portugal ranked 16th in the 28 European countries Gender Equality Index developed by the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE), while Spain was above the European average, in the 9th position. This difference in the levels of gender equality is also felt in the way both countries live their very own perception of the meaning of equality. Gender and Communication: Advances and Setbacks in a Iberian Peninsula in Crisis 309 In Portugal, despite the actions of activists, the country seems to live in a generalized apathy in what concerns the issues of gender, which coexists in an apparently pacific way with the daily misogyny of the Portuguese society. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t obvious efforts of calling out such misogyny, though it seems the latter has to adopt a flagrant form to mobilize some voices. Thus, the way sexism is disseminated throughout the Portuguese society visible in its judicial system, which has produced flagrant cases of sexism. For instance, in June 2017, a panel of judges wrote a judgment to present to an Appeal Court in order to corroborate the suspension of the sentences of two men convicted of serious attacks to a woman. The judgment read that “a woman committing adultery is a false, hypocritical, dishonest, disloyal, futile, immoral person. In short, she lacks moral probity. It is not surprising that she resorts to deception, farce, lies to hide her disloyalty”. The prosecutor had argued the sentence was too lenient and asked an appeals court for prison time but the appeal judges rejected his request. In their written ruling, the judges expressed “some understanding” for the attacker, saying a woman’s adultery is “a very serious offense against a man’s honor and dignity. They noted the Bible says an adulterous woman should be punished by death and also cited a 1886 Portuguese law that gave only symbolic sentences to men who killed their wives for suspected adultery. Also in 2017 Portugal was condemned by the European Court of Human Rights due to a controversial sentence in the case of a woman who pursued a compensation claim for medical malpractice after an operation left her in pain when walking, sitting and certainly when having sex. The judges decided that the awarded compensation should be reduced as she was over 50, and sex for the over 50s woman “is not so important.” In Spain, misogyny and devaluation of women also projected one of its most visible facets in judicial cases, though in this country, feminist movements are better organized with more voices for its expression and protests. Such was the case of the controversial sentence of a group sexual assault of a young woman in Sanferminas de Pamplona in 2016 (known as La Manada – the wolf pack). The ruling by a panel of judges finding the five men guilty of the lesser charge of “sexual abuse”, not sexual assault (rape), caused an uprising of the feminist movement and triggered deep outrage and protests visible in almost all Spanish cities in March 8th 2018. In June 2019, Spain’s Supreme Court overruled the ‘La Manada’ case’s verdict, charging the five men with rape, not sexual abuse, and increasing their prison sentences from [Document text truncated for crawler view.]