Considers information as an economic good, and examines its effects on political economy as well as on social life and skill needs. Includes case studies of electronic homework in the Federal Republic of Germany and information technologies in the ASEAN countries.
What is political economy and how can it be applied to the study of media communication? The Political Economy of Communication is the definitive critical overview of the discipline for students of the social sciences. It explains in detail the analytic tools that political economy can apply to today's increasingly global and technological information society. Mosco presents an historical overview of the discipline and defines political economy by its focus on the relation between the production, distribution and consumption of communication in historical and cultural context. This comprehensive analysis of the 'commodity form' is communication includes an examination of print, broadcast and new electronic media, the role and function of the audience, and the problem of social control. It concludes by addressing the relationship of political economy to the increasingly important fields of policy studies and cultural studies.
Are the new technologies of the information age reshaping the labor force, transforming communications, changing the potential of democracy, and altering the course of history itself? Capitalism and the Information Age presents a rigorous examination of some of the most crucial problems and possibilities of these novel technologies. Not a day goes by that we don't see a news clip, hear a radio report, or read an article heralding the miraculous new technologies of the information age. The communication revolution associated with these technologies is often heralded as the key to a new age of "globalization." How is all of this reshaping the labor force, transforming communications, changing the potential of democracy, and altering the course of history itself? Capitalism and the Information Age presents a rigorous examination of some of the most crucial problems and possibilities of these novel technologies.
Over the last decade, political economy has grown rapidly as a specialist area of research and teaching within communications and media studies and is now established as a core element in university programmes around the world. The Handbook of Political Economy of Communications offers students and scholars a comprehensive, authoritative, up-to-date and accessible overview of key areas and debates. Combines overviews of core ideas with new case study materials and the best of contemporary theorization and research Written many of the best known authors in the field Includes an international line-up of contributors, drawn from the key markets of North and Latin America, Europe, Australasia, and the Far East
A theoretical framework for analyzing the complex relationship of education, growth, and income distribution. The dominant role played by the state in the financing, regulation, and provision of primary and secondary education reflects the widely-held belief that education is necessary for personal and societal well-being. The economic organization of education depends on political as well as market mechanisms to resolve issues that arise because of contrasting views on such matters as income inequality, social mobility, and diversity. This book provides the theoretical framework necessary for understanding the political economy of education—the complex relationship of education, economic growth, and income distribution—and for formulating effective policies to improve the financing and provision of education. The relatively simple models developed illustrate the use of analytical tools for understanding central policy issues. After offering a historical overview of the development of public education and a review of current econometric evidence on education, growth, and income distribution, the authors lay the theoretical groundwork for the main body of analysis. First they develop a basic static model of how political decisions determine education spending; then they extend this model dynamically. Applying this framework to a comparison of education financing under different regimes, the authors explore fiscal decentralization; individual choice between public and private schooling, including the use of education vouchers to combine public financing of education with private provision; and the social dimension of education—its role in state-building, the traditional "melting pot" that promotes cohesion in a culturally diverse society.
Several of the most important and influential political economists of communication working today explore a rich mix of topics and issues that link work, policy studies, and research and theory about the public sphere to the heritage of political economy. Familiar but still exceedingly important topics in critical political economy studies are well represented here: market structures and media concentration, regulation and policy, technological impacts on particular media sectors, information poverty, and media access. The book also features new topics for political economy study, including racism in audience research, the value and need for feminist approaches to political economy studies, and the relationship between the discourse of media finance and the behavior of markets.
This book provides a critical political economic examination of the impact of increasingly concentrated global media industries. It addresses different media and communication industries from around the globe, including film, television, music, journalism, telecommunication, and information industries. The authors use case studies to examine how changing methods of production and distribution are impacting a variety of issues including globalization, environmental devastation, and the shifting role of the State. This collection finds communication at a historical moment in which capitalist control of media and communication is the default status and, so, because of the increasing levels of concentration globally allows those in control to define the default ideological status. In turn, these concentrated media forces are deployed under the guise of entertainment but with a mind towards further concentration and control of the media apparatuses many times in convergence with others
This book provides answers to the questions of why human-kind should go into space, and on the relative roles of governments and markets in the evolution of the space economy. It adopts an interdisciplinary approach to answer those questions. Science and technology define the boundaries of what is possible. The realization of the possible depends on economic, institutional, and political factors. The book thus draws from many different academic areas such as physical science, astronomy, astronautics, political science, economics, sociology, cultural studies, and history. In the literature, the space economy has been analyzed using different approaches from science and technology to the effects of public expenditures on economic growth and to medium term effects on productivity and growth. This book brings all these aspects together following the evolutionary theory of economic change. It studies processes that transform the economy through the interactions among diverse economic agents, governments, and the extra-systemic environment in which governments operate. Its historical part helps to better understand motivations and constraints - technical, political, and economical - that shaped the growth of the space economy. In the medium term, global issues - such as population changes, critical or limited natural resources, and environmental damages – and technological innovations are the main drivers for the evolution of the space economy beyond Earth orbit. In universities, this book can be used: as a reference by historians of astronautics; for researchers in the field of astronautics, international political economy, and legal issues related to the space economy. In think tanks and public institutions, both national and international, this book provides an input to the ongoing debate on the collaboration among space agencies and the role of private companies in the development of the space economy. Finally, this book will help the educated general public to orient himself in the forest of stimuli, news, and solicitations to which he is daily subjected by the media, television and radio, and to react in less passive ways to those stimuli.