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The Hybrid Media System: Politics and Power
New communication technologies have reshaped media and politics. But who are the new power players? The Hybrid Media System is a sweeping new theory of how political communication now works. Politics is increasingly defined by organizations, groups, and individuals who are best able to blend older and newer media logics, in what Chadwick terms a hybrid system. From American presidential campaigns to WikiLeaks, from live prime ministerial debates to hotly contested political scandals, from the daily practices of journalists and campaign workers to the struggles of new activist organizations, the clash of media logics causes chaos and disintegration but also surprising new patterns of order and integration. The updated second edition features a new preface and an extensive new chapter applying the conceptual framework to the extraordinary 2016 U.S. presidential campaign, the rise of Donald Trump, and the anti-Trump resistance protests.
367 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
September 6, 2019
Great book read for Gainous POLS 507
May 26, 2014
Chadwick's argument in *The Hybrid Media System* is so clear, so simple and straightforward that you shouldn't be surprised if you frequently find yourself thinking something along the lines of "Well, of course that's the way it works." That old and new media practices are combining to produce a hybrid logic that has significant and systematic consequences for the intersection of media and politics seems so obvious that the reader can be forgiven for wondering what is original about Chadwick's argument. But that's what's so remarkable about this book. Chadwick's presentation is so clear and compelling that it seems like reality couldn't possibly be any other way. And yet, Chadwick really is the first to present the argument of media system hybridity.
To this point, most scholarship investigating the impact of new media on journalistic and political practices takes one of two positions. The first, and perhaps most common, is that new media and the internet are speeding the complete demise of traditional mass media. Newspapers are dying. Broadcasting is becoming all about entertainment. And journalists are losing their jobs right and left, made redundant now by the "person on the street"--that is, any person with a camera phone and a Twitter or Facebook account (or maybe his or her own blog). In short, new media are proving truly transformative. The second perspective suggests that the dynamics introduced by new media and the internet are essentially faddish. As the novelty wears off, we're beginning to see that the same old rules apply and that to be news in any real sense an issue or event must still be picked up by (and therefore fit within the logic of) old print and broadcast media. In short, new media will have minimal long term impact.
Only a handful of scholars place themselves somewhere in the middle of these two perspectives, and Chadwick is one of a very few who have done so in any systematic way. Though the evidence for his argument is derived from a handful of case studies, the cases are well-chosen, and the argument lends itself well to further exploration by future studies employing a wide range of methodologies.
Easy and certainly compelling enough for the engaged layperson, *The Hybrid Media System* also seems ideal as an undergraduate text for courses on media and politics. I will definitely be assigning it in my own.
To this point, most scholarship investigating the impact of new media on journalistic and political practices takes one of two positions. The first, and perhaps most common, is that new media and the internet are speeding the complete demise of traditional mass media. Newspapers are dying. Broadcasting is becoming all about entertainment. And journalists are losing their jobs right and left, made redundant now by the "person on the street"--that is, any person with a camera phone and a Twitter or Facebook account (or maybe his or her own blog). In short, new media are proving truly transformative. The second perspective suggests that the dynamics introduced by new media and the internet are essentially faddish. As the novelty wears off, we're beginning to see that the same old rules apply and that to be news in any real sense an issue or event must still be picked up by (and therefore fit within the logic of) old print and broadcast media. In short, new media will have minimal long term impact.
Only a handful of scholars place themselves somewhere in the middle of these two perspectives, and Chadwick is one of a very few who have done so in any systematic way. Though the evidence for his argument is derived from a handful of case studies, the cases are well-chosen, and the argument lends itself well to further exploration by future studies employing a wide range of methodologies.
Easy and certainly compelling enough for the engaged layperson, *The Hybrid Media System* also seems ideal as an undergraduate text for courses on media and politics. I will definitely be assigning it in my own.
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December 5, 2014320.014 C4323 2013
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews