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American Association for Public Opinion Research
Media Hegemony: A Failure of Perspective
Author(s): David L. Altheide
Source:
The Public Opinion Quarterly
, Vol. 48, No. 2 (Summer, 1984), pp. 476-490
Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Association for Public
Opinion Research
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Media Hegemony:
A Failure of Perspective
DAVID L. ALTHEIDE
NUMEROUS studies of news media organizations and the news process
have been completed during the last decade (cf. Gans, 1972). Several
perspectives have been offered to integrate the news process and the
messages produced by it within a more general conception of social
organization. One concept which has received a good deal of schol-
arly attention in the United States and Europe is hegemony. This
paper takes an initial step toward assessing the claims and empirical
adequacy of media hegemony. Specifically, the notion of media
hegemony includes assumptions about (1) the socialization and ideol-
ogy of journalists, (2) the tendency of journalists and their reports to
support and perpetuate the status quo, and (3) the negative character
of foreign news coverage, especially Third World countries.
Following a brief overview of the theoretical foundation of media
hegemony and its claims, the empirical adequacy of these assump-
tions is assessed. While some evidence does support some claims of
media hegemonists, the three major assumptions noted above are not
Abstract Numerous studies of TV news have been published since Gans's (1972) call
for more research on the mass media. A central issue underlying much of this research
is control and dominance of the news process. This essay analyzes the logical and
empirical adequacy of media hegemony as an explanation of ideological dominance.
Analysis of recent research shows that some researchers have uncritically adapted the
"dominant ideology thesis" of media hegemony to studies of TV news and have
overlooked findings which challenge their claims about (1) the socialization and ideol-
ogy of journalists, (2) whether news reports perpetuate the status quo, and (3) the
nature and extent of international news coverage. Despite the shortcomings of the
concept of media hegemony, efforts should continue to develop an empirically sound
theoretical perspective for locating the news process in a broader societal context.
David L. Altheide is Professor in the Center for the Study of Justice, Arizona State
University, and Field Research Director, Center for Urban Studies. The author
gratefully acknowledges the comments of John M. Johnson, Kurt Lang, and anonymous
reviewers. Another version of this paper was presented at the Annual Meeting of the
American Sociological Association, San Francisco, September 1982.
Public Opinion Quarterly Vol. 48:476-490 ?) 1984 by the Trustees of Columbia University
Published by Elsevier Science Publishing Co., Inc 0033-362X/84/0048-476/$2.50
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MEDIA HEGEMONY: A FAILURE OF PERSPECTIVE 477
systematically supported. Data will be presented to indicate that (1)
journalists are not uniformly socialized into the dominant ideology,
nor are most elite journalists supportive of conservative values and
ideology; (2) journalistic reports do not routinely perpetuate the status
quo, but have been agents of change in a number of instances; and (3)
foreign affairs reporting on television is more extensive than has been
assumed, and many of these reports are sympathetic with Third
World movements as well as critical of the role the United States has
played in these countries.
Hegemony and Critical Theory
As recently articulated by Antonio Gramsci (1971), media
hegemony refers to the dominance of a certain way of life and thought
and to the way in which that dominant concept of reality is diffused
throughout public as 'well as private dimensions of social life. The
contemporary definition of hegemony is conceptually rooted in the
Marxist view of the economic foundations of a society as the most
important shapers of culture, values, and ideology; the ruling classes
who control the economic structures and institutions of society also
control its political and primary ideological institutions (Marx and
Engels, 1960).
While disagreements occur on the nature of hegemony, recent dis-
cussions of this concept make it clear that emphasis is on the cultural
and ideological modes produced by the institutions dominated by
ruling elites (cf. Barrett, et al., 1979). The general orientation of
critical theory is to expose such connections and to articulate how
culture itself is a manifestation of ideological interests not compatible
with true understanding of the processes and laws governing social
order. According to this view, therefore, an economically and
ideologically biased consciousness perpetuates itself through
hegemony, and all of society is dominated by the false logic and
consciousness (Sallach, 1973; 1974).
Hegemony replaces culture as a context for locating human experi-
ence. In its traditional usage in social science, culture has been more
descriptive rather than prescriptive. In critical theory, culture is
claimed to be directed by the ideologically inspired interests which
control and lead production (cf. Sallach, 1974; Hall, 1979:318 ff).
Unlike culture, which implies a world necessarily limited by the
symbolic experience of the members of a society, hegemony pro-
grammatically denies this claim, implying that ideological freedom can
be obtained when the dominant forces are identified and then resisted.
The implication is that when culture is unmasked, a repressive dimen-
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478 DAVID L. ALTHEIDE
sion of social life not previously recognized is revealed. And, since
the mass media are producing the very effects which control them,
research into mass communication becomes a part of the overall
program (cf. Murdock and Golding, 1979:12 ff).
TV news departments have been viewed by some researchers as
further extensions of a capitalistic economic order. Stuart Hall (1979),
for example, has argued that media products are messages in code
about the nature of society, the nature of productive relations within
the media themselves and institutional domains and social processes.
Golding and Murdock (1979) argue that decoding media to uncover
the true messages of capitalist ideology is important but it is more
essential to see the mass media as organizations which produce and
distribute commodities within a late capitalist economic order (Mur-
dock and Golding, 1974:205-6, quoted in Barrett et al., 1979:210).
The explicit and implicit consequences of media domination, ac-
cording to this view, can be stated in three general claims:
1. Journalists' socialization involves guidelines, work routines, and
orientations replete with the dominant ideology. Virtually all mass
media researchers acknowledge the economic context and rationale
for modern news organizations. What distinguishes the position of
media hegemony from other explanations of news content is the claim
that the ideology and control of the economic interests pervade the
assumptions, procedures, and orientation, of journalists who actually
produce news reports. Journalists' work routines are claimed to in-
corporate language rules and codes which resonate with the dominant
ideology (cf. Mueller, 1973; Hall, 1979:342 ff; Hall, 1980:15 ff, 117
ff). The upshot is that journalists can unwittingly promote ideological
hegemony by using their cultural categories and symbols as they do
their work, although some media hegemonists assert that journalists
use these codes consciously and strategically to promote dominant
ideological interests (Chaney, 1981:117).
2. Journalists tend to cover topics and present news reports which
are conservative and supportive of the status quo. One consequence
of the unintended and intended use of these codes is to retard social
change by presenting conservative news reports to a mass audience
(Golding, 1981:81). From this perspective, public opinion is informed
through status quo oriented news media.
3. Journalists tend to present pro-American and negative coverage
of foreign countries, especially Third World nations. International
social change is also claimed to be retarded and delegitimated by
hegemonic news media. According to proponents of media hegemony,
news emphasis on negative stereotypes of foreign countries and the
slanting of information compatible with American and Western
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MEDIA HEGEMONY: A FAILURE OF PERSPECTIVE 479
ideologies promote further control through a kind of information im-
perialism (Dahlgren, 1982). Thus, the same logic of domination which
infuses audience messages about their own social and cultural affairs
also extends to an audience's view of the world.
Media hegemony has sensitized researchers to the potential for
domination of conventional broadcast modes and procedures. How-
ever, the compelling logic of the media hegemony thesis has not been
matched by a research program to systematically assess the nature
and extent of such domination on either foreign or domestic topics.
Certainly one reason why this task has not been carried out to a fuller
extent is the confusing and often ambiguous way in which the concept
of hegemony has been used.
Hegemony is treated as an attribute and an effect in some studies of
TV news, and is therefore very difficult to falsify (cf. Turner and
Edgely, 1980). As an attribute of a late capitalist order, hegemony
defines any activity or process as a product of the ideological and
economic context from which it emerged. As an effect of the efforts
by the dominant class to keep its control and to legitimate itself,
hegemony is contained in the news reports sustaining the pervasive
ideology. Thus, even news reports critical of the powerful economic
groups are seen as a piece of ideology (cf. Gitlin, 1980).
Treating media hegemony as both an attribute and an effect creates
a methodological challenge to empirically assess claims made by
researchers. While lack of precise focus on the nature and location of
hegemonic influence in the news process does make it difficult to
assess all theoretical claims, research is available to assess the three
claims noted above.
Socialization and Ideology of Journalists
Research does show that journalists are socialized into professional
and organizational norms (cf. Gieber, 1961). As members of a par-
ticular culture, journalists do share some basic values, ideals, and
preferences, e.g., American journalists tend to accept basic premises
of capitalism (Gans, 1979). These preferences do have implications for
ideology since it is extremely difficult to totally transcend such perva-
sive cultural influences as symbolism and language. However, the
critical question is whether journalistic work routines are sufficiently
influenced by a dominant mode of thought to negate any journalistic
independence. In other words, the proponents of media hegemony are
less interested in editorial pressure by politicians, corporate directors,
and news directors (cf. Halberstam, 1979). Explicit editorial pressure
does occur, especially in smaller market operations where publishers
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480 DAVID L. ALTHEIDE
and station managers are often closely linked to the wielders of power
in their communities (Epstein, 1973; Altheide, 1976). But the media
hegemonists claim much more than this; they contend that the work
routines and bureaucratic organizing procedures used by journalists
are imbued with implicit and explicit ideological referents which con-
sistently lead to the production of messages emphasizing particular
norms, values, and sanctions (Murdock and Golding, 1979). Research
does show that news organizations rely on bureaucratic news sources
which can color news accounts (cf. Epstein, 1973; Altheide, 1976;
Tuchman, 1978; Fishman, 1980). However, since both "establish-
ment" and "anti-establishment" organizations operate bureau-
cratically (cf. Seeger, 1975; Gitlin, 1980), the ideological content of
news reports based on such sources will also vary. Further, a decade
of research on the way that news reports are socially constructed
indicates that journalists do not merely pass on information derived
from news sources but, rather, shape this information according to
certain news production routines (cf. Epstein, 1973; Altheide, 1976,
1978; Gans, 1979). Ultimately, then, the strength of the media
hegemony position requires an assessment of the orientation and
practice of journalists. We turn now to several studies which have
examined the ideological nature of this aspect of journalistic work.
John Crothers Pollock (1981, 1982) has examined the nature and
impact of journalists' experience on the approach and emphasis of
reports about international affairs. His work challenges "conventional
wisdom" that a journalist's prior personal experience matters little
when reporting on a crisis, that he/she is often compelled to present a
balanced view in the coverage.
Specifically, Pollock (1982:103 ff) concludes:
1. The experiences associated positively and negatively with an orientation
favoring detente are quite distinct from one another. Personal, intimate
learning has a substantial impact on perspectives deploring East-West con-
flict.
2. A great deal of learning affecting attitudes toward pluralism is acquired
relatively early in a journalist's career.... The sources a journalist contacts,
with foreign host country government or non-government sources, appear[s]
to have little effect on reporting judgments.
3. The size of market of a journalist's employer has some influence on
negative perspectives toward detente.
4. In pursuing a particular career path, a reporter makes an important
choice affecting his orientations toward detente.
In brief, there are at least two distinct types of professional orienta-
tion associated with foreign affairs coverage: high pluralist and low
pluralist. Journalists are not simply molded into a uniform ideological
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MEDIA HEGEMONY: A FAILURE OF PERSPECTIVE 481
shape, but rather, they play a major role in adapting their reportage to
preprofessional, personal, and organizational experiences.
An earlier study by Johnstone et al. (1976) of the background,
orientation, and ideology of journalists found that homogeneity in
background or orientation is not the rule. For example, those who had
a journalism education tended to think it was not necessary, while
those who lacked it thought it would be worthwhile. There were
important regional differences in regard to prestige, reliability, and
whether a journalist would use stories from other media in his/her
own reports. However, the authors did find that Eastern seaboard
publications were regarded as leaders in journalism standards, and
that the management and staff of the "elite press" tended to be more
Democratic and left-leaning than their counterparts in smaller opera-
tions throughout the rest of the United States. The upshot is that
while mass news is clearly an organizational phenomenon, there is a
good deal of diversity.
There have been few other studies as broad as Johnstone et al.
(1976), but recent work by Lichter and Rothman (1981) does provide a
sharper focus on the similarities and differences between journalists
and selected individuals in other key occupations. These researchers
contrasted media and business elite views on a number of domestic
and international issues. In general, they found gaping disparities.
Specifically, leading journalists lined up on the side of minorities,
consumer groups, and intellectuals-but against business and labor.
Journalists favored more governmental regulation, felt business was
profiting at the expense of Third World countries, and had little
regard for the wisdom and ability of major national leaders. Another
survey by Lichter et al. (1982) of Master's degree candidates at
Columbia's School of Journalism found similar-but even more
pronounced-disparities between the students and the business elite
as well as between students and established journalists.
Perpetuation of the Status Quo
The question of the nature and extent of the news media's effect on
the status quo, and particularly in the promotion of social change, is
troublesome for all media researchers (cf. Katz, 1981). Part of the
problem is what one means by social change. On the one hand, if
social change is meant to refer to fundamental upheaval, including
establishing another form of government and economic system, then
it is correct that few journalists would desire such social change. Nor
do there appear to be a plethora of journalistic reports advocating
such changes, at least not for the United States of America. It is
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482 DAVID L. ALTHEIDE
perhaps for this reason that proponents of media hegemony have
claimed that the major media perpetuate the status quo and contribute
little to social change.1 As we have already seen, this view is based on
the assumption that the major media are functional for other ideologi-
cally dominant institutions, and are not an independent powerful force
in their own right. Katz (1981:268) has noted that the media hegemony
position presents an unenviable problem of empirically demonstrating
that the powerful media are causing an absence of change. On the
other hand, if social change is meant to refer to major reforms and
reassessments of government policies, including income redistribu-
tion, then numerous journalists do favor social change. Moreover,
there is ample evidence that journalistic reports have contributed to
numerous social changes.
Numerous studies demonstrate media effects on significant individ-
uals, events, and issues (cf. Lang and Lang, 1981). Scholars have
shown, for example, that political agendas (Shaw and McCombs,
1977) are presented, articulated, and even altered on the basis of news
presentations. Likewise, Patterson (1980:175) argues that voter
awareness and understanding of issues is due in no small way to news
media coverage. The widespread use of opinion polls has also been
influenced by prevailing news formats (Epstein, 1973; Altheide and
Snow, 1979).
Other effects by the news media have been documented (cf.
Seymour-Ure, 1974). The work of Noelle-Neumann (1981) in the
Federal Republic of Germany demonstrates that the news media act
as agents of change rather than supporting the status quo. She also
found that people with a television set were more interested in politics
than persons who did not have one.
Domestic policy has been shown to be influenced by media empha-
sis. The role of the media in publicizing and thematically stressing
certain features of the Watergate affair has been documented (cf.
Altheide, 1976; Halberstem, 1979), and Blanchard (1974) has shown
how members of Congress promoted legislation and themselves via
the mass media.
Foreign policy and diplomacy have also been influenced by news
coverage. Halberstam's (1979) analysis of CBS's coverage of Viet-
nam, especially following the Tet offensive in 1968, leaves little doubt
that presidents pay attention to network news reports, particularly
I Paradoxically, some proponents of the media hegemony thesis which denies the
role of mass media in promoting important change also support the media imperialism
thesis, which holds that American (and some European) media significantly alter the
lifestyles and cultures of Third World countries (cf. Schiller, 1971; Boyd-Barrett, 1979).
For a thorough critique of media imperialism, see Lee (1980).
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MEDIA HEGEMONY: A FAILURE OF PERSPECTIVE 483
when famous personalities like Walter Cronkite decided "the war
didn't work . . . that we had to start thinking of getting out" (Hal-
berstam, 1979:514). The impact of the coverage of the Tet offensive in
Vietnam in 1968 has been analyzed by Braestrup (1978), and the
direct impact on President Johnson's decision not to seek another
term in office has been shown by Schandler (1977). More recently, the
impact of media formats, presentations, and emphases on Middle East
policy (Adams, 1981) and the Iranian hostage crisis have been exten-
sively studied (cf. Altheide, 1981; 1982; Raphel, 1980-81). These
works suggest an effect of publicity, focus, and thematic emphasis on
the nature and direction of administration efforts to free the hostages,
e.g., through a rescue attempt, as well as the pace of negotiations
with the Iranian captors.
Students of social movements have shown the effect of mass media
mobilization on the direction and decisiveness of issue development
and the realization of goals (cf. Becker, 1963; Turner and Killian,
1972). More recently, Johnson (1981) has documented how moral
entrepreneurs in the movement against spouse abuse incorporated
news media reports within their general strategy.
Finally, there are general effects of the news media on changing
social institutions. There is compelling evidence that the role of politi-
cal parties in the United States (cf. Robinson, 1977) has been di-
minished as a result of TV news formats and emphasis. Pronounced
changes have also been identified in other institutions, e.g., sports
and religion (Altheide and Snow, 1979). In short, there is clear evi-
dence that the news media do figure in social change, including
challenging the legitimacy of key individuals and institutions. That
such changes have not been readily acknowledged by media
hegemonists or regarded as critical of the status quo may be more a
feature of the media hegemony thesis than of inflexible social institu-
tions. Indeed, the fact of social change itself has so altered original
institutional alignments that researchers investigating the applicability
of the dominant ideology thesis have concluded that it is now less well
defined than in earlier periods, and is marked by major inconsisten-
cies. (Abercrombie et al., 1980; van den Berg, 1980).2
Foreign News Coverage
Still another feature of the media hegemony thesis is that news
organizations present negative and critical images of other countries
2 Van den Berg's (1980) analysis of the major shortcomings of critical theory have
been essentially ignored by critical theorists. Van den Berg does list six reasons for its
acceptance, including the Frankfurt critique of positivism and critical theory's "splen-
did lack of intelligibility."
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484 DAVID L. ALTHEIDE
because of procedures and guidelines awash in ideological interests
compatible with Western values and policies (cf. Schlesinger, 1979;
Beharrell et al., 1976, 1980; Gitlin, 1980; Dahlgren, 1980). Essentially,
the argument is that other societies are different and provide alterna-
tives to the hegemonic ideology encompassing American life and
corresponding views of international social order.
American network TV news coverage of international affairs has
been recently studied by several scholars. Larson (1982) found that
between 1972 and 1979, international affairs comprised an average of
37 percent of network newscasts (ABC, CBS, NBC). The coverage
was even greater between 1976 and 1979, when all three networks
devoted an average of 40 percent of their news time to international
affairs; in 1978, half of CBS's evening news dealt with international
stories (Larson, 1982:37 ff). Moreover, numerous countries in various
regions were included in these reports during the late 1970s:
This average composite newscast would have been likely to have one or two
stories involving the Soviet Union, two stories about the Middle East (proba-
bly in reference to Israel, Egypt, Lebanon, and/or Iran), two stories involving
Western European countries (most likely Great Britain, France, or Italy), one
briefer story mentioning Latin America (Cuba being most commonly in-
cluded), another briefer story related to Sub-Saharan Africa (perhaps about
Rhodesia or South Africa), and possibly a story including East Asia (usually
China or Japan) (Larson, 1982:37).
Of course, much of this coverage was "crisis-oriented," involving
conflicts with the United States, allies, or internal problems
(Dahlgren, 1982:48). There arises, then, a paradox: On the one hand,
there is far more coverage of international news in general, and Third
World news in particular, than would be anticipated by the media
hegemony thesis; yet this coverage is claimed to be negative and
promotive of cultural strereotypes. From this paradox emerges a
methodological and conceptual question: How shall we explain the
networks' decision to present a good deal of coverage about a Third
World country in negative stereotypical images? The media
hegemonists explain this coverage by reference to the class and politi-
cal interests of the journalists (Dahlgren, 1982:62). One result of class
biased news coverage is to promote informational imperialism, in
which Third World countries are systematically presented in a nega-
tive way. While these issues deserve more careful empirical attention
than they have thus far received, some recent work offers a cautious
assessment of the media hegemony position with respect to Third
World coverage.
Lichter and Rothmann (1982) surveyed 216 business leaders and
260 journalists to examine their attitudes and views toward the Third
World. The major finding was that on most Third World issues
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MEDIA HEGEMONY: A FAILURE OF PERSPECTIVE 485
studied, the journalists took the Third World position, whereas the
business leaders tended to be less supportive. And while journalists
were less homogeneous in their views, they were consistently diverse
from the business views: "The mea culpae thus emanate not from
corporate America but from the journalistic community. Far from
serving as mouthpieces for American capitalism abroad, broadcast
and print journalists were far more likely than business leaders to
sympathize with Third World criticisms on all five issues" (Lichter
and Rothman, 1982:72). In brief, then, at least this sample of jour-
nalists showed considerable cognitive and orientational distance from
the values and opinions of business leaders.
Additional research on international news reporting also challenges
the explanation of news coverage offered by media hegemonists. We
noted earlier that Pollock's (1980) study of the socialization process of
foreign correspondents found diversity in background, experience,
and orientation relevant in accounting for journalistic output. Pollock
and Guidette's (1980) study of the New York Times and the Times of
London coverage of Brazil in 1964, Chile in 1970, and South Africa in
1976 found little consistency in reporting and emphasis. The variety of
reportage within as well as between newspapers and crises was due to
the fluidity of the interaction between journalists and officials. This
fluidity casts doubt on the notion that the elite newspapers reflect the
position of the home country. To the contrary, the reporting often
raised serious questions about the legitimacy of State Department
policy toward rebels and incumbent leaders. The authors concluded:
"Informal elite networks demonstrate more flexibility than suggested
by either a reflexive representation of a country's relative hegemony
in the international economic order or a rigid commitment to ideologi-
cal polarization" (Pollock and Guidette, 1980:319).
Still another study of network TV news coverage of Latin America
reached similar conclusions. Morales's (1982) investigation of the way
the three U.S. networks covered Latin America between 1970 and
1979 did reveal a focus on foreign relations, security, violence, and
disasters, although Stevenson and Gaddy (1982) have argued that
there is more international conflict in the Third World than elsewhere,
while accidents, disasters, and nonpolitical crime are overrepresented
in news reports about the West and the socialist Second World.
However, Morales (1982) did not find the coverage to be decidedly
supportive of U.S. political or business interests and values.
Morales's (1982:90 ff) examination of the coverage of Chile (e.g.,
Allende) and Nicaragua (e.g., the Sandinistas) produced further em-
pirical damage to the media hegemony thesis. In regard to Chile, for
example, Morales (1982:101-102) reported "several surprising pat-
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486 DAVID L. ALTHEIDE
terns that do not entirely fit with certain schools of thought about
U.S. media coverage." First, Allende was seldom treated in network
news reports as a serious threat to the United States; he was pre-
sented as "moderate" in contrast to more "radical" elements; his
motives were not questioned and he was viewed as attempting to
balance forces, enact reforms. In elaborating his conclusion that the
networks presented Allende as a legitimate leader faced with some
major economic problems, Morales (1982:102) wrote: "Marxism in
Chile was not presented as necessarily evil, and the U.S. government
was not painted as an entirely innocent bystander. The absence of a
strong 'red menace' theme came as a surprise to this researcher and
contradicts, at least in this instance, part of the left's critique of TV
news.''
Morales's view of network coverage of Nicaragua was quite simi-
lar. Even though the Sandinistas were not supported by the State
Department, the networks presented the rebel case repeatedly and in
some detail. While this may have been due to the excitement and
visual nature of this topic, as well as the fact that a prominent ABC
reporter, Bill Stewart, was killed by government troops, the networks
did provide a good deal of coverage on a revolutionary movement.
"Coverage of Nicaragua refuted the claim that the networks take a
conservative status-quo bias and are inherently hostile to the left in
coverage of Latin America" (Morales, 1982:111).
Conclusion
The uncritical acceptance of the dominant ideology thesis has led
some mass communications researchers to adopt the concept of
media hegemony as an interpretive framework for studies of TV
news. The worthwhile goal of this theoretical effort was to place news
organizations and the messages they produced within a broader con-
text. In this sense, the hegemony perspective served important
heuristic purposes, and many of the scholars who sought to apply it to
mass media processes and products should be credited for their sug-
gestive insights. However, the fit has not been a good one: Doc-
umented effects and processes of social change have been denied, and
specific findings of the news process which were not easily accounted
for by the concept of media hegemony have been neglected. Kellner's
(1981:45-46) caution against the presumptiveness of applying critical
theory to mass communication is germane here:
Those theories focusing solely on television's hegemonic-legitimating images
and homogenizing social effects are one-sided and limited, as are those
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MEDIA HEGEMONY: A FAILURE OF PERSPECTIVE 487
theories primarily seeing "subversive" effects. Both sorts of theories fail to
see the contradictions within television messages and its contradictory social
effects; both exaggerate the power of television and assume a passive
spectator and manipulation theory.
Despite the empirical shortcomings of the notion of media
hegemony, there remains the critical task of placing newswork and
reports in a broader context, of understanding dominance and direc-
tion. Elements of the hegemony position may prove useful in con-
ceptual reformulations such as "paraideology" offered by Gans
(1979:68, also 213 ff):
If the news includes values, it also contains ideology. That ideology, how-
ever, is an aggregate of only partially thought out values which is neither
entirely consistent nor well integrated; and since it changes somewhat over
time, it is also flexible on some issues. I shall call this aggregate of values and
the reality judgments associated with it paraidedology, partly to distinguish it
from the deliberate, integrated and more doctrinaire set of values usually
defined as ideology....
Moreover, what we have learned from the shortcomings of the media
hegemony position suggests that an emerging theoretical rationale
could benefit from considering how the mass media themselves have
altered the social context; rather than being a "dependent" variable of
broader social and economic forces, the mass media may well be a
key "independent variable" (cf. Noelle-Neumann, 1973). This formu-
lation of media effects could be integrated with a less global version of
hegemony, e.g., "hegemonic domains" in bureaucracy (cf. Fishman,
1980) and ongoing work of pluralism (cf. Blumler and Gurevitch,
1981; Rosengren, 1981). Such efforts will go far toward empirically
grounding our macro understandings of the media's role in social life
(cf. Altheide and Johnson, 1980).
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