Democratizing Global Communication? Global Civil Society and the Campaign for Communication Rights in the Information Society

Abstract

Imputed linkages between the institutions of democracy and the media of public communication are a staple of communication studies. Globalization poses a problem for these claimed links, however. The institutions for the realization of democracy are national in scope, but communications industries and information flows have become increasingly transnational. Internationally, there is anarchy among sovereign states and no global electorate or elections. Kahler and Lake (2004), drawing on the democratic theory of Dahl (1971), tick off the gap between established notions of democracy and the realities of international politics: Nearly all definitions of democracy have at their core the idea of rule by the people. Such a standard has in turn three requirements: the members of a particular group…have the ability to communicate their preferences to those who act on their behalf, insure that their preferences are weighed equally in the formulation of policy, and remove leaders who fail to satisfy at least a majority of the members. Whether such a benchmark can be applied to international governance is a controversial issue. ((Boli &

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