Media Discourse in Contemporary India

A Study of Television News

Sudeshna Devi

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN: 9781032140667
• eBook ISBN: 9781000606904
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Regional Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

This book examines the historical trajectory of the growth of the television news and critically analyzes the role of private television news in framing the nature of public discourse in contemporary India.

Set in the context of a transformed media landscape, the book attempts to understand and analyze the role of two private national news channels, NDTV 24×7 and Aaj Tak, in producing mediatized narratives that offer a commentary on the various social, political, cultural, religious and economic issues in the public domain. This is achieved by critically examining the process and techniques of production, representation and consumption of current affairs programs such as studio debates, panel discussions, audience talk shows and documentaries aired on both the channels. Highlighting some of the key trends that impinge on the structure and mode of operation of television news media in contemporary India, the book offers a simultaneous examination of how the production, representation and consumption of the mediatized discourses shape the nature of public discourse and have social-political ramifications for the functioning of Indian democracy.

The book will be of interest to researchers in sociology, media and communication studies, popular culture and South Asian Studies.

1 Media, Democracy and Discourse A Conceptual Framework

DOI: 10.4324/9781003232209-2

A typical textbook take on the role of media in a liberal democracy, is that, it ought to provide a platform for informed, rational debates, enabling the making of a cognizant citizenry. By creating space for the free expression of diverse opinions, media is supposed to help in the formation of an enlightened public opinion that would enrich the sphere of knowledge and debate. Media ought to play the role of a critical watchdog by keeping a check on the abuse of state power by corrupt or tyrannical governments. This reasoning is largely drawn from classical liberal democratic understanding of the role of media as the fourth pillar of democracy (Livingstone and Lunt: 1994; Gans: 2003; Jenkins and Thorburn: 2003; Dahlgren: 2005).

The study is anchored in the classical liberal theory of media to understand the nature and significance of television news media in framing and shaping the public discourse in the Indian democratic system. The journey of Indian media is inextricably linked to the journey of the Indian nation state. A glimpse into the history of Indian media illustrates how communications have always been shaped by dominant policy orientations. Indian media has changed with the changing political landscape. From a state-controlled media in the Nehruvian era (Singhal and Rogers: 1989; Chatterjee: 1991; Mitra: 1993; Ninan: 1995), to the emergence of private media in the nineties (Page and Crawley: 2001; Butcher: 2003; Thussu: 2007; Mehta: 2008), to being a collaborator in the right-wing ascendancy in 2014 (Udupa: 2015; Chaudhuri: 2017), Indian media has unfortunately molded itself, with a few exceptions, to the existing political exigencies. Indian media has been an intricate part of the Indian democratic experiment. Therefore, understanding the theoretical contours of the media-democracy relationship is essential to understand how media operates in the world’s largest democracy. Toward this end, the conceptual framework of the study makes an enquiry into the liberal theorization of the relationship between media and democracy as well as the sociological understanding of producing, representing and consuming media discourse.

The Role of Media in a Democracy

A key work, which informs the idea of media as a dominant institution in a modern democratic society, finds its roots in the theory of ‘Public Sphere’ conceptualized by Jurgen Habermas (1989) in his authoritative work The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere. The public sphere, Habermas argued, signified specific social spaces like parliament, clubs, literary salons, coffee shops, meeting halls, pubs and other public spaces where citizens met and deliberated about socio-political issues. It arose with the development of capitalism in Britain, France and Germany in the late 18th and 19th centuries. For Habermas, the public sphere¹ was an instrument for nurturing and transforming democracy. By providing space for public deliberation and discussion, where all those participating could do so on an equal basis, public sphere was making democracy participatory. Media facilitated this process by providing an arena of public debate and by reconstituting private citizens as a public body, in the form of public opinion. However, developments in the modern industrialized state of advanced capitalism brought around structural transformation in the public sphere. Habermas opined how newspapers were relegated from being providers of political information and ideas to practitioners of tabloid journalism. As mass media expanded, powerful corporations came to control major media institutions like newspapers, radio, film, and television. These arms of the culture industry served the interests of the media conglomerates and the corporations and advertisers who financed them. The emergence of commercialized media was inimical to the public sphere, as it distorted communication. Commercialized media became an arena for advertising than creating a platform for rational critical debates. It led to degeneration of the public sphere (Habermas cited in Calhoun: 1996). This point reverberates with leading scholars like Carey (1989) and Putnam (1996), who argue that commercial media results in commercial culture, that subsumes the democratic objectives of a public sphere. Habermas argued that media should introspect its disintegration. For him, media ought to regain its platform of providing space to rational critical debate. He developed his idea of communicative action in response to his earlier theorization of the degeneration of the public sphere. He proposed the nurturing and shaping of an ideal public sphere, on the basis of communicative action, which he defined as, ‘when the actions of the agents involved are coordinated not through egocentric calculations of success but through the acts of reaching understanding. In communicative action participants are not primarily oriented to their own successes; they pursue their individual goals under the condition that they can harmonize their plans of action on the basis of common situation’ (Habermas, in Bohman and Rehg, eds.: 1997: 40).

The practice of communicative action literally meant the removal of barriers that distort communication. Further, it also meant creating a platform for rational critical opinion and discourse. It ought to be taken into account that not all opinion is public opinion. Habermas conceived public opinion as a reasoned form of access to truth. It referred more positively to the views held by those who join in a rational-critical debate on an issue. Thus, reason and criticism were crucial for making an educated public opinion (Habermas cited in Calhoun: 1996).

Therefore, the question that arises is, how are modern media systems facilitating the formation of a reasoned and educated public opinion? Kellner (1990) opines that the rise of the internet has expanded the realm for democratic participation and debate and created new public spaces for political intervention. Such measures have the potential to invigorate democracy and to increase the dissemination of critical and progressive ideas. Similarly, Dahlgren (2005) argues that internet has facilitated the creation of a plural online public sphere. Internet has thousands of websites having to do with the political realm at the local, national and global levels. One can find discussion groups, chat rooms, alternative journalism, civic organizations, NGOs, grassroots advocacy sites, which allow participation of differences of all kinds. Citizens belonging to different political orientations and interest, gender, ethnicity, cultural capital and geography have access to communicative spaces. Studies by Pippa (2001), Pool (1983) and Lawrence (1995) also highlight how digital media is opening up spaces for participatory democracy. Jeffrey (2000) celebrates the idea of media-powered democracy through his analysis of print media in India. He argues that the newspaper revolution of the 1980s and 1990s provided the means by which a public sphere broadened to encompass tens of millions of people in small towns and countryside. The spread of media has created platforms for deliberation which was previously non-existent. Echoing the same thought, Neyazi (2010) opines the media revolution spearheaded by the vernacular print media in India has brought marginalized groups into the public arena and posed serious challenges to the dominance of national political elites, who now cannot afford to ignore issues emanating from the regional public arena. Focusing on the production aspect, Neyazi argues that vernacular media is creating space for marginalized groups to raise their grievances in the public arena. Further, the resurgence of Hindi newspapers posed a serious challenge to the dominance of English newspapers. Hindi newspapers with strategies of localization have been very successful in creating new constituencies of readership. Localization of production, distribution and consumption of Hindi newspapers has helped in center staging the concerns of the marginal sections in small towns and villages of North India. This has, in turn, opened up political space for such groups. Their issues and concerns are now shared with the world through the local Hindi newspapers. By framing discourse(s) that reflects the issues and concerns of the marginalized populace, Hindi newspapers have made democracy participatory for them.

Focusing on the role of television, Cottle (2003) opines that news and current affairs programs on television potentially contribute invaluable resources for an overhearing and overbearing audience and can thereby be viewed as a key means of the extension of processes of democratic deepening (ibid: 23). Mehta (2008) argues that the genre of talk show based on the strong oral cultures and argumentative traditions is strengthening the link between media and democracy in India. Such programs have greatly enhanced deliberative democracy. They have created a new space for political action; giving a new publicness to the older traditions of debates and dissent. Similarly, explaining the impact of satellite television, Munshi (2013) opines that the entry of satellite television has led to broad basing of choices for Indian viewers. Cutting across the social divide, television is the only medium that reaches the billion population immediately and simultaneously. By regenerating, hybridizing, localizing and eventually Indianizing, the broadcasters invent new ways to create market for themselves. Unearthing stories of the marginalized sections, making politicians accountable, making politics transparent are some of the positive offshoots of commercialized media landscape. Likewise, for Gans (1979), media is opening up new spaces of deliberations through television talk shows in which a host of experts engage in discussions on a wide range of issues. Although at times they are hosted by high-decibel anchors, such shows are paving way for discussions and debates on issues which concern everyday life. He further argues about the prevalence of dichotomous approaches to these mediated discussions. While one section views these news programs as public forum stimulating citizen discussion, the other section notes such engagements as providing voice to established political figures and conservative ideologues, offering audiences biased perspectives on issues and events. At such junctures, the voices of the audiences become critical. It is critical to raise the question “Do these programmes reach enough people to matter, and do they encourage public discussion or do they preach largely to the converted?” (ibid: 230).

It is also critical to look at the relationship between media and citizens, because if citizens have to play a role in democracy, then they need access to an institutionalized forum where they express their opinion and question established power. Golding and Murdoch (1989) list out three kinds of relations between communications and citizenship. First, people must have access to information, advice and analysis that will enable them to know what their rights are in other spheres and allow them to pursue these rights effectively. Second, they must have access to the broadest range of information, interpretation and debate on areas that involve political choices, and they must be able to use communication facilities in order to register criticism, mobilize opposition and propose alternative courses of action. And third, they must be able to recognize themselves and their aspirations in the range of representations offered within the central communication sectors and are able to contribute to developing those representations. These rights, in turn, imply that the communications and information systems should have two essential features. At the level of production, it should offer the maximum possible diversity of provision and provide mechanisms for user feedback and participation. At the level of consumption, it should guarantee universal access to the services that can ensure the exercise of citizenship regardless of income or area of residence (ibid: 183–84). Thus, in the ideal sense, media should ensure unhindered access to information that helps citizens in making informed choices. The focus on citizens making informed choices rests on the capacity of citizens to comprehend information and act accordingly.

Thus, within this media-democracy-citizen context, this study seeks to understand the nature and significance of private television news media as an agency of framing public discourse in contemporary India by probing into the following questions: Do such televised discussions further our understanding of everyday issues? Are they really creating new avenues for public participation, critical for a vibrant democracy or are they simply in business as they are easy and cheap to produce? What is the nature of the media text being telecast? What are the differences in programming between English and Hindi news channels and between private and government news channels? What impact does such programming have on news channels public relations with stakeholders, primarily government and audience? How is the market-based media influencing the public discourse in India?

Taking a step back in history, it can be seen that media has, time and again, played a crucial role in the functioning of Indian democracy. It played a stellar role in arousing and mobilizing public opinion for independence from the British Empire. During the early years of independence, it acted as a vehicle for promoting social and economic development. The challenge to media freedom also stemmed from the state, as witnessed during the period of Emergency (1975–77). The reforms of 1991 brought in sweeping changes in media technology, revenue model, content policy, etc. These transformations impinge on media organizations and their operations. The subsequent chapters discuss and analyze these macro-changes. However, understanding the micro-processes of production, representation and consumption of media that together influence the macro-changes is also vital. Hence, an attempt is made to theoretically engage with each of the three processes which will help to gauge the macro-role of contemporary media in Indian democracy.

Producing, Representing and Consuming Media Discourse

Before proceeding with the understanding of the sociological theorization of three aspects of production, representation and consumption of media, I first look at the concept of discourse. The concept of discourse is most commonly associated with the work of Michael Foucault. Foucault’s discourse theory became the dominant paradigm in the 1980s. Foucault describes discourse as a systematically organized set of statements or narratives on a particular subject that acquire authority and become dominant at a particular historical moment. These sets of organized statements are provisional, open to contest and debate, thereby making discourse as a process of making meaning, rather than a fixed position (William: 2003). Although, Foucault does not explicitly discuss media, his theorization of power/dominance and historicity is intimately attached to the understanding of the functioning of media. Media is an institution which produces various types of discourses, and exercises power, by circulating them in the wider society. An understanding of the historical context, within which media operates, to produce such discourses, is supremely important. This engagement with the historicity helps in understanding how social and political factors shape the functioning of media in a particular society at a particular point in time. Application of a Foucauldian approach helps to understand the complexity of power relations which influence production, representation and consumption of discourses. This, in turn, signifies the power of media to define social reality and thereby influence public opinion.

The next section engages with some of the key sociological approaches that help us to understand media production, representation and consumption.

Understanding Media Production: The Organizational Approach

Who has the power to shape media content? How do they select and produce such content? How do organizational structures and routines influence media production? How do values, beliefs and experiences of news professionals impact media output? Such questions lie at the heart of the organizational approach of understanding media production. The organizational perspective analyses how micro-professional routines and organizational norms influence media production.² Rooted in organizational sociology, this micro-approach explores the processes that occur within media organizations and examines the occupational culture of the media in terms of the recruitment, career paths and norms and values of media workers (William: 2003). Media organizational studies approach the study and analysis of media institutions from inside, their entry point being the process and techniques involved in the production of news content and the professional practices and activities inside a newsroom. Exploring issues of journalistic values, daily routines, professional ideologies, hierarchy, credibility of sources, such ‘behind the scene’ studies have enriched the field of research on media organizations. Drawing upon research techniques like questionnaires, in-depth interviews and participant observation, these studies have helped to reveal the constraints, contingencies and complexities ‘at work’ and, in so doing, provided the means for a more adequate theorization of the operations of the news media and the production of the discourses ‘at play’ within news media representations – and possibly, by extension, the media more generally (Cottle: 2003: 2).

Curran (1977) states that a systematic study of media organizations and occupation began in the late 1950s. This was due to a number of external factors. First, the emergence of sociology of complex organizations in the 1950s yielded theories about organizational structure and behavior, and provided analytical tools that could be applied to the study of media organizations. Second, the struggle between the functionalist and neo-Marxist approaches focused on the extent to which media organizations and those working in them had autonomy from the dominant power structures of society. Third, increased attention was paid to the role of media in politics, with scholars examining the interaction between media organizations and political institutions, and the way in which political communication is shaped by this interaction (Curran quoted in Williams: 2003: 97). These factors h...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Tables
• Acknowledgment
• Introduction
• 1 Media, Democracy and Discourse: A Conceptual Framework
• 2 Television News, State and Market: The Changing Dynamics
• 3 Television News in Contemporary India: Charting the Field
• 4 Production of Current Affairs Programming: A Study of NDTV 24×7
• 5 Production of Current Affairs Programming: A Study of Aaj Tak
• 6 Representation of Current Affairs Programming: A Thematic Analysis of NDTV 24×7 and Aaj Tak
• 7 Consumption of Current Affairs Programming: Mapping Voices of Viewers
• Conclusion
• Annexures
• Bibliography
• Index