Transcript The Transformation of Communication in Canada

Vincent Mosco
BY: Asha Clarke, Rosemeen Shaikh, Navjot Sidhu
Introduction:
Millennium Mergers
 New Millennium = Transformation in
Communication Industry
 Began in 2000 with AOL-Time Warner
take over
 Brought together world’s largest Internet
service provider and world’s largest
holder of intellectual property
Canadian Media Mergers
 Canadian media companies followed in
the steps of U.S

Bell Canada Enterprises (BCE)

CanWest Corporation

Quebecor

Rogers Communication
Political Economy Approach
 What can a political economy approach
contribute to our understanding of these
developments in communications?
 Chapter 12 considers:
 The process of digitization and
commodification underlying new media
concentration trend
 The consequences for Canada for
putting in place a regional and global
communication regime
Political Economy Approach
 Political economy helps expand our
understanding of expansion of market
power in the communications arena
 Media concentration = advanced by
powerful processes, but are not subject to
singular forces
DIGITIZATION
 Provides gains in transmission speed and
flexibility over electronic communication that relied
on analog techniques
 Allows for one language to govern over all
electronic media
 Common universal language = digitization as
attractive
 Negroponte (1995)  new digital technologies
are creating a fundamentally new world that we
must accommodate to
 End of the world of atoms (rough, limited,
materiality) beginning of digital world (
transcends spatial, temporal and material
constraints)
 Idea that there is no alternative, that no
social or natural action can stop the
emergence of the digital world = digital age
cannot be stopped
 Digitization is aligned with the discourse by
Fukuyama about the end of history, end of
geography, and the end of politics
COMMODIFICATION
 Miege (1989) flow-type communication systems
 Commodification
 Based on inflexible system of delivering a batch of broadcast
channels into the home
 Fordist model = generic programming to mass audience
 Refinement of Commodification of communication through
digitization
 Which allows for commodity to be measured, monitored and
packaged in a specific manner
 Commodification of Labour
 Movement away from mechanical labour to electronic systems
 Elimination of jobs in the printing industry
CONFLICTS
 Digitization is not a flawless technical process and is subject to
problems that slow it down
 Commodification is challenged by organizations defending
both private sphere and public sphere
 Right to privacy
 Right to communicate openly and in a democratic fashion
 Marxist perspective
 The social impact of commodification = alienation and
commodity fetishism
 Commodity fetishism = state of social relations that
arise in a complex capitalist market structure in which
the social relationships place commodities at the centre
VIDEO CLIP
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iu0ztxdsFis
Toward an Integrated Electronic
Information and Entertainment
Services Arena
 Digitization has allowed for one common language
to be developed across the communication industry
and so there are no longer distinct barriers dividing
these industries which include:
 1) Print
 2) Broadcasting and Telecommunications
 3) Information Technology or Computer Data



LEGAL REGIMES
Print Publishing industry

Limited government involvement

Local, typically family owned
Broadcasting and telecommunication

Canada/United States/Europe all placed higher
restrictions on radio, television, telephone systems
in order to accomplish national objectives such as
national identity and a national market
Information Technology & Computer Data

When this sector took off it was not seen as
holding any public interest or public service
responsibilities, no system of subsidized pricing to
those who need it, no commitment to universality
of access, and no expectation that national firms
would shortly be on the way to multinational
control
CONVERGENCE
 The coming together of all communication sectors
around regimes that are in place for the
information technology and computer data sectors
The Concentration of Power in
the Communication Business
 1) BCE – CTV – Thomson (Globe & Mail)
 2) Rogers – MacLean Hunter
 3) CanWest Global – Hollinger
 4) Quebecor – Sun Media – Groupe
Videotron (French language & tabloid
media)
The Concentration of Power in
the Communication Business
 Canada has allowed companies to build
structures that integrate across monopoly
and competitive markets and across
production and distribution
 Example, Bell Canada Enterprise
Toward a Regional and
Transnational Communication Order
 Political Globalization and Global Context
 Free Trade Agreement, North American Free Trade
Agreement
 World Trade Organization
Regional and Global Integration
 Example
 1999 Bell Canada permitted the U.S. telephone
company Ameritech to acquire a 20% stake in it
 Rogers Communication deal with Microsoft to sell
a minority stake to the U.S. firm, whereby
Microsoft would use Canada’s largest cable
television provider to develop high speed Internet
access services
 1999, Rogers sold a $1 billon stake in its mobile
telephone company to AT&T and British Telecom
(AT&T used the WTO to challenge Canadian
dominance of Bell Canada)
FTA AND NAFTA
 Liberalized trade in this sector
under both was permitted by a
notwithstanding clause that
allowed retaliation against
cultural protectionism through
measures in other industries,
by general agreements on
restricting government activity,
and by liberalizing trade in
sectors converging with the
cultural industries
FTA AND NAFTA
 Treaty provisions also require “national
treatment” to each others companies
 Treaty provisions also place restrictions on
the ability of governments to establish new
government or public institutions to provide
services in competition with private
businesses
Global Pressures
 The WTO has had more
of an active role than
regional trade
agreements in applying
pressures to expand
transnational control over
Canadian
communications
IDEOLOGICAL SHIFT
 Although the Canadian state has traditionally
attempted to create protectionist policies in the
communications industry we are now beginning
to see a shift
 Protectionist Policies within the Culture and
Communications sectors have readily become a
part of the general processes of government
funding cutbacks
 Although attempts have been made to preserve
culture through media it is difficult to dissolve
close ties with U.S and global markets
Contradictions & Opposition
 Recap: Neoliberalism = retreat of the
state/government from all areas of social life;
private sector best provides these functions
 Neoliberalism is contradictory to the operation
of the communication arena, since it clearly
demonstrates that its ideals are not easy to
accomplish; governments are needed to
regulate & standardize
Contradictions & Opposition
 Technical concerns 
standardization, who
sets standards?
 Competitors reluctant
to cooperate since
they would have to
share info, which may
be valuable, private,
and central to their
own success
Contradictions & Opposition
 ITU (International Telecommunications Union): global body
made up of government organizations and run on a one
nation, one-vote basis to establish global standards for new
technology
 Setting up public national or international regulatory
authorities
 Critical to capitalist expansion
 How can access be expanded for technology to build
markets?
 How is it ensured that some measure of privacy will
create consumer confidence in technology?
 Government brought in to regulate by capitalists;
governments succeeded; opened private arena to public,
who used opportunity to fight for public broadcasting
Contradictions & Opposition
 Fight for personal privacy part of a wider
struggle against expanding commodity
 Conflict between need to build
consumer confidence to turn internet
into universal market tool & the need
to commodify whatever moves over
Internet, including personal identity
 Conflict deepened by technology
industries opposition to state
intervention
 Privatization of public space and
centrality of culture & communication
 Struggle of public space as global
business directed to branding of
physical & cultural space;
Americanization?
Contradictions & Opposition
 Shift from productivist emphasis on international division of




labour to concern for consumption & cultural reception
 Expansion of consumer markets & growth of popular
culture
Use of communication/info technology for opposition &
resistance
 building global resistance movements
Major opposition movements based on building global
solidarity & strategy through use of communication systems
 Strategy takes many forms: Direct attacks on
communication systems of transnational companies
Use of cyberspace to advance politics of democratic
communication
Global communication can result in open areas of attack (ie.
9/11)
Conclusions
 Several processes of transformation taking place in





Canadian communication
Digitization and Commodification are providing
opportunities for capital to turn content, audiences and
labour of the communication industries into marketable
commodities
Leading to the amalgamation of multiple industries such
as the printing, broadcasting, telecommunications and IT
sectors
Media Concentration: media ownership within Canada
where only 4 –5 groups hold power and manage the
communication industry  marginalization of others
However, each transformation processes contain
problems; ranging from glitches to outright challenges
National preferences are promoted by companies, who
are threatened by transnational integration  led to new
social movements against WTO
QUESTIONS
 How are the forces of globalization through
international capital and new globalized
communication networks acting on the entity
Canada and how are they changing it into a North
America without borders?
 Is Canadian identity/national culture threatened
through mergers and privatization of
communication?
CLASS EXERCISE
 Exercise will consist of class divided in to
two sides: FOR & AGAINST
 Statement provided to class; each side
gets 2 minutes to discuss with group
 Each side will get 1-2 minutes to present
arguments
 Debate! Side w/ best arguments win prize!
[Add quote]
CLASS EXERCISE
 “The convergence of accelerating
communication & transportation networks &
expanding neoliberalism poses danger of an
explosive combination.” (Pg. 306)
 “Like a force of nature, the digital age cannot be
denied or stopped.” (Pg. 290)
 “It is quite fair to say that in some areas the
Canadian government blazed new ground, as in May
1999 when it fully supported the decision of its chief
communication regulatory authority to formally rule
against regulation of the Internet.” (Pg. 299)
THE END