Structures socio-économiques des médias

Teacher(s)

Cools Bernard; Cools Bernard (compensates Standaert Olivier); Standaert Olivier;

Language

French

Main themes

The course will: - analyze the socioeconomic, sociopolitical and sociocultural logics in action in the media sphere, - register them in a transhistorique, analytical and forward-looking perspective - centre the media in their sociopolitical environment - study the external socioeconomic structures of the media (structures of properties, crossed interests, concentration phenomena and internationalization) - analyze the main actors (world, regional groups, European and Belgian actors) - study the socioeconomic internal structures of the media (economic logics of costs and revenues, public aids, evaluation of the demand') - put in perspective the strategies of development of the media. - to show the students the concrete reality of medias existing in Belgium - give the students the necessary general knowledge which will allow them to understand and interpret the events of news arising in world media. The course bases itself at the same time on lectures and on sessions of exercises during which the students will be introduced to the concrete reality of world media in Belgium as well as to the follow-up of the current news concerning the media and in the sociopolitical, socioeconomic and sociocultural understanding of this news.

Content

« Socio-economic structures of the media” aims to introduce the societal and economic factors that determine the current media systems. It mainly focuses on Belgian media -regardless of their language- but may use the examples of foreign media, among others to emphasize trends applying to the universe that is examined.
These are the main topics of the course (they will not necessarily be covered in that order):

1. Some basics about the media
2. Belgian media landscape : status and analysis
3. The business models of media
4. Measurement of audience and investments
5. Actors, interactions and frictions in the media systems
6. Introducing media regulation
7. Towards new ownership models
8. Conclusions

Teaching methods

Live lectures, based on preliminary readings.. The process of the course will be twofold: First phase consists of sessions explaining different parts of the reference document of the course, based on preliminary readings by the students In a second phase, voluntary students will be presenting their summary and analyses of a document -article or book extract- coming from a reading portfolio. The introduction relies oa on a podcast, that will be explained if necessary.

Evaluation methods

For the first session, written exam, with open course documents. The final exam will involve questions implying reflection and use of concepts and analyses that have been discussed during the course. The evaluation is based on the relevance of the responses and the right implementation of the content of course, within a limited time frame.
Presentation of the summary of a reading will be given a note equivalent to ± 1/2 of the total (maximum of 10 points) that will be taken into account for the final evaluation, replacing one of the questions of the written exam.
The protocol of the second exam session will be identical to the first one. The note obtained as the result from presenting a reading summary will remain valid for that session.

Online resources

The course relies on:
A general reference document available at the beginning of the period
Slides or documents showed and commented on during the sessions,
all available via Moodle
Some documents used may also be either in English or in Dutch

Bibliography

Enclosed in the reference document

Faculty or entity

ESPO