Europeanisation or De-Europeanisation? Media Freedom in Turkey (1999–2015)

Abstract

The European Union (EU) has successfully been exercising its transformative power through both its enlargement and its neighbourhood policies for decades. Nonetheless, transformation towards a more European model of governance through Europeanisation is not a linear process, but a differentiated one. Adverse consequences for Europeanisation (i.e. de-Europeanisation) have often been neglected. The case of media freedom in Turkey, with a deteriorating trend across time, exemplifies such an outcome. This article explores media freedom in Turkey in the last decade. It argues that media reforms have been reversed over time in a de-Europeanising trend, with the EU losing its position as a reference point for reforms.     

Media Dissent and Peri-urban Land Struggles in Vietnam: The Case of the Văn Giang Incident

ABSTRACT

This article explores the role of media-led dissent in Vietnam's contemporary land struggles. The analysis focuses on Vietnamese-language material published online by domestic and foreign media about the so-called V?n Giang incident – a high-profile land dispute that shook the country between 2009 and 2012. Looking at how the media treated this incident broadens studies of land struggles in Vietnam, which up till now have focused on peasants’ resistance strategies. This case not only shows that media practitioners engage in dissent with regard to land politics, but also that they engage in more straightforward criticism of the state and its corporate redevelopment partners than what most analyses of rural land struggles in Vietnam, centered on the micro-level and on “lawful” (O'Brien) forms of resistance, would lead one to believe. Illustrating this point, the author shows that media dissent throughout the V?n Giang land dispute openly challenged the government's justificatory discourse about “displacement for development” as well as the mismanagement of land resources on which political and economic elites rely to dispossess peasants from peri-urban lands. If it has not yet provoked major institutional changes, the media's contribution to land struggles has nevertheless succeeded in creating a genuine, national public debate on land politics in rapidly urbanizing Vietnam.     

Construction of Gender and National Identity in Turkey: Images of the First Lady in the Turkish Media (2002–7)

This article analyses the conception of womanhood and nationhood in Turkey through images of the First Lady in the media. It demonstrates that while there is a struggle between the secularist and Islamist media on issues such as Turkish national identity and public visibility, the secularist and Islamist discourses overlap when it comes to gender roles. In both cases, the private sphere is designated as the primary domain of women and the agency of women in the public sphere is limited by the symbolic duties they are expected to perform in accordance with the national imaginary.     

The Media as a Window on the Past? The Impact of Television and Newspaper Consumption on Knowledge of the Democratic Transition in Portugal

This study seeks to expand our understanding of how the media increase the level of political information, by focusing on an understudied yet important learning outcome: knowledge of the political past. The article explores the factors underlying variation in the recognition of the leading actors in the transitional process in Portugal. The results show that television news and newspaper exposure foster recognition of these actors, but that media use interacts with personal experience of the transition (stronger effects among younger cohorts) and party identification (stronger impact on those who do not feel close to a political party).