From Macbride to Murdoch: The Marketisation of Global Communication

The report of the MacBride Commission is credited to have brought information- and communication-related issues onto the global agenda and therefore occupies a prominent place in the history of international communication. After revisiting the New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO) debates closely associated with the MacBride Report, this article contends that, despite many advances in democratization of the media, some of the key criticisms in the report are as valid in 2005 as they were in 1980, when it was published. Focusing on the global South, the article argues that the globalisation, privatisation and marketisation of the media, exemplified by what it terms as "Murdochisation," has undermined public discourse in a global media culture predicated on entertainment and infotainment.