The Media Welfare State Nordic Media In The Digital Era

The Media Welfare State: Nordic Media in the Digital Era comprehensively addresses the central dynamics of the digitalization of the media industry in the Nordic countries—Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, and Iceland—and the ways media organizations there are transforming to address the new digital environment. Taking a comparative approach, the authors provide an overview of media institutions, content, use, and policy throughout the region, focusing on the impact of information and communication technology/internet and digitalization on the Nordic media sector. Illustrating the shifting media landscape the authors draw on a wide range of cases, including developments in the press, television, the public service media institutions, and telecommunication.

A dynamic examination of the media industry in the Nordic countries during the transition to today's digital environment.

In discussions of economics, governance, and society in the Nordic countries, “the welfare state” is a well-worn analytical concept. However, there has been much less scholarly energy devoted to historicizing this idea beyond its postwar emergence. In this volume, specialists from Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Norway, and Iceland chronicle the historical trajectory of “the welfare state,” tracing the variable ways in which it has been interpreted, valued, and challenged over time. Each case study generates valuable historical insights into not only the history of Northern Europe, but also the welfare state itself as both a phenomenon and a concept.

Ideologies have not been a focus of interest in the field of humanities and social sciences in recent decades, but rethinking the power of ideologies in the media sphere has recently returned to the scholarly discussion. The compilation book “Mediated Ideologies: Nordic Views on the History of the Press and Media Cultures” participates in this by providing selected yet justified approaches to media history from the point of view of ideological uses of media in the Nordic region. In this book, the role of media – comprising both popular media and news journalism – as a forum for ideologies and their circulation will be analyzed by focusing on the Nordic region. The perceived similarities in the media systems of the Nordic countries constitute a perfect extent for a regional media history against not only a European but also a global backdrop. This does not mean that there have not been many national differences. The book does not provide a chronological narrative of Nordic media history. Still, the ideology of media is approached not only from the standpoints of different media forms – film, television, newspapers, magazines, and periodicals – but also from several historical periods from the mid-19th century to the late 20th century. The chapters show the multidimensional role that the media has in transmitting ideologies to their audiences and the public sphere. They also demonstrate that analyzing the role of different ideologies, such as modernization, nationalism, solidarity, feminism, and peace movement in media history provides wider perspectives in understanding past and present media landscapes and people’s mediated experiences that are fostered by them. “Mediated Ideologies: Nordic Views on the History of the Press and Media Cultures” can be used both as a reference book and as a classroom adaption in the field of media, communication, and history studies.

The ebook edition of this title is Open Access and freely available to read online. Filling a gap between classic discussions on everyday media use and recent studies of emergent technologies, this book untangles how media become meaningful to us in the everyday, connecting us to communities and publics.

This open access book presents a new approach to the history of welfare state. By applying the concepts of experiencing society and the lived welfare state, the collection introduces theoretical, methodological and empirical insights for bridging the everyday life and institutional structures. The chapters analyze how the welfare state as a particular individual-society relationship has become an integral part of living in the modern society. With a long-term perspective, the chapters explore the experience of society which enabled the building and the resilience of a welfare state. As the welfare state is not a universal model of social development but historically unique in different contexts, the book broadens the focus from the Nordic countries to Southern Europe, colonial Asia and post-colonial South America. This collection is essential reading for scholars and students in the social sciences and history, as well as for policymakers and practitioners who face the contemporary and future challenges of the welfare states.

Essay from the year 2009 in the subject Communications - Journalism, Journalism Professions, grade: 5,0/1,0, University of Helsinki (Communications), course: Nordic Media and Communication, language: English, abstract: Finland belongs to a list of countries that Hallin and Mancini place in the group of the 'Democratic Cororatist' model. (quoted after Hovden 2009, p.149; Hujanen 2009, p. 2) The central elements of this group are high newspaper circulation, strong professionalism and state intervention. They rose from a history of "early democratization, consensus-based governments, a history of democratic corporatism and a strong welfare state." (quoted after Hovden 2009, p.149) These elements show clearly when taking a look at the Finnish history. Newspapers were born as political organs around 1900. 1917 Finland declared its independence and the welfare state has been built up until today. The era of newspapers as political organs ended only at the end of the 1990s and was followed by a non-political news policy. In combination to this change, in the 1950s the development of commercial media markets began and continues until today. One of the consequences of this was that the newspapers owned by media chains have to fulfil profit expectations. (Hujanen 2009, p.2) Finland has had different media eras, but the question is which cycle we are experiencing now? The media landscapes everywhere are moving, being discussed and worried about- therefore it might be the 'era of change and challenges'. Like Ann Axelsson says, "the only certainty in our industry [the newspaper industry, A/N] is the incertitude." (Das Magazin 2009)