Megamedia

Abstract

The uncompromising subtitle of Dean Alger's Megamedia makes his position on media monopoly absolutely clear. Although Alger has an impressive academic background, the book is intended for an intelligent general audience as well as for those with more specialist or professional interests in media and public affairs. Underlying the book is Alger's fierce commitment to the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which he regards as "the prime pillar of the Bill of Rights" (p. 1). Alger notes that the news merua are absolutely central to the functioning of democracy, while entertainment and other features and programs in the mass media have powerful effects on society more generally. For Alger, the essence of the First Amendment's central provision is to ensure that the principal sources of information and ideas directed at the public are genuinely independent and diverse voices which will maintain and promote a healthy democratic society. He writes. ‘We should be greatly concerned if much or most of the main media fall increasingly under the control of a small number of giant corporations and extremely wealthy and willful people, especially when such people are inclined to use the powerful media of mass communication for their own political and ecofKlmic pur- Of course for Alger there is no “if.” Megumedia is a highly readable aocount of how it in fact did happen, the implications of the m n t situation, and the implications for democracy should the present process not be stopped. The book is clearly written and coherently structured. Composed of nine chapters, each one is logically connected to its predecessor: chapter one details the growth of “megamedia,” chapter two investigates the meaning of democracy and the ways in which developments in the mass media affect the democratic process, chapter three offers a detailed account of the structure of ownership and control of the media, chapter four reviews the key elements of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which significantly changed telephone and mass media law in the United States, chapters five and six discuss and analyze the consequences of the patterns of ownership and control of the media, chapter six focuses on news operations that are part of conglomerates and other large multimedia corporations, chapter seven examines megamedia patterns in various nations around the world, chapter eight attempts to put in perspective the patterns and trends in the ownership and control of the mass media and their relation to our societies and the democratic process, and chapter nine discusses a number of ways to assure a true diversity of independent sources of news and opinion ...