A case study of newspaper delivery labour as a blind spot in the political economy of communication

The paper analyses newspaper delivery labour by focusing on two Slovenian companies: the media company Dnevnik and the distribution company Izberi. In response to the enduring trend of declining readership, Dnevnik attempted to cut its delivery costs by transferring that activity to a rival company Izberi, a move met with resistance from deliverers adversely affected by the transfer. Using the methods of in-depth interviews and document analysis, the paper aims to identify the economic rationalisation techniques used to reduce the costs of delivery labour, discipline the workforce and respond to the newspaper deliverers’ resistance to these techniques

The crisis of legitimacy and the appropriation of resistance in capitalism

Capitalism has become so naturalised in recent decades that there seems to exist little to no alternative to it. Common acceptance of this social formation begs the basic question of how particular systems are legitimised. In this paper, I look at some legitimation mechanisms at play by focusing on the capitalist tendency to ideologically appropriate criticism emerging from social struggles. I draw on the study The New Spirit of Capitalism by Boltanski and Chiapello and the cool capitalism thesis put forward by McGuigan. Both provide a basis for a case study of two advertising campaigns by Slovenia’s biggest mobile network operators. During the period of mass uprisings following the 2008/09 economic crisis, the two operators harnessed the symbolism of resistance in their advertising targeted at young people. In each case, the messages of the protests in the ads were deradicalised and largely stripped of any meaningful political content. While it is clear the advertising industry plays an important systemic role in capitalism, the two case studies hint at another way that advertisements can help perpetuate the system: by reinterpreting the critical messages emerging from within society, they become neutralised, with the critical voices thereby becoming more easily integrated into the capitalist social structure

The brave new social media

The paper looks at the wider role of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the context of their use in global political struggles, but also on the back of their sweeping abuse for surveillance by global capitalist corporations and state institutions. A general question is raised: can the Internet and social media be perceived as a means of social progress or as mechanisms of oppression? The author proceeds from a critical perspective and emphasises that ICTs must be analysed as parts of the social totality. They cannot be understood in a dichotomous way, but only as being full of contradictions. Yet, contradictions do not entail relativism - class inequalities, exploitation and domination are filtered through ICTs together with the manifold antagonisms emerging from capitalist societies.Članek preučuje širšo vlogo informacijskih in komunikacijskih tehnologij (IKT) v kontekstu njihove uporabe v (globalnih) političnih bojih na eni strani ter njihove obsežne zlorabe za nadzor s strani globalnih kapitalističnih korporacij in državnih institucij na drugi. Postavljeno je splošno raziskovalno vprašanje: ali je internet in družbene medije mogoče dojemati kot sredstva družbenega napredka ali pa jih je potrebno opredeljevati kot orodja represije? Izhodišča prispevka so v kritični teoriji in pristopu politične ekonomije komuniciranja. Na tej podlagi je izpostavljeno, da je treba IKT analizirati kot del družbene totalitete. Ker vključujejo mnogotera protislovja, jih ni mogoče razumeti na dihotomen način. Vendar protislovnost obenem ne predpostavlja relativizmadružbene neenakosti, izkoriščanje in gospostvo se pretakajo skozi IKT skupaj s številnimi antagonizmi, ki izhajajo iz kapitalističnih družb

The “Austrian School of Critical Political Economy”? A Review of Thomas Allmer’s Book “Towards a Critical Theory of Surveillance in Informational Capitalism”

This article is a review of Thomas Allmer’s book “Towards a Critical Theory of Surveillance in Informational Capitalism”. The book was published in 2012 by the publishing house Peter Lang (in Frankfurt am Main, Berlin, New York, Oxford […]). In the start of the article the author also poses the question whether there is a new school of thought emerging, namely the “Austrian School of Critical Political Economy”

"Well friends, let's play jazz." An Interview with Cees J. Hamelink.

An interview with Cees J. Hamelink, one of the most important scholars in global communication and international political economy of communication, who was also an active participant in several political initiatives and movements in the field of media and communication, including NWICO and WSIS. We spoke about his political ideas, scholarly work and how his fascinating life-path, which took him to different parts of the world, in many ways had an impact on his intellectual development

Spomin na medije in novinarstvo v socialistični Jugoslaviji

In recent decades, memory studies have become a prominent interdisciplinary field of research, with several studies focusing on the specifics of socialist Yugoslavia and its demise. Less attention, however, has been paid to the media and journalism in the life and functioning of the state. This study explores what role these central social institutions played in every-day lives of the population, what level of trust they enjoyed amongst them, and how they influenced the processes of forming collective and individual memory in socialist Yugoslavia. We consider these issues by analysing 96 semi-structured oral history interviews with media audiences. The interviewees had personal recollections of this era since they lived in socialist Yugoslavia for most of their lives and could thus provide unique and valuable insights not available by other means. Interpretative analysis was performed with deductive coding of the interviews and was separated into three parts: everyday media usetrust in the media and journalismand perceptions of socialist Yugoslavia. This paper presents a short overview of the dataset and indicates its potential value for future research. The gathered data also reveal the interviewees’ understanding and evaluation of the Yugoslav regime and, in general, provide a much more nuanced view of the socialist past than is most often found in today’s polarised public debates.Spominske študije so se v zadnjih desetletjih razvile v plodovito interdisciplinarno raziskovalno področje, ki je veliko analitične pozornosti posvetilo tudi socialistični Jugoslaviji in njenemu razpadu. Kljub obstoju večjega števila študij o Jugoslaviji pa je vloga medijev in novinarstva v svojem delovanju bila deležna občutno manj raziskovalne pozornosti. V študiji raziskujeva, kakšno vlogo so te osrednje družbene institucije igrale v vsakodnevnih življenjih prebivalcev Jugoslavije, v kolikšni meri so jim zaupali in kako so vplivale na procese tvorjenja individualnega in kolektivnega spomina. Te problematike se lotevava prek analize 96 polstrukturiranih ustnih intervjujev z medijskimi občinstvi. Intervjuvanci so v socialistični Jugoslaviji živeli večino svojega življenja in so imeli nanjo osebne spomine, zaradi česar so lahko prispevali edinstvene in dragocene vpoglede v to zgodovinsko obdobje, ki bi jih le stežka pridobili na druge načine. Interpretativna analiza intervjujev je temeljila na deduktivnem kodiranju intervjujev, razdelila pa sva jo na tri dele: vsakodnevno uporabo medijevzaupanje v medije in novinarstvoter dojemanje jugoslovanske družbe. Študija predstavlja prvi celosten kratek pregled zbranih podatkov in poudarja potencialno vrednost teh podatkov tudi za prihodnje raziskave. Zbrani podatki razkrivajo tudi, kako intervjuvanci razumejo in vrednotijo jugoslovanski režim, in na splošno zagotavljajo veliko pestrejši pogled na socialistično preteklost, kot ga je ta najpogosteje deležna v danes pogosto polarizirani javni razpravi

Novinarstvo v socialistični Jugoslaviji in imaginariji medijev skozi občinstvo, 2020

V raziskavi jih je zanimalo, kako so posameznice in posamezniki v socialistični Jugoslaviji v vsakdanjem kontekstu uporabljali medije, ter kako je ta uporaba prispevala k tvorjenju kolektivnih imaginarijev v jugoslovanski družbi. Osrednji namen je pridobivanje prvoosebnih informacij o tem, kako in katere medije so intervjuvanci in intervjuvanke uporabljali, kako so dojemali novinarje in novinarsko poročanje, koliko so mu zaupali, v kakšni meri so bili do medijskih vsebin kritični in kako so v povezavi z mediji dojemali širšo jugoslovansko družbo. Cilj raziskave je pridobivanje prvoosebnega vpogleda v prakse občinstev skozi raziskovanje spomina ter s tem omogočiti boljše razumevanje delovanja medijev v tem obdobju. Raziskava je potekala v študijskem letu 2019/2020 v okviru predmeta Zgodovina novinarstva na dodiplomskem programu Novinarstvo (Fakulteta za družbene vede).The research focuses on how individuals living in socialist Yugoslavia used media in everyday context and how this use contributed to the formation of collective imaginaries in Yugoslav society. The main intention was to collect first-person information about how and which media interviewees used in this historic period, how they perceived journalists and journalistic reporting, how much they trusted this reporting, to what degree they were critical regarding the media content they received and how they perceived wider Yugoslav society in connection to the media. The aim of the research was to gather first-person recollections by researching their memories of the past. With that in mind, they wanted to enable a better understanding of how media operated in that historic era. Research was performed in the academic year 2019/2020 as a part of History of Journalism course at the undergraduate program Journalism (Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana)