McQuail’s accountability of media model, 1997
meaningful relationship with their audiences
and those whom they aff ect, less ready to enter
into dialogue.’ McQuail sees accountability as
being in a state of crisis. His article examines
possible ways of achieving accountability and
suggests how principles and practice might cope
with present and future developments.
Concluding his analysis, McQuail cautions
against overstating the ‘crisis of accountability’;
after all, ‘the performance of media refl ects the
imperfections of society as much as their own
failings’. We must realize that ‘free media have
the right to be “irresponsible” and that some
perceived “misuses” of autonomy will be a neces-
sary price for potential benefits of invention,
creativity, opposition, deviation and change’.
▶Denis McQuail, Media Performance: Mass Commu-
nication in the Public Interest (Sage, 1992); McQuail’s
Mass Communication Th eory: An Introduction (Sage,
6th edition, 2010).
McQuail’s four stages of audience fragmen-
tation, 1997 See audience, fragmentation
of.
McWorld Vs Jihad A global confl ict in cultures,
represented by the transnational corpora-
tion bringing to the world ‘sameness’ and the
counterforces of localism. Benjamin R. Barber
in Jihad Vs McWorld (Times Books, 1995)
investigates the dynamic scenario of localite
resistance to the burgeoning power of all-
encompassing cultures emanating chiefl y from
the United States (and sometimes referred to as
Americanization). McWorld is characterized by
‘fast music, fast computers and fast food – MTV,
Macintosh and McDonald’s – pressing nations
into one homogenous global theme park ...’ (see
mcdonaldization).
Jihad on the other hand celebrates tribalism.
Th e resistance is seen to take the form of adop-
tion and assimilation of dominant imported
cultures; what Roland Robinson has called
glocalization, turning the global into the local.
See his article ‘Globalization or glocalization?’
in Journal of International Communication, 1
(1994).
With the terrorist destruction of the Twin
Towers of the World Trade Centre in New York
on 11 September 2001, what had been perceived
as essentially a cultural confl ict passed into a
new sphere of crisis, in which the government
of the US, aided by that of the UK, declared a
jihad (holy war) ostensibly on terrorism, but in
the view of many commentors eff ectively deep-
ening cultural and political divisions globally, in
particular along fault-lines between Western and
Muslim nations.is shaped and shortened (rather like the game of
Chinese Whispers, though, hopefully, not with
the same hilarious results).
McNelly illustrates a very complex process
of mediation which continues beyond the
production/presentation stage when readers or
viewers pass on the news to others by word of
mouth. What the model does not do is address
the criteria for news selection, the news values
which operate the operators of the gatekeep-
ing process. See galtung and ruge’s model
of selective gatekeeping, 1965. See also
topic guide under communication models.
McQuail’s accountability of media model,
1997 In a number of books and periodical
articles, Denis McQuail has written searchingly
on the responsibilities of media to society. His
model illustrating the relationship between
media freedom, responsibility and account-
ability is published in the European Journal of
Communication, December 1997, and analysed
in the article ‘Accountability of media and soci-
ety: principles and means’.
The model is underpinned by principles of
public service, that is the ‘best interests’ of
society in its broadest sense, and this framework
includes people as voters and citizens as well
as consumers. Free media have responsibilities
and obligations, and they are answerable for
their performance. Assigned obligations may
be discerned, for example, in the broadcasting
charters of public service broadcasting
(psb), while contracted obligations may relate
to those bodies that commission and pay for
media services. All the while self-imposed obli-
gations work according to professional aims and
practices and the organizational contexts that
infl uence them.
Media have responsibilities to source, to audi-
ence, to the public at large, to minorities, and
obligations in relation to community and nation.
Liability for harm caused can be seen to operate
when the media are brought to court on charges
of defamation, though ensuring answerability
in relation to quality of performance is obviously
more problematic.
McQuail believes ‘we face a major dilemma
in reconciling the interests of society with
current trends of media development’. More
than ever, control over the media has become
diffi cult to exercise, partly because of media’s
proliferation into many models – brought about
by new technology – and because of the trans-
nationalization of media ownership: ‘Modern
mass media are less inclined to make voluntary
commitments to society, less able to have any