We've talked a lot on this show about the problems that news deserts, misinformation, and information silos present to democracy. Our guest this week says these things are all downstream from a much more fundamental disconnect between the need for a free press in a democracy and the models the United States has set up to make it happen.
Victor Pickard is the C. Edwin Baker Professor of Media Policy and Political Economy at the University of Pennsylvania and author of Democracy Without Journalism? Confronting the Misinformation Society. We discuss the history of market failures and policy choices that led to the decline of local journalism and the spread of misinformation.
Victor walks us through his vision for what a re-imagined public media ecosystem in the United States might look like and what it will take to get there. Examples like WBEZ's recent acquisition of the Chicago Sun-Times provide examples of what's possible. Candis and Chris discuss how Victor's arguments about the assault on public media are similar to what we heard from Derek W. Black about public education last year.
Additional Information
Democracy Without Journalism? Confronting the Misinformation Society
WBEZ acquires the Chicago Sun-Times
Related Episodes
News deserts are democracy deserts too
Public schools, not government schools
How democracies can win the war on reality
Abortion is not always a clash of absolutes
Millennials' slow climb to political power
A summer of the individual vs. the common good
Extreme maps, extreme politics [reboradcast]
Jan-Werner Müller on democracy's rules
Does Congress promote partisan gridlock? [rebroadcast]
Pete Davis is dedicated to the hard work of democracy
Masha Gessen on the Moscow duel
Walter Shaub on transparency, ethics, and democracy
A different take on local news and democracy
How to end democracy's doom loop [rebroadcast]
Democracy as a way of life
Your guide to ranked-choice voting [rebroadcast]
Is it possible to overdo democracy? [rebroadcast]
Looking back to move forward
The people vs. the bureaucrats in Flint
There is no "I" in democracy
How democracies can win the war on reality
Conspiracism finds a home on the intellectual right
The Federalist Society's ideas have consequences for democracy
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
City Manager Unfiltered
Potencial Americano
The ASIC Podcast
The Chris Plante Show
Red Eye Radio