Building a New World Communication Order in Global, Regional and Transnational Cultural Spaces

• In Event: BRICS Building a New World Communication Order?

Abstract

The 1970s New World Information and Communication Order debate ended up being about building stronger national policies and productive media systems in developing countries to resist news and culture inflows from the West. Some countries, including, notably, the BRICS, largely succeeded in doing so. Even though new forms of global flow, such as satellite television in the 1990s and the Internet, seem to reassert the primacy of traditional core exporters, particularly the US and Japan, a transformation of the world communication order continues. First, there are new global exporting nations, such as Brazil, China, India, and South Korea. Second, much of the transformation is slightly obscured because it takes place in transnational spaces defined by language and/or culture, such as the Lusophone world. This paper will take Brazil as its primary example of these new phenomena and reflect on how this has changed Brazil’s status in the world system.

Author

• Joseph D. Straubhaar, U of Texas - Austin