News and effect in mass communication: Liberal and critical approaches

Liberal and critical approaches have different and opposing arguments about the main characteristics of contemporary culture and society. We can see some reflections of these two approaches in the social and political realm as well as in the realm of media and culture. This study deals with the views of liberal and critical approaches about the social effects of the means of mass communication through news. On the ground of the views of these two different and opposite approaches we find their evaluations about the contemporary society. As a matter of fact, news forms the most common and important information that mass media offers to the society. The fact that the news is the most consumed media content by people, distinguishes news from the other media content. This feature of the news shows that it has a widespread area of effect in the society. While this widespread effect is seen by the liberal approaches as the empowering of the democratic social practices, it is considered by the critical approaches as the consolidation of the forms of domination in the capitalist society. In the study, the liberal and critical views about the effects of various means of communication are discussed within a historical point of view.