Media, Politics, and Democratization in Latin America

• Author: Javier Campo,Tomás Crowder-Taraborrelli
• Published date: 01 May 2018
• DOI: 10.1177/0094582X18768905
• Date: 01 May 2018
• Subject Matter: Introduction

LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES, Issue 220, Vol. 45 No. 3, May 2018, 4–15

DOI: 10.1177/0094582X18768905

© 2018 Latin American Perspectives

4

Introduction

Media, Politics, and Democratization in Latin America

by

Javier Campo and Tomás Crowder-Taraborrelli

Translated by

Mariana Ortega Breña

This issue has a predecessor from decades ago: Culture in the Age of Mass

Media (Burton and Franco, 1978). Forty years may have gone by, but some

problems and major concepts remain: resistance, ideological manipulation

(though today we use the term “hegemonic cultural influence”), mass com-

munication, and new media technologies. Latin America was then ruled by

some of history’s bloodiest military dictatorships, while today the return of

right-wing governments after a decade of popular governments is disconcert-

ing. The hopeful ending of Burton and Franco’s introduction (“This repres-

sion has been unable to destroy the people’s culture, which continues to find

avenues to express resistance” [1978: 10]) has led to a fruitful harvest in recent

years, quickly provoking a backlash (often violent). Today we are witnessing

a substantial investment in the militarization of police forces and electronic

surveillance systems—in particular, the social networks used by young cyber-

activists who have grown up with the Internet and, as Linda Herrera (2014:

2–3) points out regarding the riots in Egypt (the “Twitter revolution”), are

accustomed to defending their political agendas online.

In recent decades, the governments of Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador,

Uruguay, and Argentina have attempted, via reform of the legislation regulat-

ing communication media, to increase participation in the production and

distribution of cultural material—in principle to ensure a plurality of voices.

The 1988 Brazilian Constitution enshrines the principle that the media must

not fall under the domination of monopolies or oligopolies (Lopes, 2014: 133).

This political commitment, which the supporters of these elected govern-

ments saw as instrumental to redemocratization, became part of a controver-

sial effort to overcome inequality in Latin America. The recent electoral

victories and parliamentary maneuvers that restored oligopolistic corporate

interests to presidential office highlight the challenge that the popular gov-

ernments posed to the dominant bourgeoisie. In a purely conservative turn,

Mexico returned the Party of the Institutional Revolution to power; the elec-

torate in Argentina claims to remember neoliberalism but elected Mauricio

Javier Campo is a researcher with the Consejo Nacional de Investigaaciones Científicas y Técnias

and a professor of film aesthetics at the Universidad Nacional del Centro de la Provincia de

Buenos Aires. Tomás Crowder-Taraborrelli is visiting assistant professor of Latin American stud-

ies at Soka University of America. The collective thanks them for organizing this issue. Mariana

Ortega Breña is a freelance translator based in Canberra, Australia.

768905LAPXXX10.1177/0094582X18768905Latin American PerspectivesCampo and Crowder-Taraborrelli / INTRODUCTION

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