Aspectos ideologicos en la teoria y los estudios de la informacion y la comunicacion

In: Revista mexicana de ciencias políticas y sociales, Band 23, Heft 86-87, S. 31-51

Abstract

No Marxist theory of communication & the media exists, although attempts have been made to apply Marxist concepts-eg, alienation, manipulation, dependence, & bourgeois capitalist control-& to develop a leftist structural-functionalism. Existing communications theory & research deals with specific semiotic & psychological aspects; its actual superstructure & historic background have not been examined. Such research has been controlled by the processes of capitalist concentration & accumulation, & the necessity for optimizing control over these processes. The global communications-information complex must be seen within the globalized structure of the transnational capitalist system. Existing theories & models are ideological to the extent that they serve this system; eg, the cybernetic model views the human being as a manipulable object that can be dominated & controlled, ignoring the social, anthropological, historical, economic, ethical, & political aspects of communication. Alternative approaches, originating in Latin America & other Third World areas, to communication's role in the construction of new societies are briefly noted. S. Whittle.