NEWS MEDIA AS A POLITICAL ACTOR AND INSTITUTION. AN OVERVIEW OF THIS PERSPECTIVE

Résumé

This article brings in a challenging perspective on the media, namely to consider it an actor and also a political institution. We are not talking about media as a political institution in the common sense of the word, but about the media as a political institution in the sociological sense. We briefly present media’s evolution and the current role that it plays in decision making process, wondering whether we should refer to some journalists as political actors. The article offers several arguments, documented by the literature of the domain, in favor of taking into consideration a paradigm shift according to which media will be seen as an actor and a political institution. Among these arguments we mention: nowadays, public policies are a result of the collaboration and conflict between newsmen, officials and other political actors; we are witnessing what has been called "mass-mediated politics"; the shaping of public policies and the shaping of news are interwined. These are just a few aspects which mark the transformation of the media and its involvement in the political process more than as a "watchdog".