ABSTRACT
Habermas’ notion of ‘the public sphere’ (1989), has been described as a space or public arena where ‘political opinion can be formed freely’ (Shattuc, 1997, 93) and as a site governed by the ‘public reason of private citizens’ (Peters, 1993, 41). This conception of a place where free, rational exchange can be sustained provides one of the best known normative models for the exercise of interaction within contemporary mediated culture, and has become an intellectual rallying-point for the development of progressive discourses. The concept of the public sphere has become an essential element within the re-formulation of democratic culture, appearing in works on culture, citizenship, media and politics (Garnham, 1986; Dahlgren, 199; Thompson, 1995; McGuigan, 1996).
