ABSTRACT
Our objectives in this book have been somewhat instrumental. We set out to learn how media developments and changing media structures interact with the processes of rendering a society more or less democratic. Our Holy Grail of inquiry has involved determining whether there is a causal effect between liberalized media and a democratic society, and as happens in most religious searches, reaching a final destination is elusive. How can we tell whether, as is so widely assumed, media reform is a necessary condition of democratization, or rather, whether free and independent media are merely attractive, superb, and even justifying products of an already liberalized society? Does media reform promote democratization or is the existence of healthy and independent media merely a consequence or sign of a society that is already on the way toward greater democratic practice? Indeed, it may be that the two processes, media reform and democratization, are mutually exclusive with little or no effect of one upon the other.
