ABSTRACT
The Italian public sphere According to Jürgen Habermas’s theory of normative cosmopolitanism, the European integration process should not be based on the search for supposed common roots, because to do so risks reigniting traditional ethnic and territorial conflicts. Nor will an effective Union be brought about by philosophical considerations or economic rationality. The solution suggested by Habermas is instead the construction, however difficult and complex, of a public sphere that can create the prerequisites for equal access to rights for the different social and cultural identities that make up the current European mosaic. This is a space in which the main actors –both public and private – that contribute to the process of integration can initiate public discourses oriented towards integrating different values into a common political culture. Accepting Habermas’s arguments, this chapter will examine the ways in which different social organizations – beginning with the media and political institutions – take part in the forming of a common public space that provides greater opportunities for reciprocal exchanges between heterogeneous communities.3 From this standpoint, multiculturalism and the pluralization of the public sphere4 represent the most important challenge to the process of integration. This challenge, expressed in terms of communicative action, highlights the
need for increased opportunities and forums for debate between European subjects as a determinant in the development of a common civil society. More recently, Habermas’s definition of a European public sphere has been enlarged in order to encompass processes of multi-level governance.5 The deliberation process, which takes place at a local level around global questions, turns the European public sphere into a ‘transit station’ which, however, may alter the trajectory of the decision-making process and, therefore, the final outcome. One thinks, for example, of the lack of a European response to crucial issues such as the financial and economic crisis, the refugee emergency in the Mediterranean region, or the responses to climate change. It is quite clear, in these cases, that the object of policies is firmly anchored at the level of the nation state, and that the direction of the process concerns the whole world, but even so the interpretative frameworks that guide the decision-making process are formed at the level of the European public space, determining its direction. At the same time, however, an ever-growing body of empirical research on the transnational coverage of the great political and social crises demonstrates how these are things that contribute to the strengthening of the European public sphere in so far as they generate journalistic debates.6 Ultimately, the public sphere is the place in which societies redefine themselves. The process of modernization has seen the expansion and pluralization of dynamic worlds and social opportunities, which have entered into close relationships with one another and defined the new structure of the communication environment. In this respect the media today play a crucial role within the public sphere, as the main route by which institutions, political powers and organized citizens propagate information. While at one time a ‘high quality’ public sphere could – according to Habermas – rely on a mainstay of information released by the elite press,7 much the same can be said about the pluralization of sources of communication and information. On the other hand, social and political systems are always broadly interested in an extended process of media coverage in which communication acquires political meaning.8 Moreover, the digital media, primarily the Internet, have profoundly transformed the communication and information landscape. The disintermediation of traditional information services provided by mainstream media has, in effect, shortened the distance between decision-makers and civil society, offering new opportunities for direct participation, bypassing intermediary networks.9 The social media increasingly integrate social circles, and challenge the functions carried out by traditional intermediary bodies – first and foremost those of politicians and journalists. According to Dahlgren, in the face of a growing demand for civic engagement the Internet has radically transformed forms of agency and demands for representation, to the point that it is no longer possible to see the public sphere as a totality.10 Rather, it should be re-conceptualized as the coexistence of a variety of autonomous spaces of collective decision-making, partly able to challenge the agencies that have traditionally intermediated in socially significant matters.
