ABSTRACT
Of wider importance than the relative efficacy of individual media as information sources is the issue of the effects of media communications on individuals and on society. What is the relationship between the products of journalism and wider social processes? If modern journalism’s purpose is to supply information to a mass audience – or, as Niklas Luhmann and the systems theorists put it, ‘the production and supply of topics for public communication’ (Loffelholz, 2008: 20) – what social role does this information have?
