28/02/20

Theories of regulation: Sonia Livingstone and Peter Lunt

•There is an underlying struggle in recent UK regulation policy between the need to further the interests of citizens (by offering protection from the harmful or offensive material), and the need to further the interests of consumers (by ensuring choice, value for money, and market competition).

•The increasing power of global media corporations, together with the rise of convergent media technologies and transformations in the production, distribution and marketing of digital media, have placed traditional approaches to media regulation at risk.

In simpler terms, they believe that the needs of a citizen are in conflict with the needs of the consumer, because protection can limit freedom. They noticed that regulating media to protect citizens from harmful content can limit freedom of expression.

It can be argued that :

society needs to protected from the potential effects of harmful media.

Vulnerable people such as children need to be protected

Bandura

Albert Bandura, posits that people learn from one another, via observation, imitation, and

modeling. The theory has often been called a bridge between behavioristand cognitive learning

theories because it encompasses attention, memory, and motivation.

An audience can be influenced by media products which can lead to copy cat behaviour. For example, watching a violent film can make someone act in a violent manner.

Discuss the relevance of Livingstone and Lunt’s theories on press regulation in connection to one or more of the issues

•      Molly Russell https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/feb/07/instagram-bans-graphic-self-harm-images-after-molly-russells-death

In response to the death of British teenager Molly Russell, Instagram has announced that it will ban all graphic self-harm images as part of a series of changes. It comes after the shock discovery that the platform had a part in the teenagers suicide, whose Instagram account contained distressing material about depression and suicide. Her father, Ian Russell, said he believed Instagram was partly to blame as the family found material relating to depression and suicide when they looked at her account after her death. This included pictures of self-harm marks on somebody with the words “You can’t Fix Me written on it”. Instagram announced a range of further measures, including the removal of non-graphic images of self-harm from the most visible parts of its app and website, which appeared designed to draw a line under what has become a reputational crisis for the brand.

Livingstone and Lunt believe that there is an underlying struggle in recent UK regulation policy between the need to further the interests of citizens (by offering protection from the harmful or offensive material), and the need to further the interests of consumers (by ensuring choice, value for money, and market competition). Media companies and newspapers have noticed that regulating media to protect citizens from harmful content can limit freedom of expression.  This can be seen in the case of Molly Russell as Instagram have given people freedom of expression at the cost of other vulnerable people seeing things that can harm them, like Molly finding out how to commit suicide through photos on the app.