| Abstract [eng] |
The research problem: The ownership structure of media organizations is comprised of natural persons and legal persons who have the right to ownership of property of media organizations (legal persons). In Lithuania, citizens of Lithuania and foreign citizens, with the exception of banks, political parties, state (with some exceptions) and municipal institutions and offices (except science and educational institutions), can act as participants (shareholders and partners) of media organizations that operate in Lithuania. The asset value of a participant of a media organization is not set, it can, therefore, be owned by a natural person and many natural and legal persons (a closed joint stock company must have fewer than 250 shareholders). The Law on the Amendment of the Law on the Provision of Information to the Public of the Republic of Lithuania stipulates that each provider of public information or an owner of a media outlet must appoint a person (editor-in-chief, editor, programme host) who is responsible for the content of the media outlet. Should the provider of public information be one and the same natural person, they are responsible for the content of the media outlet. The participants of the media organization make decisions how to distribute responsibility among three main subjects within the media organization (the holder of ownership rights, the management of commercial (business) activities of the organization, and the creators of its editorial content). In different organizations, management powers are distributed differently. A variety of organizational-structural and management forms of the media organization makes a continuum, with the concentrated power of the ownership subject at its one end, and the proportionate distribution of powers through all main subjects of the structure of the organization – at the other. Viewed from the perspective of the situational structural aspect of the organization (Donaldson, 2001), the results of the performance of the organization are determined by the correspondence of the organizational structure to the situational characteristics of the organization itself. One of the situational characteristics is the legal and economic environment of the organization, its impact over the organization’s ownership structure whose influence extends to other structures of the organization and their performance outcome. When it comes to the media organization, a certain combination (situation) of the characteristics of its environment and ownership structure create specific conditions not only for commercial but also for editorial activity whose expression is its content. The theory of political economy suggests that the economic structure of the media organization, whose ultimate segment is its ownership structure, has the biggest influence over the content of the media outlet (Garnham, 1981; Bagdikian, 1992; McChesney; Cotte, 2003). The marketable content of the media outlet guarantees a successful economic performance of the media organization. However, according to the theory of social responsibility, the media organization which carries out economic activities must be socially responsible, and therefore, prepare and disseminate true, accurate, fair, relevant and objective news (McQuail, 1989, 2005). The economic benefit gained by the media organization and its participants must not violate the public’s right to objective information. To achieve objectivity in news, it is essential that its contents meet the main criteria of objectivity: factuality and impartiality (Westesrtahl, 1983). Although it meets the criterion of factuality, a news item will not be objective if it does not fulfil the criterion of impartiality. Therefore, mass media organizations must maintain the balance of the facts they report and must stay impartial as they prepare and disseminate information. Is it possible to achieve these aims in every mass media organization? Can impartial news be produced in the news organization, if one and the same natural person is its editor-in-chief, the administrator and the holder of the ownership rights? Can news impartiality be guaranteed should the ownership structure of the organization is deprived of its concentration and the shareholders are removed from the management of the organization and the production of the editorial content? It is possible that different organizational-structural characteristics create different conditions for news impartiality. Therefore, this research paper seeks to examine whether the expression of news impartiality of the media outlet depends on the ownership of the media organization and its management structures. The relevance of the research: Mass media organizations must be socially responsible and produce the quality news content without breaching acts of law and breaking codes of ethics. Most media organizations that prepare and disseminate news act as commercial business enterprises and market economy participants who seek to match commitments of social responsibility with profit seeking activities. To achieve this aim, the media organization must have a market strategy whose one of the constituents is news content creation principles which lay down the methods of influence, and explain what (who) can have influence or what (who) cannot have any influence on the partiality of the content. Since the agenda-setting theory (McCombs, 2004) suggests that partial news content helps to set a partial social agenda, it is important to examine different organizational structures and the news content that they prepare and disseminate. Many aspects of the content they disseminate have been researched by mass media scholars. Representatives of psychology, sociology study the impact of the content over individuals and society at large. However, the media organizations that create the content affecting their consumers most often fall out of the scope of the interest of researchers. This paper examines the ownership structures of media organizations and their influence on the content disseminated by media outlets. The object of the paper is the correlation between the ownership structures of media organizations and the news partiality of media outlets. The aim of the paper is to examine the correlation between the ownership and management structures of the media organization and the expression of news partiality of the media outlet. The objectives of the paper: 1. To define the concept of the media organization; to identify the main criteria that govern the performance of the media organization. 2. To examine the impact of media organization criteria, such as ownership structure and advertising, upon the content of the media outlet 3. To define the concept of media news objectivity and media news partiality; to identify and to discuss the components of objectivity, to examine the character of the expression of partiality in biased news reports. 4. To analyze the correlation between the character of partial expression of news content of Lithuanian national dailies and the ownership and management structures of newspaper publishing organizations. Research hypothesis: the structure of ownership and management of the media organization determines the character of the expression of news partiality of the media outlet. Research methods: The theoretical part of the dissertation draws on the methods of analysis, synthesis and generalization of literature, the practical part of the paper employs the analysis of sources, the synthesis of the data of the analysis of sources, quantitative and qualitative analysis of the content of the text and the image, methods of correlative analysis. The research paper analyzes news media organizations, it also uses quantitative and qualitative methods to study the content of news media outlets. The commercial content of media outlets is assessed quantitatively, placing emphasis on the analysis of the influence of advertisers, the clients of news media organizations, on the construction of the news content of media outlets. The research paper performs the analysis of national dailies, as one out of many segments of Lithuanian mass media, because press sector is less dependent on advertising revenue (and the influence of advertisers) as opposed to electronic mass media sectors. Another important criterion for choosing national dailies for research is the economic power of newspaper publishing organizations as in this market function two biggest media organizations (in terms of their revenue) in Lithuania: the joint stock company “Lietuvos rytas” and the “Respublika” publishing group, and the organizations that enjoy good financial results: the joint stock company “Verslo žinios”, the joint stock company “Kauno diena” (the joint stock company “Diena Media News” since 2007) and the joint stock company “Naujasis aitvaras” of the “Respublika” publishing group and the joint stock company “Lietuvos žinios” whose shareholder - the joint stock company “Koncernas “Achemos grupė” - is one of the leaders of Lithuanian companies in terms of its revenue. Moreover, the main shareholders of the companies that publish national dailies set up other companies that administrate other media outlets operating in press, television, radio and internet media markets. Therefore, the representatives of the ownership structures of the companies that publish national dailies have strong possibilities to exert influence over big audiences in Lithuania. To define the expression of the partiality of the content of national dailies, the analysis concentrates on published information on the candidates to the 2004 Lithuanian presidential campaign. It is a political event which is important for the development of the state (elections of the Head of State) and the possible influence of media partiality on political processes. Such methodological approach (to research the content of. |
