News as Hegemonic Reality: American Political Culture and the Framing of News Accounts

This volume examines the role of political culture, or hegemonic ideology, in defining journalistic accounts of the world. Rachlin contends that a press, free from legal constraints imposed by an oppressive government, can still undermine the possibility of pluralism and the requirements of democracy if it is constrained by its own narrow vision of the world. It is this narrow vision that continues existing social relationships, instead of questioning or changing them, by inhibiting alternative realities. This volume examines the American press to see if it is so constrained and therefore a force that undermines rather than promotes democracy.