영국정부와 언론간의 관계를 체계이론의 시각에서 재조명한 본 연구는 영국 미디어 사에 대한 여러 가지 접근법들을 대조한 후, 정치체계와 언론체계 각각이 자신의 고유 한 논리를 통해 상대방을 외재적 환경으로 다루어내는 과정에 집중한다. 특히 블레어 정부와 언론 사이에서 발생된 습격저널리즘 국면과 이라크전 정보 문건 국면에 주목 하면서 블레어 정부의 언론대책행위가 어떻게 역설적으로 갈등적인 대 언론관계를 빚어내었는가를 분석한다. 이를 통해, 감시견 혹은 제4부로서의 전통적인 언론관이 어떻게 언론체계와 정부 사이의 관계를 기능적으로 고정시키는 수행관념으로 작동하 는가를 역사적으로 살펴 보고, 당파성과 불편부당성 등의 직업윤리적 준거들이 자유 주의적 합의에 기반한 영국적 맥락을 어떻게 특성화하고 있는가를 알아 본다. 또한, 블레어 정부와 BBC 사이의 최근의 갈등 국면에서 제출된 허튼 보고서를, 영국 정부와 언론사이의 관계의 특수성을 드러내는 독특한 접속 지점으로 포착하고, 이것이 양 체계를 조율하는 잠정적인 기제로 작동하는 방식을 분석한다.

Reappraising the relations between the British Government and the media from the perspective of systems theory, this study contrasts various approaches to British media history and focuses on the process that each political and media system, based on its own logic, handles each other as an external environment. It analyses how Blair Administration’s spins have ironically brought about conflicting relations with the British media, especially paying attention to the phases of attack journalism and the Iraq dossier. In so doing, it historically examines how those conventional views of media as a watchdog or the Fourth Estate work as operational ideas that functionally fixate the mediagovernment relation and how such professional-ethical references as partisanship and impartiality characterize the British context based on a liberal consensus. It considers the Hutton Inquiry, the report of which has been submitted as a result of recent conflict between Blair Government and the BBC, to be a unique coupling point, and analyses the way this operates as a temporary mechanism that coordinates (and fixates) both systems.

Reappraising the relations between the British Government and the media from the perspective of systems theory, this study contrasts various approaches to British media history and focuses on the process that each political and media system, based on its own logic, handles each other as an external environment. It analyses how Blair Administration’s spins have ironically brought about conflicting relations with the British media, especially paying attention to the phases of attack journalism and the Iraq dossier. In so doing, it historically examines how those conventional views of media as a watchdog or the Fourth Estate work as operational ideas that functionally fixate the mediagovernment relation and how such professional-ethical references as partisanship and impartiality characterize the British context based on a liberal consensus. It considers the Hutton Inquiry, the report of which has been submitted as a result of recent conflict between Blair Government and the BBC, to be a unique coupling point, and analyses the way this operates as a temporary mechanism that coordinates (and fixates) both systems.

, , , , , , ,

political power, media, systems theory, partisanship, impartiality,Blair Government, the BBC, the Hutton Inquiry