How Did Colonialism Conditioned The Development Of Media System?

For this assignment, I have chosen Option 1, which reads: “With reference to two ‘developing’ regions, to what extent and in what ways has the history of European colonialism conditioned the development of media systems? In your chosen examples, what evidence is there, if any, of the development of new or different models of relationship between media, the state and society, and how can these be evaluated?

Introduction
This essay examines the nature, manner and style in which European colonialism interfaced with the evolution of media systems.

It analyses different colonial regimes in contradistinct regions of the world by considering aspects such as media ownership, financial structure, legal regulation and the control mechanisms.

The
Mowlana (2002:8) posits that in the 19th Century, Western-trained elites were in charge of the press with the first newspaper having been published by Napoleon in Egypt back in 1798.

But Mowlana (2002:8) observes that another group led by Sayyid Jamal al Din was working toward unifying the Islamic world in the Middle East and other parts of the globe.

Kamalipour and Mowlana (1994) present the view that media in this region played a key role in the push for independence during the colonial days, a factor that has influenced its shape and form to
Ownership & regulation in the Middle East
Rugh (2004) posits that media trends in the Middle East have perpetuated the colonial template of government ownership and control, although privately owned media have emerged in more recent times.

In my view, this mirrors the situation in Africa where the state dominated the media sphere in the colonial period and early years of independence, leading up to the emergence of independent media in the contemporary period.

Indeed just as the rapid mushrooming of satellite TV that we observed in the instance of Africa earlier in this paper, the Middle East reflects a similar trend.

Rugh (2004:p xiv) notes that television was well established in all countries in the Arab world by the mid 1970s. Mowlana (2002:10) observes that satellite television and all forms of electronic media are widely available in the Middle East region.

Atilgan (2005) posits that despite this expansion and process of globalization in the Middle East through outlets such as Aljazeera and Al-Arabiya, the private entrants in press and broadcasting face a legal situation “characterized by flagrant insecurities for journalists and media