Free market media, democracy, and partisanship: a case study of Kolkata’s newspapers’ coverage of anti-industrialization protests

Abstract

This article studies how multiple news media’s different partisan political interests and professional journalistic norms intersect and alter the media system’s ability to represent diversity. Through a case study of the news coverage of anti-industrialization protests in the East Indian city of Kolkata and by drawing on political economic critiques and theories of political communication, this article argues that “hybrid” forms of professional journalism remain central to a media system’s ability to represent differences or “external pluralism.” This article proposes the conceptual framework of “hybrid partisan system” to account for the changes in a media system due to the intersection of multiple news media outlets’ partisan alliances and professional interests.