Talk:Politico-media complex

Criticism

I have recently added a criticism section to the entry, made some minor,complementary adjustments to the wording of the opening paragraph, while adding a few key references from journalists ranging from prominent British to obscure Australian. Between its origin and its current state of development, the entry appears to have become very US-centric in its examples and bloated. I note that it became the subject of student term project. Between the opening paragraph and the criticism section, this entry could do with much 'squeezing' and 'distilling.'

While not wishing to detract from the obvious enthusiasm shown by the students as they began their project, the work seems to rehearse, with somewhat uneven quality, a subset of that that is already present in the propaganda entry, in the main listing media forms and their being put to work, in some way, in the service of government interests or political candidature, for example.

We can find referential evidence in primary sources that the term 'politico-media complex' (PMC) is being used to name a collection of interactions between individuals/organizations (see the reference list at the end of the opening paragraph of the entry). With Chomsky's admonishments ringing in our ears (again see criticism), from what is being named the PMC in these references we can begin to put together a view on how to assimilate, consistently, new findings, from sources into the evolution of the entry.

I will note here that these interactions can and will be engaged in with varying degrees of consciousness ranging from innocence/naivete (the tendency to believe in the existence of 'objective journalism') through to cynicism/criminality(the tendency to engage in 'blatant manipulation'):

...with societies [collective systems] as with individuals there is often a striking contrast between our stated aims and the actual results of what we do. Just as the individual's basic assumptions and projects are almost inevitably buried, uncommented upon, at the center of his or her conduct, so what we claim to be doing collectively may be quite different from actual achievements of our tacit cultural objectives.

David Smail. "The Magic of the Machine." Illusion and Reality: The Meaning of Anxiety. Dent, 1987. pp. 99-100.

The segue, at the start of the second paragraph, between PMC and propaganda should be 'inverted,' something like ... Evidence of propaganda, especially in what is named the politico-media complex, can be observed using many types of media forms, including print, radio, film, television and the Internet.

The implicit 'sigh of relief' on the part of the students in the original segue, through self-admission that they didn't have much of an idea what they were supposed to be talking about (see earlier Discussion notes) is palpable but understandable.

Examples come at different 'depths.' The 'shallowest' is to view interactions as constituting a 'mutual appreciation/self-preservation society' or 'revolving door/job agency,' where the end of work, voluntarily or otherwise, in one domain leaves contacts built-up during the work such that procurement of possible employment in another domain is a matter of picking-up the 'phone, say. The 'revolving door' syndrome includes repeated appearances, in the UK, by the usual suspects on radio and television platforms such as Question Time (TV series), Any Questions, Have I Got News For You, etc.

The 'deepest' is an analysis of the various 'players' involved, their interactions within and between domains and the reliable identification of 'larger purposes' (models, such as the social psychology model, propaganda model, epistemic merit model, instantiated) thus served (avoiding mere 'conspiracy theories') both consciously and unconsciously.

Bearing in mind the ideal of hypothesis/(empirical) corroboration, contributions should go as deep as possible, avoiding original research, finding documentation in the literature - news articles, scholarly studies etc. - ideally documenting players and domains, noting an underlying model and ends being served. The icing on the cake is that this is all gathered-up under the name, 'politico-media complex.'

Ticking all these boxes will be very hard. ILakatos (talk) 11:50, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

original research

I noticed that the article is filled with [apparent] original research and some improper synthesis, along with possibly contentious statements that need references. I started adding references where I could, but realized I don't have enough time tonight so I skimmed and added tags to statements that need work (either proper sourcing, attribution of opinions, or removal because it's unverified original research). I also noticed that a few references didn't support the statements they were attached to and tried to fix this or tag this where I saw it. I may have mistakenly used the synthesis tag when OR is appropriate, so if the SYN looks like it's in the wrong place, please check that statement for OR.

And in 2 cases I removed original research. Here is the removed text:

This makes it seem like print news is a mouthpiece for citizens, rather than a tool to oppress them. Of course, the media can only be a reflection of the masses if the masses are allowed to express their views. For this, freedom of the press is necessary.

The radio industry's politico-media complex would only deepen as the years passed

I think one of the biggest issues left is that in a lot of the examples, the connection to the PMC framework is original research.

I wish I had more time to find sources. But I'm sure this article can get there over time! 69.127.235.74 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 03:22, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Article Evaluation (for a class)

The most glaring problem in this article is original research, as noted by users above. There are plenty of good citations - there is one statement in the first paragraph with 7 different sources alone - but there are many statements that are unproven, appear to be original research or are not objective. This is not spread out - it seems to be in clumps, small sections of the article rather than evenly spread out. This suggest that the article could be fixed with some effort rather than scrapped completely, if one were to edit the problematic statements. I added a citation for the effectiveness of television influencing american politics where before a citation was needed.

Matthewdrago (talk) 01:52, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

References

Serious problems with this article

This article is currently a total mess. It reads like an undergraduate research paper, contains loads of original research, and had a distinctly un-encyclopedic style. The sections are a sort of hodgepodge of ideas with a very vague thread running through them. In order to fit the criteria of a Wikipedia article it would require an extensive rewrite, basically from the ground up.

Part of the problem is that this article seems to have originally been created and defended by one user, Dsmith1usa, and subsequently defended by a series of sockpuppets of that user, who have since been blocked. Substantive editing last took place in 2013 by ILakatos, one of the sockpuppets of Dsmith1usa. Since then there has mostly been copy-editing, reference updating, and the slow removal of POV content. The one exception recently led to this section being added to the top of the page, which uses the first person, is entirely unreferenced, and essentially amounts to personal speculation on the topic.

It's not clear to me that this article can be salvaged. It amounts to personal research conducted by a single editor almost 14 years ago. It was defended by that editor and their sockpuppets for several years, until they were all blocked. The quality of the article has not improved, and I don't believe any editor will likely be able to improve it, because if the tone were corrected, the original research removed, and the whole brought into line with Wikipedia standards there would be nothing left.

I am open to hearing arguments for maintaining and updating this article to bring it in line with the rest of Wikipedia, if any are forthcoming. Otherwise, I will begin the process of nominating it for deletion after the new year. DevOhm ^Talk 18:01, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

Agree with all of the above. The article generally reads as a 'history of media' article, which already has multiple entries on wikipedia. Although this is an old note, I'm hesitant to promote the deletion of this article due to it's importance, generally and due to it being classified as high-importance across multiple subjects. I'd like to revisit this page and update it. I've been updating the political communication page to bring it in line with a more encyclopaedic standard, moving it away from the 'uncited, undergrad research assignment' state it had been for a long while. The article is now in a much healthier, well formated and cited state. Overall I think that despite this article being a big of circus at times, it's importance is high and I believe myself and other editors over time can change key parts of it, and make submissions and debate on how to move forward with it's health (even if it will be a long-term undertaking). Best, flare Flarehayr (talk) 18:04, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

Thirded. This is the work of an editor who wrote their own thoughts about what constitutes "politico-media complex" and used citations to verify that the examples happened without verifying that it has anything to do with a "politico-media complex". Flarehayr, keep in mind that anyone can set the importance ratings, and they almost certainly shouldn't actually be set to high. Deletion might be the appropriate solution, but I think at a minimum the article should be stubified so that content is only retained if the sources explicitly cover the "politico-media complex" and describe what it is beyond just a passing mention. If there are no sources like that, then deletion is the only remaining option. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 03:23, 27 December 2025 (UTC)

I agree with your points @Thebiguglyalien. One of the greatest pieces of evidence for changing the article (bare minimum) from the ground up, is that when an academic search is done on 'politico-media complex' on services like google scholar, nothing of value turns up. On the other hand when the term 'political media complex' is searched, there are many reputable entries, several by D Swanson concerning the subject in published journals. My take now based off this would be to rename the article to 'political media complex', remove large parts of (or potentially stub) the article in order for it to be re-researched, as it is relevant and 'do-able' as a task I feel. @Thebiguglyalien you also raised a really great point about the 'high importance' topic tag being randomly assigned, I agree it should be lowered to medium importance at least. Overall I'm hesitant to delete the article now that I have seen good evidence of aforementioned academic articles under the alternate name (that was not just coined by the wiki user previously). Best, flare Flarehayr (talk) 09:57, 28 December 2025 (UTC)