Communication Researchers and Policy-making

by Sandra Braman (Ed.)

• ISBN13: 9780262523400
• ISBN10: 026252340X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2003-09-01
• Publisher: Mit Pr

Summary

As the global information infrastructure evolves, the field of communication has the opportunity to renew itself while addressing the urgent policy need for new ways of thinking and new data to think about. Communication Researchers and Policy-making examines diverse relationships between the communication research and policy communities over more than a century and the issues that arise out of those interactions. The book provides primary material in the form of reports on such relationships spanning time periods, subject matter, policy issues, decision-making venues, and governments. The essays range from historical pieces on the importance of communication research since the beginning of systematic policy analysis and on the various roles that researchers can play to contemporary analyses of contributions of research to policy debates over network design and access, media violence, and advertising fraud. Substantial interstitial essays by the editor explore the impact of the policy context on communication theories and research practices, relationships between researchers and their institutional homes, the role of communication researchers as public intellectuals, and ways to maximize the impact of communication research on policy-making during this period of infrastructural transformation. The book includes an extensive bibliography.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction	p. 1
The Long View	p. 11
Policy as a Research Context	p. 33
Policy as a Research Context	p. 35
The Study of Public Administration	p. 61
The Policy Orientation	p. 85
National Information Policy	p. 105
The Symbolic Uses of Effects: Notes on the Television Violence Inquiries and the Legitimation of Mass Communications Research	p. 117
Pornography Research and Public Policy	p. 145
Transforming Principles into Policy	p. 167
Government Regulation of "Adult" Businesses through Zoning and Anti-Nudity Ordinances: Debunking the Legal Myth of Negative Secondary Effects	p. 177
Relationships with Policy-makers	p. 219
Facing Out: Researchers and Policy-makers	p. 221
Obituary for an Agency	p. 245
U.S. Mass Communication Research, Counterinsurgency, and Scientific "Reality"	p. 253
From Radio Research to Communications Intelligence: Rockefeller Philanthropy, Communications Specialists, and the American Policy Community	p. 295
A Novel Conference: The Origins of TPRC	p. 347
Communication Research on Children and Public Policy	p. 359
"Guys in Suits with Charts": Audience Research in U.S. Public Radio	p. 375
Relationship between Public Opinion and Supreme Court Opinions: Was Mr. Dooley Right?	p. 395
Relationships with Academia	p. 413
Facing In: Researchers and Academia	p. 415
The Ambiguity of Policy Research: Social Research on Broadcasting	p. 437
Get Out of the Car: A Case Study on the Organization of Policy Research	p. 445
Putting the First Amendment in Its Place: Enhancing Democracy through the Press	p. 461
Social Science and Social Control	p. 487
Remarks on Administrative and Critical Communications Research	p. 493
Researchers at the Federal trade Commission: Peril and Promise	p. 511
"Fraught with Such Great Possibilities": The Historical Relationship of Communication Research to Mass Media Regulation	p. 529
Conclusions	p. 573
Enduring Tensions and Lessons Learned	p. 575
List of Contributors	p. 593
Index	p. 599
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.