Powers of the Press: Newspapers, Power and the Public in Nineteenth-Century England(The Nineteenth Century Series)

The hold of the press over public opinion was debated with urgency throughout the 19th century. This study looks at the ways in which individuals, pressure groups, political organisations and the state sought to understand the mass communications media ot the 19th century, and use them to influence public opinion and effect moral and social reform. The author adresses this using three approaches. First he considers the 19th century theories of the influence of communications media on patterns of scoial thought and behaviour; then he examines attitudes towards the press in both high and popular culture; finally he explores the social and intellectual world of the reader, the consumer both of the press as a commodity and of the hidden moral strategies that were built into it. The tensions between Victorian moral imperatives and the operation of the free commercial market raised issues of great public concern, such as whether the mass media should be under private or public control. These tensions have dominated the way in which Britain and other western societies have thought about the newer broadcasting media, but their origins are older and more complex than studies of contemporary media acknowledge.

Table of Contents:
Contents: Introduction; THE LIBERTY OF THE PRESS - The inherited narrative; State regulation and its opponents; THE NEWSPAPER IMAGINED - Emblems and mottoes; Verse and fiction; IMPOSING ORDER: HISTORIANS AND INDEXERS - Newspaper history; Directories, indexes and collections; THE VOICE OF THE CHARMER - Moral philosophy and communication; Newspapers and the problem of public opinion; THE CULTURAL DEBATE - Poison and antidote; Respectable practice; THE POLITICAL DEBATE - Liberalism and the politics of the market-place; The conservative ’moral strategy’; JOURNALISM AND PUBLIC DISCUSSION - Newspaper reading; Reader-critics; Appendix; Index.

About the Author :
Aled Jones, University of Wales, Aberystwyth, UK

Review :
'here is a book which stands out both for the range of its research and the intelligence displayed in its depth of content. Press historians have been set a standard to emulate, and it is one they cannot ignore.' Social History Society Bulletin 'An ambitious impressively researched volume and a very good reference book for anyone working on nineteenth century journalism.' Studies in English Literature 1500-1900 'There is...much in this volume to savor both of an empirical and a theoretical nature.' Albion