Fifth-Estate-Online is an international, interactive on-line journal of radical media thinking and critical practice. It is a forum for all those who are deeply concerned about the historical and current role and power of the mass media in society.

Fifth-Estate-Online is based on the understanding that the mass media have, over the last 150 years, systematically failed to act as the critical 'fourth estate' that they have pretended to be. Instead they have consistently represented the interests of, and functioned as an integral component of the elites controlling society and determining policy.

Radical Mass Media Criticism (RMMC) has a fine history. From the later decades of the nineteenth century, throughout the twentieth century, and up to the present, social critics and cultural analysts from Tönnies, Tarde and Kraus to Herman, Chomsky and McChesney have formulated fundamental critiques of the powerful social and political role played by the mass media. Their work represents a strong and continuous tradition of socio-cultural resistance in Europe, America and elsewhere.

Yet knowledge of this tradition is rare and incomplete, and its significance, substance and implications have been neglected or shunned by mainstream historians, social scientists and media/cultural studies specialists, as well as by the media professions.

The history of RMMC, of opposition to mass media power and of the role of the mass media in the historical process is thus only starting to be written. Public mistrust of the mass media exists and is increasing, but it remains unfocused and detached from its history and revolutionary implications. There is thus a mass of material to be uncovered and published, and the issue of how best to weave it into a coherent narrative linked to real social change is up for debate.

Why is it important?

Because necessary systemic change cannot come about effectively in a conceptual vacuum, it needs to take place on the basis of a coherent understanding of what has to be changed, why and how. In order to be reversed, a negative historical situation has to be widely perceived and grasped, and a positive alternative, based on historical perspective, has to be formulated and scrutinised in the public sphere. Some partial accounts and anthologies have been published, but we are still a long way from a definitive account.

We welcome contributions to practical media analysis in a contemporary and historical context. If you are interested in Radical Mass Media Criticism (RMMC) this site is one to stay in contact with.

Just a thought ...

The International Olympic Committee and their Chinese Olympic Dream

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) broke more than a few of its governing rules and regulations dating back to Sydney 1999 and mired in corruption scandals beginning in the winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. Members of the IOC have been expelled over the past years for living extravagant lives and financially benefiting from the 'spirit of the games'. The IOC has claimed that after many difficult years of financial scandal it has finally got its house in order and to prove this, the IOC chose China to host this year's 2008 Olympics. The Dallas Morning News (April 9th 2008) reported how 'IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch was particularly eager to see the Games in communist China. The IOC's Evaluation Commission swooned like schoolgirls, calling the venues "environmentally impressive" and the budget "viable and sound." You have to hand it to totalitarianism - it tends to assure you a reliable cash flow. The committee even found a way to give a big-thumbs-up to oppressive dictatorship itself: "The overall presence of strong governmental control and support is healthy."' The IOC supported by many Western governments with more than a friendly nudge from their business partners claimed that the Olympics would be good for, and I use this word loosely, 'democracy' that is apparently emerging in China. They pointed to the huge changes in the Chinese economy and to the processes of modernisation that were occurring. They claimed, as did many Western governments that staging the Olympics in China would be a way to further encourage the Chinese regime to reform and expand democratic freedoms; in essence they attempted to convince the world of the benevolent nature that is contained within the mythical 'Olympic spirit'; it was accordingly a moral vehicle for the creation of a newly-resplendent order. Business opportunities are, apparently, secondary to the wishes of the IOC and their financial and political supporters' desires to see 'true democracy' to emerge in China. Human Rights Watch (April 1st, 2008) said: 'The Ethics Commission of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) should articulate human rights standards for host countries to end the moral void in which it operates ... The IOC, which is scheduled to hold meetings in Beijing from April 1st to April 12th, has refused to publicly articulate concerns about the human rights situation in China.' Amnesty International (April 9th 2008) says: 'Positive changes such as a reform of the death penalty system and a greater reporting freedom for foreign journalists have been overshadowed by stalled reform of detention without trial, repression of human rights defenders and internet censorship ... Hundreds of people have been detained in response to the unrest. They could face torture and other ill-treatment by China's security forces, especially those accused of "separatist" activities.' Perhaps the IOC, Western governments that remain uncritical and business who will profit from the games need to be reminded that economic reform isn't necessarily linked to democracy. After all, Nazi Germany with its Chinese style one party state also operated a capitalist economic mode of production. A look at Daniel Guerin's (1938) Fascism and Big Business would be useful ... or perhaps they already know that?