Greater media presence may facilitate information transmission and consensus or amplify existing political differences …. In the OECD greater media penetration is strongly correlated with reduced ideological polarization. Media penetration …

This paper examines the role of mass media in countering special interest group influence. I use the concentration of … 1980 to 2002, and compare the reaction of voters to increases in concentration in two different types of media markets: in …-state media markets and out-of-state media markets. Unlike in-state media markets, out-of-state markets focus on neighboring …

This paper sheds light on the links between media and political polarization by looking at the introduction of … simple framework that identifies two channels linking media environment to politicians' incentives to polarize. First, the … ideology effect: changes in the media environment may affect the distribution of citizens' ideological views, with politicians …

This chapter overviews the empirical literature on the determinants and the consequences of media capture, i.e., the … situation in which governments or other interest groups try to control the content of media outlets. We start by examining the … evidence on the effect of media capture on the content of media outlets. Then we discuss the methods governments and other …

This chapter studies situations where media sources deliberately deviate from truthful reporting in order to manipulate … electoral outcomes. Media capture occurs when the government actively attempts to influence the media industry. We instead speak … of media power when news organizations engage in biased reporting for political reasons. Existing theories identify …

In this chapter we survey the empirical literature on media bias, with a focus on partisan and ideological biases …. First, we discuss the methods used to measure the relative positions of media outlets. We divide bias into two categories … media outlets with other actors, measures based on the intensity of media coverage, and measures based on tone. In the …

We review the theoretical literature on market determinants of media bias. We present a theoretical framework that …

This chapter investigates how media coverage filters information and how this affects political accountability and … policy. I first present a baseline model of media coverage and its effect on political accountability. The model is used to … discuss the welfare consequences of private provision of news. It shows how media regulation and public broadcasting may …

I develop a model of the relation between the media environment and political obstructionism. I show that when voters … are less informed by media, obstructionism becomes a more effective political signal for the minority party. The model … thus implies that media change can cause gridlock via signaling; by contrast, the previous literature on causes of gridlock …