The first co-authored book by bestselling authors Richard David Precht and Harald Welzer: On how the mass media are endangering democracy
What the mass media report frequently diverges from the views and impressions of large segments of the population – particularly when it comes to explosive events. This often creates the impression that the mass media in Germany are being manipulated by the government or 'the state'. But the current alignment of the press is not the result of deliberate manipulation. The mass media in Germany do not conduct state propaganda. They engage in their own opinion making: with an increasingly strong tendency towards bias, simplification, moralising, sensationalising, and defaming. And they constitute echo chambers that are constantly on the lookout for what their rivals are saying or writing, and are anxious not to deviate from those opinions. Such anxiety is the best possible compost for the decomposition of society. Immoderateness and one-sidedness destroy frank and in-depth discussion, the democratic struggle for good solutions.
In their first co-authored book, bestselling authors Richard David Precht and Harald Welzer analyse the mechanisms that have led us down this blind alley: how can a liberal democracy with a pluralistic media landscape imperil itself in such a way? How has this come about in Germany? How could and can the media landscape be made even less free by the 'fourth estate'? And what does published opinion constitute when it bears so little connection to public opinion?
We have to understand how our democracy is being undermined not by means of despotism and power 'from on high' but by the public sphere itself - only then will the 'fourth estate' once again be able to do justice to its role.
