The Network Society - University of Massachusetts Amherst

Societies in Transition to the Network Society 61
ment, newspaper readership (and membership of associations) is
directly correlated to the education level of the citizens. As seen below
(Table 3.22), education, much more than newspaper readership or
watching TV news, is a central element in the civic engagement
options made by the different citizens.
Another indicator of an informational society is the relationship it
has with its media, i.e. both the freedom of the media to report freely
and give opinions and the relationship between the beneficiaries and
producers of the information.
Of all the societies in transition under analysis here, only Italy,
Argentina and Brazil are classified as partially free in terms of the freedom
of the press.
In classifying the freedom of the press, factors such as the legal
framework for journalism, political influence and economic pressures
on the freedom of expression are taken into account. Between 2001
and 2003, Portugal improved its general score (going from 17 to 15),
accompanying a trend similar to that of Finland, while the United
Sates revealed an opposite trend (from 17 to 19) and Singapore continued
to be classified as a country without freedom of the press. 6
Positive development, such as in the case of Portugal, may conceal
that the final value is due to a positive assessment of the evolution of
the legislation and regulation that may influence the contents of the
media. However, this is offset by an increase in the economic pressures
on news content. To quote the Press Freedom Survey, 2003,
“Most media outlets are independent of the government; however,
print and broadcast ownership is concentrated in the hands of four
main media companies.” (Press Freedom Survey 2003).
The comparison of models of social openness and citizenship carried
out here, as well as the analysis of the social well-being, reveals
much more clearly the differences than the data common to all the
societies dealt with herein.
6 Identical positions emerge when one looks at the online presence analysis. Finland,
Portugal and the USA are amongst the least restrictive of the media’s freedoms and
Singapore is included in the moderately free (Press Freedom Survey 2001).