Media Ethics and Global Justice in the Digital Age

Description

Today's digital revolution is a worldwide phenomenon, with profound and often differential implications for communities around the world and their relationships to one another. This book presents a new, explicitly international theory of media ethics, incorporating non-Western perspectives and drawing deeply on both moral philosophy and the philosophy of technology. Clifford Christians develops an ethics grounded in three principles - truth, human dignity, and non-violence - and shows how these principles can be applied across a wide range of cases and domains. The book is a guide for media professionals, scholars, and educators who are concerned with the global ramifications of new technologies and with creating a more just world.

Clifford Christians is Research Professor of Communications, Professor of Journalism and Professor of Media Studies Emeritus at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. His co-authored books include Normative Theories of the Media (2009), Ethics for Public Communication (2011), Communication Theories in a Multicultural World (2014), The Ethics of Intercultural Communication (2015), and Media Ethics: Cases and Moral Reasoning (2016).

'Professor Christians provides a rigorous, international reboot of the foundations of media ethics though a human-centered philosophy of technology and a cosmopolitan ethic of being human. Amid a global media revolution, citizen and scholar require such deep and audacious thinking to advance human flourishing across borders.' Stephen J. A. Ward, author of Global Journalism Ethics, Global Media Ethics: Problems and Perspectives, Radical Media Ethics A Global Approach and Handbook of Global Media Ethics 'Clifford G. Christians proffers a genuinely original account of media ethics that not only takes technology seriously, but also uses it to engage in discussions others have been unwilling - or unable - to pursue. Because digital communication is 'inescapably global', media ethics requires precisely what this book provides: a 'theory of international communication ethics.' Theodore L. Glasser, Stanford University, California 'Professor Christians has capped his uniquely distinguished career as a media ethicist with a work that is exceptionally sweeping in its intellectual reach and bold in its ambition. Christians brings both staggering scholarly range and unsparing analytical rigor to produce a challenging work that deserves to be studied and applied for years to come.' Edward Wasserman, University of California, Berkeley 'Inside this book you'll find issues as challenging as the media have ever faced, and they are occurring while the various forms of public communication are themselves in the midst of prolonged technological convulsions. Christians charts a new path through the confusion by offering a vision of global justice grounded in a human-centered philosophy of technology. This book is a showcase of keen insight, remarkable breath, deep compassion. It is essential reading for those committed to media ethics as an intellectual project that is both just and inclusive.' Christian Sandvig, H. Marshall McLuhan Collegiate Professor of Digital Media, University of Michigan 'This book provides a useful framework for both seasoned and new scholars to help guide contemporary media ethics while building on the success of the previous scholarship that made the field what it is today.' Rocci Luppicini, Prometheus