Political Economy: It's a small world after all, or is it more of the same world?

The political economy of the media doesn't have to necessarily be a confusing or an obfuscated topic. McQuail describes media economics as being a result of the continued social, cultural, and political growth which coincides with the economy and technologies. Since the media plays such a large role in the world, media economics should be an issue of concern or at least some awareness.

Media economics have several dimensions, but the main ones I'd like you to think about pertains to monopolies vs competition. McQuail notes, "Free competition should lead to variety and change of media structure, although critics point to a reverse effect: that it leads to monopoly or at least oligopoly (McQuail, 228). It's well known that many of the media industries of today are essentially oligopolies. For example, TV is pretty much owned by Disney/ABC, Viacom/CBS, Time Warner, News Corporation, and NBC.

When media economics are getting lumped together with both imperialism and globalization, that's when we know something's up. Ferguson talks about the mythologies associated with globalization, and the one which related to the issue of media oligopolies is the 'Global Culture Homogeneity.' This can be summarized as "the consumption of the same popular material and media products...creates a metaculture whose collective identity is based on shared patterns of consumption, be these built on choice, emulation, or manipulation" (McQuail Reader 245).

Taking both the myth of 'Global Culture Homogeneity' and the state of current media industries as being oligopolistic, the article I found sheds some light on what it might be like if these two concepts merged into reality. The article, http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=90002, discusses how lenient media rules could end competition between media outlets. Since the media is supposed to serve the public, a lack of diversity and competition raises some questions.

Do you think the media is not diverse enough in its ownership?

Is there any real basis to media being thought of as something which adds to cultural homogeneity due to increased globalization?

What problems might arise if the media were to be even more of an oligopoly or a true monopoly?