Abstract

The institutions of communication and technology have become so prominent in world politics that it has altered the nature of power both domestically and internationally. Marvin Kalb, who provided the foreword to the famous book ‘the media and foreign policy’ has consequently stated “indeed, only the foolish foreign leader can any longer afford to underestimate the power of TV news.” The growing convergence of politics and communication suggests that the world is moving towards the media dominated governing system. While some scholars label this system as ‘medialism’, others refer it as ‘tele-democracy’ . Tele-democracy is known as the major component of media diplomacy. There exists a vacuum in the existing knowledge relating to the role of communication in diplomacy as the image portrayed by the media can be easily tarnished due to ‘editorial bias’ or ‘acts of carelessness’. The constructive role of the media in formulating foreign policies and peacekeeping treaties is always at stake. Although each source of the media has its own decision making and operational bodies, the ruling government tends to affect the autonomy of the media by creating the problem of ‘bias’. Since the media is a great ride of power, its negative aspects also spread like wildfire. A single cartoon depiction or a single speech may be converted into a hate speech leading to a hot debate. This is where journalistic integrity clashes with public diplomacy and the freedom of expression is at stake.

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