Media between Citizens and Power

June 27, 2006

23-24 June 2006
Venice, Island of San Servolo

The International Conference “Media between Citizens and Power“ was promoted by the World Political Forum and the Province of Venice, within the Project Ethical Province. It was intended to be a work project for the identification of the contradictory tendencies which permeate globalization: from concentration to distribution of resources, from democratisation to control, from local to global institutions. The role of the media and the ways of intervention and participation of the institutions of the civil society were calling for an in-depth reflection for this reason the debate focused on the relationship between new information technologies and governance; between democracy and right to information, between concentration of the property of the media and financial and political power, investigating the interrelations among the different dimensions. The information technologies revolution is in fact changing the different levels of relationships, profoundly influencing people’s life and forms of democratic participation and the meeting analysed some aspects of fundamental interest to civil society, to professionals and to the ones who have responsibilities in politics, economics and finance.

A critical analysis of a practical problem: the individual is unable to decide if he does not have an in-depth knowledge of the processes, the growth of human capacity in the information elaboration and, on the other hand, on the possibility of granting access and right to information for all was one of the themes of the conference.