Finding Legitimacy in the Public Sphere

Finding Legitimacy in the Public Sphere: The Framing of Danmarks Radio License Debate Sondra L. Duckert Semester Project Report Grade: 10 (B)

Issue Management and Public Relations

COPENHAGEN BUSINESS SCHOOL SUPERVISORS:

FRIEDERIKE SCHULTZ AND ITZIAR CASTELLO

SPRING SEMESTER , 12 MAY 2014 Image source: http://www.photographyserved.com/

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Finding Legitimacy in the Public Sphere: The Framing of Danmarks Radio Licensing Debate In today’s media landscape, Danmarks Radio (DR), a public service broadcasting (PSB) institution, has found itself in fierce competition for the attention of the viewing public whose direct approval of its programing is essential for maintaining legitimacy. Contested public opinions critiquing the quality of DR’s content, the accusations of replicating entertainment services offered by commercial channels as well as the lack of quality programing for young adults, who are against the compulsory licensing fee, leaves the impression that DR is not fulfilling its obligation.

Furthermore, the cyclical media coverage of the license debate pertaining to DRs media fee has revealed that the debate is more than just about the license or providing quality public services.

The debate has increasingly fueled discussions about their need to redefine their public service role in the digital multichannel system. Moreover, politicians have voice their dissatisfaction regarding the programing schedule for the youth channel, DR3, in that it has failed in its role of promoting Danish arts and cultural expressions. DR3 was created to capture the attention of young adults however a recent study revealed that 45% of 18-35 year olds would opt out of the license fee if they could. DR3 has also been liken to commercial channels as it carries mostly American series and adds very little Danish produced content. Critics of DR e.g. the Danish media association often argue that as a state funded institution DR is attempting to use the support as a leverage to disrupt the market by crossing over and providing services that Danish newspaper and commercial broadcasters provide; whereas the others must use ‘pay models’ for revenue making.

Critics therefore fear that a bigger DR would create a monopoly in the Danish media industry.

The problems facing DR involves different stakeholders, represents different issues, and thus potential crisis: 1) it encompasses the concept of public service, in that the advancement in

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technology and the development of society has impacted the way in not only how public service functions, but also in the way society views public services, themselves as well as the way they view the outside world. Furthermore contributing to DRs’ broad interpretation of public service is supported by the Minister of culture, who stated that, “Public service can in principle be anything”, that leads critics to question the boundaries of public service and 2) issues involving whether or not disgruntle stakeholders have a right to make justification claims that warrant the legitimacy of public service. This paper will therefore look at agenda setting and agenda building theories as outlined by McCombs to understand the story behind DR, the license debate and young adults. The study will also look at Lindbloms’ take on the legitimacy theory to study how beholders of legitimacy justify their need for public service. As well as briefly drawing upon Luc Boltanski and Laurent Thévenot theory of justification to explore ways by which claims of justification are observed in everyday ‘critical’ situations.

To accomplish the above the report will consider the following question: RQ: How can legitimacy claims of DR be gained through communication via social media in connecting with young adults?

To answer the research question, this paper will take the approach of looking into whether poorly managed issues i.e. DRs public service issues, can lead to uncertainty and decline of its legitimacy as perceived by its stakeholders, namely, young people, politicians, the government, the publics and the Danish media industry. The study will hereinafter present the theoretical considerations, followed by the methods and analysis. Moreover, the analysis will be divided into three different parts based on agenda building/agenda setting including frequencies of actors and issues, their attributes and justification claims.

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Theoretical framework In this section I will discuss the concept of public service in Denmark, the legitimacy theory as well as identify the different justifications made by stakeholders and how they relate to different orders using the theory of Justification.

The Concept of Public Service Over the years Public service (PS) has been a key concept in the regulation of both private and publicly held owned TV and radio channels (Syvertsen). According to the research there is no one set definition of PS and that historical uses of PS are thought to have been guided by English interpretation of PS in that its existence is based on the advancement of democracy, freedom of speech, the progression of cultural reflections, societal values, etc. For example, John Reith, BBC’s1 first director, ideas about PS referred to radio ‘as an agent of public enlightenment and vehicle for the distribution of (high) culture’ (Syvertsen). The meaning of PS in the Danish media, according to Henrik Søndergaard, who has studied PS and the media, makes a distinction of the concept as it applies to (public) media institutions, the principles of program policy regulation and content requirements, and social media functions (Søndergaard). He states that Danish broadcasting is a "public service" institution that is committed to pluralism and diversity of the programs offered to the publics. In other words, ‘the media role in some way performs a public service to society.’ By his definition, PS means that the media must also have a social purpose, as PS adheres to the same logic as commercial media in terms of principles and communication.

Søndergaard stated that PS television in Scandinavia is developed to be a key competitive factor that reflects changes in the competitive environment and presents new ways to understand the mission of PS. However, as a fluid concept PS in Denmark has more to do with program policy rather than if a public service institution is designated as private or public. Søndergaard explains this as: “Public service concept is instead almost exclusively defined as a program of political

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commitment, which concerns only the application range compositions (versatility) and nature (quality). They are even claims that immediately seems pretty inaccurate when you consider that they only be managed by public institutions that are independent of the market, but also for purely commercial companies, for whom claims are nothing more than a price one must pay to access the market.” Moreover, Søndergaard admits that because PS has been used so broadly “as a conceptual clarification, it must be immediately pointed out that even very detailed analysis of the public service concept does not lead to any clear provision.” Nonetheless, commercial TV has made it challenging for PS institutions to function in an environment that has been ‘redefined from public to market’. Although public service TV were formally based on political rationality, the ideal of acting as a medium for political and cultural public, is no longer possible for PS in maintaining a position off market, where viewers, constitutes "public" in one system, at the same time “customers" in the other (Søndergaard).

Based on this concept of PS, I can draw an understanding in that from the obligations of a program policy viewpoint e.g. a public service contract reflects how public service institutions are able to provide comprehensive and diverse range of programs. This has the potential to ensure quality and variety of program schedule as well as entertainment information that also focuses on impartial information that is disseminated through out the entire society. The legitimacy crisis regarding PS in Denmark is however exemplified in that there is a campaign against the support of the compulsory license fee and thus public service. Which is in contrast in that DR is a statesponsor PSB institution whose main role is to provide the Danish population with public service programs that impacts education, cultural, political development and other societal functions.

Because public service is a main issue that is directly linked to DR legitimacy claims it is imperative that a short discussion about how to recognize and manage issues is briefly discussed in this report.

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Defining and Managing Issues A large part of the role of issue management contributes to crisis prevention and this in turns helps to stave off potential legitimacy doubts about for example, DRs public service activities. One of the points of this study is to also understand the concept of issues and issue management, and how DR can better detect when they are not in alignment with their stakeholders wishes e.g. public services programs. Issue management is a process that allows public relations professionals to recognize an issue or situation in its early stages, develop a strategy and handle the issue before it turns into a crisis (Heath). It is an essential part of corporate communication, as it provides a way for corporations to advocate their own position to the public and to the political elite (Cornelissen).

In other words, issue management allows corporations to seek out and understand conflicts and inconsistencies, internally and externally, that could possibly do them harm in the future. Issues are thus defined by their virtue of becoming a crisis, “In the context of corporate issues management, issues are controversial inconsistencies caused by gaps between the expectations of corporations and those of their publics. These gaps lead to a contestable point of difference, the resolution of which can have important consequences for an organization” (Wartick, et al.).

Essential to issue management is the balancing of stakeholders’ interests with those of the organization. In the effort to guide any discourse about issues implementing key strategies to manage issues, once identified is a proper plan of action (Cornelissen). Cornelissen recommends using the process of managing issues method to identify potential and emerging issues: 1) environmental scanning; 2) issue identification; 3) issue-specific response strategies; and 4) evaluation. Environmental scanning is a way to look for problems hidden in public opinions. Using a SWOT1 analysis is one way that can help with narrowing down the search parameters (Cornelissen). For example, one of the threats from DRs’ SWOT analysis revealed that they are 1

SWOT analysis: (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) is used as a strategic management tool that identifies business performance to improve profit and competitive advantage (Cornelissen).

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losing young adult viewership to Netflix and ViaSat streaming services. To combat this DR must also provide services that meet or exceed their stakeholder’s expectations. Issue identification is a method by which to identify key stakeholders and public opinions and provides the basis for working towards an appropriate response (see Table 1). An issue-specific response strategy allows a firm to determine how they would communicate the issue using the following options: buffering strategy, bridging strategy or an advocacy strategy. A buffering strategy is a ‘stonewall’ strategy, i.e., delaying issue development. A bridging strategy involves adapting and conforming to external expectations of stakeholders. In DRs case, this pertains to having commercial programs on their public service channels in order to attract more young adults. In contrast, an advocacy strategy involves changing the minds of stakeholders as well as their expectations and public opinions (Cornelissen). The final stage in the issue management process is evaluation. This stage involves identifying the issue, the communication strategy that was used and by investigating if stakeholder expectation and public opinions have changed (Cornelissen).

By looking into whether the licensing debate reflects the legitimacy of public service the study will seek to understand the connection between legitimacy and related issues as well as the underlining justification for the crisis.

Legitimacy Theory The legitimacy theory posits that for an organization to remain legitimate it must act in congruence with society’s values and norms (Dowling). The concept of legitimacy is about how businesses enter into a social contract with the agreement that the organization promises to perform social actions in exchange for the approval of its business strategies and rewards (Lindblom). The attempt is to ensure that the activities will be perceived as being legitimate. It is based on social judgment, acceptance, the desire to stay relevant and having a sense of control.

Lindblom (1994) makes the distinction between legitimacy and legitimation, where the

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former is considered as a status or condition and the latter as a process that leads to an organization being judged legitimate. “Legitimacy theory relies upon the notion that there is a ‘social contract’ between the organization in question and the society in which in operates. The ‘social contract’ is the concept used to represent the multitude of implicit and explicit expectation that society has about how the organization should conduct its operations” (Lindblom). However, Lindblom also suggests that the legitimacy theory gives management a way to influence the perceptions the public has of the organization implying that being legitimate is actually controlled by the organization itself. At the center of the argument for DR is the entrusted power bestowed upon them by its stakeholders and its perceived failings to meet public service obligations, necessary for its survival.

In addition, DRs legitimacy is related to media policy initiatives that have resulted in its portrayal as a commercial channel and has lead some stakeholders to believe that they have also lost their legitimacy. The legitimacy theory thus provides a way for understanding the social and voluntary disclosures and that within this understanding a method for engaging in public debates is provided. What makes legitimacy an important part of justification is that DRs public service activities are legitimized on the basis of claims made by different stakeholders, whose order of worth is synonymous with the expression of justification.

Justification Theory Boltanski and Thévenot argue that our social lives can be analyzed according to the justification of actions and that the modes of justification are made up of multiple ‘orders of worth’ that follows different values and norms. They discuss how various claims become morally justified in the public and reveal a central problem in how people try to justify their actions in different societal contexts (Ekbia). Their approach is based on the uncertainty of individuals who uses objects to establish orders and that people are not attached to only one order but possibly many orders and therefore their ‘state of worth’ can not be predetermined (Boltanski and Thévenot).

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Objects can be anything that supports the individual in their practice, e.g. gifts, rules, tools, buildings, machines diplomas, etc. (Ekbia). In essence the idea of ‘agreements and disagreements’ takes place in different worlds of justification and are based on their theory of justification that is discussed in ‘On Justification: The economics of worth’. It is therefore a framework that analyzes disputes within a complex society regarding how people justify their positions, in this case, DR, the license fee and young adults.

Six different principals of order have been identified by the authors, which assist individuals in reaching an agreement. The multiple worlds (orders) are civic, market, inspired, fame, industrial, and domestic and coexist together in society where they are often confronted with each other in social conflicts (Boltanski and Thévenot). According to the authors each world refers to a specific judgment, that has its own characteristics and testable measures (see Table 2). For example, in the civic world is the logic of social contracts, democracy and citizens rights; the market world is the logic of money and strategy; in the inspired world is creativity; in the world of fame opinions, public relations and marketing rule, in the industrial world is the logic of productivity and performance; and lastly, in the domestic world is the logic of good human relations (Boltanski and Thévenot). Moreover, the agreements must be placed in a real-world testing scenario that involves the objects by which individuals measure themselves and discover their relative worth in the world (Boltanski and Thévenot). Each world characterization is related to a different specification that helps to define the guidelines for legitimacy. They include modes of evaluation, form of relevant information, elementary relation and human qualification. In other words, a circumstance that occurs in this framework is connected with various ‘worlds’ in which an individual may find himself or herself, and where various measures of worth are at work (Boltanski and Thévenot).

Each world will therefore hold a particular ‘worth’ relative to what people are evaluated in and how other people and objects are also evaluated in everyday ordinary situations.

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By using this framework the justification process will allow for this study to question how those who hold a dispute with DR, e.g. the young adults engaging in social media and public debates, tackle the disagreements all the while certifying the legitimacy of DR activities relevant to them. Therefore, what a person stands for i.e. their worth is linked to why they stand for it, e.g. evaluation of descriptors, that justifies them taking a stand. Using the theory of justification in this report will demonstrate the conceptualization of legitimacy by looking at DRs problem in conjunction with the legitimacy theory to determine how the beholders of legitimacy justify the need for public service provided by DR.

THE FRAMING OF DANMARKS RADIO LICENSING DEBATE Agenda building - Agenda setting “The press may not be successful much of the time in telling people what to think, but it is stunningly successful in telling its readers what to think about” Bernard Cohen’s (1963).

Lippman (1922) stated that images present by the media are in our heads and tell us about the world that is often ‘out of reach, out of sight, out of mind’. He also argued that the images provided by the media are often distorted, and that we can only relate to reflections of reality.

However it is the reflection that forms our perceptions about our surroundings. McCombs and Shaw were the first to put Lippman’s ‘pictures in our heads’ to the test during the 1968 U.S. presidential election. They focused on media awareness and information to assess what voters in one community consider as important issues to actual content of messages during the campaign (McCombs). They argued that mass media have the ability to transfer the salience of issues from their news agenda to the public agenda (McCombs & Carroll). “What we know about the world is largely based on what the media decide to tells us” (McCombs). Moreover there are two perceptions about agenda setting theory: 1) the press and media are thought to not reflect reality, but

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shape it and 2) that the media is focused on a few issues which gives the perception that the selected issues are more important than the others (McCombs). The premise behind the agenda setting theory is that “ the prominence of elements in the news influences the prominence of those elements in the public” (McCombs &Carroll). Meaning that the more importance the media places on an issue of topic the publics will do the same.

The agenda setting theory is divided into two levels: 1) first level agenda setting focuses on the salience of objects; things that are considered public issues, figures or organizations and the 2) second level agenda setting focuses on the salience characteristics of the objects i.e. evaluations (McCombs & Carroll). The research for this study focuses on online newspaper articles and social media unites, whereby according to McCombs, newspapers can influence readers by the placement of the headlines and the amount of times a story is repeated. As repeated stories tend to have the most powerful influence on the publics (McCombs & Carroll). This is what Iyengar et al., calls the priming effect. The priming effect is thought to be an extension of the agenda setting theory (Iyengar 1993; Scheufele, 2000). For example if the issue of public service is primed, then stakeholders would judge DRs performance by evaluating their overall performance; whereas if the license issue with emphasis pertaining to the youth were primed then it would become the basis for evaluating DRs performance against that of commercial channels or online streaming services.

The agenda-setting theory further conveys that the media sets the public agenda, but who decides the media’s agenda? It would be incorrect to assume that the media is immune to ‘influences’ (McCombs). Thus the agenda-building theory posits that organizations public relations activities play a large part in formation of media agenda. This can be done via press releases, campaigns, news conferences, etc., (Cornelissen). DRs public relations campaign in March 2012, ‘Media license is something we give to each other’, as a method to combat the dwindling support for its activities that were steadily on the rise, was in a sense an attempt to ‘form the media agenda’.

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In any case, these methods contribute to the salience of news and subsequently the influence on public opinion and performance.

Framing Framing, similar to agenda setting, refers to how messages are encoded with meaning so that they can be efficiently interpreted in relationship to existing beliefs or ideas (Hallahan).

Gregory Bateson (1955) holds that frames are cognitive models that allow us to interpret and evaluate messages. And that frames provide us with basic understanding of our surroundings in that they are ‘meta-communications’, i.e. messages about messages (Bateson). McCombs describes framing as, “the selection of a restricted number of thematically related attributes for inclusion on the media agenda when a particular object is discussed.” McCombs et al., also considers framing as extension of agenda setting whereby the former includes more broad range of cognitive processes and the latter focuses on the salience of an objects attributes. Media frames, like agenda setting, are based on the addition or subtraction of information that is marked important for a news story (McCombs). Scheufele and Tewksbury (2007) states that framing is about how an issue is characterized by the news media which impacts the way readers interprets the story.

Agenda setting and media framing both provide guidance into how the media influences audiences. Simply put by De Vreese (2005), ‘while agenda setting deals with the salience of issues, framing focuses on the presentation of those issues’.

Method The focus of this study is about young Danes and their position on the legitimacy of DR (DR32) and the uses of public service as well as their justifications for supporting or not supporting DR in general. Based on a survey conducted in January 2014 by TNC Gallup for Berlingkse, found that 45% of Danes between the ages of 18-35 would opt out of DR license fee if the choice were 2

This report does not focus on DR3 per say as it does not have the data that could explain its position overtime.

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presented. Furthermore it was revealed that their idea of public service and what DR stands for has vastly changed over the years. The results of the survey were published in every major newspaper and on social media sites, prompting DR's general director, Maria Rørbye Ronn, to comment that the numbers were worrisome, but made the point to show that 96 % of residents use DR every week (see Figure 1).

The reason for studying this issue is that young Danes are creating legitimacy discourses that are defining what a public service is, i.e. how a public service could be legitimated. To understand the link between the justification process and legitimacy the study needed to use a framework that allows it to identify the different orders of legitimacy and ability to relate the claims of the young adults to different orders.

The study outline first included a content analysis that presented two different types of data that was collected: 1) the license debate was played out in the ‘public’ media, and thus involving different stakeholders. Data collected from online news articles were used to define the issues and to also contextualize the problems with DR and the license debate. The problem with using data from ‘news articles’ was the possibility of analyzing data based on the result of media influences i.e. media framing and agenda setting, and 2) data collected from Facebook and Twitter3 feeds where mostly from young Danes stating their position in regards to DR and DR license. This data helped in analyzing the justifications provided by the stakeholders on social media and represented the different discourses mentioned earlier in this study.

A total of thirty news articles each were collected from Berlingske and Politiken, two of Danmarks largest news publishers using infomedia and Factiva databases as well as an archival research from both newspapers (see Appendix A). The time distribution of data collected from the articles span from August 2005 until March 2014. The years between 2005 and 2013, 23 articles 3

Twitter is a 140-character micro-blogging social media channel that is used for two-way communication where users can send short messages and whereby followers of the user can read and ’re-tweet’ messages. (twitter.com) Facebook is a social media site used for connecting with family and friends, but also serves a platform for activism. (facebook.com)

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were collected (see Figure 2). In 2014 that number totaled 37 articles in the first quarter alone (see Figure 3). The two separate time spans were selected to allow for the process of media scanning used to showcase how the issues of DR and license have changed over the years. Data collected for the content analysis were later divided in two parts based on the following criteria: 1) how is the data represented in Berlingske and Politiken online newspapers and 2) what are young adults saying on Facebook and Twitter social media sites about DR, license, public service, etc. The evaluation of tone and the perception of the issues collected from Berlingske, Politiken and Twitter were also measured (positive, negative or neutral). This was done to gauge the reputation of DR and the public services they provide.

The data collected from Facebook and Twitter comprised of 87 units where the searched topics examined also included mentions of ‘DR’, ‘public service’, ‘license’ and ‘DR34’. Moreover, only active tweets during week two and week 11 were selected for analysis, as both weeks highlighted the active debate periods during which the survey results were released to the news papers and other media outlets and the point in which the politicians voted against the license discount for young adults (see Figure 4). Therefore forty-three tweets were used that represents the different discourses about DR. The tweets were clustered into five different user groups, namely public service, positive towards license, politics, DR and negative towards license (see Figure 5).

To locate the common ‘worlds’ the study searched for similarities within each tweet based on Boltanski and Thévenot ‘orders of worth’. Facebook data was eliminated from this study as it was deemed one-sided and extremely negative towards DR, DR license and DR3 and would not offer any new insights for this study.

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A twitter search of the hash tag #DR3 returned mixed results and thousands of hits as it shares the same hash tag with ‘dead raising three (#DR3)’ a video game and was therefore eliminated as research item.

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Results Both Berlingske and Politiken used surveyed results from a TNC Gallup to shape the license debate issue by framing the debate in the media that focused on young adults willingness to give up DR, thereby setting the public agenda, namely public service and young people. The main issues discussed in Berlingske articles from the first quarter of 2014-highlighted the awareness of DR in the context of the license debate at 22% and politics at 26 % (see Figure 6). Public service is also highlighted in the number of January tweets collected from Twitter, for this study at 35% and 63% of tweets (see Figure 7) that focused on politics and DR for the month of March. What this shows is the transfer of salience from the media onto publics and the ability of the publics to influence the debate that resulted in a political proposal in the form of a license discount for young adults.

However, the proposal failed to get full support from other political parties and was soon dropped.

The reason given, was that it would be too costly to support one segment of the population.

The evaluation of issue attributes, i.e. the favorability or un-favorability in describing the issues surrounding DR from the majority of the Berlingske articles had a negative tonality towards DR issues. There were 16 negative articles, with only six positive ones and eight neutrals. Negative publicity pertaining to DR occurred during the period between January 6-7 and January 10-30 (see Figure 9). During this period DR struggled to solidify its position as a public service institution as they try to stay relevant in today’s market. By acquiring foreign produced films and series only fueled the opposition’s attack on DR in that they are not meeting their public service duties. All the while DR continue to boast their success with the export of Danish produced series as well as what they considerd the success of the youth channel, DR3. However there continues to be a strong opposition by young adults towards the youth channel as it was revealed in a study that the average age group that views DR3 is between 32-45 year olds.

In reference to the main individual actors involved (see Figure 8), Morgens Jensen a

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member of the Social Democrats (S) and Ellen Trane Nørby Venstre (V) exhibit the most influence as actors at 19% for Berlingske. Six actors have been identified in Politiken as having some influence on the media agenda. They include Danish People’s party, DR, DR3, Morten Marinus, ‘The population’ and the Youth at 11%. Mogens Jensens is an advocate for public service and therefore it is natural that he would play a large role in the license debate in favor for DR. He has appeared in every major article regarding issues of license and public service. On January 21, 2014 Jensen published an article titled, “S: Public service strengthens the community”, stressing how the new media agreement must focus on children and youth.

Berlingske and Mogens Jensens have been the two most influential entities in making the issues of license (fees and youth) and public service more salient to the publics as a great deal of attention were paid to these two issues. Therefore the more prominently Berlingske and Jensen discussed the issues of license fees and public service as well as the repeated coverage, the more those issues became embedded in readers mind (Iyengar).

Data collected from Twitter feeds, were also equal in the amounts of positive and negative tweets about DR. During the period between March 4th and March 10th all comments and tweets about DR were negative. There are those that are in favor of DR public service programs while others are against paying for the service. For example, tweets about DR license and public service between March 19th and March 20th were positive (see Figure 11). The positive tweets included the reality show ‘Monte Carlo’ and the ability to access DR from other countries. Other positive and support tweets for DR were mostly from users who are politicians and journalists.

To further understand the justifications of the tweets and how they relate to different orders and how the orders relate to what this study understands from the concept of public service is that public service programs are needed because as stated earlier, they impact education, cultural, political development and other societal functions. Table 3 shows the relationship between the

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‘orders of worth’ and justifications.

Table 3. Orders of worth and Justifications Different Orders Justifications Civic - Collective interests and actions - Group membership - Democracy (democratic operation) - Equality

Industrial

- Professionalism - Competent - Expertise

Examples from Twitter - “Streaming outside of Denmark, positive towards license” - “Against the license, no one wants to pay license, no one is proud of being forced to” - “License discount for young adults, reflections about why it is not possible to make a discount for the young people now that the retired people how the opportunity”

Characteristics of Twitter users - Politicians - Students active on twitter with a large following

- “Reflections about why you have to pay license if you don’t use DR, cancel the license” - “Retransmission of programs a week long - gives the license money back? I have already paid for the programs once before? "

- Politicians - Journalist - IT specialists

Some twitter users voiced their displeasure of being forced to pay the license fee judging it as not adhering to the democratic process. Their interaction reflects the essentials of a democratic process.

In this situation the twitter users are displaying their state of worthiness (in the civic world) by being involved in the democratic process. Nevertheless DRs position is that it is their duty to strengthen Danish democracy through program initiatives. In another situation justifications were DRs perceived competition with commercial firms as well as the lack of Danish value and culture that is represented in DRs content. Twitter members justify their actions against DR, by defining their worth as customers in a civic world, whereas DR defines its worth as producers of public service in an industrial world. In other words, DR evaluates their performance according to how effective they are in connecting with the publics whereas Twitter users see their position as striving for equality, fairness and democracy in reference to the license fee. Also as mentioned earlier, it is no longer possible for public service to maintain a position off market, where viewers, constitutes "public" in one system, at the same time “customers" in the other (Søndergaard).

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Conclusion and Strategic Recommendations One of the immediate conclusions of the analysis is the existence of media framing in the relationship between online newspapers, Berlingske and Politiken and how they were able to shape both the license and public service issues with the assumption that young adults are willing to give up DR, thereby setting in motion the public agenda as well. What the research has shown is that the media consciously/unconsciously became the catalyst by framing issues and setting agendas.

Thereby placing DR and their record of public service under a microscope for the publics to assess its legitimacy for them.

In reference to public service, the description of public service has been very limited in that DR considers everything as public service. Their broad interpretation of public service that is being justified has created an entire spectrum of legitimacy building that has to be in line with the changes in not only the viewing habits of stakeholders but cultural changes as well. The reason why public service in Denmark is in a crisis is because DR does not take into consideration that a narrower role of public service; as the concept of public service has not necessarily changed but the methods of delivery has.

In conclusion the methods of how legitimacy claims of DR can be gained through communication via social media in connecting with young adults are listed in the strategic recommendations below.

Strategic Recommendations for practitioners: 1.

Strategy: DR needs to have a proactive issue management style. This would allow them to

frame issues themselves before others do it for them. In issue management, sometimes ‘it is not the content, but who tells it first’.

2.

Stakeholder group and goal: To identify powerful stakeholders, and make an effort to change

their perception of the issues and events. Also rebuild a relationship with young adults by finding a balance between meeting their expectations as well as the politicians.

3.

Have an effective core message: It is imperative that DR, the public and non-political media

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have to ability to communicate what they stand for and why there is a need for them.

4.

Communication style: With the changing viewing habits of young adults is will also become

critical to communicate effectively with every stakeholder group, but especially children and young adults. DR should aim narrow instead of wide (personal). They should conduct conferences with experts and academics stressing the importance of public service and democracy.

5.

Communication Channel: DR should create a digital platform through “young” channels that is

only for the young and not through the traditional.

6. Content: Employ youth creativity teams that would allow DR to have greater insights into the types of content youth would watch. It would also benefit DR to create a mobile app for young adults, considering that most young adults use their mobiles for mostly everything.

Going forward, a possible suggestion for this study would be to conduct a public opinion poll in order to measure the public’s agenda. Future research could also include a more explicit look at the role of political actors and DR roles as a lobbyist, considering that it is a state funded institution. What would be the position of the politicians in this scenario and would they continue to make recommendations to DR; could this situation be considered a conflict of interest for the politicians. Knowing that they participate in the media negotiations for public service with DR. Finding legitimacy in the public sphere is about how audiences use newspapers, TV, radio, magazines, social media sites and bloggers sites as platforms of public opinions where issues are formed and debated on. Social media sites like Twitter have been key in the revitalization of the public sphere by preventing further erosion of democracies around the world. The theory of justification allows the study to go into depth in understanding the system behind our reasoning.

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Boltansk, L. & Thévenot, L. (1999). “The Sociology of Critical Capacity”, European Journal of Social Theory, August 2(3) 359-377 Castells, Manuel. (2008). "The New Public Sphere: Global Civil Society, Commuication Networks, and Global Governance." The Annals of the American Academy, 78-93.

Cornelissen, Joep. (2011). Corporate Communication. London, EC1Y: SAGE Publications Ltd. Dowling, J. & Pfeffer, J. (1975). "Organizational Legitimacy: Societal values and organizational behavior." Pacific Sociological Review 18, no. 1,122-136.

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Medieudvalget, Rapport/Medieudvalget, Statsministeriet.

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Appendix Appendix A: Collection of Online News Articles: Berlingske and Politiken (2005-2014) Berlingske newspaper Politiken newspaper Date 11.03.14 26.02.14 26.01.14 30.01.14 15.01.14 12.01.14 10.01.14

English Translation of Titles "License agenda in media agreement negotiations."

"Jelved reject license discount for young people. " "Double standards in the fight for our TV time " "DR will provide TV programs live longer with the new app " "Millions for DR testing gathers dust” "DR wasting license money to reach young people " "License to each other "

Date 26.03.14 22.03.14 20.03.14 19.03.14 18.03.14 14.03.14 12.03.14

09.01.14 09.01.14 08.01.14

25.02.14 19.01.14 12.01.14 11.01.14 10.01.14 07.01.14 02.01.14

“This week's Quote: DR asking for it.”

"Is X Factor Public Service?"

"License is fundamentally wrong “Blue politicians on the warpath: DR3 hangs by a thread”

01.01.14

"Come on TV2"

07.01.14 07.01.14 07.01.14 07.01.14

"The battle for Denmark's DR " "Diversity or state monopolies " "If DR is only going to make narrow intellectually TV so we are abandoning the public service remit " "DR's youth channel affects far in always target group" "Socialists will give young people a license discount" "Although we are a small country, we do not be stupid " "License Manager: Young people often ask if they can get a discount" "Media researcher: License Discount will not change the attitude of young people to the DR " "Young SFere will fund the DR of tax " "Majority of license discount for the young " "Liberal Alliance: you should be able to subscribe to the DR " "DF: DR has failed in the strongest terms "

“Jelved: There is no limit to DR” “Politiken believe DR can better assess where DR 3 works best” “DR 3’s channel editor after criticism: I think (that) we are a huge success” “Political parties: Remove DR3 from TV screen” 18 year old Lasse: I did not know that DR3 was a youth channel” “Politiken asks: What do DR stay away from?”

“Political parties requires showdown with ‘public entertainment’: DR must tighten up” “Looking for the Danish guilty conscience” “Spare me the DR's formation” “The young people must be part of the public service overhaul”

22.08.13 10.08.13 20.09.11 15.05.11

06.01.14 05.01.14 02.01.14 26.04.10 14.09.07 03.05.07 07.06.06 25.10.05 24.10.05 09.09.05 18.03.05

"Young people ready to drop DR " "Newspapers and DR collide on the web " "Debaters: DR has been lopsided " "Debate: Chronicle: The license is a thing of the past " "The Radicals will discontinue the license " "R: 25 cents a day can save DR " "Historical and modern media agreement " "Liberals will not let DR increase license " "DR will have higher license" "Plummer: The government Snyder license payers " " Young people are moonlighting "

06.05.10 04.05.10 22.01.10 16.01.10 01.05.09 25.03.09 24.05.07 29.11.05 20.11.05 26.10.05 31.08.05

"New Thinking: What will Danmarks Radio anyway?"

"Paula Larrain:" The time for one license " “DR General: Public Service for Young People” ”Direct: We must not have journalism or Old Danish shows as part of the ’XFactor’ format "The dream of a free media market" "Populism hare replaced Public Service" "Replication: DR and public service - time to stand beard from snot" “Liberate DR” "Good PS must inform, excite, fascinate and challenge" "Death sentence: Politicians kill public service” “Feature: 'Six ideas for a future that DR” "License: The license has survived itself" “License: DR in risk with judgment on license“ "DR: No increased license" "Pluralism: Bourgeois alignment of DR?"

08.01.14 07.01.14 07.01.14 07.01.14 07.01.14

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Appendix B: Tables and Figures Table 1. The Stakeholders salience table illustrating how attributes are mixed in defining stakeholder priorities. (Adaption of Mitchell stakeholders salient model) Power - EU - Danish media organization - Other broadcasters

Latent - low salience Dormant Discretionary

Legitimacy

Urgency Lacks the ability to exercise urgency

Lacks authority

- EU - Producers of niche programs Little influence or Lacks favorability access to the firm - Employees – Suppliers – Customers - Public relations - Employees (disgruntle) - Protestors against the license Lacks authority, little fee influence

No urgent claim

Lacks power to influence Demanding Expectant Moderate salience Active rather than passive stakeholders

Dominant Dangerous

Dependent High Salience

Definitive

- Danish Media organization No urgent claim

- Employees (disgruntle) - Protestors against the license fee Lacks favorability - Danish media – The public - EU - Government (blue politicians, not in power) - Government (current red government), Politicians - The public, Young adults, - Contractual stakeholders: Employees/future employees, customers, private suppliers - Community stakeholders: Government, Media

Table 2. Boltanski & Thévenot Orders of worth ‘Common worlds’ Mode of evaluation (worth) Form of relevant information Elementary relation Human qualification

Inspired

Domestic

Civic

Grace, nonconformity creativeness Emotional

Esteem, reputation

Collective interest

Oral, exemplary, anecdotal Trust Authority

Passion Creativity, ingenuity

Fame (Opinion) Renown

Market

Industrial

Price

Productivity, efficiency

Formal, official

Semiotic

Monetary

Solidarity

Recognition

Exchange

Equality

Celebrity

Desire purchasing power

Measurable: criteria, statistics Functional link Professional competency, expertise

Source: Boltanski & Thévenot, Sociology of Critical Capacity (1999)

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FIGURES Figure 1. Survey results from an internal document presented by DR, showing the percentages of DR users.

Figure 2. The graph shows a weekly account of the number of articles collected between 20052013. The high points reveals the events for DR were popular.

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Figure 3. The graph shows a weekly account of the number of articles collected in the first quarter of 2014. The spike indicates the period when the TNC Gallup survey results were released and subsequently after.

Figure 4. Twitter activity based on two main public events: 1) survey result from license debate 2) Politicians rejection of the discount license fee for young adults.

FINDING LEGITIMACY IN THE PUBLIC SPHERE

Figure 5. Twitter justification tweets (#DRlicens)

Figure 6. Berlingske and Politiken Issues, 2014 based on content analysis research results.

Figure 7. The percentage of tweet between January 2014 â&#x20AC;&#x201C; March 2014; #DRlicens

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FINDING LEGITIMACY IN THE PUBLIC SPHERE

Figure 8. Berlingske and Politiken Actors Frequency Pie chart from January-March 2014

Figure 9. Berlingske evaluations chart for the years 2005-2014

Figure 10. Politiken Evaluation chart from the years 2005-2014

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Figure 11. Twitter Evaluation chart from 2014.

Appendix D: Definitions Description of each Stakeholder type (Cornelissen) Dormant Stakeholders - Possess power to impose their will through coercive, utilitarian or symbolic means, but have little or no interaction /involvement as they lack legitimacy or urgency.

Discretionary Stakeholders – Are likely to be recipients of corporate philanthropy. No pressure on managers to engage with this group, but they may choose to do so.

Demanding Stakeholders - Those with urgent claims, but no legitimacy or power.

Dominant Stakeholders - The group that many theories position as the only stakeholders of an organization or project.

Dangerous Stakeholders – Those with powerful and urgent claims will be coercive and possibly violent.

Dependent Stakeholders – Stakeholders who are dependent on others to carry out their will, because they lack the power to enforce their stake.

Definitive Stakeholders - An expectant stakeholder who gains the relevant missing attribute.

Notes Content Analysis Actors and Issues Actors: Marianne Jelved (Minister of Culture) Radikale Venstre, Ellen Trane Nørby (Spokesperson, V), Troels Ravn (Spokesperson, S), Michael Arreboe (Head of dr.dk),Klaus Hansen (CEO in Producentforeingen), Michael Astrup Jensen (V), Mogens Jensen (S) CEO of Branchen ForbugerElektronik (Consumer-Electronics), Laila Kelp Rasmussen, Radio- & TV-nævnet, Danske Medier (private medias’ organization), Ellen Trane Nørby (V) media spokes person, Venstre, Caroline Reiler (Legal Director), Hans Jonas Hansen, Private person (Henriette Tarris, Birkerød, under 25 years),Maria Rørbye Rønn, Secretary General of DR, Ebbe Dal, Michael Bruun Andersen (Media researcher at Roskilde Universitet), SBS Discovery (compotitor, 7’eren), TV2 (Competitor, Zulu),Ole Sohn (SF), Zenia Stampe I, Mette Bock, member of the Danish Parliament for Liberal Alliance,Lotte Boas (Head of DR License), Professor Frands Mortensen from Aarhus Universitet, SF Youth (Socialistic Peoples Party), Venstre, Dansk Folkeparti, Liberal Alliance, Lisbeth Knudsen (CEO of Berlingske Media), Gallup,Maria LyRasmus brygger, head of Liberal alliance ungdom Rikke Bordorffs, license payer, Ellen Trane, media spokes person, Venstre, Anne Stig Christensen, former planning manager at DR, Lars kabel, media scientist, Özlem Cekic, media spokes person, Claus Kastholm Hansen (cand.phil & writer at Berlingske), Paula Larrain (conservative debater), Eva Agnete Selsing (writer at Berlingske Simon Emil Ammirzbøl, media spokesperson for Radikale Venstre, Kenneth Plummer (former head of DR), Det Radikale Venstre (Danish party), Simon Emil Ammitzbøll, Charlotte Broman (head of campaigns in DR License), Jens Christian Nielsen

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(researcher in young adults), Jens Rohde (media spokesperson for Venstre), Carina Christensen from the Conservative People’s Party, Peter SKaarup from the Danish People’s Party, Jeppe Bech, student and negative towards license, Folketinget (government), DR,TV2, Henrik Søndergaard (medieforsker), Pia Kjærsgaard (politiker DF), Lasse Jensen (journalist, debattør), License payers, license controllers, Morten Dahlin, Samuel Rachlin (politiken), Rasmus Brygger, head og Liberal Alliance Youth, DR3, Michael Aastrup Jensen, Liberal Alliance, Danish People’s Party, Social Democrat, Mogens Jensen, Mette Bock, Morten Marinus, Radicals, Zenia Stampe I, Liberal politicians, Tina Byrld, Youth editors, Berlingske, Politiicans, Populations, Youth, YouTube,Netflix,Michael Aastrup Jensen, Morten Marinus of Danish People’s party, Troel Ravn (Social Democrats), Özlem Cekic, Political parties, Irene Strøyer, Jesper Jürgensen, Jesper Grann Laursen, Frederik Obelitz, Søren, Rasmus Stegmann, Patrick Rasmussen, Mauran Muthiah, Klaus Gregersen, Gert Valentin, and political active for SF youth, Laura Marie Duus, Kasper Nordborg Kiær, Bjarke Nielsen and political active for Liberal Alliance,Niclas Bekker, member of Twitter and local politician, Verena L. Rytter, Viva, Morten, Martin Lyngbæk, Thomas Strøm Hansen, Emma Olivia, Sophie Kastrup, Troels Johannesen, Lars Andersen, administrator of the Facebook group, Jacques Dehnbostel the media spokesperson of Socialdemokraterne (S), Morten Hardtrance Sommer, Paw Solhøj Tulstrup, Magnus Gartoft Nilsson, Jens-Christian Gregers Ruhrskov, Sergio Rodriguez, Jonas Halling Dali, Martin Skallerup, Henrik Friis Pedersen, Peter Bjerregaard, Christian M. Jakobsen.

Issues: Politics, public service, pubic service demands, content, competition, license, DR license, Danmarks radio license, youth and license, development, modernization, comment from DR, DR general director.