International Communication and The Ideological Battlefields: Implications For Developing Countries

Abstract

This study sought to explore international communication and global news flow. It also critically examines the extent the theoretical paradigms used in explaining and describing international communication cover the full complexity of global communication in the 21st century. This paper through the library research method examines the entrenched hegemonic dynamics that characterise international communication and its implications on developing countries with a specific focus on evolving ideological and theoretical issues among states in the world. The theoretical framework for this study is pegged within the context of the World Systems Theory.
The study concludes that because information dissemination at the international level is vertical and carried out within definite spheres of communication hegemony to the disadvantage of developing countries, the only news that favours capitalist interests (Western ideology-oriented) is disseminated. Further, the study’s conclusion indicates that contrary to mainstream capitalist assumptions that emphasise the evolutionary character of growth as a natural consequence that developing nations must follow, capitalism favours what we term “bourgeois ideology”, an ideology that makes us feel as though the social world and the technological advantages are there for developing countries to express ourselves, while in fact, these countries are mere puns on the
international chessboard.