170 | 31, pp. 167-185 | doxa.comunicación

July-December of 2020

The Social Communication legislation in the subnational space. The case of Mexico

ISSN: 1696-019X / e-ISSN: 2386-3978

brought its discussions related to the new dynamics (in legal-political and in communicational) on the regulation of technological innovations, mainly related to broadcasting, telecommunications, access to broadband, accountability, violence against communicators, and audiences rights. Some of these discussions are exhibit in some works. For example, Lay (2013) made a discussion from the legislative debate of 2006 to discuss the relation of State, democracy, and media. In this debate, allies from the company Televisa proposed a law media initiative that encourages it on the Federal Legislature. Lay addresses the problem of factual powers of media and its approach in the theoretical and academic discussion.

Esteinou (2015), another author who analyses the federal regulations of media, is concerned about the lack of legal boundaries of media power. From his perspective, this has occasioned that the constitutional State stands up a hybrid State, where media entrepreneurs have factual political powers with considerable importance. Arroyo (2015) states that the reform of 2013 encourages the consolidation of a private and economic model for broadcasting and telecommunication sectors. He considers that this situation interferes with the media development of the country and weakness the rights of information and communication. Huerta & Becerra (2016) argues that the main problem comes from the regulatory laws from the reform; on these laws, a small group of entrepreneurs of the sector was beneficiated by the legislation. Gómez (2018) observes the fights of the civil society to democratize the media system in Mexico against the private/trade hegemony which domains the sector.

On the other hand, Toussaint (2018) presents the transition process of the analogic to digital in public television, in the Mexican Public politic frame for the analogue switch-off. She finds the power imbalance between the public and private model “in favour of consortium in almost all aspects: coverage, audience, and budget” (p. 14). Álvarez (2018) presents broad research using a critical glance at the history of the telecommunication and broadcasting sector in Mexico. She exhibits the regulations, rights, institutions, infrastructure, and social problems from the legal formation as a sector. Also, she analyses the place of Mexico at the international level.

Hincapié & López (2018) considered that in the case of the violence against journalists in Mexico, the regulation in the subject is not enough. Even the reforms look forward to straightener the democratic processes; there is a set of extralegal practices of containment of reforms that preserve the authoritarian and anti-democratic practices. This situation harms the protection of the informants, which commit the respect of the freedom of expression.

Even the regulation of social communication in Mexico has federal competence; it is true that the states open opportunities to legislate very particular aspects related to the regional demands. There are still few works elaborated from these regions that reflect on this aspect. An example of this is the research of Brambila (2018), who evaluates the mechanism that protect journalists and activists of human rights. She visualizes some problems related to aggression and responses to them in states of the Mexican Republic. Some of these responses come from the state legislations.

Espino (2016) and Espino & Mendoza (2015) present a work to show some problems related to the regional control of media in the states. For this, they characterize the case of the state of Querétaro. According to the authors, regional