https://doi.org/10.1177/0163443717704998
Media, Culture & Society
2018, Vol. 40(1) 94­–109
© The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0163443717704998
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Media, capabilities, and
justification
Giles Moss
University of Leeds, UK
Abstract
In this article, I evaluate the use of the ‘capability approach’ developed by Amartya
Sen and Martha Nussbaum as a normative perspective for critical media research. The
concept of capabilities provides a valuable way of assessing media and captures important
aspects of the relationship between media and equality. However, following Rainer
Forst’s critique of outcome-oriented approaches to justice, I argue that the concept
is less well placed to address important questions of power and process. In particular,
when it comes to deciding which capabilities media should promote and what media
structures and practices should promote them, the capability approach must accept the
priority of deliberative and democratic processes of justification. Once we do this, we
are urged to situate the concept of capabilities within a more process-oriented view
of justice, focused not on capabilities as such but on outlining the conditions required
to support such justificatory processes. After discussing the capability approach, I will
outline the process-oriented theory of justice Forst has developed around the idea
of the ‘right to justification’. While Forst does not discuss media in depth, I argue his
theory of justice can provide a valuable alternative normative standpoint for critical
media research.
Keywords
capabilities, capability approach, deliberation, equality, Forst, justice, justification,
media, Nussbaum, Sen
Critical media research addresses complex questions about the relationship between
media and equality, freedom and power. In so doing, it raises important normative issues
relevant to social justice and yet, as Sue Curry Jansen (2011: 1–2) and Nick Couldry
(2012: 200) have noted, the connections between media research and philosophies of
Corresponding author:
Giles Moss, University of Leeds, Clothworkers’ Building North, Leeds LS2 9JT, UK.
Email: g.s.moss@leeds.ac.uk
704998MCS0010.1177/0163443717704998Media, Culture & SocietyMoss
research-article2017
Original Article
Moss	 95
social justice remain comparatively scarce and underdeveloped. Theories of social
justice can help media researchers to reflect more systematically on the normative commitments
and concepts that necessarily underpin their critical evaluations of media.
Without doing this, the danger is that critique rests on questionable assumptions that
remain implicit or loses its critical bite, becoming what John Downey and Jason Toynbee
(2016: 1263) call ‘critique light’.
The recent discussion of the ‘capability approach’ developed by Amartya Sen (1980,
2009) and Martha Nussbaum (2003, 2011) is a welcome attempt to reflect more explicitly
on the normative perspectives that underpin critical media research. A number of
media theorists have advocated the capability approach, arguing that it can provide a
useful way of evaluating media critically and connecting media to broader questions
of social equality and justice (Cohen, 2012; Couldry, 2007, 2012; Garnham, 1997;
Hesmondhalgh, 2017; Mansell, 2002). From this perspective, we should define equality
in terms of the capabilities people have available to them (what they have an opportunity
to be able to do in their lives) and assess media in terms of how effectively they enable
valuable capabilities. In so far as media help to promote important capabilities that are
essential to social justice, advocates of the capability approach argue that it can justify
significant media policy interventions, such as public service media, designed to make
these capabilities available to all as entitlements (Garnham, 1997: 33, Hesmondhalgh,
2017: 12).
In this article, I evaluate the capability approach as a normative perspective to guide
critical media research. I argue that the concept of capabilities provides a useful way of
thinking about the relationship between media and equality. However, the concept is less
well placed to address important questions related to power, since, as the philosopher
Rainer Forst (2014a: 25–30) argues, the capability approach tends to focus attention
more on the desirability of particular ‘outcomes’ than on the justifiability of the ‘processes’
and ‘relations’ that generate these ‘outcomes’. To provide a firm normative basis
for critical media research, advocates of the capability approach must explain (1) which
capabilities media should promote, (2) what types of media structure and practices
should be used to promote these capabilities, and – most importantly – (3) how decisions
about these questions are justified. The most convincing answers to these questions
emphasize public deliberation and democratic processes. But once we acknowledge
the importance of the principle of democratic justification in this way, we are urged,
following Forst (2014a, 2014c), to resituate the concept of capabilities within a more
process-oriented, discursive theory of justice, focused not on capabilities as such but on
establishing the conditions required to support such justification.
The article is divided into three sections. In the first section (‘Capabilities and media’),
I will introduce the concept of capabilities, describing how it provides a useful way of
thinking about the relationship between media and equality. In the second section
(‘Capabilities, entitlements, and the problem of justification’), I will then outline the problem
of justification faced by the capability approach, arguing that democratic deliberation
ultimately provides the only credible way to ground normative claims. Finally, in the third
section (‘The right to justification and justificatory equality’), I will consider how Forst’s
process-oriented, discursive conception of justice might offer an alternative normative
perspective to support critical media research. Building on the work of Habermas
(1997) and Rawls (1971, 1993), Forst (2002, 2014a, 2014c) has developed a clear and
96	 Media, Culture & Society 40(1)
compelling theory of justice based on the principle of the ‘right to justification’. Although
Forst does not discuss media in depth and the relevance of his work to media has not yet
received significant attention (for an exception see Downey and Toynbee, 2016), I argue
that his theory of justice can provide a valuable normative standpoint to support the critical
analysis of media. Indeed, in so far as media must be implicated in efforts to secure
people’s fundamental ‘right to justification’ and ‘justificatory equality’, media analysis
cannot but be central to struggles to achieve justice more generally.
Capabilities and media
Any convincing normative theory of justice, Sen (2009: 291) argues, is based on some
claim about ‘equality’. But how equality is defined varies considerably from equality of
basic freedoms to equality of income. Debate, therefore, tends to focus on the question
‘equality of what?’ (Sen, 1980). For Sen (2009) and Nussbaum (2011), an individual’s
relative advantage and disadvantage should be measured in terms of what ‘capabilities’
they have (what they have an opportunity to do in their lives), rather than other things
such as their resources or the satisfaction of their preferences. Drawing on the capability
approach, a number of media theorists have suggested that capabilities provide a useful
way of evaluating media systems and conceptualizing the relationship between media
and equality (Cohen, 2012; Couldry, 2007, 2012; Hesmondhalgh, 2017; Garnham, 1997;
Mansell, 2002). Furthermore, in so far as media promote certain central capabilities,
such as being informed and able to participate in public life, media may be viewed as
central to realizing social justice more generally.
The capability approach offers an alternative to economic theories that judge people’s
advantage and disadvantage in terms of the satisfaction of their subjective preferences.
The principles of the ‘free market’ and ‘consumer sovereignty’ are based on the idea that
market competition and economic imperatives will force companies to respond to consumer
preferences, and provide consumers with what they want. Leaving aside the fact
that people have vastly different levels of resources to satisfy their preferences through
the market, and that markets generate positive and negative ‘externalities’ not captured
by ‘market-expressed preferences’ (Baker, 2002: 82), there are reasons why judging an
individual’s advantage and disadvantage in terms of subjective preferences is problematic.
Sen (2009: 282–284) and Nussbaum (2011: 81–84) note that disadvantaged groups
adapt their preferences to their social circumstances, tailoring them to what they have
already or realistically expect to achieve.As Nussbaum (2011: 54) describes, ‘Preferences
are not hard-wired: they respond to social conditions. When society has put some things
out of reach for some people, they typically learn not to want those things’. Since preferences
are ‘adaptive’ in this way, they are an unreliable indication of what people might
value in different social circumstances. So, if we measure equality in terms of the satisfaction
of existing preferences, we may underestimate the disadvantage of particular
groups and reproduce rather than challenge their inequality.
A different approach would be to judge equality in terms of people’s resources, such
as their income and wealth. The distribution of resources is clearly an important aspect
of equality. However, as Sen (2009: 233–235) and Nussbaum (2011: 56–58) argue, the
problem with assessing equality solely in terms of resources is that people require different
resources to achieve the same things. Sen (2009) gives the following example:
Moss	 97
[I]f a person has a high income but is also very prone to persistent illness, or is handicapped by
some serious physical disability, then the person need not necessarily be seen as being very
advantaged, on the mere grounds that her income is high. She certainly has more of one of the
means of living well (that is, a large income), but she faces difficulty in translating that into
good living (that is, living in a way that she has reason to celebrate) because of the adversities
of illness and physical handicap. (p. 234)
Rather than focusing on the resources people have, it would be better to consider what
individuals are able to do with these resources, while recognizing that different individuals
may require different resources to achieve a similar level of functioning.
To assess equality, we might focus then on measuring what people do or achieve in
their lives. Sen (2009: 235–238) and Nussbaum (2011: 24–26) draw a further important
distinction here between ‘functionings’ and ‘capabilities’, where functionings refer to
what people actually achieve and capabilities to what people have the opportunity to
achieve. This distinction is significant, since the concept of capabilities (unlike functionings)
encompasses freedom of choice as a value. To show why the distinction matters,
Sen (2009) gives the example of the difference between someone who cannot eat because
they have no food and someone who chooses not to eat voluntarily:
[I]n terms of being hungry and undernourished, a person who voluntarily fasts, for political and
religious reasons, may be just as deprived of food and nourishment as a famine-stricken victim.
Their manifest under-nutrition – their achieved functioning – may be much the same, and yet
the capability of the well-off person who chooses to fast may be much larger than that of the
person who starves involuntarily because of poverty and destitution. (p. 237)
Since it recognizes freedom of choice as an intrinsically important value, the concept of
capabilities is a better way of assessing equality than functionings, as well as resources
and preferences.
What then about the relationship between capabilities and media? While media are
not the main focus of the capability approach, Sen (2009) discusses their role. He is
well known for his argument about how a free press, along with democratic rights, can
help to prevent famines even in relatively poor countries by putting pressure on public
authorities (Sen, 2009: 342). In addition to ‘giving voice to the neglected and the disadvantaged’,
Sen (2009: 335–337) argues that media can contribute to other important
capabilities through their ‘major informational role’, the ‘formation of values’ and
‘public reasoning’. Sen’s recognition of the positive contribution media can make to
key democratic capabilities is extremely valuable. However, as Nick Couldry (2012:
202) argues, Sen’s discussion of media ‘seems to elide a free media and free communication’,
which can obscure the way in which ‘injustice is possible in the media
domain even when formally free media institutions exist’. Market-based media,
although formally free and independent from the state, may still produce or reproduce
inequalities and fail to support important capabilities. Subsequent media theorists who
have adopted the capability approach view it as a way of critically evaluating all media,
including market-based media systems, and potentially justifying substantial nonmarket
policy interventions (Cohen, 2012; Couldry, 2007, 2012; Hesmondhalgh, 2017;
Garnham, 1997; Mansell, 2002).
98	 Media, Culture & Society 40(1)
The appeal of the concept of capabilities for critical media analysis is not hard to
appreciate. As already noted, capabilities provide an alternative to subjective preferences
as a way of thinking about an individual’s relative advantage and disadvantage. From the
1980s onwards, media systems have become increasingly ‘marketized’ and organized
around the principle of consumer sovereignty (see Hesmondhalgh, 2013: 119–158).
However, the problem of ‘adaptive preferences’ identified by Sen (2009) and Nussbaum
(2011) applies to media as it does other areas. Indeed, the problem may be exacerbated
for two related reasons. First, the advantages and disadvantages of media use can be
difficult for consumers to calculate in advance. Media may take the form of ‘experiential
goods’, the full value of which can only be ascertained after use (Graham, 2013: 44).
Media-related risks, such as the threat posed to privacy through the collection of personal
data, can also be difficult for users to assess (Solove, 2012). Second, we often turn to
media in order to help us to form our preferences in the first place (Baker, 2002: 12,
Hesmondhalgh, 2017: 10). As Sen (2009: 335–337) argues, media play a ‘major informational
role’ and contribute to ‘public reasoning’ and the ‘formation of values’. But
then if media challenge and change our preferences – through ‘an “auto-paternalistic”
learning process whose outcome is indefinite’, in Jürgen Habermas’ (2009: 133) terms
– using these preferences to determine the value of media is problematic.
A focus on capabilities also has advantages over approaches that calculate equality in
terms of media access. Consider, for example, debates about digital inclusion and inequality
(Couldry, 2007; Mansell, 2002). A focus on access to digital networks alone,
however necessary, has long been recognized as insufficient. In conceptualizing digital
inclusion, we also need to consider digital skills and literacy, what types of services and
content are available to different groups, and ultimately, as Robin Mansell (2002) argues,
‘what citizens are able to do as a result of their interactions with the new media and what
capabilities they are able to acquire as a result of those interactions’ (p. 420). By moving
beyond a focus on access alone, the capability approach has far-reaching implications
potentially for how we think about media policy interventions, leading, as Nicholas
Garnham (1997) notes, to ‘radical positively discriminatory conclusions’ (p. 27). It suggests
the need for a differentiated approach to policy, which is sensitive to how effectively
media services and content cater to the needs of diverse groups and which
recognizes that groups may require different resources to realize the same capabilities.
Finally, the distinction Sen (2009) and Nussbaum (2011) draw between functionings and
capabilities is also important. The choice media markets offer to consumers may be overstated.
No matter how dynamic media markets are in satisfying consumer preferences,
market forces will still tend to drive companies, as Robert McChesney (2003) notes, only
to offer ‘people what they want within the range of where they can make the most profits’
(p. 130). Still, given the intrinsic importance of freedom of choice as a value, any normative
perspective that runs counter to it is not likely to attract widespread support. The focus must
then be on the range of opportunities people have available to them, rather than their actual
media practices and use alone. This has important implications for policies designed to bring
about greater equality. Placing the emphasis on capabilities is, as Garnham (1997) describes,
particularly important in the context of the critique of welfare as a form of forced consumption,
since in the capabilities approach such cases of forced consumption, whether the force derives
Moss	 99
from market relations or the state, can be seen, in comparison with the achievable relevant
capabilities, as a form of deprivation. (p. 39)
Capabilities, entitlements and the problem of justification
Capabilities then provide a valuable way of conceptualizing the relationship between
media and equality, and the concept has advantages over other ways of thinking about this
relationship, such as media-related preferences, media access and actual media practices
and uses. At this stage, however, there is a problem. To provide a convincing account of
the relationship between media and social justice and a firm normative foundation for
critical media research, advocates of the capability approach need to explain (1) which
capabilities media systems should promote as entitlements, (2) what types of media structures
and practices should be used to promote them and – most importantly – (3) how decisions
about these questions are justified. While advocates of the capability approach can
respond to these questions in different ways, the only really convincing answers, as Forst
(2014a: 17–38) has argued, emphasize public deliberation and democratic processes. But
then once we acknowledge the importance of the principle of democratic justification in
this way, we are urged, following Forst (2014a, 2014c), to resituate the concept of capabilities
within a broader process-oriented and more discursive theory of justice.
Nussbaum (2011) is clear about the fundamental capabilities that should be protected
and promoted. She identifies a list of ‘central capabilities’ she argues are required for a
‘dignified and minimally flourishing life’, which consists of capabilities that relate to
‘life’, ‘bodily health’, ‘bodily integrity’, ‘senses, imagination, and thought’, ‘emotions’,
‘practical reason’, ‘affiliation’, ‘other species’, ‘play’ and ‘control over one’s environment’,
both ‘political’ and ‘material’ (see Nussbaum, 2011: 33–34, for a more detailed
description). Given their importance, Nussbaum (2011) argues that these capabilities
should, as a matter of social justice, be protected and promoted to all as ‘fundamental
entitlements’. For Nussbaum, unless capability theorists take a clear position on which
capabilities are most fundamental, they will not be able to provide a convincing theory
of justice. Following Rawls’ notion of ‘political liberalism’, she argues that her list of
capabilities is ‘thin’, so that different social groups – supporting varied ‘comprehensive
doctrines’ – should be able to support it (Nussbaum, 2011: 90). She also allows some
scope for public deliberation in deciding how capabilities are implemented in different
political contexts (Nussbaum, 2011: 74). Nonetheless, as others have argued (see Clark,
2013), the role Nussbaum gives to public deliberation in determining and justifying capabilities
is limited. While Nussbaum (2011) suggests that the ‘informed’ preferences of
social groups are relevant, the role remains ‘subsidiary’ to that of the theorist (p. 80). The
main justification of the list appears to be the theorist’s ‘intuitions’and ‘judgements’about
what people require to achieve human dignity and flourish (Nussbaum, 2011: 78).
Sen (2009) takes a different approach. Rather than using capabilities to construct an
ideal theory of justice, he defends the concept as a way of making comparative assessments
about individual advantage and disadvantage and argues that we should focus on
addressing inequality and injustice in particular cases through ‘realization-focused comparisons’.
He does not advocate a specific list of capabilities and rejects the idea that
theorists can determine, in the absence of public debate, which capabilities are most
important to protect and promote. Instead, he emphasizes the need for public deliberation
100	 Media, Culture & Society 40(1)
to test normative claims and arrive at more objective judgements (Sen, 2009: 39–46). As
he explains in response to Nussbaum, ‘the problem is not with listing important capabilities,
but with insisting on one predetermined canonical list of capabilities, chosen by
theorists without any general discussion or public reasoning’ (Sen, 2004: 77).
The debate between Nussbaum and Sen about how to justify capabilities is reflected
to some extent in the application of the capability approach to media. In his analysis of
the capability approach, Garnham (1997: 30) acknowledges the problem of justification
and the different positions Nussbaum and Sen adopt. While he does not side with
one or the other, the position he takes in other work suggests that he may adopt a
Kantian approach and hence follow Sen in emphasizing deliberation (see Garnham,
2000: 165–189). Along these lines, Mansell (2002: 422–423) stresses the role of public
debate in deciding which media-related capabilities should be entitlements. Nick
Couldry (2007: 397), by comparison, favours an Aristotelian perspective, arguing that
an objective theory of basic capabilities able to command a broad ‘consensus’ may be
possible. However, he does not set out a theory of media capabilities and injustice as
such. Following Sen, he focuses pragmatically on specific cases where injustice can be
addressed and justice advanced (Couldry, 2012: 201–202). David Hesmondhalgh
(2017) also defends an objectivist approach. He explains that his ‘notion of well-being
is objectivist rather than subjectivist’, arguing that ‘what is good is not simply relative
to one’s point of view – and social science can help develop ways of thinking about
what might be good in a more objective way’ (Hesmondhalgh, 2017: 9). He advocates
Nussbaum’s list of central capabilities, but – in a significant revision to her framework
– suggests adding capabilities related to popular cultural practices (Hesmondhalgh,
2017: 13). As an example, he urges us to consider how popular music may promote
human flourishing, arguing that ‘the provision of an adequate musical education and
funding for musicians and distribution would be a vital element of policy informed by
such a capabilities approach’ (Hesmondhalgh, 2017: 13).
Such theoretical accounts of the relationship between media and capabilities are
extremely valuable and could contribute to public debates about the value of media in
important and illuminating ways. However, the status of these arguments ultimately
remains unclear. While arguments about the importance of particular media-related
capabilities may gain wide public support, it seems problematic to assume that they are
universal normative claims and matters of consensus without public deliberation – this is
especially the case where we move from a ‘thin’ list of capabilities such as Nussbaum’s
and make our accounts ‘thicker’. Sen’s (2004, 2009) argument about the necessary role
of public deliberation in deciding upon capabilities appears to be convincing. To put the
point more strongly, democratic discourse appears to be the only credible basis upon
which to ground universal normative claims (Habermas, 1997). As Forst (2014a) argues,
justified claims to goods do not simply ‘exist’ but can be arrived at only through discourse in
the context of corresponding procedures in which – and this is the fundamental requirement of
justice – all can in principle participate as free and equal individuals. (p. 19)
If this is the case, a normative priority must be to address the inequalities and limitations
that characterize public deliberation in practice and to enhance people’s capabilities in
relation to practices of justification (Bohman, 1997, Coleman and Moss, 2016). As I
Moss	 101
describe in the next section, the promotion of particular media-related capabilities may
be defended on these grounds, as required by the principle of justification alone (Forst,
2014a: 36, 2014c).
In addition to the question of how particular capabilities are justified, advocates of the
capability approach must also consider the justifiability of the structures and processes
through which capabilities are created. The capability approach, as Forst (2014a: 25–30)
argues, is an ‘outcome-oriented’ approach to justice, in the sense that it tends to focus
attention more on outcomes than on the processes that produce these outcomes. For
example, while the concept of capabilities is helpful in assessing individual advantage
and disadvantage, it is more limited when it comes to thinking about the nature and justifiability
of the structures and processes that create these advantages and disadvantages
in the first place or by which they may be changed. As a result, Forst (2014a: 25–30)
argues, the capability approach tends to downplay important issues of power and process
that are central to social justice.
By focusing on outcomes rather than processes, one problem is that the capability
approach may not pay adequate attention to the important question of how inequalities of
capabilities are produced. As Forst (2014a) explains, commenting on Sen’s work,
[H]ow asymmetries of capabilities, if we take that as the material of justice, actually come about
makes an essential difference. Are they the result of deliberate action, of structures that benefit
some rather than others and are upheld deliberatively, or are they the result of circumstances the
responsibility for which cannot be ascertained? For any theory that, like Sen’s, aims to eradicate
or at least reduce concrete forms of injustice, it is essential to have a clear focus on these
injustices and their historical and structural background. To be sure, a lack of basic capabilities
due to hunger or bad health needs to be addressed whatever story is told about how it arose; but
for a theory of justice it is crucial to ask the genealogical question. (p. 28)
Elsewhere, to illustrate this point, Forst (2014a: 19) notes that there is an important
difference between somebody who is disadvantaged because of a natural disaster and
someone who is disadvantaged because of unjust political or economic relations. While
assistance is needed either way, he argues that in one case it is a question of ‘moral solidarity’
and in the other of ‘justice conditioned by the nature of one’s involvement in
relations of exploitation and injustice and the specific wrong in question’ (Forst, 2014a:
19). Although Sen (2009: 23) acknowledges this type of distinction himself, noting that
there is a ‘real difference’ between outcomes that result from human agency and those
that do not, Forst (2014a: 28) maintains that the capability approach is not well placed to
address the distinction adequately. As he argues, ‘because the capability approach is
primarily focused on outcomes, its ability to integrate such distinctions into its basic
framework is limited’ (Forst, 2014a: 28).
The question of how inequalities in capabilities emerge is important in relation to the
use of the capability approach in media research and policy. This is true in so far as we
not only want to describe capability inequalities connected to the media but also explain
how particular media structures and practices may be implicated in producing and reproducing
these inequalities and potentially addressing them. Hesmondhalgh’s (2017)
recent contribution to the debate is especially valuable in this respect, since it aims to
102	 Media, Culture & Society 40(1)
combine the capability approach with the political economy of media to explain how
specific economic factors may inhibit the promotion of valued capabilities. Being clear
about what causes capability inequalities and deficits is important when it comes to
thinking about policies to address them. For example, those who advocate lightly regulated
markets may acknowledge that some media that are publicly funded are required at
the margins to mitigate capability deficits associated with ‘market failure’, but seek to
insulate private media organizations themselves from democratic accountability and
regulation. However, where particular media structures are associated with inequalities
in capabilities, it could be argued that these structures should change or at least be clearly
justified to those affected by them.
The importance of the justifiability of media structures and outcomes is reflected in a
different way in debates about public service media and other policy interventions
designed to address capability deficits. Advocates of the capability approach suggest that
public service media can be justified in so far as it promotes valued capabilities as entitlements
(Garnham, 1987: 33, Hesmondhalgh, 2017: 12). But while achieving particular
outcomes are important, public service media cannot be evaluated in these terms alone.
Debates about public service organizations tend to focus not just on the content or services
they provide and what users gain from them but also on the quality of the relations
public service organizations have with the public and whether they are democratically
accountable and justified (Bardoel and d’Haenens, 2008: 351). From Forst’s perspective,
it is critical that policy interventions designed to achieve greater equality or justice are
organized democratically and justified to the public. When we focus on outcomes rather
than on processes, the danger is that we do not pay sufficient attention to these important
political questions. As Forst (2014a) describes,
the political question of who determines the structures of production and distribution and in
what ways is disregarded or downplayed, as though a great distribution machine – a neutral
‘distributor’ – could exist that only needs to be programmed correctly using the right ‘metric’
of justice. (pp. 18–19)
Such an approach would be problematic, Forst (2014a) explains, ‘because it would mean
that justice would no longer be seen as a political accomplishment of the subjects themselves
but would turn them into passive recipients of goods – but not of justice’ (p. 19).
Nussbaum (2011) and Sen (2009) acknowledge critiques of the capability approach
from a more process-oriented perspective. Comparing outcome- and process-oriented
approaches, Nussbaum (2011: 95–96) emphasizes the point that some capabilities
encompass the importance of ‘fair procedures’, including, for example, rights to political
participation. She argues that judicial and political processes have a role in implementing
capabilities (if not deciding them), and she acknowledges a need for the capability
approach ‘to think more systematically about political structure’(Nussbaum, 2011: 180).
However, without developing a more central connection between justice and democratic
deliberation, the danger is that democratic processes remain secondary and marginal,
such that ‘we end up’, as Anthony Simon Laden (2014) argues, ‘with a conception of
democracy as primarily a voting scheme, rather than a more full-blown form of collective
self-government’ (p. 106). As already noted, Sen (2009) places significant emphasis
Moss	 103
on deliberation and democracy. He discusses the importance of process as well as outcomes
and draws a distinction between ‘comprehensive outcomes’, which consider
‘actions undertaken, agencies involved, processes used, etc’, and ‘culmination outcomes’,
which refer to ‘simple outcomes in a way is detached from processes, agencies,
and relations’ (Sen, 2009: 215). But then, as Sen (2009) acknowledges, the concept of
capabilities is not well placed to deal with these questions:
Capability is, as I have tried to emphasize, only one aspect of freedom, related to substantive
opportunities, and it cannot pay adequate attention to fairness and equity involved in procedures
that have relevance to justice. While the idea of capability has considerable merit in the
assessment of the opportunity aspect of freedom, it cannot possibly deal adequately with the
process aspect of freedom. (p. 295)
Citing this passage, Forst (2014a: 30) urges Sen to go further towards a more processoriented
view of justice. The capability approach, he argues,
is not only incapable of generating an account of fairness by its own means, but it also needs to
accept the priority of the process aspects when it comes to the question of justice. For justice is
about who determines (and with what justification) the basic structure of society as well as its
institutional workings. (Forst, 2014a: 30)
To sum up this section, there are important political questions of justification advocates
of the capability approach must address to provide a firm normative foundation for critical
media research. Advocates of the approach must explain which capabilities media systems
should promote as entitlements and how these decisions are justified. Likewise, the
media structures that create capability deficits in the first place and those that are used to
address them raise important independent questions of justification. The capability
approach is not well placed to answer such questions in its own terms, since it tends to
focus on particular outcomes rather than on processes. In the next section, I will outline
the alternative process-oriented, discursive theory of justice Forst (2014a, 2014c) has
developed based on the principle of a ‘right to justification’. Forst’s theory is better able
to address the questions of justification raised by the capability approach I suggest, while
also providing the means to assess and defend the importance of particular capabilities.
Given that media are central to realizing people’s ‘right to justification’, Forst’s perspective
also provides a valuable alternative normative standpoint for critical media research.
The right to justification and justificatory equality
Justice, for Forst (2014a, 2014c), is closely related to power. In his view, people’s most
basic claims to justice do not come from a desire for more resources or the capabilities
they need to flourish but from a resistance to arbitrary power (Forst, 2014c: 2). When
people challenge illegitimate power, they demand that the decisions and structures that
shape their lives in politics and society more generally are adequately justified to them. In
so doing, they make a claim to a basic ‘right to justification’ (Forst, 2014c: 2). As Forst
(2014c: 2) defines it, ‘this right expresses the demand that there be no political and social
relations of governance that cannot be adequately justified to those affected by them’.
104	 Media, Culture & Society 40(1)
What does ‘adequate justification’require? Forst follows Habermas (1997) in emphasizing
the importance of public discourse. For any normative claim to be justified, Forst
argues that it must be accepted by all those affected, as determined through inclusive
discursive procedures. More specifically, he argues that ‘reciprocity’ and ‘generality’ are
the key criteria through which justifications are assessed in deliberative processes.
‘Reciprocity’, as he explains,
means that no one may refuse the particular demands of others that one raises for oneself
(reciprocity of content), and that no one may simply assume that others have the same values
and interests as oneself or make recourse to ‘higher truths’ that are not shared by others
(reciprocity of reasons). (Forst, 2014c: 6)
‘Generality’, meanwhile, ‘means that reasons for generally valid norms must be shareable
by all those affected’ (Forst, 2014c: 6). Forst builds his theory on the basis of this
particular conception of discursive justification alone, maintaining that all normative
claims must be assessed via the criteria of reciprocity and generality, as determined
through discourse involving all those affected.
If we accept the centrality of the right to justification, the normative priority must be
to enable people to participate in practices of justification on an equal basis with others,
so they are able to challenge illegitimate power.Achieving greater ‘justificatory equality’
(Forst, 2014c: 8) will mean securing appropriate processes and relations of justification
or what Forst (2014c: 6) calls a ‘basic structure of justification’. This will involve ‘specific
rights and institutions and a multiplicity of means and specific capabilities and
information, including real possibilities to intervene and exercise control within the basic
structure’ (Forst, 2014a: 36). Given the conditions required for justificatory equality are
substantial and not fully realized, Forst’s theory is potentially radical in its implications
for both critique and policy. However, these implications follow from the principle of
democratic justification and do not depend for their persuasiveness on any other objective
truths. The theory is ‘autonomous’, in the sense that it is based on the principle of
justification alone (Forst, 2014c: 7).
Once a basic structure of justification is established, Forst (2014a: 36–37) argues that
it is up to relevant publics in different political contexts to decide how resources should
be produced and distributed. The distribution of any resources not presupposed by the
basic structure of justification, including those related to media, will be subject to democratic
decision-making. Publics may reach different judgements about which goods
should be produced, how they are produced, and how they are distributed. Furthermore,
Forst (2014c: 175) does not assume that deliberation will necessarily result in consensus
and that all groups will be convinced that the best political outcomes have been reached.
As he notes, political decisions may reflect a ‘compromise’, where groups accept an
outcome because it balances conflicting interests but does not reconcile them (see
Habermas, 1997: 166). Political decisions may only be justified ‘indirectly’, where
groups disagree with an outcome but accept its legitimacy since the processes that generated
it are justified and there are effective opportunities to reopen the debate in future
(see McCarthy, 1996). These different possibilities underscore the same central point.
Securing people’s basic right to justification and ability to participate in practices of
justification on a more equal basis with others must be the first task.
Moss	 105
As already noted, since justificatory equality is far from being realized, Forst’s theory
is potentially far-reaching in its implications for critique. Relating his work to the
tradition of critical theory, Forst (2014a: 1–13) argues that his normative perspective
must be combined with critical social research. What he calls a ‘critique of relations of
justification’ would, among other things, identify ‘non-justifiable social and political
relations’ characterized by ‘exclusion, privilege, and domination’ (Forst, 2014a: 7), and
critique ‘“false” (potentially ideological) justifications’ that ‘represent non-justifiable
relations and structures as being justified’ (Forst, 2014a: 8). It would also work towards
establishing a ‘basic structure of justification’ and aim to account for ‘the failure or lack
of effective social and political structures of justification which would be tailored to
uncovering and transforming unjustified relations’ (Forst, 2014a: 8). Forst (2014a: 10)
describes how a ‘critique of relations of justification’ means focusing on power, and
in particular the ability to shape and influence the justificatory discourses available to
others. Referring to media directly, he describes how this ‘presupposes an analysis of
discursive positions of power in social space (positions, offices, authorities, media, etc.)
and in discursive space (hegemonic narratives of justification, counter-narratives, etc)’
(Forst, 2014a: 19).
While Forst does not develop these comments further himself, it is not difficult to
flesh out possible links between his approach and critical media research. As a substantial
literature on media and the public sphere demonstrates (see Lunt and Livingstone,
2013), media are clearly a crucial site of public discourse, where particular justificatory
relations are enacted and justificatory discourses circulate. Critical media research
informed by Forst’s theory of justice would focus on examining the extent to which
today’s media environment provides the conditions for justificatory equality, enabling
groups to contribute to practices of justification equally with others. Doing this will
mean considering the opportunities people have to represent themselves through media,
and also the way media organizations – as a crucial site of discursive power – represent
their interests and values. The latter question remains central, despite the possibilities of
‘mass self-communication’ (Castells, 2009). As Couldry (2012) notes,
self-communications do not stop mass media circulating, nor do they influence the degree to
which mass media are even-handed in their representation of the social world: nor, given the
difficulty of becoming visible online […] do they necessarily have any wider effect beyond the
momentary satisfaction of expression. (p. 203)
Drawing on Forst, we can identify a number of tasks for a ‘critique of mediated relations
of justification’.
A first task would be to evaluate the justificatory discourses media circulate. As Sen
(2009: 335–337) argues, media may help to ‘give voice to the neglected and disadvantaged’
and promote other important democratic capabilities. Yet critical media research
raises the concern that media also reproduce justifications that support (potentially
unjust) power relations. In a recent article, in this journal, Downey and Toynbee (2016)
suggest that Forst’s theory of justice can ground the renewal of ideology analysis in
media research, where ‘ideology critique becomes an analysis of the (unjust) ways in
which unreciprocal or unequal relationships between persons are justified’(p. 164). Such
106	 Media, Culture & Society 40(1)
ideological analysis cannot, as Forst (2014a: 8) emphasizes, result in ‘definitive answers’.
Researchers must accept the ultimate authority of discursive processes among those
affected. Nevertheless, media researchers may still question justifications using the criteria
of ‘reciprocity’ and ‘generality’, as Forst (2014a: 8) suggests, and raise concerns
that mediated relations of justification are structured in ways that dominant justifications
are reproduced without being adequately tested and confronted by alternative discourses
(see White, 2004, for an account of ideology along these lines).
Another task would be to explain what prevents more effective mediated relations of
justifications from emerging. Media researchers point to various structural factors that may
be relevant here, including a reliance on elite perspectives (Corner, 2014: 24–27), limited
funding directed towards quality independent journalism (Baker, 2002; Fenton, 2011;
Habermas, 2009: 131–137; McChesney, 2013: 172–215), the concentration of media ownership
(Noam and International Media Concentration Collaboration, 2015), the tendency
towards media fragmentation and personalization (Couldry and Turow, 2014; Mancini,
2013) and ongoing inequalities in media access and use (Murdock and Golding, 1989;
Robinson et al., 2015). Meanwhile, critical analyses of the media policymaking process
offer reasons why policies to address such issues may be difficult to achieve, by explaining
how the policymaking process – even in democratic contexts – can be weighted in favour
of the interests and values of particular groups (Freedman, 2008: 80–105; Hesmondhalgh,
2005). Importantly, Forst’s theory of justice can normatively ground these critiques of
media policymaking too, since it encourages us to focus on the quality not only of the relations
of justification produced through media but also of the relations of justification that
surround media and the need for them to be further democratized.
A final task for a critique of mediated relations of justification would be to consider
how media might contribute to enhancing justificatory equality in practice. Returning to
the concept of capabilities at this stage is useful. As the democratic theorist James
Bohman (1997: 326) argues, ideal procedural accounts of deliberative democracy often
lack an adequate conception of ‘political equality’, assuming that ‘citizens are similarly
situated or similarly capable of making use of their opportunities and resources’. He
argues that the capability approach’s more sophisticated understanding of ‘equality’ provides
a useful corrective (Bohman, 1997). Likewise, in media research, there is a need to
investigate not only the ‘opportunities and resources’ of justification the media environment
offers but also the complex factors that shape how different groups will relate to
these ‘opportunities and resources’ in practice and which will ultimately determine the
‘justificatory capabilities’ they have available to them (see Coleman and Moss, 2016;
Couldry et al., 2007; Dahlgren, 2009). But while the concept of capabilities helps in
considering what achieving justificatory equality requires, as Forst (2014a: 36) stresses
himself, it is Forst’s theory of justice that supplies the normative reasoning for prioritizing
capabilities related to justification in the first place. In addition, Forst reminds us that
policy interventions designed to achieve greater equality – and resulting media structures
and practices – must themselves be justified to the public. After all, as described above,
social justice is not something that can be handed down to citizens but something citizens
must determine and achieve for themselves (Forst, 2014a: 19).
These brief comments are meant only to be indicative and demonstrate links that
might be drawn between Forst’s theory of justice and media. More space would be
Moss	 107
required to consider Forst’s approach and its implications for critical media research and
policy in full. Important questions clearly remain. Not least, given the fundamental role
deliberative reasoning plays in Forst’s theory of justification, we need to reflect on what
this involves in practice, especially in view of concerns that particular forms of discourse
and reasoning can end up sustaining as well as challenging potentially unjust relations
of power (on this point, see the essays by Allen (2014) and Olsen (2014) and Forst’s
(2014b) reply). Nevertheless, on Forst’s account, a focus on how to improve the quality
of the relations of justification generated by media and the relations of justification that
surround these media must be the normative priorities. Indeed, if we accept the ‘right to
justification’ as a guiding normative principle, both these tasks of critical media research
become central to achieving justice more generally.
Concluding comments
The application of the capability approach to media has helped to stimulate debate
about the normative perspectives that underpin media research and how media relate to
social equality and justice. Following media theorists who have advocated the approach
(Cohen, 2012; Couldry, 2007, 2012; Garnham, 1997; Hesmondhalgh, 2017; Mansell,
2002), I have argued that the concept of capabilities captures important aspects of the
relationship between media and equality and has advantages over other ways of thinking
about this relationship, such as media-related preferences, media access and actual
media practices and uses. However, the application of the approach also raises important
political questions about power and process that are central to justice and which the
capability approach is not well placed to answer in its own terms. The process-oriented,
discursive theory of justice developed by Forst (2014a, 2014c) addresses such questions
through its emphasis on the ‘right to justification’ and ‘justificatory equality’. His theory
of justice provides a means to assess the importance of particular capabilities and provides
a valuable alternative normative standpoint for critical media analysis. More than
that, given that media must be central to achieving greater justificatory equality, Forst’s
theory of justice places critical media research at the centre of struggles to realize social
justice.
Acknowledgements
I would like to express my thanks to John Corner, Nick Couldry, David Hesmondhalgh, and the
anonymous reviewers for their comments on earlier drafts of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this
article.
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