La banalización de la política. La televisión y los nuevos medios contra la virtud cívica

Studies on political participation, republicanism and participative democracy are on the increase. Partly, this is a consequence of the much potential that new technologies offer in order to promote political participation. Nevertheless, the studies in this field are focused on stressing the goodness of participation, leaving two important things aside. On one hand, researches in the field of Political Communication mark out the concept of political participation, and do not attend –because it is not their ambit of study- to the redefinition of the concepts of politics and the political. On the other hand, analysis in the field of Political Theory leave aside one question that, by definition, stay on the sidelines of their subject of study, but which is essential in order to understand the phenomena which is causing the connections between politics and new technologies: the form that politics is acquiring in the new public sphere, which includes the new communication media. Participative democracy emphasizes the promotion of participation and, in consequence, the development of civic virtue. The question is, ¿what should we understand by civic virtue in a media society? And, ¿in which way is the idea of politics influenced by the new media and the sense that communication is acquiring? These are the main questions that this paper tries to answer