Katz Colloquia: Margot Susca, American University

"The News Media Plutocracy: Concentrated Ownership, Financial Power, and America’s Democratic Crisis"

About the Talk

The American news media system is characterized by increasingly concentrated ownership and investment among some of the world’s wealthiest individuals, corporations, and asset-management firms. At the same time, the United States has experienced a significant deterioration in press freedom. Reporters Without Borders ranked the United States 64th out of 180 countries in its most recent World Press Freedom Index, reflecting a substantial decline from previous years. The organization attributed this deterioration, in part, to intensified political pressure on the press during Donald Trump’s return to the presidency.

This talk examines the relationship between these developments by situating contemporary American journalism within the broader political economy of media landscape. Susca introduces the concept of The News Media Plutocracy to describe this emerging configuration of concentrated wealth and media power.

Please register before October 1

About the Speaker

Margot Susca is associate professor of journalism, accountability, and democracy at American University in Washington, D.C. She combines investigative reporting techniques with critical political-economy methods to examine media ownership and its implications for democracy. Dr. Susca is a recognized expert on the growing influence of private equity and hedge funds in the news marketplace, and her work and commentary have been featured in dozens of articles in outlets around the world.

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Her first book, "Hedged: How Private Investment Funds Helped Destroy American Newspapers and Undermine Democracy," received the Frank Luther Mott/Kappa Tau Alpha Research Award, which annually honors the best research-based book on journalism or mass communication. Dr. Susca’s second book is under contract with the University of Massachusetts Press. In 2022, she received American University’s Outstanding Teaching Award, presented annually to a full-time, tenure-line faculty member.

For more than a decade, Dr. Susca has served as associate editor at the Investigative Reporting Workshop, an independent, nonprofit center at American University dedicated to training and mentoring investigative journalists. Dr. Susca was a newspaper reporter in Connecticut and Florida before earning her doctorate.

Lunch will be provided to attendees