Integration-Related Remit and Functions of Public Service Media

Are public service media legally obliged to create social cohesion? And how is the integration-related performance of these media perceived?

Public service media play a pivotal role in the German media system as well as in the media repertoires of the population. In recent years, however, the debate about their mission and scope of services has intensified, especially with respect to their relevance in digital media environments.

This interdisciplinary project wants to combine a legal and regulatory science perspective with a communication science perspective within the framework of the Research Institute Social Cohesion RISC (Forschungsinstitut gesellschaftlicher Zusammenhalt FGZ). Based on this, it will address the following research questions:

  1. What does the public service media remit to create social cohesion look like from from (constitutional) law?
  2. And how do social subgroups perceive the performance of services of public service media in this respect?#

To the project description on the website of RISC

Photo by Todd Gardner on Unsplash

Project Details

Overview

Project start: 2020; Project end: 2024

Programme Area: Program Area 1 Social Functions of Communication and Media

Research Group: Transformation of Journalism and the Public Sphere

Co-operation partners

  • Research institutes within the Research Institute Social Cohesion

Contact information

PD Dr. Jan-Hinrik Schmidt

PD Dr. Jan-Hinrik Schmidt

Head of Programm Area 1

Leibniz Institute for Media Research | Hans-Bredow-Institut
Warburgstraße 30b
20354 Hamburg

Similar projects & publications

Zwei Jugendliche, zu sehen von hinten oben, sitzen auf einer Mauer und blicken auf ein Handy
New DFG Research Project

Safeguarding Epistemic Trust in Adolescents: Conceptual Approaches and Policy Options

The interdisciplinary DFG project, “SETA: Protecting the Epistemic Trust of Adolescents: Conceptual Approaches and Policy Options,” conducted in collaboration with the Weizenbaum Institute, examines the state’s obligation to protect the epistemic trust of 13- to 17-year-olds without infringing on freedom of expression and information.

Cover des Arbeitspapiers Reuters-Bericht 2021
Report for Download

Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2021

The Reuters Institute Digital News Report, which provides an international comparison of news consumption, is being published for the tenth consecutive year.

Cover der Zeitschrift der Leibniz Gemeinschaft - Ausgabe 2/2026 zum Thema "Medizin"
Click Consultation

Consultation with Dr. Insta

The latest issue of the Leibniz Association’s magazine, which is part of the Science Year 2026, focuses on the topic of “Medicine.” Claudia Lampert, head of the Health Communication research group at the HBI, is interviewed about health influencers.

Cover
Open Access Publication

German Public Broadcasting Corporations in the Age of Streaming Platforms and AI

In her Friedrich Ebert Foundation publication project, Magdalena Stratmann describes how public service broadcasting in Germany addresses the challenge of fulfilling its legal mandate amid drastically changed conditions in the digital information ecosystem.

Cover der Studie
Recently Published!

Exploring GPT Representation of Journalistic Culture

The study by Prof. Dr. Wiebke Loosen et al. examines how large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT can reflect journalistic value systems. To this end, the GPT-4o model was asked to answer questions from the “Worlds of Journalism Study,” which explores perceptions of journalistic roles, theories of knowledge, and ethical principles.

Historische Aufnahme des hr-Funkhauses am Dornbusch aus den 50ern
Media History Project

The History of the Regional Public Broadcasting Corporation of the Federal State of Hesse in the Postwar Period

In January 2029, the Regional Public Broadcasting Corporation of the Federal State of Hesse (Hessischer Rundfunk) will celebrate its 80th anniversary. To mark the occasion, Dr. Hans-Ulrich Wagner is conducting scholarly research on its origins. His research focuses specifically on corporate history, personnel decisions, and programming policy in the postwar period.

Cover Arbeitspapier Nr. 84
Brief Report in English

Babies and Toddlers in Monetised Social Media Profiles

Stephan Dreyer, Claudia Lampert, and Kira Thiel published an English summary of their study on babies and toddlers in family-influencing content. They present their findings on how babies and toddlers (ages 0–5) are depicted in German-language, commercially oriented social media profiles on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.

Cover der Zeitschrift KIR
Published on Beck-online

Freedom of Expression in the Age of AI

In their article in a journal on artificial intelligence and law, Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schulz and Moritz Wiechert analyze the first German case law on automatically generated content. In doing so, they highlight the fundamental challenges facing traditional freedom of expression law in the age of AI.

Cover der Publikation "Avoiding the News But Still Feeling Connected? The Role of News Use and Avoidance Practices in Different Public Connection Repertoires"
Recently Published!

Avoiding the News But Still Feeling Connected?

How are different forms of news avoidance related to various types of individual public connection? The article by Julia Behre, Lisa Merten, and Uwe Hasebrink suggests that avoiding the news does not necessarily mean turning away from public life.

Cover Organizational Research Methods Journal
Open Access Publication!

Argument Mining for Organizational Research

How do organizations justify their decisions, establish legitimacy, and engage with their environment through communication? This article introduces aspect-based argument mining (ABAM) as a new method for answering these questions. ABAM can identify patterns of argumentation in large text corpora, such as the Twitter debate on nuclear energy in Germany.

1 2 3 … 35

Page 1 from 35

Newsletter

Information about current projects, events and publications of the institute.

Subscribe now