Download file 182 KB Texto completo en español More of: Eugenio Tironi Guillermo Sunkel

This article examines the roles played by the mass media in restoring democracy in Chile and then the actual process of democratic consolidation. Unlike the more traditional views that have tended to prevail in the political debate and in communications research, it is held that political variables alone do not account appropriately for the happenings in the media system during the authoritarianism nor its participation in the democratization process. It is argued that endogenous factors related to an internal modernization of the communications media system, in the context of an expanding open market economy, are key to understanding its evolution and its impact on the democratic transition and consolidation.