This course examines the relationships between media, power, and democracy in contemporary political life. It focuses on a number of important themes, including theories of media effects, the construction of political news, election campaigning, government communications and spin, media and the policy process, the rise of digital media, the globalisation of media, agenda setting, and propaganda and the role of media in foreign policy and military intervention. The overarching rationale is that we are living through an era of tumultuous change in how politics is conducted and communicated. The great digital disruption of the early twenty-first century continues to work its way through media systems around the world, forcing change, adaptation, and renewal across a whole range of areas: political parties and campaigns, interest groups, social movements, activist organisations, news and journalism, the communication industries, governments, and international relations. Our approach will be comparative and international.