Abstract The basis of this study is to establish whether news on HIV/AIDS treatment issues is dominated by non-expert and activist sources as opposed to state or government and expert sources. It also seeks to determine if there is a growing use of the alternative or non-official sources in the reporting of this issue in the selected South African Press (The Star and The Sowetan). In reference to the concept of ‘primary definition’ by Hall (1978) and his colleagues, official sources have automatically been assumed to be the dominant sources as regards usage by journalists or reporters and have as a result been expected to be the definers of news agendas. However, this concept has been criticised by Schlesinger (1990), who argues that non-official/activist sources may have more power to define media topics than has been implied in the past. This study therefore has examined whether such a trend may be shifting to pave way for the increased use of alternative sources as well. The findings of this report have proved that while official sources continue to be used in dominance as sources, there is undoubtedly a large use of non-official sources as key sources as well. This is a challenge to Hall’s (1978) concept that in its rigid nature fails to accommodate such a notion. It is however in concurrence with Schlesinger’s (1990) views that recognise the fact that non-official/alternative sources cannot be underestimated in terms of their power to define news agendas. Further, in an attempt to explain why and how these non-official sources have succeeded in achieving media attention, the study has also examined some media strategies that have been put in place by various source organisations. It has also proposes a more nuance model of the ‘theory of dominance’ that gives a provision for the ability of sources to be dynamic because of various factors.

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This thesis discusses the development of the Czech media market after 1989 in context of political economy of the media. Its author observes the main trends in development of the commercial media market - especially print media market - in the Czech Republic and abroad, as these trends had a crucial influence on the development of Czech media after disruption of the Soviet Bloc and when the democratic and market environment has been established. Besides that, the work searches for the particular economic aspects of the media market defined by the leading critics in the media research sphere and, at the same time it tries to apply them on the Czech print media market. All of these findings are summarized into hypothesis at the last chapter, which are tested by quantitative media content analysis and columns and supplements analysis on the sample of Czech dailies. The results confirm the aspects of this influence and brings a new subjects to the further research which could describe a particular examples of influence of commercial sphere on media more in depth. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

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