Can the Press Be an Actor in International Relations? Towards a Theory of Media Agency in Conflict Settings.

Can the press become an actor in International Relations rather than merely an observer of them? IR theory has long overlooked the press as an autonomous participant in the international system. While non-governmental organizations, multinational corporations, and international institutions are routinely analyzed as non-state actors, media organizations tend to appear only as background conditions shaping diplomacy rather than agents within it.

If diplomacy involves struggles over legitimacy, visibility, and influence across borders, what happens when institutions capable of shaping public narratives enter that arena? This talk proposes a conceptual shift by introducing the Media–Diplomatic Triangulation Framework, a theoretical model that identifies the conditions under which a media institution moves from reporting international events to actively intervening in them.

Speaker: Teresa Martín | PhD Candidate in International Relations Complutense University of Madrid: Department of International Relations and Global History

Harvard University: The Committee on Ethnicity, Migration, Rights