Political Significance of Recognition Via Mass Media–An Illustration from the Berlin Blockade.

It has long been observed by social scientists and, more intuitively, by those who are concerned with the practical politics of public opinion, that one function of the mass media is to confer recognition on individuals or groups. Public recognition, in turn, when it comes from a "significant other" or an important reference group, may exercise an influence on the opinions and behavior of those who receive it. The purpose of this paper is to examine the role that recognition, as expressed through the mass media, played by influencing politically-significant behavior in one crisis situation—the Berlin blockade of 1948-49. Following the end of the Second World War, the city of Berlin in Germany was divided into four sectors, each of which was occupied by one of the four major powers. A full blockade of the land and water routes leading to the sectors occupied by the Western Allies was imposed by the Soviet Union in June 1948. Moscow's objective in doing this was apparently either to force the United States, Great Britain, and France to relinquish their position in Berlin, or else to obtain major concessions from them in West Germany.