Media, Culture & Society 2015, Vol. 37(1) 134–143 © The Author(s) 2014 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0163443714553563 mcs.sagepub.com The press in Catalonia: between the digital challenge and nation building Emili Prado Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Spain Abstract This article discusses the challenges facing the Catalan press in a context marked by the digitization and by a political process that demands independence. The media landscape in Catalonia is populated by media produced at Spanish level and at Catalan level, and this applies to the press, radio and television. Mainstream paid-for newspapers, available to the citizens of Catalonia produced at a national, regional, local or state level, whether written in Catalan or Spanish merit discussion. This kind of press is the most influential in the shaping of Catalonian public opinion and therefore plays a central role in the political debate on independence. In this context, newspapers in Catalonia are facing the crisis of the print-only business model and falling revenues from a declining readership base and the subsequent fall of advertising revenue. To face this problem, newspaper publishers are throwing themselves into digital strategies (web, tablet, mobile phones). Keywords Catalonia, cultural identity, media, nation building, online strategies, press Introduction Catalonia is a European stateless nation, which nowadays is integrated into the Kingdom of Spain, having the political status of an Autonomous Community with a House of Representatives (the Catalan Parliament) and a Government (the Government of Catalonia). After the dictatorship of General Franco, established in Spain from the end of the Civil War (1939) to the democratic transition, which started with the dicta- tor’s death in 1975 and was completed with the approval of the Spanish Constitution Corresponding author: Emili Prado, Department de Comunicació Audiovisual i Publicitat, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Catalonia, 08193 Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain. Email: Emili.Prado@uab.cat 553563MCS 0 0 10.1177/0163443714553563Media, Culture & SocietyPrado research-article 2014 Crosscurrents Special Issue: Small Nations, the Press and the Digital Challenge by guest on October 30, 2016 mcs.sagepub.com Downloaded from