The paper’s perspective is based on a theoretical framework by the German sociologist and philosopher Jürgen Habermas (1962; 1996a) who has argued for the normative significance of democracy and the public sphere. The media are considered a vehicle for a public sphere. However, the media are not only net-contributors to a democratic debate, but also to its exclusion of certain voices and perspectives. A democratic perspective focuses on formal and de facto access to and participation in the public media: who are included and who are excluded and whose points of views are (re)presented? In very broad terms, the democratic role of the media has been understood as a forum for a society’s collective dialogue with and about itself (Keane 1991). Dahlgren (2009) frames one debate on media and democracy as television, popular culture and civic culture with a specific focus on television as a space for civic cultures. The paper contributes to a debate on gender, democracy and civic engagement by means of looking at theories on media and democracy. The paper’s empirical data describes the news sources of two Danish news programs in terms of gender and majority Dane / minority ethnicity in relation to different types of news sources (journalists, politicians, bureaucrats, spokespersons from NGO etc.).
