The strengthening of a media-critical perspective is particularly necessary when problematic dimensions of conceptualizations and practices of digitization are becoming increasingly clear in the context of economic and political interests. Digital capitalism, as data and surveillance capitalism, corresponds with a large-scale expropriation and exploitation of personal data profiles. It functionalizes lifeworlds and places of education to an unprecedented extent. In view of an increasing influence of the IT economy on educational fields, it is important to take a closer look at structures of digital capitalism and strategies of the 'Global Education Industry' (GEI). The aim is to identify connections between technological, economic, socialisational and socio-cultural-political developments. This theoretical effort is necessary as to enable media education to further develop its goals and concepts in dealing with these new challenges and also to sharpen its profile in terms of educational and professional policy.

- Which economic and social models of the future are associated with different versions of digital capitalism?

- How do the structural principles of digital capitalism influence socialization agents, like parents, schools, media, and peers?

- To what extent are the interests of a digital capitalist economy expressed in educational policy support programs for digitization in pedagogical fields of action (at EU- and country-related levels)? What strategies exist on the part of the IT industry to occupy public educational spaces?

- To what extent do existing social inequalities and educational injustices intensify under the conditions of digital capitalism?

- Which goals and tasks of critical media education are important to strengthen democratic and sustainable development paths in media development, in the use and design of digital media?

- With which strategic partners in different social areas (also in the economy!) should media education cooperate more to support democratic and sustainable development paths in the field of media?

A main challenge which underlines all contributions is a differentiated take on media education in the era of digitization aiming at alternatives to widespread misleading rhetoric of “digital education” and at non-reductionist perspectives beyond techno-centric takes on education with, through and against digital media. As for critical perspectives, a comprehensive edited collection of approaches to media critique in the digital age has been published recently (Niesyto & Moser 2018) including a chapter by Buckingham (2018) that is available in English, too, and that has been further elaborated recently (Buckingham 2019).

The symposium will address selected aspects along the outlined questions from theoretical and empirical perspectives with contributions from Austria, Germany, Norway and Scotland.

Buckingham, D. (2018): Going Critical: Zu den Problemen und der Notwendigkeit von Medienkritik. In: Niesyto, H. & Moser, H. (Eds.): Medienkritik im digitalen Zeitalter. München: Kopaed, pp. 45-58 (English version available online: https://davidbuckingham.net/2018/07/18/going-critical/). Buckingham, D. (2019): The Media Education Manifesto. Cambridge: Polity Press. Niesyto, H. & Moser, H. (Eds.) (2018): Medienkritik im digitalen Zeitalter [Media Critique in the Digital Age]. München: Kopaed (abstracts in English: https://kopaed.de/dateien/Abstracts%20(english).pdf). Niesyto, H. (2017): Medienpädagogik und digitaler Kapitalismus. Für die Stärkung einer gesellschafts- und medienkritischen Perspektive. In: MedienPädagogik, Heft 27 (2017), 1-29, http://www.medienpaed.com/article/view/435. Schiller, D. (1999): Digital Capitalism. Networking the Global Market System. Cambridge/MA: MIT Press. Selwyn, N.l; Hillman, T.; Eynon, R.; Ferreira, G.; Knox, J.; Macgilchrist, F. & Sancho-Gil, J.M. (2019): What’s next for Ed-Tech? Critical hopes and concerns for the 2020s, Learning, Media and Technology, https://doi.org/10.1080/17439884.2020.1694945. Staab, P. (2019): Digitaler Kapitalismus. Berlin: Suhrkamp. Verger, A.; Steiner-Khamsi, G. & Lubienski, C. (2016): World Yearbook of Education 2016. The Global Education Industry. New York: Routledge. Verger, A.; Steiner-Khamsi, G. & Lubienski, C. (2017): The emerging global education industry: analysing market-making in education through market sociology, in: Globalisation, Societies and Education, 15:3, 325-340, DOI: 10.1080/14767724.2017.1330141. Zuboff, S. (2019): The Age of Surveillance Capitalism New York: Public Affairs.