mediadiscourse

DEMOCRATIZING GLOBAL MEDIA
Generating a Discourse

1. MEDIA & DEMOCRACY
what is the role of (mainstream contemporary) media in a ‘real’ free &
democratic society?

Edward Herman
It should entertain, amuse and enlighten – and as regards enlightenment, it should fill what is called the ‘public sphere’ in which the issues important in a democratic society are debated and discussed and information is provided relevant to those debates and issues. This makes for informed citizenship, essential to a genuine democracy.

Michael Albert
Supposing in a good society ... media would entertain, inspire, educate, inform, provide a vehicle for developing and sharing ideas and agendas – for everyone. In other words, it would do pretty much what people say media is supposed to do now.

Good future media would do these things compatibly with the operations of other central structures of a good future society. As a result, good media, like other good undertakings in a good society, would be structured in accord with solidarity among actors, equitable distribution of income and circumstances, diversity of options and undertakings, and participatory self management for both those producing and those consuming the media's information.

Good media would have, as additional media-specific values, honesty, relevance, quality, the presentation of diverse views and provision of diverse channels and modes of communication available to all, especially dissenters – all of which highlight the problem that we endure now, of course. Because now the key defining structures of societies are antithetical to entertaining, inspiring, educating, informing, and providing means for developing shared ideas and agendas for everyone – other than in the limited sense of doing these things consistently with reproducing elite class, political, gender, and racial advantages. With current media, the worthy aims that we advocate are swamped by unworthy aims that maintain our subordination. Thus, mainstream media nowadays deliver honesty, relevance, diversity, access, and aesthetic quality only within the constraint of first serving elite, corporate, political, and other interests. In the future it would provide honest information and uplifting entertainment instead as a first priority, against and undermining any elite interests that might exist.

Stephen Fein
In a free society, the media should offer the broadest possible spectrum of information and opinion and allow individuals to choose what they wish to see, hear and read. In a democratic society the media should help its citizens become better informed. In a free and democratic society the media should do both.

Chavi Nana
The primary role of the media in a democratic society should be to provide a channel through which views, both of the majority and the minority, can be expressed. Especially given the fact that the majority of democracies are too large to facilitate direct democracy, the media should present a forum in which multiple opinions are courted, represented, and in which discussion is encouraged.

Janet Weil
“Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”
Article 19, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

As I sit down to write my responses to the questions on “Democratizing Global Media” at my computer in California, I am uncomfortably aware of the severe lack of equality and reciprocity in the media (and political) relations between the U.S. and Pakistan. My country is not flooded with Pakistani media messages that seek to change, abruptly and permanently, cultural practices such as care of the elderly, relations between adult children and their parents, and courteous behavior of youth – messages that I might well agree with! My nightly national newscast does not start with statements by Pakistani leaders or careful analysis of decisions taken by the government of Pakistan; but the reverse may well be true of news of the United States in Pakistan. What is the picture of Pakistan to the average television viewer in the United States – and to me?

So … here we are, brainwashed or at least confused and distracted by the global media “thwarting any meaningful reflection on blatant injustices … and selling seductive fantasies …” Media grow out of, reflect and perpetuate the already existing, highly inequitable structures. What to do, where to begin in the face of systems of mostly corporate-controlled, highly undemocratic, world-altering media?

I have grave doubts that global media can ever be ‘democratized’ – that is, produced in some form of economic democracy and expressing the views of, and meeting genuine needs of, all its ‘consumers’. That ideal can be approximated in locally or regionally controlled media, perhaps. However, I do not feel at all hopeless; to engage in this discourse is already to begin to, in Chomsky’s words, “discover what [I and others] think and believe in, to engage in interaction …”

Javed Jabbar
The very nature of media is to be selective, to be suppressive and to be subjective and that focuses attention on the five paradoxes of media, on which I have written extensively. Firstly, the function of media being to delineate reality has unfortunately moved from delineation to distortion because distortion is in-built into the very nature of media. Therefore, media, in any ongoing situation in a society, should strive to minimize that inherent tendency to distort by being unable to represent the totality of a given situation. We assume that media portray reality, say independent, balanced, fair media doing a fair job of representing reality, which actually they don’t because it is not possible for media to be comprehensively accurate. But obviously we cannot do without media; we need media so that somebody sitting in Timbuktu gets to know what’s happening in the Sindh Education Foundation. So, what should media do? I think, first and foremost, reduce this natural tendency towards distortion and suppression or selection.

Wasif Rizvi
All these terms are misinterpreted and misrepresented very frequently. Free democratic society is a very loaded term; it has been described within a particular framework, which in itself is highly questionable. Very simply a free democratic society should mean that people are allowed to participate in decision-making. They are a part of decision-making, in small socio economic decisions about their lives at a grassroots community level.

Unfortunately none of these frameworks in so-called formal situations exists. Numerous anthropological studies have shown that these frameworks did exist, do exist but in small isolated and what is normally labeled as backward or primitive societies. The studies have shown us that in pre-modern time and even during contemporary times there have been fairly significant and sizeable societies in which such frameworks existed where common people were allowed very significant roles in decision making which influence the entire community.

In the modern frameworks, however, such possibilities do not exist. Therefore, the so-called free democratic societies basically consist of small high interest setups in which the power - almost the entire power of decision-making is concentrated. In so-called free enterprise societies where we see a lot of private control which can also be called as money control or interest.

So if the question does not have a connotation of what we normally imply by the free democratic society only then we can move into the ideal role of media. I think it's important to understand that the moment we attach terms like free government or democracy, they come with a very heavy burden of predetermined frameworks, which have nothing to do with freedom or democracy. As a matter of fact, some writers have coined the term corporate oligopoly in which private business controls the vast sectors of decision making, those sectors include, what we call, the media agencies and then obviously their role is then limited to promoting, cementing, advancing the powers of their owners and majority share holders.

Ideally though, if you have a framework of people participating in their own decision-making then media has an important role of examining, reflecting and raising awareness regarding those decisions. Media should then have frameworks in which people are allowed to come and participate freely and have their points of views, with their real interest highlighted.

The other important role that it has is giving exposure and expression to a lot of cultural and social phenomenon i.e. engaging arts and cultural expressions and literature for all these societies in which it is functioning democratically.

Good media therefore has a multi-pronged function but essentially staying within the framework of grassroots decision making and democracies and participating in it as a tool for information exchange of awareness, providing reflective platforms for people to come and express and engage in various forms of cultural expressions.

Shilpa Jain
I am highly critical of any role a centralized, mass media would play in a democratic society. First, we would need to understand what a democratic society is and what it means to be ‘free’? Unfortunately, the primary examples of a ‘functioning, well-run democracy’ leave much to be desired. Given corporations’ and international agencies’ near-total control over policymaking decisions, extremely skewed legislative representation (where one needs to be a millionaire or lakhpati to contest elections), and low voter turnout (barely 40%), we must seriously consider whether ‘democracy’ exists in these countries – or anywhere in the world.

We can try and envision a free and democratic society: a network of small, interconnected and interdependent societies, where power and decision-making would be dynamic and mobile, never concentrated in a few hands, never in a central place. Where individuals and collectives would continuously work to determine how they want to live, their relationships with each other and with nature. In such a context, media – of any and all forms – would be there to nurture critical thinking and creativity, to ensure a diversity of ideas and values, to offer spaces for dialogue and dissent.

But media (television, film, newspapers, textbooks, etc.), as it currently exists, cannot play this role. Built into its functioning is a near-total reliance on elite power interests – for management, financial backing, technological know-how, and therefore, for conceptual control. In other words, what we ‘know’ about the world is largely a function of what we are told: the sensationalistic and superficial analysis we get from this monopolized media. It succeeds in diverting public attention away from key issues, root causes, systemic factors, our roles and responsibilities – indeed, everything that is critical for nurturing a democratic society. Instead, the world over, the middle class is kept busy with soap operas, music videos, superficial news, talk shows and sports. The media – in its awesome technological grandeur – remains at a great distance from our everyday lives and experiences. The isolation, passivity, narrow thinking, etc. bred by media guarantees that people rarely reflect on why their families, communities, societies, are facing deep crises and what they can do about it?

Thus, despite all the rhetoric of being the ‘watchdog of society’, the mainstream media mainly exists to reinforce the dominant will of the elite. How could it be otherwise, when the media is largely owned and operated by a handful of conglomerates, who have their own interests in profit-making via consumerism and control over resources? For these reasons (and more), today’s media cannot play the role needed in ‘free’ and ‘democratic’ societies: for encouraging and facilitating creative expression, lively and dynamic dialogue, and personal and social responsibility.