INFO SOCIETY SUMMIT TO AVOID ISSUE OF MEDIA

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LONDON, Nov 30 2003 (IPS) - The conspicuous absence of any real reference to today\’s media in the draft Declaration or Action Plan of the upcoming World Summit on the Information Society is indicative of the power and impact of the media, writes Seán Ó Siochrú, a founder and spokesperson for the CRIS campaign (Communication Rights in the Information Society) and author of \’\’Global Media Governance: A Beginners Guide\’\'(2002). The features of today\’s media landscape were not predetermined by the nature of new technologies nor by globalisation per se but rather by the systematic application of market principles to media across the globe, the author writes in this analysis. In few places was this force local. Rather, the strategy was pursued by a handful of Northern corporations, strongly backed by their governments, who tailored global governance mechanisms to suit their needs and persuaded national regimes to adopt their ways. The CRIS campaign along with others in civil society have taken up the challenge to broach the issue of the media and its impact at their parallel summit, the World Forum on Communication Rights, which will take place at the same time as the WSIS and focus on issues such as poverty and the media, peace, conflict and communication rights. A people\’s movement is gradually rising to the challenge of initiating this change, on local, national and global levels, and turning our concerns into concrete action.

As the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) is about to get under the way, the conspicuous absence of any real reference to today’s media in the Summit’s draft Declaration or Action Plan is indicative of the power and impact of the media. The Summit will take place in Geneva on 11 December.

The revolution in media and communication in the last decades is plain for all to see: more variety, more colour, more choice, and a proliferation of television and radio throughout the world. The (at least partial) eclipse of the repressive state brought welcome relief to many from dull, unbelievable media, and opened the door to the gloss of international fare and formats endorsing a global vision of freedom and plenty. Media have multiplied, choice for some has became apparently limitless.

The features of this new media landscape were not predetermined by the nature of new technologies nor by globalisation per se, though these were prerequisites. Its defining characteristics come from the force impelling it forward: the systematic application of market principles to media across the globe.

In few places was this force local. Rather, the strategy was pursued by a handful of Northern corporations, strongly backed by their governments, who tailored global governance mechanisms to suit their needs and persuaded national regimes to adopt their ways. Many reluctant governments – some fearful of losing control, others sincerely concerned about the social and cultural impact – could do little but yield to (and sometimes make deals with) the new reality of satellite television, the Trojan horse of the media revolution.

But the inner logic of the new paradigm is now revealing itself

Gradually, but steadily, everything is beginning to look the same again. Despite the multiplicity of channels, a uniformity of spirit is evident, as if shaped by the one invisible architect. In news and current affairs, in entertainment and education, the same process is happening. Although the fear of being swamped by global output was only partially realised, most media, whether local or international, share a key feature : their aim ultimately is to enrich their owners. More and more, media’s sole goal is to generate profits for shareholders, and such motivational uniformity is homogenising content and format in a number of ways.

First, generating profits is achieved largely through maximising advertising revenues, and advertisers are interested only in those with money to spend. Hence the media focus inordinately on them. Second, maximising profits means reducing costs, and news and current affairs are far more expensive than format-driven ‘lifestyle’ journalism, and imported programming is far cheaper than producing your own. Third, as private corporations, media themselves have specific social and economic sectoral interests that firmly align them with other actors in the private sector.

As the market prevails over more and more media, subtle but telling pressure is exerted on journalistic principles and the creative spirit. Laws safeguarding freedom of expression are ineffectual against these tendencies. News turns to more saleable ‘infotainment’, current affairs and criticism skim the surface with clich‚s, drama and entertainment become formulaic, content emerges from a single mould, while diversity is nothing more than multiple imitations of new fads and formats.

These developments really do matter.

What sets media apart from most other economic sectors is their central role in the politics, identity, and culture of society. A healthy media sector is a vital component of a vibrant democracy, the main means by which people learn about the issues, develop their ideas, understand and inform political decisions. Excessive media control by any section of society undermines the capacity for informed political debate and hence democracy itself. Furthermore, with the gradual dissolution of community and family life, media are becoming the main source of individual and collective identity formation, especially among young people. Linked to this, media play an ever greater role in cultural formation and reproduction. Media that incessantly and exclusively peddle an individualist and consumerist worldview run the risk of destabilising a shared sense of community, threaten cultural diversity and vitality, and indeed do little to dissuade us from impending environmental disaster.

Media’s unique role in democracy lies behind perhaps the most worrying trend of all: the emergence of unholy alliances between governments of very different hues and corporate media. This is not the traditional government-cheerleading corporate media of the US, the home of the market model. Rather, it is the intimate relationship between the UK’s Labour government and Rupert Murdoch’s media empire. It is the direct ownership ties between politicians and the media, as in Silvio Burlusconi’s Italy and Thaksin Shinawatra’s Thailand. It is the commercial media’s alliance with economic and political interests to topple the elected government of Venezuela.

The implications of these cases and others are enormous. Increasingly there is the potential for commercial media to consolidate its grip on political life by wringing regulatory and other concessions from government that enable them to grow ever more powerful, leaving a handful of media owners with unprecedented and unaccountable political power.

In the past, the biggest threat to media freedom was the state. Now there is another, even greater threat : the control of media by corporate interests and the absolute subjugation of media to the imperatives of profit.

So what can be done? How do we build on people’s intuition that more is not always better?

We must begin from the idea that if a diversity of social interests own and control media, if they are driven by a variety of underlying goals, and if they derive income from many sources, then we are more likely to see media that reflect and pursue the interests of all sectors of society, and indeed of society a whole.

The growing concentration of media ownership, nationally and globally, must be reversed. Almost everywhere, laws enacted for the express purpose of limiting how many media outlets can be owned by one corporation are under attack. So are legal limits to ownership across various media and measures to ensure some degree of local ownership. Instead, these must be reinforced, and a global dimension added.

More importantly, we must design and build an environment for multiple types of media to flourish: public service media, fully independent of the government; community-owned media with the sole goal of serving communities of geography and interest, from local to global levels; non-profit trusts and foundations with public interest goals; as well as commercial media. Funding sources, always beyond the manipulation of government, must be made available and augmented to support different media, perhaps based on the public commons that media utilise : the radio spectrum, satellite orbits, the public rights of way. A global dimension here, funded again through public commons, is also vital to ensure that poorer countries and communities can afford diverse media structures.

People, and their associations, are becoming increasingly aware of what is wrong with their media and of their own ability to create an environment supportive of diverse, quality media, motivated by the desire to preserve and extend democracy, freedom, and creativity. Accordingly the CRIS campaign along with others in civil society have taken up the challenge to broach the issue of the media and its impact at their parallel summit, the World Forum on Communication Rights, which will take place at the same time as the WSIS and focus on issues such as poverty and the media, peace, conflict and communication rights, ringing alarm bells throughout the corridors of the WSIS. A people’s movement is gradually rising to the challenge of initiating this change, on local, national and global levels, mobilising growing public sentiment, and turning our concerns and fears into concrete action. (END/COPYRIGHT IPS)