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CIAO DATE: 04/05/07
Introduction
by John Walcott
At the same time as the American news media, already suffering from a series of self-inflicted wounds, confront a sobering array of economic, technological, and even intellectual challenges, the notion of a free, aggressive, and independent media has begun to put down roots in what heretofore had been stony soil.M
That is a hopeful sign in a world that seems sadly in need of one. A free public square—literal, metaphorical, or virtual— where information, ideas, and opinions can be freely presented, tested, and challenged, is essential to the development of civil society, which in turn is essential to liberal self-governance.
In South Korea, Yong-Chan Kim and Kyun-Soo Kim report, distrust of traditional media, widespread access to broadband Internet connections, and new traditions of collective political action have given rise to a new breed of online “civic storytellers.”
“In South Africa,” writes Mia Malan, “public health battles—particularly those related to HIV/AIDS—are increasingly being fought on television news bulletins, front pages of newspapers, and radio talk shows.”
But if media that are free and independent— not just politically but also economically and intellectually—can promote transparency, democracy, and accountability, media that are enslaved, indebted, or intimidated are little more than megaphones for those in power. In Egypt, for example, Adel Iskandar describes how, despite some halting moves toward greater democracy that have been exaggerated by the foreign media, President Hosni Mubarak has kept most national television programming under strict state control and minimized the opposition’s television time and visibility.
“The involvement of the media… can yield both positive and negative results,” depending largely on how free and independent the media are and how responsive public officials are to public opinion, Claude Salhani writes in his essay on the role of the media in the humanitarian crisis in Kosovo.
“Today, the media remain vital in politics as indicated in the common expression ‘the power of the press’,” Salhani says. Inflammatory and inaccurate reporting in the Albanian-language media served to inflame ethnic tensions in Kosovo, and media neglect allowed the genocide in Rwanda to proceed, he notes. On the other hand, he writes, the media helped make possible a military action that helped save the lives of tens of thousands of ethnic Albanians by portraying NATO’s 1999 intervention in Kosovo as justifiable and Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic as a rogue. Salhani contrasts the international support for U.S. military action with the widespread international criticism of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq four years later.
It is hardly surprisingly then that democratic and non-democratic governments, NGOs, and even terrorist groups all seek to co-opt, intimidate, subjugate, or own the media, for the simple reason that invading other countries, governing, addressing problems such as AIDS and global warming, and fomenting revolutions are all easier if the media watchdogs are brought to heel and harder when they’re nipping at your heels.
No less a media maven than Ayman al Zawahri, Osama bin Laden’s chief lieutenant and heir apparent, reflected last July on the role of the media in a letter to terrorist leader Abu Musab al Zarqawi in Iraq: “I say to you: that we are in a battle, and that more than half of this battle is taking place in the battlefield of the media. And that we are in a media battle in a race for the hearts and minds of our umma [the Islamic nation].” Al Zawahri also chided al Zarqawi for beheading hostages, not because it is morally offensive but because it looks bad on al Jazeera: “Among the things which the feelings of the Muslim populace who love and support you will never find palatable are the scenes of slaughtering the hostages.”
John Walcott is the bureau chief for Knight Ridder in Washington, D.C. and adjunct professor in the Masters of Foreign Service program at Georgetown University. He is also co-author of the book Best Laid Plans: The Inside Story of America's War Against Terrorism.