Critical years for journalism

By Alex P. Vidal

 

“The courage in journalism is sticking up for the unpopular, not the popular.”—Geraldo Rivera

SOME of the world leaders who waged a battle royal against the press continued to stumble and fall even as the people’s trust and confidence in the purveyors of news and information has not eroded.

The fall of US President Donald Trump can be cited as a good example.

His efforts to undermine the credibility of the critical press by constantly calling journalists who asked tough and confrontational questions during press conferences as “fake news” appeared to have backfired.

The press refused to be bullied and continued to report the truth and be faithful to the veracity before, during and after the November 3 Presidential Election.

When the press reported the truth about Mr. Trump’s lackadaisical handling of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), the American public believed it because it’s the truth and nothing but the truth—no matter how some White House spinners, including Mr. Trump himself, refuted it.

There are now 14.6 million cases in the United States with 281,000 deaths (as of December 6, 2020, according to the data from the New York Times).

Analysts pointed to Mr. Trump’s indifference on the COVID-19 issue to be the major reason why he lost to President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr., 302-232.

Sidestepping the pandemic issue and calling the press “fake news” in a bid to disparage the media has cost Mr. Trump his reelection, in one way or the other.

 

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The Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has compiled the 2020 World Press Freedom Index showing that the coming decade will be decisive for the future of journalism, with the COVID-19 pandemic highlighting and amplifying the many crises that threaten the right to freely reported, independent, diverse and reliable information.

This 2020 edition of the Index, which evaluates the situation for journalists each year in 180 countries and territories, suggests that the next 10 years will be pivotal for press freedom because of converging crises affecting the future of journalism: a geopolitical crisis (due to the aggressiveness of authoritarian regimes); a technological crisis (due to a lack of democratic guarantees); a democratic crisis (due to polarization and repressive policies); a crisis of trust (due to suspicion and even hatred of the media); and an economic crisis (impoverishing quality journalism).

These five areas of crisis—the effects of which the Index’s methodology allows us to evaluate—are now compounded by a global public health crisis.

“We are entering a decisive decade for journalism linked to crises that affect its future,” RSF secretary-general Christophe Deloire said. “The coronavirus pandemic illustrates the negative factors threatening the right to reliable information, and is itself an exacerbating factor. What will freedom of information, pluralism and reliability look like in 2030? The answer to that question is being determined today.”

According to the RSF “analyses”, there is a clear correlation between suppression of media freedom in response to the coronavirus pandemic, and a country’s ranking in the Index.

Both China (177th) and Iran (down 3 at 173rd) reportedly censored their major coronavirus outbreaks extensively.

In Iraq (down 6 at 162nd), the authorities reportedly stripped Reuters of its license for three months after it published a story questioning official coronavirus figures.

Even in Europe, Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary (down 2 at 89th), had a “coronavirus” law passed with penalties of up to five years in prison for false information, a completely disproportionate and coercive measure, said the RSF analyses.

“The public health crisis provides authoritarian governments with an opportunity to implement the notorious “shock doctrine”–to take advantage of the fact that politics are on hold, the public is stunned and protests are out of the question, in order to impose measures that would be impossible in normal times,” Deloire added.

“For this decisive decade to not be a disastrous one, people of goodwill, whoever they are, must campaign for journalists to be able to fulfill their role as society’s trusted third parties, which means they must have the capacity to do so.”

 

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Crises threatening journalism’s future, according to the RSB analyses:

GEOPOLITICAL CRISIS. One of the most salient crises is geopolitical, caused by leaders of dictatorial, authoritarian or populist regimes making every effort to suppress information and impose their visions of a world without pluralism and independent journalism. Authoritarian regimes have kept their poor rankings. China, which is trying to establish a “new world media order,” maintains its system of information hyper-control, of which the negative effects for the entire world have been seen during the coronavirus public health crisis.

TECHNOLOGICAL CRISIS. The absence of appropriate regulation in the era of digitalized and globalized communication has created information chaos. Propaganda, advertising, rumor and journalism are in direct competition. The growing confusion between commercial, political and editorial content has destabilized democratic guarantees of freedom of opinion and expression. This encourages the adoption of dangerous laws which, on the pretext of restricting the spread of fake news, facilitate tougher crackdowns on independent and critical journalism.

DEMOCRATIC CRISIS. The previous two editions of the World Press Freedom Index reflected a crisis caused by growing hostility and even hatred towards journalists, and this crisis has now worsened. It has resulted in more serious and frequent acts of physical violence, and therefore an unprecedented level of fear in some countries.

Leading politicians and those close to them continue to openly foment hatred of journalists. The democratically elected presidents of two countries, Donald Trump in the United States (up 3 at 45th) and Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil (down 2 at 107th), continue to denigrate the media and encourage hatred of journalists in their respective countries.

CRISIS OF TRUST. Mistrust of media outlets suspected of broadcasting or publishing news contaminated by unreliable information continues to grow. According to the Edelman Trust Barometer, which studies the public’s trust in institutions, 57% of the people polled in its latest international survey thought the media they used were contaminated with untrustworthy information. Undermined by this crisis of trust, journalists become the targets of the public’s anger during big street protests taking place in many parts of the world.

ECONOMIC CRISIS. The digital transformation has brought the media to its knees in many countries.

Falling sales, the collapse in advertising revenue and the increase in production and distribution costs linked above all to increases in the price of raw materials have forced news organizations to restructure and lay off journalists.

In the United States, for example, half of the media jobs have been lost over the past ten years.

These economic problems have social consequences and an impact on the editorial freedom of media around the world. Newspapers that are in a much weaker economic situation are naturally less able to resist pressure.

The economic crisis has also accentuated the phenomena of ownership concentration and, even more, conflicts of interest, which threaten journalistic pluralism and independence.

(The author, who is now based in New York City, is a former editor of two dailies in Iloilo, Philippines)