As we work to shape a new Nepal, restructure the state and usher in a new era, there has to be talk on making sure the media does not end up distorting democracy. There has been a lot of talk of restructuring the public sector, the state, not enough talk of the private sector media should it get concentrated in a few hands, or might fall prey to MNC inroads.
Even in the most established democracies, corporations are not allowed to give unlimited contributions to those running for office. It only makes sense to not allow corporations to have all the say in the information the public ends up feeding upon.
Democracy is one person, one vote, not one rupee, one vote.
A balance has to be struck. The business innovations that the private sector brings have to be appreciated. But then efforts have to be made to make sure the media does not end up in a few corporate hands.
An entity like the BBC ends up looking good. The public pays for it.
In the case of Nepal, letting a thounsand flowers bloom in the local FM markets might be a good approach. Major ownership concentrations should be disallowed.
Politicians elected through the one person one vote mechanism as members of state funded parties should be able to make the right decisions on this count in terms of shaping media policy.
Monopolies and oligoplies are anti-market. Diffused power is good for market competition.
A great source of revenue could be to auction airwaves. You rent out, you don't sell off. Money thus generated could pay for public media.
In Nepal's case, being a small country sandwiched between two large ones, there is also a need to watch out for a massive Indian private sector infiltration that might hijack the public discourse. FDI has to be limited by law in the sensitive sector of the media.
Vigorous political parties that ensure public participation in debates on policy issues are a major plus. People going to political meetings, and organizing protest programs are healthy for democracy. Mass meetings on the Nepali scene are stuff to appreciate and hold on to.
I ran into this media theme when I was doing some reading on Costa Rica. That country abolished its army more than half a century ago. But it struggles with this issue of the media distorting democracy. Nepal has to watch out from early on. In that sense the media truly is like the fourth arm of the state. The media is of great public importance.
When the country is only recently emerging from the thumb of a regime where journalists had to worry about basic human rights abuses and not corporate concentrations of power, we might be tempted to not worry too much about the later, but we need to. Early work will go far. We can learn from the experiences of other countries to leapfrog. We have to think ahead.
On The Web
Amazon.com: Megamedia: How Giant Corporations Dominate Mass Media ... the press has increasingly been muzzled by the moguls who control newspapers, television, books, and magazines. ...... a frightening picture of how these megamedia mergers (involving Disney, Murdoch, Gates, and Time-Warner) have limited the kind of information the public receives ..... the corporate media takeovers by 12 multinational companies that now control most newspapers, television stations, and book companies and about the resulting impact on the distribution of information ...... small local papers taken over by the larger newspaper chains, and the major losers are the small towns whose local news gets diluted ...... Censorship can sometimes come in the form of corporate caution. ..... ways to hold big corporate media responsible for not only increasing diversity but also presenting society with fair and unbiased information.
Project Censored Media democracy in action
Megamedia: How Giant Corporations Dominate Mass Media, Distort ... he pleads against the worldwide conglomeration of media and attempts to mobilize public opinion to support media diversity.
Powell's Books - Megamedia : How Giant Corporations Dominate Mass ...
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy
Mainstream Media - Global Issues A free and impartial media is a key pillar to a functioning democracy
Do Polls Reflect Media Distortion? - Center for Media and Democracy
Toxic Sludge Is Good For You - Center for Media and Democracy corporations manipulate our democracy
[PDF] Mass media and democracy crisis
Editorial--Media and Democracy
Amazon.com: Corporate Media and the Threat to Democracy (Open ... When corporations control the flow of information, he suggests, they will inevitably do so in a way that promotes their own interests over those of the citizenry. From an analysis of the corporate influence over the 1934 Communications Act to a discussion of how media convergence might kill off hope of the Internet bringing about a revolution, he debunks the myth of an objective, liberal media and emphasizes the belief that issues of media ownership should be treated as matters of public policy rather than strictly business.
Democracy Now! | Corporate Media and the Threat to Democracy
Corporate Media and the Threat to Democracy, Seven Stories Press
Corporate media versus democracythe nature of the U.S. media system undermines self-government .... The Founding Fathers, to the extent we can generalize, envisioned a press that above all else would stimulate public involvement -- what media historian John Nerone has termed the "town meeting" metaphor of the press. ..... as the control in each market became concentrated among one or two or three owners, and as ownership concentrated nationally, all media came to reflect the interests of owners and advertisers, rather than diverse interests of any community. ...... Since 1992 there has been an unprecedented wave of mergers and acquisitions among the media giants ...... When Disney produces a film, for example, it can also guarantee the film showings on pay cable television and commercial network television, it can produce and sell soundtracks based on the film, it can create spin-off television series, it can produce related amusement park rides, CD-roms, books, comics, and merchandise to be sold in Disney retail stores. Moreover, Disney can promote the film and related material incessantly across all its media properties. ...... What is tragic — or absurd — is that the dominant perception of the "free press" still regards the government as the sole possible foe of freedom. That this notion of press freedom has been and is aggressively promoted by the giant media corporations should be no surprise, though that is rarely noted....... The effects can be seen on the two most important issues in U.S. politics in the 1990s: Foreign trade and health care. In both cases, powerful interests were able to neutralize public opinion, even though, initially, based on personal experience, it was against GATT and NAFTA and for a single-payer health system. ...... After a wave of mergers and acquisitions, three of the world's four largest media giants now own the three largest book publishers. At the retail end, U.S. bookselling is becoming highly concentrated into the hands of a few massive chains. This corporatization of publishing has led to a marked shift to the political right in what types of books clear the corporate hurdles. ...... The Internet has opened up very important space for progressive and democratic communication, especially for activists hamstrung by traditional communication media. But, the notion that the Internet will permit humanity to leapfrog over corporate communication is in sharp contrast to the rapid commercialization of the Internet....... public systems of broadcasting were established to serve publicly determined goals, not to generate profit. ...... The extent to which there is non-elite participation into communication policymaking may be a barometer for the level of democracy in a society........commercial broadcasters became a force that few politicians wished to antagonize; almost all of the congressional leaders of broadcast reform in 1931-1932 were defeated in their re-election attempts, a fate not lost on those who entered the next Congress........ The initial plan to have the CPB funded by a sales tax on the purchase of new radio sets and television sets, somewhat akin to the BBC method, was dropped, thus preventing public broadcasting a stable source of income necessary for planning as well as editorial autonomy. ........ The U.S. government only provides around 15 percent of the revenues; public stations depend on corporate donations, foundation grants, and listener/viewer contributions for the balance. In effect, this has made PBS and NPR stations commercial enterprises, and it has given the large corporations that dominate its subsidy tremendous influence over public broadcasting content, in a manner that violates the fundamental principles of public broadcasting. It has also encouraged the tendency to appeal to an affluent audience, rather than a working-class audience, because upscale viewers/listeners have far more disposable income............ The overarching purpose of the 1996 Telecommunications Act is to deregulate all communication industries and to permit the market, not public policy, to determine the course of the the communications system......... gives the green light to further consolidation of the global market these firms dominate........ the ideology of the infallible marketplace, a virtual civic religion in the United States and globally in the 1990...... The case for the market rests upon a mythological presentation of pure competition, where there are an infinite number of small entrepreneurs battling to serve the public by lowering prices and improving quality in constant ferocious competition. In terms of pricing, output, and profits, oligopolistic industries resemble pure monopolies far more closely than they do the mythical competitive market. And in few areas is this more true than in the advertising, media and telecommunication industries.......... In markets, one's income and wealth determine one's power. It is a system of "one dollar, one vote," rather than "one person, one vote." ...... commercial media firms produce that which is most profitable and in their interests. When people consume from the options provided, the media giants then state that they are satisfying audience demand. ...... a case of supply creating demand as much or more than it is a case of demand creating supply. ..... Citizens must determine the nature of their communication system through full and open political debate ....... Often journalists have fairly conservative positions on class issues of trade, taxation and government social spending, especially as one climbs to the high-paying ranks of the elite journalists....... With lavish funding from a dozen major conservative foundations, including those of Bradley, Scaife, and Olin, conservative groups have developed a very sophisticated PR apparatus to funnel conservative positions and stories into the media....... Conservative pundits dominate TV and radio discussion programs, paired with centrists who are quite comfortable in the corridors of corporate power. By contrast, it is nearly impossible to find even token left criticism in the mainstream media....... create a decentralized, accountable, nonprofit and noncommercial sector, which could provide a viable service to the entire population ..... This does not mean that there is no place for commercial media, merely that the dominant sector of the system must be nonprofit, noncommercial, and accountable to the public. Moreover, to the extent that commercial media and advertising play a role in a democratic media, they should be taxed to subsidize the nonprofit and noncommercial sector. ....... spectrum space should be leased (never auctioned) for commercial use, with the proceeds applied to support nonprofit and noncommercial media...... The opposition is wealthy, powerful and expert in ideological warfare. It effectively owns both major political parties. Its self-interest is draped in motherhood, the flag, the First Amendment, apple pie, and, of course, the mythological market ....... labor's demise has been partially due to the right-wing ideological assault on unionism and progressive government policies. In the 1940s there were approximately 1,000 full-time labor beat reporters and editors on U.S. daily newspapers. Today there are less than ten....... this is also a global fight. The corporate media/communication system may well be the defining feature of the global market economy....... communication technologies lay the basis for instantaneous global capital and currency markets, and undermines not only national sovereignty, but also popular sovereignty, as societies seem compelled to obey the dictates of global markets or face immediate and stern economic punishment........
Robert W. McChesney / Rich Media, Poor Democracy argues that the media, far from providing a bedrock for freedom and democracy, have become a significant antidemocratic force in the United States and, to varying degrees, worldwide...... the major beneficiaries of the so-called Information Age are wealthy investors, advertisers, and a handful of enormous media, computer, and telecommunications corporations.... we must organize politically to restructure the media in order to affirm their connection to democracy. .....
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