In the mid-2000s City University’s Journ­al­ism school — well me, to be pre­cise — had a num­ber of con­ver­sa­tions with the Bahraini author­it­ies about journ­al­ism edu­ca­tion, in the con­text of a more open and robust polit­ical cul­ture. The con­ver­sa­tions began with an approach by a junior mem­ber of the rul­ing fam­ily, a former aca­demic of lib­eral inclin­a­tion who wanted to do some­thing to sup­port change.

As a journ­al­ist with CBS News, I was depor­ted from Bahrain back in 1992 so I was a little wary of their enthu­si­asm. (The Inform­a­tion Min­is­ter Dr Tariq Alo­moayyed summoned me to his office and asked why I had entered Bahrain on a tour­ist visa: “No one comes to Bahrain as a tour­ist, Mr Monck.”)

But in the mid-2000s, the small king­dom seemed to be slowly open­ing up. The old king and his min­is­ters were gone. Exiles had been recalled.

One of the more encour­aging signs was a tol­er­ance of digital dis­sent, embod­ied by blog­gers like Ali Abd­ulemam, who ran bahrainonline.org . The Wall Street Journal (art­icle here) noted Abdulemam’s blog as a pointer to pro­gress in the Gulf. He was part of the Global Voices network.

The con­ver­sa­tion about journ­al­ism edu­ca­tion car­ried on for a year or two, went up the offi­cial chain of com­mand, and even­tu­ally went cold. The prom­ise of a more robust polit­ical cul­ture cooled too. That chill brought not only silence, it also brought arrest and impris­on­ment for some.

Today Ali Abd­ulemam is on trial, hav­ing been arres­ted for “dif­fus­ing fab­ric­ated and mali­cious news on Bahrain’s internal situ­ation to spread rumours and sub­vert the Kingdom’s secur­ity and sta­bil­ity.” (http://english.bna.bh/?ID=89532 ). I know the pro­gress­ive and enlightened people I met in Bahrain’s gov­ern­ment will be embar­rassed and saddened by this trial, and that their pub­lic silence will not reflect their private views. They will also know that their efforts to pro­mote Bahrain as a mod­ern and busi­ness friendly state risk being under­mined by the actions of the secur­ity appar­atus. In build­ing a bet­ter future for Bahrain enabling dis­sent — and integ­rat­ing it — is as import­ant as inter­na­tional advert­ising campaigns.

You can read more about Ali Abd­ulemam in the WSJ, The Atlantic and on Global Voices.

Ali Abdulemam’s trial is sched­uled for today (Thursday 28, Octo­ber). His case is but one of many, yet it stands for what many people hoped blogs and the digital revolu­tion might achieve, and his impris­on­ment is testi­mony to another broken tech-topian prom­ise. And he deserves better.

Alan Rusbridger’s What is the future of the fourth estate prompts a thought on the state of Brit­ish media, or — more simply — the BBC/Murdoch duopoly.

The BBC com­mands radio, online, magazines (Top Gear, Gardener’s World) and main­stream TV view­ing. Sky and News­corp com­mand sub­scrip­tion TV and print.

They are — natch — deadly rivals. News­corp thinks of the BBC as a patri­cian and para­sitic not-for-profit, leech­ing money off those who reap no bene­fit from the licence fee whilst sim­ul­tan­eously pun­ish­ing any free enter­prise (think News 24 remov­ing the com­mer­cial base for Sky News). The BBC for its part has replaced the Church of Eng­land in the lives of the nation, and its com­bin­a­tion of sanc­ti­mony, saint­li­ness and soap.

The Guard­ian is — of course — squeezed by both.

Such is the power of the duo­poly that one is obliged to take sides. As BBC loy­al­ists will tell you with the air of sym­path­etic, but impa­tient teach­ers: to cri­ti­cize is to under­mine; to ques­tion the licence fee effect­ively heresy. As News’ people will tell you — the BBC &**ç%!!

But this misses the point. The BBC is effect­ively apolit­ical, unable to cam­paign to change the estab­lish­ment on which it reports. News­corp is a weapon unsheathed in defence of its own quix­otic interests. One has the artistry and affect­a­tions of dec­ad­ence, the other the vital­ity and vicious­ness of barbarism.

Neither option in the duo­poly offers plur­al­ity. But it has, until recently, mirrored rather well Britain’s polit­ical sys­tem. Of course, coali­tion gov­ern­ment has inter­rup­ted that…

Belinda Giles sent me the fol­low­ing email:

Dear Adrian

I am a uni­ver­sity stu­dent in West­ern Aus­tralia, study­ing law/journalism. I am work­ing on an opin­ion piece for the journ­al­ism com­pon­ent — the sub­ject is ‘journ­al­ism is the lifeblood of demo­cracy’. Dur­ing my googling I came across your blog — ‘a blog about news’.

I have to say you are one of the few sources I have come across that is a pro­ponent for the ‘anti’ per­spect­ive — that journ­al­ism is not neces­sary for demo­cracy. As a res­ult, I would be most appre­ci­at­ive if you could answer a few ques­tions for my opin­ion piece?

Below are my replies.

How does a demo­cracy actu­ally func­tion without journalism?

Many demo­cratic insti­tu­tions already func­tion ‘without journ­al­ism’, espe­cially at local level, (e.g. Eng­lish coun­cils) – and by journ­al­ism, I include both report­age (e.g. coun­cil reports) and ‘watch­dog’ func­tions (e.g. hold­ing to account, investigation).

The myth­o­logy of journ­al­ism stresses these vital civic func­tions, although there is a little evid­ence to sup­port such claims.

Cer­tainly news­pa­per journ­al­ism did play a part in filling an insti­tu­tional vacuum in the rap­idly urb­an­iz­ing United States, but the con­cerns of the 20C with respect to journ­al­ism were not about pre­serving and enhan­cing that role, but mostly about the polit­ical power that ‘journ­al­ism’ placed in the hands of media proprietors…which tells you some­thing about where the bal­ance lay.

The devel­op­ment of gov­ern­ment, bur­eau­cracy, inspect­or­ates and legis­lat­ive over­sight all con­trib­uted to reduce the role and scope of journ­al­ism as the ‘fourth estate’.

Incid­ent­ally dur­ing news­pa­per strikes in the mid-20C, parts of the US were without journ­al­ism for long peri­ods (months) without any notice­able ‘demo­cratic crisis’.

What are some altern­at­ive sources of polit­ical inform­a­tion, if not journalism?

(Polit­ical inform­a­tion is not the only neces­sity in a demo­cracy. There’s also the require­ment to organ­ize around it – hence the old-fashioned news­pa­per cam­paign as a proxy.) I think sites like theyworkforyou.com are excel­lent sources of polit­ical inform­a­tion. So, too, are select committees.

Pres­sure groups, think tanks and NGOs are increas­ingly soph­ist­ic­ated inform­a­tion gather­ers and they recog­nise the import­ance of com­bin­ing robust data with cam­paign­ing agendas.

What would you say to the asser­tion ‘journ­al­ism is the lifeblood of democracy’?

Say journ­al­ists. But there are fewer of them and demo­cracy seems to be surviving.

When con­sid­er­ing the role of journ­al­ism in polit­ics and demo­cracy, how do you think com­mer­cial interests, leg­al­it­ies and the danger of journ­al­ism affect the abil­ity of journ­al­ists to even ful­fill this role?

I loved being a journ­al­ist, and many of my friends still are journ­al­ists and they risk much in pur­su­ing stor­ies in places like Afgh­anistan. But I think we often roman­ti­cize the role of journ­al­ists (the price of self-justification?).

Polit­ical journ­al­ism is largely at the level of intel­lec­tual gos­sip – who’s up, who’s down, who’s in, who’s out. As the old rhyme goes:

‘You can­not hope to bribe or twist (thank God!) the Brit­ish journ­al­ist.
But, see­ing what the man will do unbribed, there’s no occa­sion to.’

When it comes to cam­paign­ing, I’m a big believer in a civil­ian twist to Machiavel­lian ‘virtu’. Machiavelli thought cit­izens shouldn’t hire mer­cen­ar­ies to fight their battles. By doing so they made them­selves slaves.

I think journ­al­ists are a little like those con­dot­tiere — swash­buck­ling myth-makers, and we cit­izen con­sumers? We’re a little like Machiavelli’s con­tem­por­ar­ies who sold out their civic freedoms for security.

I think cit­izens should organ­ize them­selves and not rely on proxies.

In light of the con­cerns of journ­al­ism being/not being the lifeblood of demo­cracy, do you think there is a future for it?

As long as there’s a need to rep­res­ent the present and recent past as stor­ies to tell us who we are, there is a future for journ­al­ism. Whether or not that is a very effect­ive way to organ­ize human affairs, I couldn’t say, but for the story-tellers it is an enjoy­able way, and suf­fi­ciently so for journ­al­ism to remain attract­ive as a pas­time if not as a profession.

Janet Mal­colm has some choice words about journ­al­ism in her exten­ded essay in the 3 May 2010 New Yorker.

Over the years, the social status and the edu­ca­tion level of journ­al­ists has risen and some journ­al­ists write extremely well. But the pro­fes­sion retains its trans­gress­ive­ness. Human frailty con­tin­ues to be the cur­rency in which it trades. Malice remains its anim­at­ing impulse. Con­tinue read­ing →