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Writing Media Rights
"I would argue that it is not the job of corporations and commercial interests to envision a world in which there is parity in access to communications, it is not the job of corporations and commercial interests to promote media democracy. If we are to have a world in which access to information is an international and fundamental human right, it is our job as interested citizens and community leaders to make it happen. We must create domestic and international policy to bring about communications equality for all people. We must ensure that technology is a means to an end not the end itself. We must envision technology as a vehicle rather than a destination."
—Bunnie Riedel, executive director, Alliance for Community Media, November 16, 2000
MediaChannel emerged from a global interest in what we, perhaps awkwardly, term "media issues": the political, social and cultural roles of mass media, the structures and trends of communication and information systems. The participation of over 600 groups in MediaChannel's first year bears witness to the breadth and depth of worldwide concern.
While discussions of these issues rarely appear in the dominant media (no surprise there), international coalitions have been working for at least 25 years to describe these public concerns and organize around them. Scholars, activists and members of the NGO community have come together to attempt declarations broad enough for mass support, yet specific enough to lead to action. But history shows that if media reform campaigns are able to get past the gatekeepers of public debate, they should expect powerful opposition.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the backlash from the U.S. government following UNESCO's efforts to address global communication rights almost brought down the U.N. organization. When developing nations called for a "New World Information and Communication Order" (NWICO) to redress global information and technology imbalances, the U.S. media responded in force. "The American media was dead set against the NWICO, and thus NWICO was dead on arrival, " recalls former UNESCO media liaison Joseph Mehan. "It never had a chance."
After the United Nations officially abandoned the NWICO approach in 1989,
grassroots alliances focused on citizen action. Statements like the "Peoples' Communication Charter," with recurring themes of media "freedom," "democracy," and "rights," have circulated in conferences and classrooms, but have rarely moved beyond these select circles. These international initiatives haven't been assaulted by the major media, but perhaps disregard is opposition enough.
MediaChannel presents this collection of media declarations and works-in-progress to encourage your participation, perspectives, questions, critiques and solutions. Do these manifestos earn your support? What can coalitions do better to move from text to action? And perhaps most important, can we find points of consensus among these visions for change that we can all endorse and work toward? Please join the discussion in the MediaChannel Forum.
— Aliza Dichter (liza@mediachannel.org), editor.
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"The Global Knowledge Media Forum"
Adopted in March 2000 by a gathering of media leaders, editors and news directors from developing
countries, this declaration states that media "must be confident, vibrant, entertaining, surprising,
proactive, balanced and informed. [They] should scrutinize governments and corporations, but also
international organizations and the donor communities themselves."
From Panos Institute, March 10 2001
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Seattle Statement
This brief statement was composed in 2000 to make "a fairly simple case for the development of a 'public sphere,' for the collective use of communications as a complement to rights-based declarations." Co-author Doug Schuler discusses some of the difficulties of translating philosophical pronouncements into action.
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Voices 21
Calling for "A Global Movement for People's Voices in Media and Communication in the 21st Century," this coalition has issued statements and action plans on the themes of access and accessibility, right to communicate, diversity of expression, security and privacy, and cultural environment. Founded in 1999, Voices 21 demands "that the voices of ordinary people around the world no longer [be] excluded from media and communication."
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Videazimut —
The International Coalition For Democratic Communication
A grassroots alliance of independent television and video practitioners and organizations, Videazimut warns: "The right to communicate is seriously undermined by the workings as well as the structures and dominant models of communications systems." This international NGO, formed in 1990, has issued declarations on democratic communication at meetings in Cape Town (1998), Cajamar (1996) and New Delhi (1994).
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Declaration Of Media Independence
Drafted by MediaChannel's Danny Schechter and based on the U.S. Declaration of Independence and South Africa's Freedom Charter, this document is offered "as a working draft for readers to react to, revise and, hopefully, in part or in its entirety, to put to use."
From The Media Channel,
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The Milan Declaration
On Communication And Human Rights
Adopted by the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters (AMARC) in 1998, this declaration builds upon and includes links to earlier statements and charters on communications rights. At the core is a call for recognition and support for community broadcasting "as an essential form of public service broadcasting and a vital contributor to media pluralism and freedom of expression and information."
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MacBride Round Table
Founded in 1989, this communications advocacy group is concerned with worldwide information imbalances. It holds annual meetings of scholars, activists and journalists to present papers and hold discussions on global communication issues. Its Web site collects the Round Table's annual statements and houses the "Conclusions and Recommendations" from the original MacBride Report, which is no longer available from UNESCO.
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The Willow Declaration
In 1981, a group of artists, writers, educators and researchers met in Willow, New York, to declare North American support for the goals of the UNESCO MacBride Commission in solidarity with Third World aspirations. The Willow Declaration points out that those in the so-called "developed" world also need a new information order.
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Platform For U.S. Media Reform
Excerpted from "It's the Media Stupid" by Robert McChesney and John Nichols, this statement argues
that media reform — through antitrust law, public broadcasting funding, broadcast regulations and
other initiatives — must become a central political issue in the United States. Randy Baker is
skeptical of proposals supporting
new government regulation and promoting new technologies, preferring a plan that concentrates on funding independent media.
From Media Alliance-San Francisco Bay area, January 1 2001
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AS THE MEDIA WATCH THE WORLD, WE WATCH THE
MEDIA.
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