29_________________ The media and the public sphere Nicholas Garnham From Colding, E, Murdock, G. and Schlesinger, ľ jed*) (1986) Commutmalhig XWiíits, Leicester University Press, pp. 45-53. The great strength of the public service model, to which we need to hung on through all the twists and turns of the argument that has raged around it. is the way it (a) presupposes and then tries (o develop in its practice a set r»' social relations whkh are distinctly political rather than economic, and (b) at the same lime attempts to insulate itself from control by the state as opposed to, and this is often forgotten, political control. Reith's original version was undoubtedly drawn (mm the tradition of the Scottish enlightenment and, within the very narrow limits within which the economic and political forces of the time allowed him to operate, the early practice of the BBC, as Scannell and Cardiff's recent research «hows, made a noble effort to address their listeners as rational political beings rather than as consumers (Scanneil, 1980; Cardiff, 1980) It is easy to argue that the agenda for debate and the range of information considered important was hopelessly linked to a narrow class-based definition of the public good and that it m doomed to failure, because public aspirations were already so moulded by the consumerisl ideology secreted by the dominant set of social relations in society, that this alternativ«; set, as the experience of Radio Luxembourg demonstrated, could only be imposed on listeners by the brute force of monopoly. But this is to miss the point of the enterprise and its continuing importance as both historical example and potential alternative. After all, one tould use the same argument (indeed people are already using this argument in relation to the power of local government) that because of declining voter lum-out one should simply abolish elections. The economic and the political For the problem with liberal tree press theory is not just that the market has produced conditions of oligopoly which undercut the liberal ideal nor that private ownership leads to direct manipulation of political com muruťatjon, although it does, ľut that there is a fundamental contradiction between the economic and the political at the level of their value systems and o' the social relations which those value systems require and support. Within the political realm the individual is defined as a citizen exercising public rights of debate, voting, and so on, within a communally agreed structure of rules and towards communally defined ends. The value system is essentially social and the legitimate end of social action is the public good. 2-Jf- Within (he economic realm, on the other hand, the individual is defined as producer and consumer exercising private rights through purchasing ■ on the market in the pursuit of private interests, his or her actions being co-ordinated by the Invisible hand of Ihe market This contradiction produces two clashing concepts of human freedom. On the one hand, as sed for instance by Hayek and in some versions of Thalchcrism and Reaganism, human freedom is defined in economic terms as Ihe freedom to pursue private interest without political constraint. On the olher hand, the socialist and Marxist traditions define freedom in political terms and m- political intervention in the workings of the market in order to liberate the majority from its constraints Both traditions assume that the Kinltadiction is resolvable In Suppressing either the political 01 live economic. Ihcsc clashing concepts of freedom are reflected in debates about the media's political role. On one side the market is teen as a bulwark against tfu enemy, state cvnsorship. Ihus private ownership of the means of communication is at best a positive good and at worst Ihe lesser of two neces- On the other side capitalist control of the media Is seen as an obstacle to free political communication and as the explanation of the media's role in maintaining capitalist class hegemon v. In both traditions politics is equated with state power. 1 want to argue that this contradiction is irresolvable because in social formations Characterized by an advanced division of labour, both functionally and spatially, only the market is capable of handling the necessary scale of allocative decision-making across wide sectors of human productive tCth ity, while at the same time there is a range of social decisions which no democratic society will be prepared to leave to (he market, or rather if it does leave them to Ihe market, it forfeits all claims to democracy These include the control of social violence, the provision of a basic level of health and material well-being and above all includes control over the development of the market itself, both in its internal structure, for example, the problem of monopoly, and its externalities, such as environmental questions. Once we recognize this irresolvable contradiction then the analytical task becomes one of mapping the in teraclions I vt ween t he two spheres and the politic, il task, one of working out the historically appropHatc balance between recognizing, on the one hand, that pursuit of political freedom may override the search for economic efficiency, while on Ihe other the extent ofpOSflMe political freedom is constrained by Ihe level of material productivity The field of the mass media is a key focus for examining this contradiction because they operate simultaneously across Ihe iwo realms. Thus a newspaper or a TV channel is at one and ihe same time a commercial operation and a political institution. The nature of the largely undiscussed problems this creates can be illustrated if one points to the elaborate structure of law and convention which attempts to insulate politicians, public servants and the political process from economic control - mips against bnberv. laws controlling election expenditure, the socially validated view, however often it may actually take place, against the use of public office for private gain. And yet at Ihe same time we allow what we KCOgnJze H * iritral political institutions, such as the press and broadcasting, to be privately operated. We would hnd it strange now if we made voting rights dependent upon purchasing power or property rights and yet access to the mass medi*, as both channels of information and fora of debate, i' largely controlled by just such power and tights. But the incompatibility between the commercial and political functions of the media is not just a question of o»r id control, important as such questions are. It is even more a question of Ihe value system and set of social relations within which commercial media must operate and which they serve to reinforce. For il is these that are inimical, not (ust to one political interest group or another, bul to the very process of democratic politics itself. Thus political communicalion which is forced lo channel itself via commercial media and here I refer not just lo Ihe press but lo public service broadcasting so far as it competes for audiences with commercial broadcasting and on its dominant terms - becomes the politics of consumerism, Polihcians relate to potential voters not as rational beings concerned for Ihe public good, bvit in Ihe mode of advertising, as creatures of passing and largely irrational apppfctc, to whose self-interest they must appeal. Politics, as Reagan so strikingly demonstrates, becomes nót a matter of confronting real issues and choices, but of image. Appeal to people's dreams and fantasies and realit) «ill take care of itself. Politics becomes no longer a matter of balancing pnontips or choosing between desirable but incompatible ends within a political programme, but of single Issues which can be packaged in easily consumable and sellable form, like soap powder, and to which Ihe response,' like that of the decision lo purchase, is a simple and immediate yes o» no, not the '|usl a moment' of debate. The contemporary prevalence of this model of politics among voters Is well illustrated by H. Himmelweit et «J.'s recent book Hot« WWrs Decide where what Ihe authors Identity as the consumer model of voting appears to best explain actual voting behaviour. Following this model as the authors put it.'what matters is that the act of voting, like the purchase of goods, is seen as simply one instance of decision making, no different in kind from the process whereby other decisions are reached* (Himmelweit ří ú/., 1985). Unfortunately, however, there is no mechanism in Ihe political realm like that of the invisible hand of Ihe market, to ensure that individual responses to distinctly presented political ■■■■■ v result in coherent political action II is a form of polihcs and political communication which enables both citizens and politicians to live in an esM-nliallv apolitical world where all our desires can be satisfied, where ,-..■ can have higher welfare benefits, higher defence expenditure and lower taxes, where we can strengthen the rights of women without challenging the nghls of men, where we can appeal to the majority bul at the same time protect minorities Such a politics is for» ed to lake on the terms of address of the media it uses and to address its readers, viewers and listeners within the set of social relations that those media have created for other purposes. I hus ihe citizen is appealed lo as a private individual ralhn than as a member of a public, wilhin a privatized domestic sphere rather than within thai of public life. For instance, think of the profound political difference between reading a newspaper in one's place of work or in a cafe and discussing it with those who share thai concrete «-I of social relations on the one hand. and watching TV within the family circle or listening to radio or watching 248 TV pkblk sphere a video-cassette on an Individual domestic basis on (he other. Think o( the Sony Walkman as a concrete embodiment of social isolation, as opposed to participation at a rock concert. Public service and knowledge-broking However, while I want to argue that the public service model oi the media has at its heart a set of properly political values and that its operation both requires and fosters a set of social relations distinct Írom and opposed to the economic values and relations which are essential to an operating democracy, at the same time in its actual historical operation it has so far shored WfUh the I labermasian concept ol the Public Sphere a crucial failure to recognize the problem of mediation within the Public Sphere and thus the role of knowledge-brokers within the system. In particular the public service model has failed to come to terms with the proper and necessary social function of both journalists and politicians. In relabon to both groups there is a (allure Sufficiently to distinguish between two communicative functions within the ľubtic Sphere, on the one hand the collection and dissemination of information and on the other the provision of a forum for debute. lournalists within |>ublic service broadcasting, under the banner of balance and objectivity, claim to carry out both (unctions and to do so in the name of the public. However, this produces 4 contradiction. On the one hand, the function of information search and exposition, that carried out at its best, (or instance, by teachers, cannot simply be equated with political advocacy. 1 lere Jay Blumler is right (Blunder el fl/., 1978). On the other hand, journalists are not in any way accountable to the public they claim to serve and themselves conshtute a distinct interest. How then are we to ensure that this function is carried out responsibly? It clearly needs to be accompanied by a structure of Freedom of Information, and so on. H also heeds much better trained journalists. It also, because of its expense, tiuile clearly depends upon a public service structure of provision, since otherwise hJflh quality information will become not a public good but an expensive private asset. But it still remains that the function cannot simply be left to unaccountable journalists. It needsa public accountability structure of its own and a quite distinct code of profcssion.il value- separate from the politic,)! debate function. Within such a structure much greater direct needs to be give» to independent fidds ol social expertise It is a perennial and ju-titiable criticism of journalists by experts that journalists themselve> decide the agenda of wha I -int and at the same lime too often garble the information for presentational purposes, perhaps bodies such as the Medical Research Council, the economic and Social Research Council. Greenpeace, Social Audit, and one could list many others, should have regular access to bnv.d*-.isting and print channels and employ their own journalists to clarify current issues for the general public as a background to more informed political debate. On the other hand, the debate function needs to be more highly politicized, with political parties and other major organized social movements having access to the screen on their own terms rather as Was the case until recently in Holland, although that model is itself in the process ol being I IK I undermined by the very economic forces to which I pointed at the outset. Here one might envisage a situation where any group that could obtain a membership o( over a certain size would be eligible (or regular access to air bme and national newspaper space. Indeed I labermas himself seems to envisage some such arrangement when he aigues that the Public Spheu-today requires that'a public body of organized pnvatt individuals take the place of the now defunct puHk body o( private individuals'. Such organizations would themselves, he argues, hav« to have democratic iniemal structures The Public Sphere, he writes, 'could only be realized today, on an altered basis, as a rational reorganization of social and political power under the mutual control of rival organizations committed to the public sphere in their internal structure as well as in their relations with the state and each other' (Habermas, 1979, p. 2U1). Public service and the political party Todatc. the operation of public service broadcasting has tended to reinforce the .if>o|iticism of consumerism by pitting broadcasting, not just against the state, but against politicians It i< politicians that arc seen as inherently untrustworthy, at having to be criticized, as trying to interfere in and control broadcasting. Furthermore, as it has operated within the confines ol a tradition of critical journalism and of balance and objectivity, broadcasting has contributed to the observable dedine of the political party. It has done" so by pre-empting its role as a Communicator of politically relevant information and as a structurer of political debate. As the press has become steadily more depoliticized. politicians and political parties have been forced to communicate to the electorate via TV on terms largely dictated by journalists The parties are unable to expound a coherent position, but are forced m respond issue by issue. By concentrating on personalities TV has at the ume time enhanced the position of political leaders at the expense of party organizations. This decline of the political party matters because, in societies split by conflict* ol interest (in my view all conceivable societu I parties represent the rationalist and universalist moment ol the Hegelian state, that is to say, they arc the indispensable institutional form by which the views of the individuals are shaped into that necessary hierarchy of interlocking, mutually interdependent ends and means that we call a political programme, without which rational political action in terms of some version of the public good is impossible. That is not to say that the present pattern of parties is optimal. But the current fashion for movement politics. CND, the women's movement, and so on, which is in ilselt in part a response to the diMrline of political parties induced by existing pallerns of media dominance, in part a product of (hat very consumerist ideology I am concerned to critique, in part an expression ol dissatisfaction with the programmes of existing parties, in no way provides an alternative to the political party, as indeed these movements are discovering. You cannot develop a realistic and tealirable movement towards disarmament or women's rights unless it is integrated with other social and economic objectives into some structure and universal programme of political priorities. A similar argument holds against the other alternative posed to tne puHn U p*> l»K'« servkc model, that oť wme version of pluralism, however the material base of ihat pluralism might be decided. But in general such visions, Midi yearnings for a return loa golden age of press rrccdom. are attempts pfeeiscW .old the crunch of political choice. Indeed, that is perhaps the main unconscious attraction of the fret; press model and indeed of the market model, thai it removes the weight of conscious social choice. Public service, universaiism and an international public sphere One of the strengths of the public spherv concept which I would want to Mess and which I would want to link to any revitalized notion of public v is th.il ol universalem 1 mean by this the notion that the KOpe of a political decision structure muu be conterminous with the scope of the powers it amis to control. In recent tradition this has in general meant within the boundaries of the nation-state, so that citizenship of suth states is defined in terms of certain nationally universal lights and obligations. The principle of tying voting to property rights was an important expression of this because it recognized the importance of the relationship between the right to participate in decision making and a not easily avoidable involvement in the consequences of those decisions. It is precisely for this reason that capital, so long as it can flow internationally with ease, should not be accorded such rights. Within this envelope ot rights and obligations all citizens, whether they are on the winning or losing side of a political debate, arc forced to live with its consequences. I hus proper democratic participation cannot be Irresponsible by definition. In some countries this important truth n embodied in laws requiring all citizens to vote Mow, while it would clearly be both UlipoStftjhi and undesirable to require all citizens ti> participate in a minimum amount of political Information consumption and debate or to make electoral participation dependent upon such participation, in principle it is a mere corollary of a requirement to vote. Indeed this is the principle which trade unions correctly mobilize against the institution of mandatory postal ballots. However, public policy should, if democracy is to be taken seriously, favour citizen participation in such debate. If that is the case debate must include as many of the existing views in a society on the relevant issues as possible. This cannot, by definition, be provided by sectionalized, ghcttoized media talkingonly to a particular interest group or the party faithful. In terms of national issues it must lake place a! a national level and is undercut by a multiplication of simultaneous viewing and listening options. It is this thai is the rational Core of the argument mobilized in favour of the existing public service broadcasting duopoly in Britain: namely, that the existence of a national fucus for political debate and information i> important lo the national polilical proco» Ihe problem .■! the relation! M Kali needed between communication channels and political power then takes on a different dimension when we consider the transnational aspect of current media developments li we see media structures as central to the democratic polity and if the univetMlism of the one must match thai of the latter, cleaity the current process in which national media control is being undercul i* part of that III I ' process by which power is being transferred in the economy to the international level without the parallel development of adequate political or communkalioTi structures. This is already apparent from the problem facing iiuropean governments, in the face of satellite broadcasting, of trying lo match tlteir different systems of advertising control and indeed, although vi far as I know this has not yet been discussed, systems of political H Iťl us be dear. It is in Ihe interest of the controHers of multinational capital to keep nation-states and their citizens in a slate of disunity and disfunclional ignorance unified only by market structures within which such capital can freely flow, while at the same time they develop their own private communication networks The development of the Financial Times and the VJallSircrl four ml and of private, high-cost, proprietary data networks and services on an international scale to serv e the corporate community and lis agents is a clear sign of this trend Ihus not only do we face the challenge of sustaining and developing the public sphere at a national level. Such a development will simply be bypassed, if we do not. at the same time and perhaps with greater urgency, begin to develop a public sphere where at present one hardly exist* namely, at the international level It is here that current threats, led by the US government, bul supported and abeiied by the UK. to UNESCO and the ITU. need to be seen for what they are, attempts h] destroy what little publk sphere actually exists at an international leve'-It is significant that the crime of which these institutions stand accused is politici za t ion'. In conclusion. I have tried lo argue here that Ihe necessary defence and expansion of Ihe public sphere as an integral part of a democratic society requires us to re-evaluate the public service model of public communu ttioO and, while being necessarily critical of its concrete historical actualization, defend it and build upon the potential of its rational core in Ihe fare of Ihr existing and growing threats to ils continued existence. 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