Nuclear Reguero. InCom-UAB
Freedom of the press, the legitimating principle of the media in liberal democracies, has been confused with freedom of property. The ideal that the closest approximation to truth will emerge from the competitive exposure of alternative viewpoints fades with the persistence of control and concentration of the media, which remain the major barriers to the exercise of freedom of expression. Changing this scenario requires new concepts and instruments, and the rights to communication are a proposal in this regard.
There is no doubt of the alarming relevance that the concentration of ownership of the mass media and its control by economic power and the governing class on a global and local scale (Media Initiative, 2013) have taken. Reaching this situation, which is repeated with particular nuances in today's democracies, after more than five centuries of struggle against censorship and advocacy of free expression, the foundations that justify current policies in the field of media have been shaken.
Indeed, the fact that States continue to guarantee the rights of their members in the field of social communication leads us to two fundamental questions: the logic that guides the development of communication policies and the concepts and models that follow. The logics of both aspects can be described as anachronistic if we consider that the democratic state is not a status but a process towards the achievement of freedoms and equality. Therefore, the mechanisms and conventions that must guide this process must adapt to the evolution of society.
From the first issue, which today is materialized with the demands for governance in the field of media - especially the internet, we will only briefly mention it. Basically, it must be remembered that current communication policies continue to be a consequence and reflection of the particular logic of States (which, in their role as arbiters, find ways of creating consensus and branching their power and guaranteeing their stability), and Companies (who find in the distribution and sale of information a source of income and expand their power on a transnational scale). A logic that leaves out the third sector, the citizens and social and cultural movements that find in the media a tool of opposition, protest and cohesion when it comes to creating articulations for social change.
The first sector has public radio and television networks that it controls to a greater or lesser extent depending on the contexts; The second benefits from the establishment of neoliberal philosophy and has confused freedom of expression with that of business, and the third, given its difficulty in accessing the technical and financial resources to exercise freedom of expression, is the Which highlights the scarcity of spaces available to exercise this right (Senécal, M., 1986).
While in Europe the deregulation of publicly owned media was seen as a way out of avoiding government influence, the opposite situation in the United States was evident: the Press Freedom Committee itself warned in the 1970s that the market had Reduced the opportunities for access and satisfaction of the information needs of society, and therefore had not guaranteed freedom of the press (McQuail, D., 1991).
Along the same lines, numerous studies, including those promoted by the European Commission between 2009 and 2013 (see Related Links), show that the coexistence of public ownership of the media and private-commercial property has not served To put an end to the growing lack of pluralism in communication systems. The main reasons are the vertical and horizontal concentration of the media combined with the weakening of national policies due to the increase of transnational pressures and guidelines. And to this we should add the lack of will of the political representatives to get the media to be also for the citizens.
"Neither manual political philosophies nor jurisprudential justifications can continue to insist on the liberal myth that press freedom - institutionalized in one way or another - legitimizes the exercise of power by its contributions to a freely formed public opinion, because that it is not true. Public opinion formed through the media is not and can not be a sound opinion, it is not and can not be a free opinion. It is not enough that everyone has access to the media. The very constraints inherent in mass communication are a form of censorship "(Saavedra, M., 1987: 182-183 in Aguilera, 1990: 33).
If the market does not guarantee political information pluralism and state interventionism and indirect media management does not necessarily imply a guarantee of this free public opinion (Aguilera, 1990), a new paradigm must be sought to guide new communication policies. Defended since the 1970s, the notion of the right to communicate offers a new key in this regard.
References:
- Freedom Of Press Essay, http://essaynparagraph.com
- Freedom of the Press, https://grademiners.co/
- The Freedom Of The Press Essay, http://www.antiessays.com
- Essay on the Freedom of the Press, http://www.preservearticles.com