Freedom of the press or freedom of the media is the freedom of
communication and expression through mediums including various
electronic
media and
published materials. While such freedom mostly implies the absence
of interference from an overreaching
state, its preservation may be sought through
constitutional or other
legal protections.
With respect to governmental information, any government may
distinguish which materials are public or protected from disclosure to
the public based on
classification of information as sensitive, classified or secret and
being otherwise protected from disclosure due to relevance of the
information to protecting the
national interest. Many governments are also subject to sunshine
laws or
freedom of information legislation that are used to define the ambit
of national interest.
The
Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: "Everyone has the
right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom
to hold opinions without interference, and impart information and ideas
through any media regardless of frontiers"
This philosophy is usually accompanied by
legislation ensuring various degrees of freedom of
scientific research (known as
scientific freedom), publishing, press and printing the depth to
which these laws are entrenched in a country's legal system can go as
far down as its
constitution. The concept of
freedom of speech is often covered by the same laws as freedom of
the press, thereby giving equal treatment to spoken and published
expression.
Status of press freedom worldwide
Beyond legal definitions, several
non-governmental organizations use other criteria to judge the level
of press freedom around the world:
-
Reporters Without Borders considers the number of journalists
murdered, expelled or harassed, and the existence of a
state monopoly on TV and radio, as well as the existence of
censorship and
self-censorship in the media, and the overall independence of
media as well as the difficulties that foreign reporters may face.
- The
Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) uses the tools of
journalism to help journalists by tracking press freedom issues
through independent research, fact-finding missions, and firsthand
contacts in the field, including local working journalists in
countries around the world. CPJ shares information on breaking cases
with other press freedom organizations worldwide through the
International Freedom of Expression Exchange, a global e-mail
network. CPJ also tracks journalist deaths and detentions. CPJ staff
applies strict criteria for each case; researchers independently
investigate and verify the circumstances behind each death or
imprisonment.
-
Freedom House likewise studies the more general political and
economic environments of each nation in order to determine whether
relationships of dependence exist that limit in practice the level
of press freedom that might exist in theory. So the concept of
independence of the press is one closely linked with the concept of
press freedom.
Worldwide press freedom index
Every year, Reporters Without Borders establishes a ranking of
countries in terms of their freedom of the press.
The Worldwide press freedom index list is based on responses to
surveys sent to journalists that are members of partner organisations of
the RWB, as well as related specialists such as researchers, jurists and
human rights activists. The survey asks questions about direct attacks
on journalists and the media as well as other indirect sources of
pressure against the free press, such as non-governmental groups. RWB is
careful to note that the index only deals with press freedom, and does
not measure the quality of journalism.
In 2011-2012, the countries where press was the most free were
Finland
and Norway
followed by
Estonia,
Netherlands,
Austria,
Iceland,
and
Luxembourg. The country with the least degree of press freedom was
Eritrea,
followed by
North Korea,
Turkmenistan,
Syria,
Iran, and
China.[1]
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Freedom of the
Press
Freedom of the Press is a yearly report by US-based non-governmental
organization
Freedom House, measuring the level of freedom and editorial
independence enjoyed by the press in every nation and significant
disputed territories around the world. Levels of freedom are scored on a
scale from 1 (most free) to 100 (least free). Depending on the basics,
the nations are then classified as "Free", "Partly Free", or "Not Free".
In 2009
Iceland,
Norway,
Finland,
Denmark,
and Sweden
topped the list with
North Korea,
Turkmenistan,
Myanmar (Burma),
Libya,
Eritrea
at the bottom.
Non-democratic
states
According to
Reporters Without Borders, more than a third of the world's people
live in countries where there is no press freedom.[2]
Overwhelmingly, these people live in countries where there is no system
of
democracy or where there are serious deficiencies in the democratic
process.[3]
Freedom of the press is an extremely problematic problem/concept for
most non-democratic systems of government since, in the modern age,
strict control of access to information is critical to the existence of
most non-democratic governments and their associated control systems and
security apparatus. To this end, most non-democratic societies employ
state-run news organizations to promote the propaganda critical to
maintaining an existing political power base and suppress (often very
brutally, through the use of police, military, or intelligence agencies)
any significant attempts by the media or individual journalists to
challenge the approved "government line" on contentious issues. In such
countries, journalists operating on the fringes of what is deemed to be
acceptable will very often find themselves the subject of considerable
intimidation by agents of the state. This can range from simple threats
to their professional careers (firing, professional
blacklisting) to
death threats,
kidnapping,
torture,
and
assassination.
Reporters Without Borders reports that, in 2003, 42 journalists lost
their lives pursuing their profession and that, in the same year, at
least 130 journalists were in prison as a result of their occupational
activities. In 2005, 63 journalists and 5 media assistants were killed
worldwide. Examples include:
Regions closed to foreign reporters
History
The
Republic of Poland-Lithuania
Freedom of Press laws were first passed in the
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1539.[9]
England
The
Glorious Revolution of 1688 in England established
parliamentary sovereignty over
the
Crown and, above all, the
right of revolution. A major contributor to Western
liberal theory was
John Locke. Locke argued in
Two Treatises of Government that the individual placed some of
his rights
present in the
state of nature in
trusteeship with the
sovereign (government)
in return for protection of certain
natural
individual rights. A
social contract was entered into by the people.
Until 1694, England had an elaborate system of
licensing. No publication was allowed without the accompaniment of a
government-granted license. Fifty years earlier, at a time of
civil war,
John Milton wrote his
pamphlet
Areopagitica. In this work Milton argued forcefully against this
form of government censorship and parodied the idea, writing "when as
debtors and delinquents may walk abroad without a keeper, but
unoffensive books must not stir forth without a visible jailer in their
title." Although at the time it did little to halt the practice of
licensing, it would be viewed later a significant milestone as one of
the most eloquent defenses of press freedom.
Milton's central argument was that the individual is capable of using
reason and distinguishing right from wrong, good from bad. In order to
be able to exercise this ration right, the individual must have
unlimited access to the ideas of his fellow men in “a free and open
encounter." From Milton's writings developed the concept of the open
marketplace of ideas, the idea that when people argue against each
other, the good arguments will prevail. One form of speech that was
widely restricted in England was
seditious libel, and laws were in place that made criticizing the
government a crime. The King was above public criticism and statements
critical of the government were forbidden, according to the English
Court of the
Star Chamber. Truth was not a defense to seditious libel because the
goal was to prevent and punish all condemnation of the government.
John Stuart Mill approached the problem of authority versus liberty
from the viewpoint of a 19th century
utilitarian: The individual has the right of expressing himself so
long as he does not harm other individuals. The good society is one in
which the greatest number of persons enjoy the greatest possible amount
of happiness. Applying these general principles of liberty to freedom of
expression, Mill states that if we silence an opinion, we may silence
the truth. The individual freedom of expression is therefore essential
to the well-being of society.
Mill’s application of the general principles of liberty is expressed
in his book
On
Liberty: "If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and
one, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be
no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the
power, would be justified in silencing mankind".
India
The
Indian Constitution, while not mentioning the word "press", provides
for "the right to freedom of speech and expression" (Article
19(1) a). However this right is subject to restrictions under sub clause
(2), whereby this freedom can be restricted for reasons of "sovereignty
and integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations
with foreign States, public order, preserving decency, preserving
morality, in relation to contempt, court,
defamation, or incitement to an offense". Laws such as the
Official Secrets Act and
Prevention of Terrorist Activities Act[10]
(PoTA) have been used to limit press freedom. Under PoTA, person could
be detained for up to six months for being in contact with a terrorist
or terrorist group. PoTA was repealed in 2006, but the Official Secrets
Act 1923 continues.
For the first half-century of independence, media control by the
state was the major constraint on press freedom.
Indira Gandhi famously stated in 1975 that
All India Radio is "a Government organ, it is going to remain a
Government organ..."[11]
With the liberalization starting in the 1990s, private control of media
has burgeoned, leading to increasing independence and greater scrutiny
of government.
Nazi
Germany (1933-1945)
In 1933 Freedom of the Press was suppressed in
Hitler's Germany by the
Reichstag Fire Decree of President Paul Von Hindenburg, just as
Adolf Hitler was coming to power. Hitler largely suppressed freedom
of the press through
Joseph Goebbels'
Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. As the Ministry's
name implies, propaganda did not carry the negative connotations that it
does today (or that it did in the Allied countries); how-to manuals were
openly distributed by that same ministry explaining the craft of
effective propaganda. The Ministry also acted as a central control-point
for all media, issuing orders as to what stories could be run and what
stories would be suppressed. Anyone involved in the film industry—from
directors to the lowliest assistant—had to sign an oath of loyalty to
the
Nazi Party, due to opinion-changing power Goebbels perceived movies
to have. (Goebbels himself maintained some personal control over every
single film made in Nazi Europe.) Journalists who crossed the Propaganda
Ministry were routinely imprisoned or shot as traitors. The
Sicherheitsdienst and other Nazi police organizations also created a
network of internal, domestic spying, so that for example, the
White Rose Society was in constant fear of discovery and execution.
Sweden-Finland
The world's first Freedom of the Press Act was introduced in
Sweden-Finland
in 1766, mainly due to
classical liberal member of parliament
Anders Chydenius.[12][13][14][15][16]
Excepted and liable to prosecution was only vocal opposition to the
King and the
Church of Sweden. The Act was largely rolled back after
King Gustav's coup d'état in 1772, restored after the overthrowing
of his son,
Gustav IV of Sweden in 1809, and fully recognized with the
abolishment of the king's prerogative to cancel licenses in the 1840s.
Denmark–Norway
Between September 4, 1770 and October 7, 1771 the kingdom of
Denmark–Norway had the most unrestricted freedom of press of any
country in
Europe. This occurred during the regime of
Johann Friedrich Struensee, whose first act was to abolish the old
censorship laws. However, due to the great amount of mostly anonymous
pamphlets published that was critical and often slanderous towards
Struensee's own regime, he reinstated some restrictions regarding the
freedom of press a year later, October 7, 1771.[17]
Implications of new technologies
Many of the traditional means of delivering information are being
slowly superseded by the increasing pace of modern technological
advance. Almost every conventional mode of media and information
dissemination has a modern counterpart that offers significant potential
advantages to journalists seeking to maintain and enhance their 'freedom
of speech'. A few simple examples of such phenomena include:
-
Satellite television versus
terrestrial television: Whilst terrestrial television is
relatively easy to manage and manipulate, satellite television is
much more difficult to control as journalistic content can easily be
broadcast from other jurisdictions beyond the control of individual
governments. An example of this in the Middle East is the satellite
broadcaster
Al Jazeera. This Arabic-language media channel operates out of
Qatar,
whose government is relatively liberal with respect to many of its
neighboring states. As such, its views and content are often
problematic to a number of governments in the region and beyond.
However, because of the increased affordability and miniaturisation
of satellite technology (e.g. dishes and receivers) it is simply not
practicable for most states to control popular access to the
channel.
- Web-based publishing (e.g.,
blogging)
vs. traditional
publishing: Traditional magazines and newspapers rely on
physical resources (e.g. offices, printing presses) that can easily
be targeted and forced to close down. Web-based publishing systems
can be run using ubiquitous and inexpensive equipment and can
operate from any global jurisdiction. To get control over web
publications, nations and organisations are using
Geolocation and
Geolocation software[citation
needed].
-
Voice over Internet protocol (VOIP) vs. conventional
telephony: Although conventional telephony systems are easily
tapped and recorded, modern VOIP technology can employ low cost
strong cryptography to evade surveillance. As VOIP and similar
technologies become more widespread they are likely to make the
effective monitoring of journalists (and their contacts and
activities) a very difficult task for governments.
Naturally, governments are responding to the challenges posed by new
media technologies by deploying increasingly sophisticated technology of
their own (a notable example being China's attempts to impose control
through a state run
internet service provider that controls access to the Internet) but
it seems that this will become an ever increasingly difficult task as
journalists continue to find new ways to exploit technology and stay one
step ahead of the generally slower moving government institutions that
attempt to censor them.
In May 2010, U.S. President
Barack Obama signed legislation intended to promote a free press
around the world, a bipartisan measure inspired by the murder in
Pakistan of
Daniel Pearl, the
Wall Street Journal reporter, shortly after the
September 11 attacks in 2001. The legislation, called the
Daniel Pearl Freedom of the Press Act, requires the
United States Department of State to expand its scrutiny of news
media restrictions and intimidation as part of its annual review of
human rights in each country.[18]
Organizations for press freedom
See also