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World Not United On Free Press Importance
Question: What’s more important: a free press or ensuring social stability by, if necessary, curtailing a free press?
Answer: The world is divided. The BBC reports:
World opinion is divided on the importance of having a free press, according to a poll conducted for the BBC World Service.
Of those interviewed, 56% thought that freedom of the press was very important to ensure a free society.
But 40% said it was more important to maintain social harmony and peace, even if it meant curbing the press’s freedom to report news truthfully.
Perhaps these issues yield what some may consider surprising results due to the fact that the 21st century is wrought with special pressures for many societies. Aside from issues related to the Third World, there’s the issue of the growing political clout of religious communities within countries, the threat of terrorism, and a clamor in some countries to toss out entrenched parts of the establishment. The BBC goes on to report:
In most of the 14 countries surveyed, press freedom (including broadcasting) was considered more important than social stability.
The strongest endorsement came from North America and Western Europe, where up to 70% put freedom first, followed by Venezuela, Kenya and South Africa, with over 60%.
Not surprising…nor is this:
In India, Singapore and Russia, by contrast, more people favoured stability over press freedom.
In those countries, around 48% of respondents supported controls over the press to ensure peace and stability. Around 40% expressed the view that press freedom was more important.
Should the media in the U.S. feel safe and pleased with its showing?
HARDLY:
But some developed countries which strongly believed in press freedom were critical of their own media’s honesty and accuracy.
In the United States, Britain and Germany, only around 29% of those interviewed thought their media did a good job in reporting news accurately.
Conclusion? It would be accurate to conclude that, even in countries where press freedom is considered vital, press freedom remains one of the most vulnerable freedoms in societies and, most likely, will be one of the first to be curtailed if there were a grave national crisis and if higher-ups decided the press interfered with recovery or security goals.
ALSO OF INTEREST:
World Press Freedom Committee
World Association of Newspapers
U.S. Now Ranks 53rd In World Press Freedom Index
World Journalists Killed HERE and HERE
Government Threatens Press
5 Responses to “World Not United On Free Press Importance”
To be fair, some of those lower countries have centrifugal forces that are tending to pull them apart (if not active, militaristic opposition). A more independent press in the short term could concevably act as the last straw. Let’s not forget that without order, people suffer quite a bit.
That said, for all the bellyaching people do about our press, it’s nice to see that most of us value some version of the truth.
The question creates a false dichotomy, IMHO. The implication is that freedom of the press destabilizes countries and that stabilizing countries requires control (read: censorship) of the press. I’m sure that reporting certain things can certainly destabilize a country, but I’m SURE that a country that doesn’t have free press cannot succeed in the long run, since without the public spotlight corruption and abuse runs amok.
Freedom of the press and freedom of expression is not only good, it’s essential for a functioning society. It should extend as far as it possibly can, leaving only the bare minimum necessary for safety (like missile secrets, or identities of secret agents..ejem) out of bounds. Strict controls should be in place to ensure that the term “State Secret” does not get to be applied to anything inconvenient for the government.
The one area where regulation could be justifiable in the interest of stability is in journalistic honesty. You should be allowed to report virtually anything true, but be held responsible if you make things up, most especially if it’s things that destabilize the nation.
I am always in favor of freedom of speech, and if I were president the only exceptions to freedom of speech I would allow would be re: national security. But other than that, I am totally anti-censorship and pro-freedom of speech, and all things incumbent with that freedom.
There’s a problem with these statistics, Joe: freedom of the press is defined differently in different countries. Very few countries, even those we wouldn’t hesitate to characterize as free, have as free a press as we do. In the UK, for example, the government can restrict publication of damaging secrets and the libel laws different than they are here.
My guess is that if the question were re-phrased to describe the situation with the press here even fewer people would be enthusiastic about it.
Some time ago I read the constitutions of all of the Gulf States. It might surprise you under the circumstances that nearly all had substantial guarantees of freedom of speech and of the press. But nearly all had a handy little phrase attached to the guarantee: “except as provided by law”.