Flat Earth News

national | arts and media | opinion/analysis

Wednesday April 30, 2008 18:46

by Chekov Feeney - WSM

From journalism to churnalism

Review of Nick Davies' Flat Earth News

This is an extraordinarily detailed exposition of how the modern media functions. The author, veteran Guardian journalist Nick Davies, along with a team of researchers from Cardiff University, spent several years monitoring the British media and tracing the sources of the stories that they carried. The results were pretty shocking, even for somebody who already has a very low opinion of the corporate and state media.

Davies describes how an increasingly single-minded focus on profit has caused the media industry to outsource much of the primary production of stories and content to PR agencies and state press offices. The role of journalists has been reduced to what he calls “churnalism”, copying and pasting from press releases or government briefings.

Amazingly, his analysis showed that, of a sample of 2000 articles from the ‘quality’ press, only 12% were based on original research and only 12% of the “facts” copied from the hopelessly unreliable PR sources showed any evidence of having been checked. The end result is that the media is increasingly nothing more than a propaganda vehicle for those with the best PR – the rich and the powerful.

American anarchist Noam Chomsky, in works like Manufacturing Consent, has developed a compelling socio-political analysis of the media’s function in self-declared democratic society. However, he generally focuses on the “what,” rather than the “how”, demonstrating that the media operates as a system which, taken as a whole, produces propaganda in support of the powerful.

Chomsky has, however, relatively little to say about the mechanisms by which this propaganda is produced. Flat Earth News fills in the gaps. It provides a wealth of detail which explains exactly how the profit-motive of the industry operates within newsrooms to limit the amount of time and resources available to journalists to establish the truth of what they are reporting. As a result, lots of things that simply aren’t true become the subject of global news coverage.

In addition to the meticulous statistical analysis of the media’s output, Davies presents a series of case studies which draw on his long journalistic experience and network of contacts in the industry to trace exactly how particular issues have been systematically distorted by the media. This is grim reading.

The ease with which the security services were able to plant totally fictional material about Iraq in the run up to the invasion; the appalling and illegal activities of the press in gathering personal details about their targets; the culture of virulent racism and xenophobia in the Daily Mail: depressing snapshots of an industry that seems beyond saving.

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Journalists Call for Global Solidarity to Overcome Threats to Media

by IFJ

Wed Apr 30, 2008 23:44

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) says global battles for safety, decent work and quality journalism can only be won if journalists stand together in defence of their rights.

In a statement marking World Press Freedom Day 2008, the IFJ has called for a renewal of global solidarity among journalists to combat the threats facing media.

“The future of journalism depends upon building fresh solidarity,” said IFJ President Jim Boumelha. “Our work is at the heart of the struggle for democracy and human rights.”

The IFJ says the future of journalism will not be guaranteed by politically-inspired publicity stunts or by dumbing down media and cutting editorial budgets.

“In recent days we have taken our message of solidarity to China, Pakistan, Russia, Mexico and Iraq,” said Boumelha. “In all of these places journalists are under pressure. Our colleagues will succeed in defending their rights if they work together, reach out to everyone in journalism old and new, and build bridges that will make journalism strong. Wherever there is division and discord it is only the enemies of press freedom who prosper.”

Across the globe, unions belonging to the IFJ, the world’s largest journalists’ group, are marking World Press Freedom Day with national events and activities to highlight the crisis facing people working in journalism.

In Europe, Arne Konig the Chair of the EFJ said: “World Press Freedom Day gives us an opportunity showcase how quality journalism is vital for democracy and can only be achieved when journalists have access to decent working conditions and respect for their role”.

The EFJ says that pressure on journalists to reveal sources of information and residual political interference are key challenges facing journalists and media.

“But we cannot ignore the impact of the economic crisis that has overtaken much of Europe’s media. Quality journalism is suffering as media owners impose devastating cuts in editorial budgets,” said Konig.

For more information contact the IFJ at +32 2 235 2207
The IFJ represents over 600,000 journalists in 120 countries worldwide

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