The Analyser - Politics

About Freedom and Democracy

I believe it is vital to the interest of journalists and the public alike that we should educate the public with the knowledge that in a democratic society the journalist is, in fact, exercising the highest form of citizenship by monitoring events in the community and making the public aware of them and their importance; by skeptically examining the behavior of people and institutions of power; by encouraging and informing forums for public debate.

We need to make it clear to the public that the journalist best expresses citizenship by functioning as a committed observer. Far from being the disinterested, disengaged outsider many people consider journalists to be, because they do not take a direct activist�s role in affairs, the journalist who works in the public interest is one who is interdependent with the needs and hopes of his fellow citizens and uses his work to help all members of the community.

This special interdependence flows from the public�s need for timely, accurate, independent information and the journalist�s need for an interested public. This interdependent role of journalists is one of the defining characteristics of democracy.

A journalist is never more true to democracy � is never more engaged as a citizen, is never more patriotic � than when aggressively doing the job of independently verifying the news of the day; questioning the actions of those in authority; disclosing information the public needs but others wish secret for self-interested purposes. And this sort of interdependent role is not found only in journalists. Our society recognizes such independent, often infuriating, behavior by others in order to protect our freedom and the rights of citizenship. We recognize, for example, such independent behavior in doctors and lawyers.

We may be upset, but we should understand when we learn that in an emergency situation a doctor saves the life of a convicted child molester before treating a less seriously wounded policeman because deep down we know that is what a doctor�s role requires and it is in the interest of all of us that the doctor does so. We recognize such independent behavior by lawyers who diligently and aggressively fight on behalf of a defendant in court against the government even in the most troublesome cases. And deep down, we understand that it is just such adherence to the rule of law that protects all of us.

It is important that we help the public come to an understanding of this role for the journalists. Without journalism � without a steady, reliable flow of independent information without which the creation, care and continuation of a public opinion would not be possible � self government would disappear. Journalism and self government will rise or fall together.

If journalists are to effectively pursue the independence that their work requires, it is important that the public understand and accept that role as a valid one. The only way to assure that is for the journalist to act with the responsibility commensurate with the freedom their independence requires.

For all that the speed, techniques and character of the news delivery has changed, the primary purpose of journalism has not: to provide citizens with a credible and accurate account of events in society so that they can be free and self-governing.

The world in which the well of accurate, reliable, factual information is not being constantly replenished is one that becomes more polluted with gossip, rumor, speculation and propaganda. This is a mixture that is toxic to civic health. This is a mixture that will produce a public less and less able to participate in civic life. This is a mixture that makes it more and more likely that a self-appointed elite will be free to exercise its will on society.

The individual reporter may not be able to move much beyond a surface level of accuracy in a given story. But the first story builds to a second, which the sources of news have responded to mistakes and missing elements in the first, and the second to a third, and so on. Context is added in each successive layer. In most important and complex stories, there are subsequent contributions on the editorial pages and the letters to the editor � the full range of public conversation and private.

This practical truth thus becomes a protean thing that grows as a stalagmite in a cave, drop by drop over time. And the process by which it grows is transparent to the audience. This is the process we should help the public understand.