2.1 Lippmann and his Public Opinion.
The ideas of the first author that we will be analysing in this essay is Walter Lippmann and his, as some argue, the most significant work-a book called Public Opinion – He looked at the press as a representer of a democracy and freedom, however after many year research of the political information he concluded that, the media cannot be fully democratic and trusted in many cases, because the modern society is too complex. The centrepiece of Lippmann’s argument was that press will always have more than one opinion and they can be either wrong or right, but as long as the information comes from a journalist(and it always will) it is impossible to provide correct information avoiding stereotypes and his understandings as well as the manipulations of other interested sides. [1]
It is important to mention that Lippmann was working on his research after the First World War, which means that by that time there were yet no television in neither USA nor European countries and radio was as well not used by many.
‘‘However Lippmann’s argument that news and truth are not same thing tends to be dispute by the body of practicing journalism and by number of journalist scholars as well. One such is a Douglass Cater, who popularized the idea that press is the fourth branch of government’’ ( Altshull,1984:191)
2.2 Douglass Carter – Expands the ‘Fourth Branch’
Cater attacks Lippmann’s thesis about press being a lie and even a threat to democracy, he argues that the press is a power that ‘guards’ the government calling the press a ‘watchdog ‘of the power. He argued that press is the one that creates the reality for people and “making a picture of reality on which men can act” (cited in Altshull,1984:191) Journalists are the ones that brings all facts to life.[1]
Here we can see a contrast view, even an attack of the previous Lippmann’s theory.
2.3 Abuse of power.
As Lippmann and Carter shows us more fundamental and also older views, the next article I would like to review is the Guardian news UK article “Hacking: Miliband and Clegg seek media ownership limits.” This article is about UK’s Labour party leader Ed Miliband trying to pay audience’s attention to the situation where media power is in a hand of one person, in this case – Mr Murdoch’s . As it is stated this is not a ‘one to one’ battle, Miliband argues that the situation when one person owns the one-fourth of the press and also the TV broadcasting channels, it is ‘unhealthy’ and ‘dangerous’, he also uses the words ‘abuse of power’ and claims that new boarders and limits must be brought as the world now has changed as the nowadays rules are the same as the ones for the digital age that do not take into account the advent of mass digital and satellite broadcasting. In my opinion it does state the situation between media and Politics today, which I will be discussing in the third section of this essay.
What I would like to do next is to criticise not the main idea, but the certainty of the ideas they provide us. If summarising inaccurately the ideas of the authors, as we can already understand in the previous section of the essay Lippmann argues that the media is untreatable, maybe even a threat to democracy, on the other hand Cater claims that media is reliable and powerful and there are no doubts for it becoming a fourth branch of government.
2.4 Media, Government and Dictatorship.
Even though the Soviet Union has a tiny connection with the West European countries, it would be hard to see the whole picture of media and government relationships without bringing a short example of a country where media was just a weapon of a government to control society, where such expressions as “freedom of speech” did not exist, what did exists was censorship and propaganda. So to clarify the ‘media philosophy’ in Soviet Union. In Altshull book Agents of power he really clearly describes the three main roles that were expected from the presses in Lenin’s Soviet Union.
The three main roles for the media in Lenin’s thoughts were – collective propaganda, collective agitator and collective organizer. What is interesting, it was Lenin who, when gained the power established a some kind of monopoly in the press, where there were no even a signs of freedom of the speech and party were those ‘owners’ of the media, and it was also Lenin, who were writing speeches on how the capitalist “freedom of the speech” is nothing more than freedom for the rich and the bourgeoisie to oppress the working mass of the people.[1]
Comparing Lenin’s thoughts on this topic to the Lippmann’s and Carter’s issues we can find the connection, Lipmann argued that the truth and news often are two different things, whilst Carter claimed that media encloses power and is an instrument of governing, here- we can see that both these arguments are masterly used by Lenin – firstly by assuring people that press is against them, then later, after the revolution – using it as a method to expand his influence on society. So does it mean that media being a fourth branch is only possible, when it works in the interests of government? Would it ever be possible in the democratic society?
3. Argumentation and Discussion.
In this section I will summarize the main points of four approached of defining media and its power described above and will put forward my own argument, taking in an account all of the previous statements.
I agree that ideas and theories every article are applicable and even though all of these four theories and events where stated in different times and parts of the world we still can find examples in nowadays political life that supports, for example Lipmann’s thoughts on diversity and bias of the information provided to the public. At this place I would like to start forming my argument – That will allow to state the main ideas of the argument – As we now, the three branches of government – are constitutional, there is no possibility to view the judiciary and its work from various point of view, the government has the constitution, laws and it has reinforced the laws during many years, yet the media is not a single institutions and there will never be a single guarantee that the media is leaded by the honest forces without a self interest. So the question- Can something that is almost impossible to control (and as we can see in the 2.3 – Nowadays the ‘mediated plot’ of everyday life expands with a help of a modern technology) ever become a part of a regulated system of governing? Answer to this question encloses my main statement of this essay. I argue that it is wrong to even use a literate expression as ‘fourth branch of government’ as it emphasizes the link and cooperation between media and other three powers. If, of course we are speaking about a modern, West European or any other democratic country.
What do the existing branches have in common? They have a clear separation of power, yet still they do have the same interests, so if press would ever become the fourth branch, it would start to have same aims as the government which would lead to loosing trust of the public, so the main critique of the government as we know it now would likely disappear, then it would only function as a weapon, propaganda tool and also could, and probably would lose the trust of the audience. As it hard to make such a predictions, but still there is a possibility that with press becoming a part of government, - would not it be a threat to the main government in whole? Would democracy even be possible without the freedom of press?
I argue that there are not even a slightly possibility that press would ever work as a fourth branch of power within the three existing ones.
Here we could take an example of the Soviet Union and communistic regime where press was just a way to control the society, referring to the fourth section of the literature review
It also might be slightly irresponsible to state that the media cannot be seen as a fourth branch, whilst there are many authors and even examples within this essay who claim and certain about media co-working with government, the section 2.3 tells about the views of Douglass Carter who is an author of a book named “Fourth branch of government”, on the other hand the 2.4 news article review shows us that as soon as there are an negative information against political forces, parties or government, the media is the one to blame, and this is only one of the many cases we can read in the newspapers each week, when politicians turns again journalists, and even more reversed articles, where journalists fights against party, so there are no way to put this “fourth power” under one umbrella. There are also some ‘verbal mismatches’ I want to discuss on the information given about main assumptions of Douglass Carter- on the one hand he explains media to be the fourth branch of power, whilst on the other- he calls it a ‘watchdog’ over the other three. Media is providing a balance, and a very correctly stated ‘watchdog’ expression jut highlights the role – not as a partner of government but as a link between masses and government, explaining political process and processing the information.
In an introduction part it was stated that media is a strong power, Jim Morrison said “Whoever controls the media, controls the mind.” And in my opinion this quote is a great way to stress out how powerful media is, if used right.
What’s Next?
What is necessary to mention- new factors that is now changing the mediated world, and now, for sure we know,- It will never be the same. In times when the articles discusses above where written, you had to be a journalist to speak your mind and provide it to the public, now – the meaning of free speech has been changed forever. The development of the new technologies, globalisation and modernisation that develops so rapidly nowadays changes the role of the media as well as the role of an individual in it. With a help such networking and micro-blogging services as Twitter and Facebook, Wordpress and other opportunities of the Internet world now can change the world such and turn attention to the political problem and issues. These services are also changing the government – individual relations as now the heads of governments and politicians can turn directly to public with any issue they have and want to explain, there are no presidents of the modern countries who does not tweet and inform, so now the government is informing as well. It is hard to predict where all of this is going, but for sure, the media world will never be the same again, so nor will society – As for example, the possibility to add a comment to the articles and involve in discussion with other readers, a function that the regular newspapers never provided is developing people’s minds and educating them in making their own decisions about rights and wrongs of the political processes. In the new mediated world- everyone is involved.
. Conclusion
It is clear that the limits of power of media are wide, but answering the essay question we can conclude that media is in the same time – more than a branch of government, as sometimes it is more trusted, more reliable and even more powerful, but as I stated at same time the status of media is less than a comparing it with a fourth branch attaches to it. Media as an institution is way too destructive and limit less to be taken serious in many cases. Media could never exist as a separate power and it is impossible for it too collaborate with government.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Books
[1] Herbert J Atschull (1984) ‘Agents of power.The role in the News Media in Human Afairs’ Longman, New York (98-191)
Articles
[2], and (2011)‘‘Rupert Murdoch's empire must be dismantled – Ed Miliband” , Saturday 16 July 2011 21.00 BST
