9 May 2011 | Americas, Mexico
Mexico City is the third largest city in the world. And like every major city, its citizens have a love hate relationship with governability. But in the 2010 barometer of the Americas, conducted by Vanderbilt University, 40 per cent of Mexican citizens believed that the rule of law must be respected, a higher ranking than Argentina and Chile, an important comparison given that Mexico is facing unprecedented violence due to its drug war. But citizens want to get involved, and there is a proliferation of citizen journalists.
One of the most interesting citizen groups is called Ciudadanos en Red, or Citizens Connected, an internet portal that was founded in 2004 and has grown to be one of the most important independent citizen journalism groups in Mexico City. The group is consulted daily by journalists, analysts and just curious city residents. It’s director, Rene Solis Brun, says they are different than any other group because they don’t apply filters and only place in their portal the information submitted by citizens. Unlike other citizen internet sites in Mexico, it is not an activist group. It receives announcements, denunciations, and criticisms from 1700 citizen committees, from throughout the city, which it runs on its site without changes. The site has comments on events in the city, including incidents of corruption by government workers. In another the site runs a story of violence at another elementary school in a working class neighborhood. The group Citizens Connected is a project of Metrópoli 2025, a citizen awareness group.
Brun says the site is evidence that people in Mexico City care about their city. His only worry is that most of those involved in citizen groups are people 40 years and older. His organisation is working towards engaging the youth in the city, and has joined Twitter in an attempt to reach out to a younger audience, you can follow them at @ciudadanosenred
5 May 2011 | News and features
Argentina has found an effective way of stifling independent inflation data — fining economists who question the official government statistics. Ed Stocker reports
In Argentina, inflation is never far from the media agenda. Primetime news channels endlessly debate the monthly rises in the canasta básica — the basic monthly family shopping basket — and the apparent divergence from official statistics.
Expressing contrasting views about the level of inflation in the country has become a divisive issue, highlighted by the decision of Internal Commerce Secretariat to fine several companies in April over their price-rise data.
Companies fined include Estudio Bein & Asociados, Finsoport, M&S Consultores and GRA Consultoras, as well as Graciela Bevacqua, a former employee of Indec, the state organisation charged with gathering statistics.
The secretariat claimed companies were being fined for publishing information that lacked “scientific rigour”, adding that if it was broadcast by media organisations it could “lead to error, deception or confusion”.
Miguel Kiguel , a former economist for the World Bank and head of the Econviews financial consultancy, received a fine of AR$500,000 (£73,000) for his forecast.
Speaking to Index on Censorship, he said: “This whole episode [fine] is surprising. The process is based on fair commerce laws that don’t apply to professional services and misleading advertising –– but we don’t carry out any type of advertising.
“It’s a way of scaring professionals who suggest that inflation is higher than the figures published by Indec.”
Asked if the government’s actions amounted to a freedom of expression violation, he replied: “Effectively these fines limit freedom of expression. The whole case is based on public declarations that I made in newspapers and on the radio. It is very worrying that one can receive very high fines for expressing one’s opinion on inflation and monetary policy.”
Last Thursday (28 April ) members of the Internal Commerce Secretariat defended their decision to impose fines. El Cronista Comericial, a newspaper that had previously questioned the reasons behind the fines, published an article by Internal Commerce national director Fernando Carro and Graciela Peppe, entitled “The truth will make us free”.
In the article they wrote: “One cannot assume that the resolutions behind the fines violate rights guaranteed by the National Constitution… Claiming that the fines infringe constitutional rights has no basis.” They added that suggesting government actions were an act of censorship showed a “profound confusion”.
The article continued: “From the ongoing investigation it has been possible to prove that the levels [of inflation] ascertained and disseminated by the firms that have been punished are little more than an artificial invention, based on reflections lacking the smallest hint of reliability.”
Earlier this year Indec published its figures for 2010, stating that inflation for the year was 10.9 per cent. Other economists suggest the unofficial figure is closer to 25 per cent.
Last April a group of pro-government activists interrupted the launch of a new book criticising Indec at Buenos Aires’ annual Feria del Libro (Book Fair). Gustavo Noreiga’s Indek: historia íntima de una estafa (Indek: the intimate story of a fraud) criticises the running of the statistics body, claiming President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner exercises political control over it.
Ed Stocker is a freelance writer based in Buenos Aires and London
1 Feb 2011 | Uncategorized
Financial Times editor Lionel Barber’s Hugh Cudlipp Lecture, delivered last night, managed to fit the many and varied dilemmas facing the UK press into a short and entertaining speech.
It is pretty much accepted by anyone in possession of a press card that print media is in decline; but Barber points out that this a very much a western world phenomenon. In some markets, print is thriving:
These figures largely reflect a western disease: the virus has yet to strike the world’s biggest countries, China and India; and it is not true of many emerging countries such as Brazil, where the appetite for news in all forms is growing fast.
Since 2005, for example, the number of paid-for Indian daily newspaper titles has surged to 2,700, according to the World Association of Newspapers. The circulation of Hindi papers rose from less than 8m in the early 1990s to more than 25m last year. Meanwhile, the total circulation of Brazilian newspapers has expanded by 1m over the past decade to 8.2m, with steamy tabloids among the biggest beneficiaries.
Barber goes on to question why US and UK newspapers are suffering. Could it be because the press is a little too close to those it is meant to scrutinise?
In hindsight, Watergate was a curse as well as a blessing for American journalism. The courageous reporting of the Post and the New York Times – coupled with the favourable Supreme Court rulings on publication of the Pentagon Papers – were landmarks for the interpretation of First Amendment rights and the freedom of the press. But they also encouraged the cult of celebrity and media self-absorption.
In the words of Eric Alterman, as reporters became more sophisticated and respected, the top rank came to be regarded as the social equal of those people they were reporting on such as Senators and CEOs. Some came to identify more closely with their subjects rather than with their readers. In short, they joined the Establishment.
Does this apply to Britain?
[…]I believe we have entered our own period of media self-absorption, driven partly by our industry’s financial difficulties. Second, we have in recent years witnessed if not exactly a merger of the media and political class, certainly an increasingly intertwined relationship which, I suspect, does not necessarily serve the interest of either.
Today, many members of the political elite in Britain have all worked in or with the media industry. David Cameron worked in a commercial TV company. Jeremy Hunt ran a publishing business. Michael Gove was a newspaper columnist. Boris Johnson was a magazine editor (and still writes a weekly newspaper column). Ed Miliband was a TV researcher. And Ed Balls was an editorial writer for the FT.
This new social network in Britain may be more informal than formal, but it still comes across as far too cosy. Arguably, our elected representatives have become a tad too respectful toward broadcast and print media.
Many would argue that the web has broken up the influence of this network, with the exploits of Wikileaks in 2010 blowing traditional media out of the water. But Barber, quoting New York Times editor Bill Keller, questions this narrative:
Keller’s observation that Assange was primarily a source is highly pertinent. That plain fact should tamp down the fevered debate over whether WikiLeaks spells either the end of diplomacy or a new age of journalism. Like Keller, I believe it does neither.
Barber is also quite scathing on the News of the World phone-hacking scandal:
The suspicion must remain that News Corporation assumed that it enjoyed enough power and influence in Britain to make the phone hacking controversy go away.
Of interest to Index readers is this line, which will have to be borne in mind as the government’s defamation bill comes before parliament:
Many MPs are itching to retaliate for the humiliation of the expenses scandal, but statutory regulation would be a grave step in the wrong direction.
Press freedom is woven into the fabric of our nation. We do not want to go down the same road as countries such as Argentina, Hungary and South Africa which have adopted or are about to adopt new laws curbing press freedom. Democracy, it should be remembered, is not just about holding elections.
There is a case for rebalancing the right to privacy and the protections offered by Britain’s overly onerous libel laws which are weighted in favour of the well-heeled plaintiff. But Westminster should also tread carefully with regard to privacy, lest the rich and famous, on and off the football field, become untouchable.
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3 Nov 2010 | News and features
Ana Arana finds out how the producers of Mexican soap operas sidestep government and Church outrage
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