"In Latin America the subject of Means of Social Communications, and the concentration of media ownership, has a direct relationship with Our Democracies' future," wrote Aram Aharonian Several years ago When He Was Vice-President of the newly-formed Pan-Latin American satellite-television station Telesur ('The New Television Station of the South).
The crux of the problem lies, firstly, with the key role the media played in espousing Brazil’s dictatorships and the related consensus, and then with the support given to the neoliberal policies of the first democratic government in the ‘80s and ‘90s. The reports published in the daily newspaper El Mercurio supporting Augusto Pinochet’s military coup over Salvador Allende’s governing Unidad Popolar (“People’s Unity”) party in 1973 were famous, with the sociologist Armand Mattelart describing Chile as “a textbook example” as the coup d’état was instigated “in part by the CIA, multinational copper and electronics companies and American news agencies, in close conjunction with opposition media and local armed forces.”
In recent years, with a continent-wide revival in Latin America and the election of progressive governments in most countries, the question of media democratisation has begun to appear in political agendas. The priority is breaking up long-standing monopolies and giving a voice to the millions who have been on the fringes of society and off the information radar for years.
A first step was taken in 2005 with the creation of the public satellite broadcaster TeleSUR by Venezuela, Argentina, Cuba, Uruguay and Bolivia with the aim of making up for an historical lack of information in South American countries about their own neighbours. After this the number of initiatives for democratising the media kept on growing: “Venezuela has regained control of its radio-electric spectrum, which had previously been sequestered by vassal oligarchies from American interests, transforming it into public property. Bolivia created an Indigenous People’s Radio Network and has launched the state-owned newspaper Cambio (Change). Argentina has ended Clarin Group’s media monopoly and strengthened state-owned television and radio networks”, Brazilian journalist Beto Almeida stressed. The latest stage on this journey was the National Conference on the Media, which was recently held in Brazil.
The media situation in Brazil is characterised by the undisputed domination of eleven families, chief among whom are the Marinhos, owners of the Globo group. Founded by Roberto Marinho in 1962, two years before the coup d’état, thanks to contributions from the American giant Time-Life, during the dictatorship period, Globo group became the main Brazilian communications company, with a radio, TV and newspaper presence throughout the country. Having survived the dictatorship, the company remains the main tool for influencing opinions among Brazil’s elite. In 2002 the president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva managed to win the election despite ferocious attacks from Globo’s television programmes and newspapers, but in recent years he has sought a middle ground with the group, going so far as to nominate for the post of Communications Minster one of their men: the former journalist Hélio Costa.
The National Conference on the Media signalled a considerable change to the status quo. As Murilo Cesar Ramos, coordinator of the Laboratory on the Politics of Communcations at the University of Brasilia, explains: “Brazil has a long tradition of holding conferences about the country’s social problems. The first, on the subject of health, took place in 1941. President Lula’s two mandates have revitalised this tool, but the problem of democracy in communication has always been a taboo topic, so much so that it was not included in the government’s programme. It was, therefore, a surprise when Lula announced the Conference in January at the World Social Forum in Belém.”
The National Conference on the Media is the last stop on the roadmap to participatory democracy, a process that has taken several months to complete and involved a total of fifty thousand people participating in the twenty-seven local stages that took place all over Brazil. Over 6000 proposals were formulated, which were then reorganised into about 1600 key ideas and transcribed in fifteen notebooks by the Getulio Vargas Foundation. The aim was to produce a program platform to present to Parliament in order to address changes in the laws on telecommunications. This path has not been without its obstacles and limitations, especially as the Globo group has tried to make the initiative fail in any way possible. Socialist movements also have launched more than a few criticisms of the government on this subject, above all because of their choice to allow Brazilian media firms to attend the conference with equal representation to the pressure groups: 40% of delegates each, with the remaining 20% coming from the State. Further to this, Indymedia Brazil has shown that some of the laws on sector reform, such as the one on digital television, are already being discussed in Parliament and that it is highly unlikely that these discussions will be influenced by the outcome of the Conference. In spite of these issues, the work of the Conference has not been any less hard-fought and in the end 672 proposals were approved.
The major points of conflict were the question of social control of the media, taxation of commercial firms to support public initiatives and the definition of clear guidelines on media concentration and the issuing of licences. The biggest battle has been lead by community radio networks; an arena that has been one of the most hard-fought in the recent quest for democratisation of the media. “The problem with community radio is that the government will not grant licences, or if they do they go to powerful local oligarchs”, Aloisio Andrade from Radio Juventude, a community radio station belonging to the Rede Abraço network, explains. The subject of these complaints is known as “electronic Coronelismo”, the concentration of broadcasting powers in the hands of powerful local individuals, which are used to control opinions in order to maintain power. Today in Brazil 30% of senators and 15% of deputies (from the upper and lower houses respectively) are holders of broadcasting licences.
It is highly unlikely that these proposals will be adopted by Parliament, especially as they touch on strong personal interests. As soon as the Conference had finished both the newspaper O Globo and the Communications Minister Hélio Costa rushed to minimize its effect, describing it as “wishful thinking on the part of Brazil’s extreme left that will have no concrete implications for government.” Opposing this view are the deputies Luiza Erundina and Rosane Bertotti from the Central Única dos Trabalhadores. Erundina, who has campaigned for media reform in Brazil for many years, asserted: “This struggle began a long time ago, long before the conference itself, and the government cannot ignore the proposals put forward.” Bertotti emphasised the ongoing commitment this represents for pressure groups: “We cannot think of this Conference as an arrival point, but instead we should view it as a point of departure, a foundation laid for future disputes and for an ever-increasing democratisation of communications in this country.”
By Luca Muzi, translation of Sarah Potter.
Source: European Alternatives
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