By CIME Staff
Two years after it began as an informal discussion on media ethics among a group of journalists in Prague, the Center for International Media Ethics CIME is proud to introduce a whole new concept to the field of media. J-Ethinomics is the founding principle of journalism ethics courses at CIME. The term unites the concepts of Ethics and Economics in the field of journalism. It describes practices in journalism that have an aim towards building trust, credibility, and accountability - values that are the foundation of media ethics - and the impact of these values on media economics. It is a principle based on the idea that media organizations' use of ethical practices can serve as a practical strategy for media business to generate revenue.
J-Ethinomics is supported by research demonstrating a positive correlation between building audience trust in the media and developing a loyal audience base
By Silvana Blanca Velasco San Martin
Freelance Journalist
Lima, Peru
On October 16, 2008, Magaly Medina, a Peruvian entertainment journalist and anchor of the nighttime TV program "Magaly TV", famous for her "scandals" which local viewers call "ampays" (a Quechua word meaning "red-handed"), was imprisoned for defamation, after losing a judicial fight against the soccer player Paolo Guerrero.
To sum up the battle, in November of 2007, the night before a qualifying match for the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa between Peru and Brazil, Guerrero - one of the principal players - left a party with a model, they say, at dawn. Photos prove that they left together, but the inability to verify the exact time at which the images were captured sealed Medina's fate and locked her up for three months.
The photos were real, but the time proved to be her Waterloo, because Medina said they were taken at two in the morning and Guererro's defense said that they left at ten or eleven pm. What the journalist wanted to prove was that the athlete, instead of properly concentrating on the next day's game, distracted himself and that is why his performance during the match was horrible and we lost.
You may think "Soccer players don't belong to the world of showbusiness", but in my country, Peru, they do. Many are linked with cabaret stars, dancers, and models in almost always scandalous romances. They go out to dance clubs, drink in excess and more than one has had problems with the police. And it's Magaly Medina's program that spreads the videos, from the least favorable angle, of course.
Its his private life, without a doubt. But do we journalists have a right to interfere and divulge the scandalous actions of celebrities? Is it ok that there are programs that dedicate themselves solely to this purpose, and that the protagonists often lend themselves to the scandals in search of fame?
Such is the case with the program "Magaly TV." So Medina, who was seized for defamation, is on the air again after her liberation and continues to do the same thing, although a bit more cautiously. But, there are two sides to the coin. On one side are the artists and athletes: do they really have a private life or must they be 100% on display without the slightest bit of privacy? And secondly: if we limit the presence of these kinds of programs, will we truly be attacking freedom of expression?
The response is complicated. As a journalist I believe that artists are not obligated to expose themselves entirely, except if they want to do so and are given the platform. But it's also this excessive ambition for notoriety that pushes them to tell all and expose themselves to anything to garner attention.
And this is where Medina's program fits perfectly. She welcomes them to her set, exposes them to ridicule and makes fun of them, protecting herself by asserting "this is what people like". But I disagree, because in Peru as in many countries, entertainment journalism can develop with standards and class, gliding elegantly over rumors without destroying honor, and without packing each broadcast with them.
There are quality Peruvian productions that only hope for an opportunity to show themselves. These, disseminated with professionalism, gain a public and create much-needed honorable work, without those awful scandals that do us more harm than good.
By Kate Newman and Rachael Small
CIME Staff
On 12-13 February 2010, CIME staff members joined forces in southern Mexico for the second annual CIME Forum. The state of Oaxaca contains more speakers of indigenous languages than any other region of the country, with significant numbers of Zapotec and Mixtec peoples, and as many as sixteen other indigenous groups. All of this made Oaxaca an excellent venue for discussion of the Forum topic: “Representation of Indigenous Peoples in the Mexican Press.”
Oaxaca-based project assistant Abraham Vásquez was joined by CIME staff members Noah Castro, Kate Newman and Rachael Small. The event was attended by media professionals from all fields: community radio, commercial press, and photographers, as well as professors, students, and interested members of the Oaxacan community.
CIME collaborated with Protección a la Joven de Oaxaca, a non-profit organization that provides housing to women of indigenous backgrounds living and studying in the city. The Forum was held in the courtyard of Protección a la Joven, where Ms. Newman began with opening remarks, reminding participants that "No country has perfectly ethical media; even high levels of press freedom do not guarantee ethical journalism. However, the challenges in each region are different, and it is important to be having this discussion in Latin America today." Participants were appreciative of CIME's organization of the event, telling staff members that while these issues are prevalent, they are rarely addressed so explicitly. As one participant mentioned, "The capacity to question is very important, and [I appreciated] the openness and recognition of the speakers."
Each panelist gave their presentation, touching on issues of representation in the written press and radio. Speakers included Lilia Oralia, Director of the Ciudadanía Express, Sócrates Vásquez of Mixe community radio Jenpöj, and Pijy Gutierrez of Noticias, who spoke of her personal experience with discrimination as an indigenous woman and the politicization of indigenous people in the media.
Open discussion followed, and participants and panelists touched on the root of discrimination against indigenous peoples as it is expressed in the press, as well as the complexity of indigenous/mestizo identity in contemporary Mexican society. As one participant mentioned: "I enjoyed the participation from two perspectives, the indigenous person and the urban mestiza."
Many of the journalists who attended enthusiastically offered to work with CIME on media ethics workshops in Oaxaca, to help sensitize other journalists and students of journalism to the ethical issues particular to media professionals in that region of Mexico. CIME enthusiastically looks forward to continued collaboration with these individuals, as well as the rest of the Oaxacan media community.
CIME was invited to the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium on January 11th to speak on the topic of data protection and journalists. The lecture addressed the exemptions for the media included in the European Data Protection Directive of 1995 and the UK Data Protection Act of 1998. The topic inspired a lively debate, in which participants from many European countries discussed how journalists can maintain ethical standards towards their sources while striving to deliver information that serves the public interest.
A significant part of the media's exemptions in the EU and UK data protection legislation hinges on the issue of public interest. However it is difficult to define what actually counts as public interest. The Directive of 1995 and the Act of 1998 are not explicit about this. However, the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) of the UK maintains that there is a public interest in freedom of expression itself. The PCC has a Code of Practice that tries to clarify in which cases journalists may be permitted access to data that would be denied to other people, in the instance that they are using the information to put together and publish a story that benefits the "public interest". This would include cases where the content of their reporting serves to detect or expose a crime or serious misdemeanor, protect public health and safety, or prevent the public from being misled by some statement or action of an individual or organization.
Interviewed by Rachael Small
CIME Staff
Dr. Tom Brislin is the Chairman of the Academy for Creative Media at the University of Hawai'i. He has written many articles on the media in Japan and international media ethics, as well as providing newsroom ethics training in Hawaii and Guam. He is currently teaching a class in Media Ethics at the University of Hawai'i.
CIME:How long have you been studying the media in Japan? What inspired you to focus on that part of the world?
Tom Brislin: I first visited Japan in the 1960s while I lived on Guam, attending the University of Guam. This was the dawn of the age of Japan-Guam forgiveness (Japan's occupation of Guam during World War II was marked by cruelty) and Japanese tourism to Guam as an inexpensive tropical alternative to Hawai'i. I was also working for the Guam Daily News at the time, whose editor was a close friend of the editor of the Tokyo Shipping and Trade News. I visited the TSTN editor, who regaled me with stories about the trials and tribulations of running an English-language daily (British tabloid style) in Japan.
I maintained an interest in Japanese culture and political affairs, and kept the editor's anecdotes in mind, but did not return until the late 1990s on my first research trip, which focused on the intercultural skills needed, and ethical issues faced by, foreign correspondents. I interviewed several U.S. correspondents from such news agencies as Newsweek, the New York Times, L.A. Times, NBC, AP, NPR, and Bloomberg News Service.
During this period Shoko Asahara, of the Aum Shinrikyo cult that released sarin gas in the Tokyo subways, had just been captured, which provided a good case study for the coverage differences between Japanese and U.S. media. While researching coverage in the library of the Japan Foreign Correspondents' Club, the sarin gas connection led me about the case of Marco Polo, a People-style magazine that had recently been shuttered as a result of international protests to its running of a Holocaust-denial story.
CIME: In your opinion, what is the most prevalent ethical problem currently facing journalists in Japan?
TB: The initial (foreign correspondents) study found one of the significant differences in U.S. and Japanese reporting styles to be the Kisha Kurabu, or press club system of Japan, which was an industry practice that seemed to limit both individual journalistic action and story coverage. It also led to several creative, if Byzantine, practices, such as leaking stories to U.S. correspondents that Japanese journalists could not publish in their own papers (exclusives are virtually banned by the press club system). They could then report on what was reported in the U.S. press.
I noted, through interviews with Japanese journalists who worked on both the English and Japanese language editions of the major newspapers, that younger journalists seemed to want to buck the system, while the older journalists and editors were quite comfortable with it.
The Marco Polo case became a broader study of anti-Semitic publishing in Japan, which also noted Kisha Kurabu influences on what could not be reported in a major daily newspaper, but could be handed to a subsidiary or aligned magazine [that was] not allowed press club entry. One result, captured by a key quote from one journalist: Our newspaper covers our politicians from the waist up, while our magazine covers them from the waist down.
My work in these two studies attracted the attention of two colleagues in Japan, one from Hiroshima City University and the other from Doshisha University in Kyoto.
With my colleague from Hiroshima City University, we designed a study, funded by the national broadcasting system NHK, on differences in the coverage of youth crime in the U.S. and Japan, where the identities of youthful offenders under the age of 20, regardless of the severity or notoriety of the crime, perpetrator, or victim, are kept absolutely confidential. This is another press club dictum, as the Japanese Supreme Court ruled that the government could not prevent the publication.
My colleague from Doshisha quoted my earlier studies, particularly the Marco Polo case, at length in his book about the problems in the Japanese press. He invited me to be a keynote speaker on the issues raised by the Kisha Kurabu system in Japanese journalism at the annual Doshisha conference on the media.
The youth crime study was published in both the U.S. and Japan and presented at an international ethics conference in Australia. My colleague in that study, Yasuhiro Inoue, and I have undertaken further studies, including one on the perceptions of Japanese culture, language, and history through Anime.
CIME: Can you propose a method for journalists to deal with this problem?
TB: The press club system had its advantages post World War II as it promised a self-censorship system to avoid any overt censorship from first the U.S. military government, and the subsequent return to Japanese rule. It is so ingrained in the Japanese press system that it could never be completely eliminated. But in an era of globalization, it has become obsolete, and antithetical to a truly free press. The press clubs themselves (there are separate ones for the coverage of government, political parties, courts, financial systems, etc.) will need to loosen their restrictions on individual initiative and restricted membership.
CIME: What are the most important ethical concerns for any journalist to take into consideration, regardless of where they are writing?
TB: Obviously truthfulness and full-disclosure reporting - not holding back for any personal or corporate conflict of interest. They should also keep in mind their fundamental purpose is to empower the citizenry to promote self-governance at all levels.
CIME: How does writing about international issues affect a writer's ethical responsibilities?
TB: Too often foreign correspondents - and their editors back home - want to lapse into stereotypes. For example, one correspondent in Germany told me that his editors wanted to see some reference to Hitler or the Berlin Wall in the first graf of every story. They thought that was the only context the readers had for such a dynamic and democratic country. While the Germans want to be forward looking, some journalists want to keep them chained to their past.
CIME: Could you share an ethical dilemma you have faced and how you approached it?
TB: We had knowledge of a potential collapse of a financial institution if it did not receive an immediate and immense infusion of capital. We wanted to protect those readers who had invested their life savings in this institution, and to inform all readers on the impact of all financial institutions if one failed. We also knew that if we ran the story, that saving capital would not materialize, and the institution's failure would be a foregone conclusion from the publicity. We opted to give the institution one week to gather that capital. They did, and the crisis was averted. On a personal level, though, my fiancee (now gratefully my wife) had her savings in that institution. Should I tell her to withdraw her funds when I was unwilling to share that information with the thousands of other depositors? I kept silent. Once the dust had settled, though, it provoked some lengthy and heated discussions. She did silence me with the question: "Would you have told your mother, if her entire savings were wrapped up there?" At what point does protection of family override protection of the audience?
CIME: In what ways can media editors help to maintain a high ethical standard in their publications? To what extent must the responsibility fall solely on the shoulders of the journalists themselves?
TB: I have discovered in my outreach work as a newsroom trainer that very few newsrooms engage in ethical discussions. The most they do have are defensive rationalizations after having published or broadcast something that has come back to haunt them. The "jargon" of ethics should be as common as the jargon of publishing or broadcasting in the newsroom. Editors should conduct in-house training, and take advantage of the short case studies and critical incidents that are included in many professional magazines and journals.
Journalists, of course, must have a deep and abiding sense of professionalism. They daily hold people's reputations in their hands. All too often ethical dilemmas arise from a lack of communication between journalist and editor. Ethics needs to be a "front-loaded" discussion, not an after-the-fact defense.
Copyright © Ammado AG, 2012
