Many shades of media bias

Simantini Krishnan, SNS, 30 March 2014: The acrimony in political discourse has found an unlikely target. The Indian media is at the receiving end of brickbats on account of perceived biases in its coverage of key events on the campaign trail. The issue exploded on the scene when Arvind Kejriwal accused the mainstream  media of kowtowing to Narendra Modi's electoral agenda. The hyperbolic reference to imprisonment heightened existing tensions, and it appeared that the AAP's extended honeymoon with the media was at last coming to an end. Specifically, this episode trained the spotlight on the constraints imposed by India's politico-industrial complex on its fourth estate.

Earlier, debates on media independence were triggered off by mounting attacks on journalists known to wield the pen against Narendra Modi. While supporters of Mr. Modi celebrated the downfall of a 'Congress-controlled' media, detractors mourned the death of objectivity and free speech. On both sides of the political divide, the premium on truth and objectivity camouflaged a deeper issue that never received the attention it deserved. An independent media is hardly inconsistent with partisan views and opinions. As long as it is accommodative of all possible shades of bias, a partisan media can in fact contribute to greater levels of awareness on issues. This is not simply a matter of free speech, important though it is. Partisan standpoints uphold different aspects of social reality, admittedly some more than others. When each of these is allowed to flourish without constraint, the composite picture emerges in all its complexity.

The classic conception of independent or watch-dog media, which was intricately tied to the protection of individual liberties from the authoritarian tendencies of powerful states, underwent many twists and turns in the twentieth century. Censorship of the media gained ground in socialist regimes, where it became an instrument of the state for mobilising support and maintaining order. In Nazi Germany, it was one of the most powerful means of rallying support for Hitler's idiosyncratic military adventures, including the disastrous foray into the vast and unknown terrain of Russia. In the post-colonial era, sections of the media assumed an activist role to assist developmental efforts of new countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. At the same time, rising media-control by profit seeking corporations led to a system of self-censorship, whereby the boundaries of discourse were imposed not by authoritarian governments, but by the inbuilt mechanisms of agenda-setting, selection, omission and commission.

The insidious forms of censorship perpetuated by politico-industrial complexes are particularly relevant in democracies of the twenty first century. Civil liberties are routinely undermined not as much by overt manifestations of state power as they are by pervasive ideologies of moral coercion. To operate within this context, the concept of the watchdog media needs to be reinvented to reflect the plurality of views and standpoints. The pursuit of objective truth is sometimes an exaggerated cause, as too much fuzziness surrounds the interactions of state, society and corporations. Instead, a vibrant fourth estate ought to be invested in upholding the whole range of perspectives that inform various situations on the ground. The Indian media has always shied away from openly taking sides in politics, ostensibly for the sake of neutrality. However, this has only constricted the scope for debate in an ever narrowing field of inquiry.

The Western media is perhaps more evolved in this respect. Corporate ownership has not prevented the flourishing of contrarian ideologies. For every Fox news that parrots the standpoint of a socially conservative Republican American, there exists an MSNBC that makes no bones about being rabidly left-liberal in its orientation. This has come about possibly because corporations discovered irrefutable business logic in tapping into the diversity of views and opinions. No wonder then that Rupert Murdoch's News Corp owns Foxtel as much as it does an avowedly liberal mouthpiece such as the Wall Street Journal.  Profit can be independent of ideology, and this is the lesson to be learnt by corporations with a stake in Indian media houses. Patterns of ownership certainly affect the media's ability to dwell on deeper issues such as legitimacy of the state, domination by elites or marginalisation of dissidents, but boundaries are automatically stretched when different voices find accommodation in the mainstream.

The problem faced by the Indian media boils down to the issues of crony capitalism that are at last finding some traction in the electoral arena. The unholy nexus of the political establishment with mercenary corporations translates into surreptitious control of the fourth estate. While little information is available in the public domain about major stakeholders in Indian media houses, there are speculations galore about key players driving editorial decisions. The tentacles of cronyism are choking the eco system, snatching livelihoods of common folk, driving up the cost of living and smothering voices of dissent.  Without the eradication of cronyism, profitability cannot be disentangled from ideology. The explosion of partisan views across the political spectrum cannot occur.

The writer is a London-based political scientist