English Local Government - Coursework Example

English Local Government The spread of democratic ideas and subsequently ideals, and the emergence of a global system of economy and politics because of complex interdependence have contributed to the resurgence of the local government. One of the major forms of decentralization in the twentieth century has been the break up of empires and colonies into nation- states, the most recent example being the break up of the Soviet Union and the separation of Kosovo from Serbia. The pressure for pursuing and adopting democracy as a political ideology and system has led to a new emphasis on local governance below the level of the nation- state. The rise of the global political economy has provided localities with another alternative to the traditional national capitals that have existed for quite some time now. According to Teune, although the patterns of local governance have similar features of provincial and local governments, the push for democracy will give local politics a greater role in the issues of peace and prosperity than has been true during the long recent period of the rise in authority of nation- states1. Local governments and domestic politics have become focal points of current day democratic political development. The two primary reasons for this are: firstly, the beginnings of a second democratic revolution that is solely based on participation, and secondly, the emergence of a global political economy that defines local conditions for peace and prosperity. The former requires local self determination rather than top- bottom direction whereas the latter frees localities from national governments by providing alternatives for resources and support; the new sources being other countries or international agencies2. The question and perhaps the existence of local democracies have become crucial in the newly established democracies, whose shaky and rather weak national democratic institutions are based on weak traditions of local autonomy. Many former Communist countries of central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia are in the complex processes of just establishing democratic institutions. However, what are lacking in these countries are structures of civic societies- private associations, political parties, and interest groups which, in most of the cases were destroyed by totalitarian political regimes. Other parts of the world are also under global pressures to become more democratic by altering the course of their efforts of the past decades to develop politically by building stronger states and effective, rational national policies for economic growth and welfare for the poor. Moreover, there is a new democratically established Latin America, democratically elected governments are being established in southern Africa, and several former authoritarian countries in Asia are taking effective steps from the top down to become more democratic. In addition, heavy welfare states in Northern Europe have been forced to reduce the economic role of central governments in order to participate in newer European political institutions. In the United States, the debate over federalism and the role of the government has again gained substantial momentum in the political agenda3. However, throughout the last two decades, Britain or the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland had gained notoriety as one of the most centralized nation- state societies in Europe. Shortly after New Labor’s landslide leap to power in 1997, this unitary but multinational state was granted with a comprehensive program of constitutional ‘modernization’ consisting of an elected Parliament for Scotland, a National Assembly for Wales, an Assembly for Northern Ireland, an elected Assembly and Mayor for London, along with Regional Development Agencies for the eight English regions4 (MacLeod). In becoming more decentralized and when it comes to local and regional politics, the big question arises whether or not the local and regional media exercise power without any responsibility. According to Curran and Seaton, the orthodox interpretation of the British press has remained more or less unchanged for over a century now. The British Press is generally said to have attained its freedom around the middle of the nineteenth century. This view, first adapted during the pioneering of the Victorian histories of journalism, has been repeated without hesitation, uncritically ever since in standard histories both of the press and that of modern Britain. Attaining this freedom of press is attributed to a heroic struggle against the state. The events of prime importance during this struggle are said to be the abolition of the Court of Star Chamber in 1641, the abolition of press licensing in 1649, Fox’s Libel Act of 1742, and the repeal of press taxation, the so- called ‘taxes on knowledge’ in the period 1853- 1861. Only with the last of the reforms, as is claimed, did the press finally achieve freedom. This landmark in the history of Britain is also held to be the product of the capitalist developments of the press. Though, some researchers place greater significance on the market evolution of the press than on its legal development. With regard to the Georgian press, Curran and Seaton quote Professor Roach as stating that the true censorship lay in the fact that the newspaper had not yet reached financial independence, and as a result depended on the administration or the parties. Eventually the newspaper profits grew as a result of advertising revenues which ultimately rescued the press from economic dependence on the state5. With their added emphasis on the free market and the legal emancipation as the foundation for the freedom of press, orthodox histories of the press provide a powerful, mythological account with a contemporary moral. Hence, the historical account of the advertiser as the midwife responsible for the freedom of press is invoked by all sorts of journalists everywhere to justify the role of advertising in newspapers as well as the high dependence of newspapers on advertising. The daily existence of newspapers in the public and social life would not have come about had the businessmen not used it for advertisements. Similarly, journalists oftentimes site the historical struggle against state control as the basis for opposing any sort of state- sponsored reform of the press. Orthodox accounts of press history hence have policy implications for the present day as well. Part of the ideological resonance of these accounts also stem from their powerful evocation of the part played by the freedom of press in empowering the masses during the nineteenth century. Financially independent newspapers provoked the masses to think and made governments accountable. The emergent free press also made a vital contribution to the maturing of the British democracy by becoming more responsible and less partisan6. On the contrary, many historians argue when newspapers became independent of political parties and affiliations. Many are also extremely critical of the first generation of press lords given the increasing commercialization of the press. The period around the middle of the nineteenth century it is argued did not inaugurate a new era of press freedom and liberty, but rather it established a new system of press censorship instead which was more effective than anything that had gone before. Market forces succeeded, it is said, where legal repression failed in conscripting the press to the social order7. Since the Second World War a social responsibility theory of the press had emerged in various democratic societies around the world. The main source of this paradigm is the Hutchins Commission in the United States, but a similar added emphasis on serving the society rather than commerce or the government has also arisen in parallel fashion without any links whatsoever to the Hutchins. Fortunately or unfortunately, professionalism and codes of professional conduct and ethics are too narrow and superficial to serve as the framework or foundations for a global social responsibility theory paradigm of the twenty first century. Rather, universal ethical principles provide the most appropriate framework and the cross- cultural axis around which around which these principles revolve in the sacredness of human life. Embedded in the protonorm of human sacredness lie ethical principles such as human dignity, telling the truth and normal efficiency. These principles are citizen ethics instead of professional ethics; they are set in the social domain where social responsibility theory gets its rationale8. The Hutchins Report insisted on serving the media’s duty to the society instead of facilitating the interests of commerce and governments. Believing that the press was caught in the mystique of its own individual rights, the Commission stood both terms on its head with the label of social responsibility. The Commission was worried that post World War two media were becoming political and social enterprises. According to the Commission’s view, industrial and technological imperatives could impede truthful and comprehensive reporting. Demanding and attaining independence from government intrusion and insisting on personal rectitude were not enough by themselves. Responsible journalism does not strengthen the government in power, nor does it insist merely on the individual right to publish and make a profit. The press must remain free from government and business pressures and serve the society to the best of its abilities instead. Thus, socially responsible news is defined by its duties to the community. For the social responsibility theory it is the duty of the press to provide a truthful, comprehensive and intelligent account of the day’s events in a context which gives them rationale and meaning. The press should therefore serve as a forum for the exchange of comment and criticism but at the same time giving a representative picture of the constituent groups of the society, helping in the presentation and clarification of the goals and values of the society at large provide full access to the day’s intelligence. According to the Commission, the primary mission of mass communication is to raise social conflicts from levels of violence and vulgarity to the plane of civil discussion9. Most of the European Union takes social responsibility for granted. It is the dominant, mainstream doctrine in journalism and media policies including public service broadcasting. A significant reminder of this was given by the Summit of the European Union in Amsterdam in 1997 through the adoption of the following Protocol on Public Service Broadcasting: The High Contracting Parties, considering that the system of public broadcasting in the Member States is directly related to the democratic, social and cultural needs of each society and to the need to preserve media pluralism, having agreed on the following interpretive provisions, which shall be annexed to the Treaty establishing the European Community: The provisions of this Treaty shall be without prejudice to the competence of the Member States to provide for the funding of public service broadcasting in so far as such funding is granted to broadcasting organizations for the fulfillment of the public service remit as conferred, defined and organized by each Member State, and that such funding does not affect trading conditions and competition in the community to the extent that would be contrary to the common interest, while the realization of the remit of that public service shall be taken into account.10 This introductory paragraph makes the important point that public broadcasting as opposed to commercial broadcasting should be understood in the European Union as part of the social and cultural spheres based on national priorities rather than on the economic sphere based on free competition within the broader European scale. Hence, public serving broadcasting is defined at the constitutional level as an exception to the principle of a free European market. The rest of the mentioned text specifies that the funding of public service broadcasting, notably license fee paid annually by the consumers, is protected at the national level against normal European Union wide competition rules. These rules have already been invoked by commercial broadcasters who claim that the public broadcaster with its subsidies violates the principle of the free European market. This protocol averts such claims and provides legal security for public funding. The protocol also strengthens effectively the dual broadcasting system in Europe where strong public and private sectors exist simultaneously11. This protocol clearly reflects the spirit of the Hutchins already in its reference to media pluralism. This means to oppose media concentration that is commercial media concentration in the free market. It is ironic that what is supported instead is public service broadcasting which usually becomes institutionalized in massive monopolies like the British Broadcasting Corporation. At close scrutiny however public service monopolies are in close accordance with the concept of media pluralism since their whole philosophy is to provide equal access to and fair convergence of all sectors of the society regardless of socioeconomic status, place of living, home language and so forth. Although the Amsterdam protocol offers legally concrete evidence in support of Hutchins thinking in the particular field of public service broadcasting, a number of other documents both by the European Union and the Council of Europe define the broader area of European Audiovisual Policy and what is regarded in Europe as the Information Society. In these emerging policy areas one can also trace Hutchins thinking as exemplified and thus glorified in resolutions by the European Parliament12. Many like Kevin Williams and Richard Evans believe that history’s popularity on television is partly what is perceived as the revival of media’s interest in the past. We are in a period where there is immense hunger for history among the adult book- reading, television- watching, and movie- going public. Furthermore, Williams quotes Evans as saying that the media have discovered that history is a repository of an endless quantity of human stories. Almost all historians believe in the fact that history and media are more intertwined today than ever before. This is evident by the fact that many movies based on history like Gladiator, 300, Pearl Harbor have been immense blockbuster hits. But this interconnectedness is not always welcome. It has posed a dilemma for historians, with gathering of the profession debating the issues raised by the media’s representation of history, especially that as depicted by television. There exists a varying degree of dissatisfaction regarding the accuracy and truthfulness of what is shown as scriptwriters and television and film producers are criticized for sacrificing the real truth and depicting false stories, selling them with the name of entertainment to earn a few million dollars. Williams claims that at a more profound level television and film histories present a challenge to the profession of history. He further quotes Pierre Sorlin by saying that visual media have given the people a new image of the past. He argues that television is a postmodern phenomenon which tends to present a flattened vision of the past, blurring distinctions between events and the truth from fabrication. Characterized by the absence of hierarchy between the details that all seem of equal importance, the media sacrifices any sort of meaning and content13. The media are and have always been intimately tied up with the construction of identities, especially national identities. For instance, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) from its initial years as a privately owned company emphasized the role broadcasting could play in the development of a national community. It broadcasted events such as the Cup Final, the Monarch’s Christmas speech and the State Opening of Parliament which were ardently used to bring the British nation together. Similarly ceremonial events such as state funerals, royal weddings, the Olympic Games, World Cup and specific commemorations have been used by broadcasting systems around the world as an affirmation of national community, continuity and solidarity. These ceremonial events help produce historical narratives which help reinforce national histories and identities. Similarly the media are seen as presenting a particular account of the nations past, reinforcing particular myths and stereotypes and at the same time excluding or marginalizing certain groups, voices, subcultures or interpretations which may have some degree of truth behind them. These myths perpetrated by the media may not be altogether always wrong but are most certainly dominant interpretations of what happened in the past which play a very significant role in exercising a strong influence over popular memory and the public’s understandings. However, one can see that media’s close association with popular national myth has changed as a result of the process known as globalization which has consequently undermined and weakened national consciousness, values and allegiances. Hence, it has brought forth the demand for the alternative historical accounts14. Broadcasting in Britain has traditionally held the role that it is a public service that is accountable to people only. While retaining the essential and primary public service element, it now also embraces the elements of competition and choice: the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) which broadcasts television and radio programs, the ITC (International Television Commission) which regulates commercial television services, including cable and satellite services, the Radio Authority which licenses and regulates commercial radio services including cable and satellite services. The three bodies work to broad requirements and objectives, defined and endorsed by the Parliament, but are otherwise independent in their daily conduct of business. While the freedom of media is a great blessing nonetheless for the society and the world in general, it also exploits the exalted position it is held in. While it broadcasts the truth without any political or governmental affiliations, it is prone to mould the truth as it suits to sell it, hence the existence of misrepresentations. 1. Christians, Clifford and Kaarle Nordenstreng (March 2004) Social Responsibility Worldwide: Exploring Questions of Media Morality Journal of Mass Media Ethics Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 3- 28. 2. Curran, James and Jean Seaton (2003) Whig Press History as Political Mythology Power Without Responsibility: The Press, Broadcasting, and New Media in Britain Routledge, pp. 3- 5. 3. Jones, Martin and Gordon MacLeod (December 2004) Regional Spaces, Spaces of Regionalism: Territory, Insurgent Politics and the English Question Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers Vol. 29, No. 4, pp. 433- 452. 4. Teune, Henry (July 1995) Local Government and Democratic Political Development Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science Vol. 540, Local Governance Around the World, pp. 11- 23. 5. Williams, Kevin (August 2007) Flattened Visions from Timeless Machines Media History Vol. 13, No. 2, pp. 127- 148. Read More