Abstract
A rise of new forms of communication and new media architecture once again in history reopens the question about the media’s role in changing the political environment. In this sense Katrin Voltmer’s book brings us back to essentials in thinking about the intricate relationship between media and democracy. Her project is highly ambitious in considering the applicability of the western model of democracy and the liberal model of independent media to other parts of the world. The scope of Voltmer’s book is astonishing too – it resembles an ocean where geographic magnitude meets with broad and fundamental themes. Voltmer navigates quite elegantly in this space posing remarkably clear questions and logical examples. Needless to say, despite a very broad angle of analysis the volume reaches an impressive consistency.
This fascinating journey is essentially conceptual. The point is to make sense and find a systematic approach in understanding the position of communications media in political transitions. As with sailing on the sea, it is important to be prepared for the unexpected while also looking for regularities, repeating patterns that would help to understand circumstances and take sound decisions. Voltmer is right in her choice – too often we deal with particular cases that give us historically precise, but almost sterile accounts of change that are hard to compare with other similar cases and circumstances as ‘everything’ is deeply rooted in a particular historic, cultural, economic context. An attempt to reveal common platforms in this search is guided by two directivess: the first is concerned with the role of the media in democratic transitions; the second follows the changes of the media themselves and poses the question as to how successful the projects of revamping media structures and performances have been.
Voltmer’s book is thin in numbers, metrics and comparisons of large sets of quantitative data. Her approach clearly aims at capturing the very sense and nuances of the processes and mechanisms of the media’s involvement in democratic transitions. In other words, she wants to describe how the machine works without the necessity of displaying its various parameters and indicators. She is curious to get to the internal logic of this change, where the media are both the agents as well as the structures, influencing and being influenced by democratization.
While reading the book our appetite grows for becoming immersed more thoroughly in some of the transition cases, to follow the processes in South Africa, Russia, the Philippines or some of the Arab countries in greater depth. But the case studies are composed to support the broader theoretical framework, not to offer complete regional or national explanations. Voltmer makes remarkable use of the secondary data extracting unknown paradoxes that support her arguments and the theoretical structure of the book. Insights into a handful of cases help to make the conceptual choices more convincing. Voltmer is an excellent writer – her sentences are fresh and engaging. Both students and scholars, not to speak of journalists and policymakers, will be absorbed with this substantial diagnosis of media and democratic change.
The book opens with accounts on democracy and democratic media. Voltmer’s conceptual assumptions might sound provocative: qualities of democracy are painted as elastic, seemingly adaptable to very specific historical, cultural and political conditions. Clearly, in her view one size does not fit all. Democracy is understood as a social construct that is used, modified, interpreted in particular cultural environments. This however doesn’t mean that standards do not exist and the empty shell of ‘democracy’ can be filled with any substance provided it is adequately tailored by a ‘democratic’ rhetoric. The basic norms guiding media performance in transitional democracies might seem equally elusive or plastic, especially when the norms are examined against the dynamics of the process of democratization itself. The role of the media in the very initial phase of transition can be characterized by high unpredictability, volatility and uncertain outcomes. It may vary considerably depending on cultural conditions and historical specificities. Sometimes and somewhere, less adversarial and critical media may contribute to consolidation of democracy or more democratic outcomes better than would be the case with watchdog-like and intensively investigative media. Voltmer challenges the prevailing orthodoxy in viewing the media and journalism as watchdogs, forums and information-providers in a subtle and eloquent way. On the one hand, she asserts that normative values are floating; on the other hand, that they are to be anchored. Inspired by Whitehead’s (2002) categorization, she conceives ‘the floating’ elements of the norms as negotiable and open to adjustment, while ‘the anchored’ elements are those which are indispensable to preserve the distinct meaning of democracies.
Describing the virtues of democratic media, Voltmer chooses two fundamental categories: independence/freedom and diversity. She elaborates on whether any kind of freedom/independence is equally good for democracy and what kinds of diversity are better or worse for democracy. Distinguishing between internal and external diversity, Voltmer tries to unpack a widely shared view that ‘internal’ diversity seems to better serve the democratic purpose that ‘external’ diversity. While the former enables us to present different opinions and views side by side, the latter leads to fragmentation. Yet Voltmer critically admits that with internally pluralistic media it is often impossible to expect a kind of deep diversity that can crystallize through politically or culturally oriented media. Moreover, external pluralism (or parallelism in a broad sense) releases a kind of social energy, along with commitments and engagements that internal pluralism is not able to generate as it always has to be moderated, neutral, mainstream-focused. Thus, both levels of diversity are equally important for democracy – each at a different stage of formulating views and solutions.
In the second part of the book, Voltmer introduces a set of key concepts that help to clarify how media affect democratic regime change in media-saturated environments. To see the media as both an enabling and constraining force, Voltmer distinguishes between structural and agency-related sources of media influence. The structural dimension is mainly equated with media technologies, the agency-related dimension with journalistic agency. Media structures, however, cannot only be attributed to technology. The structures revolve around various forms and arrangements: ownership, media control, modes of financing, functions the media play in societies and ways in which the media interact with users. The technologies are certainly among the prominent forces in structuring media landscapes, but not the only one. Although Voltmer asserts repeatedly that the reality of communicative abundance and media-saturated environments changes the nature of democratization, the cases used to illustrate this trend are not linked into a more complex picture.
Undoubtedly, the role of time in the process of democratization cannot be omitted. Voltmer’s point of departure in this respect is a developmental theory of democratization assuming that the process evolves in steps that logically build on each other. Realities in transitional democracies, however, demonstrate that democratization is not a one-way process. In some countries different stages occur simultaneously, some are very short or absent altogether. Voltmer is well aware that as with human characteristics, so also with transitions: ideal models are very rare. Hence, various paths imply also specific media roles. For example, in the case of top-down liberalization, as well as a bottom-up process, not only do media act differently, in addition different media outlets, forms and services flourish and are differentially involved in the process of change.
The stage of democratic consolidation is interestingly analysed by Voltmer as she distinguishes carefully among symptoms in which the media seem to be particularly important in influencing outcomes decisively. These symptoms accompanying and eventually magnifying the specific nature of transitions include institutional consolidation, delegative democracy and populism, political parties without constituencies, accountability and political culture. All are seen as fragile points that may under certain conditions overshadow or reverse the trend of democratization. Voltmer emphasizes that it is the dynamics of a media-saturated environment which may amplify the weaknesses of a democratic system. Yet it would be noteworthy to remember that media may be seen as fragile too – struggling with regulatory uncertainties, political interferences or the competition of transnational actors.
Although Voltmer observes that in different geopolitical regions in the world particular types of authoritarianism developed, and that there is path-dependency, the ‘regional aspect’ of democratization as well as the particular characteristics of media systems would perhaps deserve more attention. She distinguishes the four main authoritarian regime types that emerged in Latin America, Eastern Europe, sub-Saharan Africa and East Asia. The media systems in these regimes differed significantly in their relationship to political power. This then translated into a particular self-perception of journalists in new media environments after the period of democratic change.
Voltmer could certainly have focused on new macro-regional political constellations that influence the course of transition and the media role in the regions mentioned and omitted. In the case of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) for instance, membership in the European Union and Council of Europe, and gradual transposition of accession standards, played a quite important although not final role in democratic transitions and media change. At the same time, a number of relatively recent cases in CEE (the controversial use of libel law by judges in Slovakia, Hungarian media law, lack of independent media regulatory authorities) demonstrate that national responses may corrode transnational attempts when collective purpose becomes weak. Another interesting aspect is the role of cultural proximity and the political use of culture in a search of regional models of media governance. For example, the media-related cooperation of Arab states in the Arab League and political support for transnational media such as MBC and others, builds often on proclaimed historical and cultural commonalities. The ‘cultural’ and ‘heritage’ arguments are often used as justification for the particular type of control imposed on the media as was the case with the Arab Satellite Broadcasting Charter introduced in 2008. It goes without saying that transitions are to a great extent cultural phenomena and the answer why in some states we observe recently politically reversed trends might have to do with specific cultural features and values. Indeed, cultural proximity theories can explain why certain regional ‘media spaces’ share important structural and performance-related characteristics. Macro-regional forces are interesting to explore also in terms of alternative paths of globalization put forward by new emerging powers such as China, India and Brazil. Some of these initiatives (e.g. Chinese media operations in Africa) may promote different normative standards for media structures and journalistic practice.
In the third part of her book, Voltmer explores four key arenas of media transformation – political, economic, social and professional. These are largely derived from the well-known work of Hallin and Mancini (2004), but Voltmer employs a clearer focus on the specifics of transitional democracies. Analysing the role of the state, Voltmer puts forward a highly relevant diagnosis portraying new multi-party democracies as political jungles where everybody has to survive in relation to long-term actions and their consequences in an always unpredictable future. These conditions are certainly shaped by the growing uncertainty of international and supra-national structures. Quite paradoxically, before being successfully completed democratic transitions may face new types of crisis marked by a lack of economic and financial stabilization and the reshifting of global power.
Voltmer also takes one specific case for a more focused analysis – the transformation of state broadcasting in Eastern Europe. She argues that given the genuine desire of CEE countries to democratize media and politics, public service broadcasting was bound to succeed in the region. However, the outcomes of transformation create a more bitter than satisfactory picture. Voltmer points out that without necessary cultural changes on all sides of the process, the full and fundamental transformation from state broadcasters to public service broadcasting has turned out to be impossible. Important questions can be posed in this respect: to what extent are successful PSB models like the BBC, ARD and NHK applicable to other cultural/political environments? Why has PSB transformation failed also in other European countries – including Spain, Greece and Portugal? Did the fact that some CEE countries followed different models (e.g. Poland the French model, Czech Republic, the German) affect the outcomes of PSB transformation?
With respect to media markets, Voltmer pays attention to the intricate relationship between the state and market, and compares it with a balance between democracy and the market. She argues that although ‘third’ wave democratization always involves market-oriented economic reforms, markets do not necessarily have an intrinsic preference for democracies. What markets need are secure property rights, political stability or predictability, rather than volatile conditions. For a specific focus on this, Voltmer analyses links between the media, money and power. Two instances are studied in this respect – media capture and capture of the state by the media. While the former case denotes a situation when media are politically controlled, the latter manifests the power balance tilting towards organized business groups including the media.
The third dimension – political parallelism – is painted by Voltmer in opposition to the concept of internal diversity. She is right to observe that parallelism does not exclude high standards of journalistic reporting, nor does neutrality and detachment guarantee high-quality political coverage. She is attentive also to a destructive force of parallelism, warning against the ‘toxic public sphere’ that jeopardizes social and political integration. The focus section turns to a particular group of transitional democracies – namely those that emerge from violent civil conflicts.
The fourth and final dimension studied by Voltmer is the strongest case in her analysis: she approaches journalism as a social field that adapts to the new environment of transformed politics. Voltmer first discusses the general norms and standards that constitute journalistic professionalism, while at the same time, she admits the presence of multiple models that coexist and compete even within a particular culture or country. In the focus section, Voltmer addresses a well-known, albeit largely undescribed journalistic practice: the exchange of money for favourable coverage.
In the conclusion, Voltmer is clear that the role models for how to ‘do’ democracy are no longer exclusively sought in western democracies. At the same time, she bitterly observes that the outcome of transformation of the media in ‘third wave’ democracies is disappointing. Besides, the very momentum of democratic transformations coincided with a communications revolution that once again in history dramatically changed the way media function in societies and interact with a political process. The third wave of democratization has not only brought a large ‘divergence of democracy’ but also generated distinctively different media systems and forms of journalism. Certainly, one size doesn’t fit all, but we are still able to distinguish between better and worse quality, between the media systems that better respond to the communication needs of a country’s citizens and those that do not allow the users’ demands and needs to be met. And we can perhaps even assume that, regardless of all the diversity in standards of journalistic performance and professional experience, we may easily say in what countries and media systems it is preferable to work and function as a journalist.