Designated by the United Nations in 1993, 3 May was World Press Freedom Day, something that you might have missed in last week’s news. Journalists in Britain arguably ignore the event with good reason; as a country we are proud of our tradition of respecting the public’s right to criticise, which predates any official guarantees first set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Over a century ago the archetypal Victorian radical teetered on soapboxes flinging pamphlets to the crowd (when he had one) and today’s savvy hacks use hidden microphones and cameras to expose up-to-no-good politicians.
The situation, to generalise, exists in a similar fashion throughout the rest of the developed world. Ever since Henry Demarest Lloyd published articles exposing corruption in business and politics in 1880s America, the culture of bold investigative journalism in Western Europe and the United States has been a regular source of scandal, capable of administering strong doses of accountability to those living in the public eye.
Yet the value of a free press is easily taken for granted. The United States has historically avoided the routine pursuit of journalists’ sources, but after winning an historic election with promises of radical reform, Barack Obama’s administration has gone on to prosecute more government ‘leakers’ under the Espionage Act than any previous administration. In the U.K., the Leveson inquiry into press standards constitutes a government-mandated probe into the behaviour of a profession already ring-fenced by super-injunctions and some of the world’s most repressive libel laws. As a knee jerk reaction to the excesses of a badly behaved press, it inferred the end of press self-regulation; a universally accepted ideal and the strongest measure of a society’s willingness to embrace unfettered freedom of expression. Any perceived shift away from this framework would set a worrying precedent that will resonate around the world.
War and economic crisis make it unsurprising that so few column inches are devoted to the shocking combination of extreme violence, impunity and pernicious legislation that results from an absence of freedom of expression in the majority of the rest of the world. The headlines too often direct focus elsewhere. Yet press freedom advocates have been unwavering in calling a free press the essential right necessary for accountability and a free society. The economic rise of the Gulf States and China has not correlated with any greater regard for human rights. Sanctions on Myanmar are likely to be revoked after its recent opening, yet press censorship and human rights abuses reportedly continue. Ensuring that the structures of power exist within a framework of accountability remains the essential role of a free and independent press; taking it for granted is the first step towards losing this hard-won privilege.
