In early March, Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva promised greater press freedom in his country. He also stated his intention of improving the protection of journalists and access to public information. Vejjajiva held out the prospect of new legislation in this context. Just four weeks after this welcome announcement, a blogger in Bangkok was sentenced to ten years imprisonment for lèse-majesté (violating the dignity of the reigning sovereign). He had digitally altered pictures of the Thai king and his family and posted them on the Internet.
These at first sight contradictory signals from Thailand are characteristic of the media situation in many Asian countries. On the one hand, classic forms of censorship – state “muzzles” on bothersome issues, blackened photographs, jamming of foreign radio stations – are going out of fashion. More and more parliaments and governments are committing themselves to the independence of the media. On the other hand, media companies and journalists are being taken to court more and more frequently on charges of libel or slander, and they face heavy fines or prison sentences if found guilty.
De jure, press freedom is colliding with the protection of the individual; de facto, censorship is taking a detour through the courts. After all, the threat of legal action is often enough to silence critical media and reporters. One new aspect is that bloggers and online journalists are also being increasingly targeted by the authorities, even in the more liberal Asian media landscapes like Thailand, Taiwan and South Korea. Yet this is not surprising, since the influence of the “network reporters” is growing rapidly.
News that is too delicate for publication by the conventional mass media can be found just a few clicks away on the Worldwide Web. Bloggers are covering controversial topics and exposing media articles as obsequious and uncritical. By no means every online contribution is seriously researched. But in a few years time about a billion people in Asia will have access to the Internet. And blogs have become established as a daily source of information among the “digital natives”, the under-thirties. One of the main reasons is that the online diaries often contain items that are not reported in the press, radio and TV.
In 1996, the battle lines between the digital and analogue worlds had not yet been drawn. The Internet was still in its infancy. This was when the Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAF) launched a regional media programme in Asia. The Singapore-based office is defined not so much geographically as thematically. Unlike a country bureau, the Foundation’s media programme can become active in virtually all the countries of the region. In terms of content it concentrates on projects in the fields of media development and political communication. All the heads of the regional programme have come – and still come – from the media sphere.
The online era was yet to dawn when the Foundation was launched, although “offline” the media programme in Asia identified itself very early on with the basic principles of digital communication. As in the Internet, it was all about dialogue and cross-border interaction. Although the events, courses, workshops and publications often relate to, or have an effect on, just a single country – partner media, key communicators, speakers, authors and experts from several countries in the region are always involved, and all activities are communicated internationally. This not only attracts more attention, it also affords greater protection for the players when critical issues are involved.
For example, media representatives from Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam and the People’s Republic of China participate in the training courses offered by the Konrad Adenauer Asian Centre for Journalism (ACFJ). The media programme created this partner organization almost ten years ago as an Institute of the Ateneo University in Manila. To date, 500 to 600 journalists from nearly 30 countries have attended its courses. The most important partner in the media-policy work is the Asia News Network (ANN). Its task is to intensify and institutionalize the exchange of media content within the Asia region. The aim is to make the spectrum of opinions and information available for political decision-making as broad as possible. Just over ten years after its creation, 21 newspapers from 19 countries belong to the network. The Bangkok-based association publishes the weekly magazine ASIANEWS. Most of the member newspapers are published in English. Altogether, the associated publications have a daily circulation of 14 million. This makes ANN the biggest news syndicate for newspapers in Asia.
Because of its high circulation, top politicians are often happy to join discussion groups together with ANN’s chief editors and publishers. Thailand’s Prime Minister Vejjajiva made his announcement on the new media legislation in March at a ceremony to mark the tenth anniversary of the Asia News Network. Even China Daily reported his promise of more press freedom. Only on page 11, but better than nothing ...
* The author is Director of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation’s Media Programme Asia
