Alternative And Community Media In Canada

Freedom of media in Canada

Discuss About The Alternative And Community Media In Canada.

The freedom of media or the freedom of press is a principal which expresses and communicate through various mediums including electronic and printed media. The management of word freedom in relation to media signifies the absence of any interference made by an overreaching state. The preservation of media freedom is done through constitutional and other form of legal remedies. On the other hand it is also in the benefit of the society that specific information has to be concealed from being revealed to the public. Therefore the term freedom of media has been under considerable debate. It has been provided through the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights that every person has a right to freedom of expression and opinion. This right consists of freedom to hold an opinion without any interference and to seek, impart and receive information and ideas regardless of frontiers from any media. The paper argues that every state has some sort of control over its media where the degree of control may vary according to the state (McLelland  2015).

The importance of good governance and free media has been emphasized by substantial literature. In addition not much information has been derived which suggests that freedom of media is harmful for the society. All the political institutions are correlated with democratic Institutions the alone do not determine the freedom of media. Several non democracies have more freedom for media as compared to those countries having democracy. Further even where political institutions remain unchanged media freedom often fluctuates within the countries. The government uses media to ensure that citizens are mobilize towards the support of actions which are actually not in their individual best interest. For the context of this paper there are two significant terms which needs to be focused up on. Firstly the paper focuses upon media ownership which means that media can be owned by the state all privately and secondly the paper focuses upon media bias through which emphasis is laid on the degree to which news on misreported in favor of the government by media. Media bias is typically influenced by media ownership (Dencik and Leistert 2015). The primary purpose of this paper is to denote that every state has a degree of control over the media which operates in it. The degree of control maybe more in some states as compared to another but it is not absent. This paper focuses on control of media by the states in Canada and China.

Media limitations in Canada

The thesis statement of this paper is that although the extent of control which China has over its media is much more than that of Canada it cannot be said that Canada is totally free from state control in relation to its media. The nature of media directly affects the way in which information is delivered to the citizens. The way in which something is communicated is equally important as compared to what is communicated to the audience. The paper identifies the level of state control with respect to media in Canada and China and then compares the situation in both the countries to come towards a proper conclusion in relation to the thesis.

The media sector of Canada is well developed. Newspapers, magazines and televisions are for the purpose of primarily making profit by the corporations based on subscriptions, advertising and other revenues related to sales. In addition a number of interventions are provided by the government to both the publication and the broadcasting sector so that it can remain profitable.  These interventions include additional taxation-law on foreign companies in relation to reducing competition in advertising magazine and barring foreign company from entrance in the broadcasting sector.  The broadcasting sector is Canada includes the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation/Société Radio-Canada which is a government funded broadcaster operating TV and radio networks in French and English. In addition own TV broadcasting services are offered by a few provincial governments like Quebec's Télé-Québec and Ontario's TVOntario.  Media ownership and the state of media in Canada are regulated by the Canadian Government through the Canadian Radio and Telecommunications Commission.  It has been stated by Section 3 of the Canadian Broadcasting Act provides that equal rights, multicultural nature of the society, the linguistic duality and the special position which aboriginals hold within the society has to be reflected by the media.  As stated by Thom (2018) the appropriate functioning of democracies relies upon the situation were information is freely exchanged. This situation has also been recognized by the Canadian constitution. The freedom of press had been imported by the Canadian constitution from the British constitution.  The Freedom of thought, opinion and expression as well as freedom of media and other communication means is now enshrined in Section 2(b) of the CANADIAN CHARTER OF RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS in form of fundamental constitutional rights and freedom.  In situation where the freedom in Canada is regarded as the freedom which is governed through legal provisions there are certain limits which have been imposed in the fundamental freedom provided by the charter. As per the charter "such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society” are in place on the media.   The charter has been used by the Supreme Court in the recent years a number of times for the purpose of striking down a few restrictions which had been imposed by legislations along with precedents set out by common law. One of such instances took place when ye court made a declaration in 1989 that the prohibition in relation to reporting contents of a statement claim in Alberta is Unconstitutional.  Another such instance took place when common law in relation to consideration of publication bans on court proceedings had been reformulated (Pan 2017).

Media independence in Canada

It has been argued by Foley (2016) that there are various limits which have been imposed by the law on the freedom which has been provided to media in Canada.  There are various forms in which the limit on freedom has been imposed by law. A few forms of limitations are applicable on all media and a few of certain kinds of media. One of such limitations is the law of defamation.  This situation takes place when a person records, writes and distributes a message which can or actually does lower the reputation if another person in the community. In this situation the person distribution or making such message has to prove before the court with proper evidence that message which has been provided is more than un true in nature. In addition defenses are also provided to the expression of an opinion where it has been provide as a fair comment in public interest.  In addition where a defamatory statement has been made irrespective of the truth a defense can be claimed that the statement had been based on accurate and fair reports.  Rights are also provided to the media in relation to making an appeal for restrictions on their publication however not always are such appeals successful. There are also OPEN COURTS AND PUBLICATION BANS which are imposed on the Media in Canada. Where the media does not have access to information it has no right to publish it. What happed in the jury room cannot be disclosed by the media.  The Access to Information laws also have a considerable effect on media independence in Canada. These provisions have been enacted to protect  personal information confidentiality under government control (Skinner 2015).

It has been argued by Pan (2017) that the situation for media in Canada is stable and free and generally outlets are able to exercise editorial independence and operate without undue influence. To the contradictory it has been stated by Corrigall?Brown (2016) that the Canadian government has passed several harsh laws in the recent years which has raised concerns relating to the freedom of expression. Another issue which is although not frequent but is significant in relation to Canadian media independence is that of ill treatment of journalist by the police. Canada enacted a very debatable and controversial law in relation to anti-terrorism in June 2015.  The law constitutes of rules against “terrorist propaganda” and also imposes restrictions upon acts which promote or encourage terrorism.  After the National Freedom of Information Audit conducted by Newspaper Canada it has been reported by them that few advances have been made by the government towards enhancing the access to information. According to Ritchie, Driscoll and Maron (2017) in a outstanding case resignation had been provided by a national post editor as he had been prevent by newspaper executives from publishing a section which dissented from endorsement  of the paper form the Conservative Party.  Media professional who were covering a student protest in Montreal had been harassed and detained in March 2015 by the police.

The freedom of expression and the press has been guaranteed by the Canada’s 1982 constitution. On the other hand the government has been provided with the right of restricting free speech where it has to achieve its aim of promoting gender equality, ensuring social harmony and prohibiting discrimination. In addition any form of hate speech has been made an offence as per the penal code even through prosecution for the same is rarely done (Thom 2018). A section of the Human Rights Act had been repealed by the government to prohibit expressions which are “Likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt.” A few other provincial legislations also declare hate speech an offense (Ritchie, Driscoll and Maron 2017).  A bill had been introduced by Quebec authorities in relation to combating and preventing speeches which incite violence of hatred against a group of people or particular individual. However it had been argued by Anker et al., (2012) that the vague language which has been used in the bill along with the harsh nature of penalties can have a considerable negative impact on the freedom of expression. A case had been brought against the federal government by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), White Pine Pictures and Toronto Star which challenged the restriction imposed on a journalist to access Canadian citizen Omar Khadr (Ritchie, Driscoll and Maron 2017). It had been alleged by the parties that constitution right of freedom of press is being violated by the government along with right to information for the public by imposing such restrictions. However the claim had been rejected by the federal court which stated that no violation has been made on the part of the government by indulging into the alleged action. Concerns had also been raised by the journalists in relation to Bill C-44 which seeks to widen the powers of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service that these provisions would enhance the surveillance authority of the agency. The Bill C-51 came into force which constitutes of rules against “terrorist propaganda” and also imposes restrictions upon acts which promote or encourage terrorism.  The powers of the CSIS and other security agencies have been widened by the bill. It has been argued by the advocates of freedom of expression that the vague wording of the bill and broad scope of the law leaves rooms form abuse and curb free speech. The constitutionality if various portions of the bill had been challenged by The Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) and The Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE). Further it had been stated by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) that law has the potential of imposing undue restrictions on human rights (McLelland 2015).

It has been agued by Dencik and Leistert (2015) that the news media in Canada including public broadcaster CBC have the freedom of expressing diverse political views. In an outstanding case resignation had been provided by a National Post editor as he had been prevent by newspaper executives from publishing a section which dissented from endorsement of the paper form the Conservative Party and Harper. Postmedia is the powers of the National Post which is the biggest Canadian newspaper company.  The media sector in Canada includes variety of privately owned online and print outlets and competition exists between commercial broadcasters and public CBC where programming is aired in English and French on radio station and multiple televisions. The broadcasting rule provides specific percentage of Canadian content on different kinds of stations and promotes the creation of local programming. The use of internet is unrestricted and widespread and almost 95% of the population engages in internet use. However an ongoing issue which exists is in relation to the Concentration of private media ownership (McLelland 2015).

It can be asserted evidently from the above discussion that media in Canada is subjected to significant degree of control of the state. There are several laws which are enacted by the government for the purpose of imposing restriction upon the freedom of media. Although these laws do not have the direct purpose of limiting the freedom of expression and media but they indirectly have a significant impact upon the free performance of media. There is no doubt about that fact that freedom of expression and media is a part of the Canadian system as it has been duly incorporated in the constitution. However the extent to which such rights are provided in the court is a controversial matter. As discussed above there are several rights and platforms which are provided to the media in the country for the purpose of escalating an issue which the rights are compromised (McLelland 2015). However there have not been many instances where a successful appeal has been made by the media organizations. The issue in relation to media biasness is also of much significance in Canada. According to Anker, Arias and Bauer (2015) the Canadian media is primarily private owned and thus seeks to make profit in the capitalist market. Thus there are significant chances that media biasness comes into the context as they organization only seek to promote news which are in favor of their profit making strategy. These organizations restrain from publishing news which are against the interest of the state government and not necessarily the public.  Therefore it would not be wrong to state that media in Canada is under state control even where significant rights are provided by the constitution for free media and expression (Dencik and Leistert 2015).

This section of the paper throws light upon the condition of the freedom of Media in China.  The media of china constitutes of newspapers, magazines, televisions and radio. The internet has also since 2000 emerged a significant form of communication by media (Ding, Liu and Zhang 2018). However it is also under strict scrutiny of the Chinese government. Until 1980 all media outlets in China has been run by the state. The onset of economic reforms paved the foundation of Independent media outlets (King, Pan and Roberts 2014). Media outlets which are run by the states such as Xinhua, CCTV, and People's Daily still hold a considerable share in the market. The Chinese media has been subjected to an increasingly commercial market in spite of heavy government monitoring. Regulatory agencies like the State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television (SARFT) and General Administration of Press and Publication (GAPP) impose strict regulations on areas which are considered as the taboo by the Chinese government which includes among other things government policies in Tibet and Xinjiang, Communist Party, the banned religious topics, like the Falun Gong  and the Dalai Lama and pornography (Chen and Yang 2017).  In china most relaxed time of media was under Deng Xiaoping  during the 1980s however they had been significantly tightened after 1989 Tiananmen Square Protests.  Although the rules had been relaxed again in 1990s but the influence of internet and its capacity to encourage dissent prompted heavier regulations under the government of Hu Jintao.  According to Tai (2014) China has been categorized as a very poor in relation to media freedom.  It has also been alleged by the report that the Chinese government are having “the sorry distinction of leading the world in repression of the Internet” (Chen and Yang 2018).

The communication and media industry in china is subjected to many government regulators and agencies.  The nomenklatura system of cadre appointments is the primary mechanism organized vertically which is used to force media outlets to act in accordance with communist parties’ request. The system includes the people who are in-charge of the Chinese media industry (Power 2016). The State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television has the responsibility of overseeing and administrating the functioning of enterprises owned by states who involve in broadcasting, radio and television industry (Jiang 2015).  The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has the function of administrating the internet services and physical communications infrastructures providers.  The General Administration of Press and Publication has the function of administrating videos, newspaper, audio media, periodical and new industry. The Ministry of Public Security's Cyber Police force has the function of investigating internet fraud, pornography and scams and regulating online content.  The constitution of china in the same way like Canada provides its citizens freedom of speech and press (McLelland 2015).  However the authorities have been provided significant rights by the Chinese media regulations to disallow news stories by making a claim that they may initiate the exposure of state secrets and put the country into danger. This is because a very vague definition in relation to what constitutes state secrets has been set out. This provides power to the censor any information which may be deemed harmful by the authorities to their economic and political interest.  It has been argued by Jiang (2015) that Chinese government  is in a “schizophrenia” state in relation to media policy as it goes “back and forth, testing the line, knowing they need press freedom and the information it provides, but worried about opening the door to the type of freedoms that could lead to the regime’s downfall.”( Chen and Yang 2017)

The first white paper on the internet had been issued by the Chinese government in 2010 May which focused on the concept of “internet sovereignty,” according to which all users of the internet in china were mandated to be signatories to a public pledge in relation to professional ethics and self regulations for the internet industry of china (Dong and Kriesi 2016).  The pledge contains even more strict rules as compared to those in the white papers. Censorship in relation to all form of media has been tightened since power had been taken up by Chinese President Xi Jinping.  A new media policy had been provided by him in 2016 for state and party news. The policy provides that all work done by the media of the party has to reflect the will of the party and safeguard the unity of the party along with its authority (Mina 2014).  He had further emphasized that alignment has to be made by the state media with actions, politics and thoughts of the leadership. It is been argued in favor of policy by the government that they are necessary for the purpose of ensuring political stability in the country (King, Pan and Roberts 2017).

China has been ranked last out of sixty five countries which by the freedom house in 2017 for the third consecutive year in relation to internet usage. Without borders a France based watch dog organization has ranked china 176^th out of 180 in relation to freedom of press. It has been stated by experts that usually their own monitors are employed by Chinese media outlets so that their content can be ensured as being politically acceptable (Rauchfleisch and Schäfer 2015). The Communist Party’s propaganda department along with government’s Bureau of Internet Affairs weekly circulates Censorship guidelines to major media providers and editors. The Chinese government has imposed total ban or temporary black outs on websites like Facebook, Wikipedia, Twitter and Youtube as it deems such websites as potentially dangerous. A few specific materials which are categorized as a threat to the political stability are also imposed with bans (Lorentzen 2014). These materials include controversial videos and photos along with such terms. In addition particular keenness has been seen on the part of the part of the government towards blocking reports which have the potential of initiating a position of social unrest like the health and environmental scandals, official corruption, ethnic strife, certain religious groups and the economy. Websites belonging to the New York Times, Bloomberg news service and few other significant international publications have been blacked out periodically (Chen and Reese 2015). In addition their journalists have been often threatened and harassed along with the denial of visa applications. Reports have been provided by both New York Times and Bloomberg in relation to the private wealth held by Chinese political leaders. Micro-blogging services are also subjected to restrictions in china in response of subjects like corruption (Smith 2017). Censors also quickly identify and block any discussion in relation to violent incidents in China’s Xinjiang Autonomous Region, Tibet, The Falun Gong spiritual movement and home to the mostly Muslim Uighur minority group (Qin,  Strömberg  and Wu 2017).

There are more than a dozen censorship government bodies in china which enforce and reviews laws in relation to information flow out of, within and into china. Among such bodies the Communist Party’s Central Propaganda Department (CPD) is the most powerful agency which works along with State Administration of Radio and General Administration of Press and Publication to make sure that doctrine of party is promoted through the content. A large number of people are employed by the Chinese government for the purpose of censoring and monitoring media in china (Auer and Fu 2015). Reference is made by the experts in relation to the report published in 2013 by the state owned Beijing News which provided that about two million employees have been provided with the responsibility of reviewing the posts made on internet through the use of compiling reports and keywords searches for “decision makers.” These workers are called as the public opinion analysts but have been actually hired by the private and state sector to monitor the internet in china (Du 2016).  In addition media outlets are provided editorial guidelines along with directives which restrict coverage of topics which are politically sensitive by the CPD (Wang, Paul and Dredze 2015). In a very talked about incident which involved Southern Weekly the liberal Guangdong magazine the new year’s message of the paper had been rewritten by the government censors with respect to giving tribute to the Communist Party (Cairns 2016). Mass demonstration had been triggered by the general public and the staff who made a demand for the resignation of the bureau chief of the local propaganda.  Although a compromise had been reached by the staff and censor which intended to relax controls at least theoretically, almost all the censorship was still in place.  Myriad methods in relation to censoring the internet are deployed by the Chinese government. The Great Fire wall which originated from the Golden Shield Project is the primary place of online censorship and surveillance efforts of the Chinese government. The ways introduced by it incorporates keyword filtering, bandwidth throttling and preventing access to specific websites.  It has been stated by Kou, Semaan and Nardi (2017) that large scale use is made by the fire wall of Deep Packet Inspection technology in order to prevent access relying on detection of keywords. Various range of methods have been employed by the government for the purpose of inducing the journalists to self censor, including demotions and dismissals, arrests, fines, forced televised confessions and libel law suits. Thirty eight journalists had been imprisoned in china as per a US based watchdog in relation to freedom of press issue Committee to Protect Journalists as of February 2017. An eleven year sentence had been provided to Chinese activist Liu Xiaobo for talking in favour of freedom of speech and democratic reforms in Charter 08 which is a statement which is signed by various prominent citizens of china (Xu 2014).

In relation to foreign media china requires correspondents of such countries to get permission before they report in the country. Further administrative blocks had been used by the country to stop the journalists from making reports on sensitive topics like financial developments, economic and corruption (Kuang 2018). Under the contemporary government polices the ability of journalist of foreign nations have been considerably reduced in relation to travelling in china (Beina 2014).

Conclusion

The above discussion makes it clear that media in china is subjected to high level state control. Although the constitution of china provides freedom of expression and press to its citizens there is no practical application of such rights which can been identified through the analysis of media policy in china. In spite of the growing commercial interest in the Chinese media it can be stated that almost everything which the media of a country deals with is controlled by the Chinese government in relation to Chinese media. On the other hand although some amount of state control is exerted in the media sector of Canada there are various polices which depict the application of freedom of press and expression in the country. There are several laws which are enacted by the Canadian government for the purpose of imposing restriction upon the freedom of media. Although these laws do not have the direct purpose of limiting the freedom of expression and media but they indirectly have a significant impact upon the free performance of media. However it can also be evidently stated that there is no doubt about that fact that freedom of expression and media is a part of the Canadian system as it has been duly incorporated in the constitution. There are several polices which are in place for the purpose of ensuring the rights are provided to citizens and media of Canada. However in relation to china there are no such polices and almost the entire media sector is controlled by the state. There is no practical application of the right of free expression and media in China in the light of present government policies. Analyzing the media freedom in Canada in the light of China, does not show that there is total freedom of media in Canada.  This is because there is considerable control exerted by the Canadian government in relation to media freedom although it is significantly less than that of china it cannot be said that it is not present at all. Thus it can be evidently stated that although the extent of control which China has over its media is much more than that of Canada it cannot be said that Canada is totally free from state control in relation to its media. ‘All media are subject to some form of state control, some more so than others.’vz

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