Thussu quotes Roach’s 1987 prescient comments on "the U.S. predilection for oversimplifying complex issues" and "the need to ensure that NWICO would not reinforce government-run public sector communications media at the expense of the private sector" (Roach, 1987 qtd in Thussu , 2006: 36). Had she been writing to day, Roach may have been talking about Tea Parties and Town Halls, but she wasn’t.
As IC students, we see NWICO again and again in various courses and readings, but I think it's good to continue to re-consider it because it's such an integral part of our understanding not just of American Cold War history but of various dueling ideological world views, such as those of the World Economic Forum vs the World Social Forum, for example. Each time I read a gloss of it in the first chapters of a textbook like this one, I see it a little differently. This time, for example, I noticed how naïve the 1980 resolutions sound—some read more like complaints then viable solutions. For example, how does a nation actually go about the “elimination of the imbalance and inequalities which characterize the present situation” or the “elimination of the negative effects of certain monopolists, public or private, and excessive concentrations” (UNESCO, 1980 qtd in Thussu, 2006: 34)? These resolutions point to the existence of inequalities, but in grand U.N./UNESCO style, they sound like toothless decrees…
Viability aside, though, the NWICO debate marks the one the earliest flare-ups of the clash between what is now called ‘global neoliberal capitalism’ and what I suppose you would call a socialist resistance to it.* For me, re-reading the critiques and arguments for and against NWICO and UNESCO's 'agenda' seem particularly relevant in the current political climate-- at least the climate portrayed by popular media news outlets like Fox, NBC, CBS, etc. There is a particularly strong resurgence of the tendency to couch debates in terms of what is "American" vs 'socialist' and what ‘takes away our freedom’ and doesn’t. All of of this really boils down to what Roach was talking about, though—a debate about what a government should or should not regulate, and how much ‘free market’ is enough free market.
The American Constitution is unique in its focus on ‘freedom from the government’, which we all know stems from our colonial history. The NWICO debate is just one more way that the American tendency to shy away from any sort of government/public control (even its own, democratically-elected government) manifests itself. The fact that our main news media outlets are privately funded rests on this belief in freedom from the government, freedom from government influence. The only problem with this is the fact that a media chiefly motivated by profit and accountable its private owners is in no way accountable to the public or its interests, of course. The fact that in many (most?) countries, the govt-funded BBC has maintained its reputation as a reliable, 'balanced' source of world news--beating out cnn--shows (me) that when it comes to news and the public interest, the American way is not necessarily the better way.
While NWICO may have been co-opted into communist/Cold War debate, it still represents a key critique of Western hegemony and neo-liberal capitalism that added to a debate that is still raging today...
* One of my favorite critiques so far, btw, is Boaventura De Sousa Santos’ The Rise of the Global Left: The World Social Forum and Beyond,
"The fact that our main news media outlets are privately funded rests on this belief in freedom from the government, freedom from government influence. The only problem with this is the fact that a media chiefly motivated by profit and accountable its private owners is in no way accountable to the public or its interests, of course."
ReplyDeleteThe Constitution, Bill of Rights, Declaration of Rights are examples of Enlightenment documents. The various ideas swirling around at that time, particularly the latent ideas of Rousseau's 'Noble Savage' - where it is organization and 'civilization' that contaminates people. That people, unregulated and left to 'the pursuit of happiness', will be good. The government, as an entity, was seen as prone to corruption - in fact, most people forget that America spent a century as a loose 'confederation' of states before the adoption of the Constitution in the 1790s. It was only during just prior to the Great Depression, where business abuses such as sweatshops and deplorable monopoly practices came to light thanks to 'muckrakers' (newspapers), and then the collapse of business in the '30s that led to the new belief that government could 'redeem' or protect people from themselves. In historical perspective, this view is pretty young.
The opposite view is still very strong unfortunately, so we forgoe the potentially helpful regulatory role the government could play.