DUBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY School of Communications the Political Economy of Development News
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DUBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY School of Communications The Political Economy of Development News : Analysing News Coverage Under Aquino A Thesis submitted to Dublin City University for the Degree of Master of Arts by Meldy Pelejo, Dublin, 1990 C MELDY PELEJO DECLARATION I, Meldy Pelejo, being a candidate for the degree of Master of Arts as awarded by Dublin City University declare that while registered as a candidate for the above degree I have not been a registered candidate for an award of another university. Secondly, that none of the material contained in this thesis has been used in any other submission for any other award. Further, that the contents of this thesis are the sole work of the author except where an acknowledgement has been made for assistance received. Head of School of Communications Dean of Faculty of Communications & Human Studies Dublin City University Prof. W. R. Spence University of Ulster ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to my supervisor Professor Farrel Corcoran for his patience, advice and encouragement throughout my period of study and especially during my first few months in this country. The constant encouragement and support from Miriam, Martha, Marjorie, Berry, Therese, Anne and from so many other friends which kept me going in spite of many agonizing moments deserve a heartfelt 'thank you'. I would also like to thank Celia, Jean, Tanya, Niall and Catherine for their help. Maria, deserves special thanks for her perseverance in checking my work and for her support during the last stages of this project. TABLE OF CONTENTS P a g e List of Tables (i) Abstract (ii) Chapter One. Introduction 1 1.2 The Dimension of Development Problems Today 5 1.3 The Economic Theory of Development 6 1.4 The Nature of Development Problems 8 1.5 Towards a Definition of Development 12 1.6 Media and Social Change 15 1.7 Media and Development --- Early Theories on Modernization 16 1.8 Rethinking on Media and Development 24 1.9 Media and Dependent Development 26 Chapter Two. 30 2.1 Development Communication and the United Nations 31 2.2 Media in Education and Information 34 The Nicaraguan Radio Mathematics Project 35 Rural Radio in Bolivia, Tanzania and Bangladesh 38 2.3 Mobilization of Media at National Level 40 The Peoples Republic of China 40 Afghanistan 45 Rural Newspaper in Africa: the Forerunner of Development Journalism 48 2.4 The Failure of Communication and Development Programmes 54 Theory Failure 54 Programme Failure 58 Political Failure 59 2.5 In Brief 62 Chapter Three. 3.1 Development News: the Status of the Concept 63 3.2 Defining Development Journalism 66 Two Configurations 68 The Beginnings 70 Instituting Development News in Asia 74 P a g e 3.3 Development Support Communication and Development Journalism 78 The Practice of Developmental Journalism: The Case of Guyana 83 3.4 Governmental Journalism - Inevitable ? 86 3.5 An Analysis of Development News Studies 90 The Lack of Development News in "What" Media 93 Correlating Development Information with National Development 95 The Preference for Political News 100 Development News-Conceptual and Methodological Problems 101 A Linear View of Communication 103 From Quantitative to Qualitative Study 106 3.6 In Brief 108 Chapter Four. 109 4.1 A Profile of the Philippines 110 4.2 A Brief Historical Perspective 111 4.3 The Economy 121 4.4 The Philippines' Social and Political Structure 123 4.5 The Philippine Press 127 The Press as Business Enterprise 129 The Press Enterprise in Philippine Politics 131 4.6 Media Under Marcos - The Press as Government's Tool in National Development 134 Media Control 141 Other Means of Control 144 4.7 In Brief 145 Chapter Five. 5.1 The Philippines After the 1986 Revolution 146 The Spirit of 1986: Three Interpretations 148 The Analysis 149 Popular Democracy: The Answer? 150 A Profile of the Different Political Groups 153 The People's Movement 153 The Military 154 The Insurgencies 156 The Present State of the Philippine Economy 157 P a g e 5.2 Two^News Ideologies Under Aquino 158 The Media After the 1986 Revolution: The Free Period 1986-1987 159 The Restrictive Period: 1988-1990s - Back to Governmental Journalism? 164 5.3 The Aquino Government's Economic and Political Agenda 167 5.4 A New Agenda: Economic Development and CounterInsurgency 169 5.5 Methodology 173 The Content Analysis 174 5.6 Discussion of Results 181 Land Reform 181 The Insurgency Movement 184 Military Bases 186 Contextualisation of the Content 187 Analysed The Insurgency Situation 187 The Insurgency Situation: A Costly Enterprise 188 A Two-edged Sword 190 Institutional Bias 194 Socio-cultural Bias 196 5.7 Conclusions 199 References 203 LIST OF TABLES Page Table 1. Percentage of Increases in the Number of Media in Fiji Between 1970-1982. 95 Table 2. Distribution of Provincial Newspapers Among the Three Main Islands. 128 Table 3. Number and Proportion of Front Page Stories in The Philippine Daily Express, Bulletin Today and Times Journal. 138 Table 4. News Stories with the Most Number of Items. 139 ABSTRACT Analysis of development news research up to the present reveals that the field has not progressed from studying development messages' effects to a broader outlook on media and the structures in which they operate. For this reason, the present study has strived to account for how the political and socio-economic context of Philippine society influences the operation of a governmental journalism policy. This study set out to do two things. Firstly, it aimed to clarify the widespread idea that the use of communication for development purposes is not unlimited. Information dissemination - the objective of development news - is not the sole solution to development problems. Hence, the study of development news cannot be confined to correlating the amount of development content in the mass media with the level of development achieved within a certain period as most previous development news studies have done. This study aims to show that such correlations are futile unless seen within the context of the political economy of the media. News, especially in the press, is governed by policies that are influenced by the socio-political situation of the society in which it is produced. Secondly, by focusing the analysis on the socio economic and political context in which news restrictions under Aquino emerged, the study can point out parallelisms between Marcos' and Aquino's news policy. The study of communication and development, in particular, development news can then move from the linear model of communication to the political economy model. As a first step, the author examines the early theories on communication and development in order to present an overview of the underlying principles in many development communication programmes. Chapter two discusses cases or illustrations of the application of the theories of media and development. The chapter also points out the shortfall of these projects which the author attributes to seeing information dissemination as the solution to development problems. Chapter three then deals with the concept of development journalism, and the misunderstanding surrounding the concept. In this chapter, the author points out that the emphasis placed on content analysis has led to the failure to see development news as a policy arising from the immediate socio-political context of society in which media operate. Chapter four looks at the case of the Philippines under Marcos and how developmental journalism was the policy that oriented the practice of journalism during this period. The last chapter then looks at the Philippine press under Aquino and strives to assess the use of the same policy of governmental journalism. The study strives to achieve this through the use of qualitative analysis of news coverage of issues surrounding the insurgency, the land reform and the US military bases, combined with contextualisation of the content analysed. CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION In the study of communications and development, it is impossible to avoid the analysis of economic and political structures within a national or an international context. Yet, a look at the vast amount of literature on development and communication reveals that the study of the political economy of the media, especially, in relation to development has frequently been overlooked. This is particularly evident in the field of development journalism where research has been confined to content analyses of national media systems. It is only in the last two decades with the call for a New World Information Order within UNESCO debates, that the study of the role of communications in development was brought within the sphere of the political economy of the media. This study of the political economy of development news in the Philippines begins by looking at the various theories on the role of communications in development. The aim of reviewing these theories is to give an overview of the theoretical foundations on which the various uses of the mass media in development are based. With this overview, it is easier to see that media and development schemes that are based on a linear perspective of communication and socio economic development fail to address the root of development 1 problems. Then, an illustration of the different uses of the media in education, health and information projects follows in order to show that information dissemination is not the sole solution to the problem of poverty. There are two reasons why information dissemination is not seen as the simple solution to development problems. Firstly, because development problems are not rooted simply in ignorance or in the underdevelopment of the economy. It is only now that development scholars are slowly recognizing that development is not only economic.