Vol I, #2 Fall 2005 Justice Rising Grassroots Solutions to Corporate Domination “Eight out of ten big media giants Information and Democracy share common Corporate Control and the Rise of Popular Media memberships on by Jim Tarbell boards of directors with ur cultural story determines our political Federation are promoting a 20-part series "celebrat- each other”. Ofuture. The corporate right understood this ing America’s agriculture." GRACE worries that this agribusiness production will not show the “ugly reali- Peter Phillips, when they financed a bevy of think tanks in the Project Censored, page 3 early 1970s to retake the political dialogue from the ty of the excesses that come from the unregulated, progressive movement of the 1960s. They popular- large-scale industrialized agricultural system promot- ized terms like "free trade" to describe the money- ed by corporate America,” but rather some popular- “Marketing strat- powered, global commercial empire that they are ized myth of bucolic America. egy is replacing spreading across the planet. Starting thirty years ago, Fortunately, the “Freedom train,” as John Nichols news judgment corporate-funded foundations began investing over a of Free Press calls the burgeoning media democracy movement, is on the roll. As he points out, everybody in many media billion dollars to create media-savvy institutions like the American Enterprise Institute, the Heritage should be on board, “because if media is not your num- outlets.” Foundation and the Competitive Enterprise ber one issue it has to be your number two.” The quan- Ross Gelbspan, Page 4 Institute, which provide a disproportionate amount tity of groups involved is growing exponentially. of the experts quoted in America’s mainstream Cooperation between alternative media allies is creating “The campaign is media. They also established a stable of media watch new media venues available to increasingly larger por- seeking groups like the Media Institute and Accuracy in tions of the American public. Local media groups are calling publishers and broadcasters to account for biased enthusiastic Media, which perform the double task of making sure that American media maintains a pro-corporate reporting and creating their own new media venues. media monitors stance and convincing the American public that the Diverse groups that have been isolated from media pro- to help docu- media has a pro-liberal bias. duction are getting their stories out. Political uproar ment instances It is a message that the major media owners stopped the FCC's media consolidation plan although of fake news appreciate. While terms and technologies of modern that fight is not over and everyone has to be prepared to use.” media are complex, i.e., spectrum (all radiated air- stop plans to piecemeal those changes through. These stories are in this Justice Rising. Read, Bob Burton, waves), blogs, channels, etc, the ownership is simple. SourceWatch, Page 5 In the past quarter century the ownership of learn, enjoy and most importantly, become the media America's mainstream media has decreased from and supplant the pseudo-experts promoted by the fifty to only six corporations and these six have think tanks and funded by corporate money. Lay “What do we board interlocks with almost every major corpora- claim to a diverse and realistic American future. want and need tion in the country . With an eye to the bottom line these business groups have become amenable not from the elec- only to use the free experts of the think tanks, but tronic tools that also the corporate video news releases that are up till now have becoming increasingly common. only been used Now corporate control is reaching into the to deceive and public broadcasting system. Besides the flood of cor- delude us?” porate underwriting that tax cuts have forced public media to depend upon and the pro-corporate agen- DeeDee Halleck, da of the head of the Corporation for Public Page14 Broadcasting, media watchers are concerned about corporate financed programs that are being pushed A Publication of on public television. The Global Resource Action the Alliance for Center for the Environment (GRACE) warns that Democracy Monsanto and the American Farm Bureau graphic: Kjersten Jeppesen Creating Media Democracy by Ben Clark ast year, community- ence campaigns by groups like Free Radio Berkeley Lbased activists mobi- that broadcast from micro radio transmitters with- lized in coalition with the out FCC permission forced the government's hand Democratic party minority on Low Power FM radio licenses and won the only of the Federal Communi- new mandate for public service broadcasting passed cations Commission (FCC) by Congress and the FCC in decades. to fight FCC Chair Pete Tridish of the Prometheus Radio Project, a Michael Powell’s attempt to group that trains community organizations on how further consolidate media to set up legal Low Power FM (LPFM) stations, ownership. Demonst- advocates that media activists take on the struggle graphic: © 2000 Zack Johnson rations, public hearings, for a share of the digital radio spectrum even as they congressional maneuvering and a federal lawsuit fill up the small niche created by the legalization of filed by activists eventually rolled back part of some low-power stations. He notes that in Europe, Powell’s consolidation. However, so far, the move- as commercial broadcasters migrate to digital, the ment has failed to win the more crucial battle of entire FM dial is being freed up, with significant gaining more spectrum for public use and re-impos- space being allocated to public interest broadcasts. ing public interest obligations on media corporations Andrea Buffa, communications director at the that use public airways and public rights of way to activist organization Global Exchange in San deliver their product to consumers. Francisco, considers the direct action and civil dis- The corporations meanwhile are prospering. The obedience part of a much broader fight for media $70 billion dollar digital television giveaway of the democracy in the United States. "The first step is to There's a lot to Clinton era is now bearing fruit for the corporate get people to realize your media system doesn't have be gained by owners of broadcast licenses nationwide. They can to consist of Survivor, Big Brother, Rush Limbaugh, now cram six different signals into their allocated spec- grassroots lobby- and Howard Stern,” she says. "Congress and the trum but are paying not a penny more to the public FCC have sold off the entire media infrastructure to ing of the FCC for the privilege. No new public interest requirements corporate interests. Our goal should be to get US and Congress have been imposed in exchange for this giveaway. media policy out of the hands of the corporations Meanwhile cable and satellite corporations are charg- and change the [access] architecture so that there are ing the public for content which is already paid for by many ways for people to put on programming rele- advertisers, or even more absurdly, by taxpayers and vant to the cultural, economic, and political needs donations to so-called public radio and television. of their communities.” She advocates reserving 50% Despite these corporate gains at the FCC, Mark of the digital TV and radio spectrum for non-com- Lloyd, a senior fellow at the Center for American mercial local programming, reinstating restrictions Progress and formerly of the Civil Rights on media ownership, and preserving and expanding Communications Forum, thinks there's a lot to be open access on Internet broadband services. gained by grassroots lobbying of the FCC and Simply changing the size of the big media cor- Congress. "Let's not whine about the [$70 billion poration’s pie slices by fighting media consolidation digital] giveaway, let's use it as leverage for fighting won’t change the information diet of people back,” Lloyd advises activists. He points out that most trapped inside the US media system. Moving the members of the public are unaware that broadcasters growing media democracy movement into the don't pay for their licenses. messy struggle for gaining more spectrum rights for Once they find out, he alternative and community media, defending exist- Formula for success believes the public will be ing allies within the mainstream and making sure The media democracy movement needs to wage a in a good place to ask what that low-income people, communities of color, three front struggle: 1.) Create and win media spec- local communities are going women and queers are part of the struggle is a tall trum in existing and new technologies that is to receive from broadcasters order, but it's what we’ll need to win. reserved for non-profit, non-commercial community- in exchange for their use of based media; 2.) Advance the presence of under-rep- the spectrum. Ben Clarke is a member of the board of The Media resented and misrepresented communities to create Many media democracy Alliance in San Francisco and co-edited the books and control their own media image and content; 3.) activists don't share Lloyd's September 11 and the US War: Beyond the Defend media workers who break the hidden cen- faith in the FCC and Curtain of Smoke as well as Voice of Fire: sorship rules of the existing media so that alternative Congress. They claim that media viewpoints can penetrate the mainstream. Communiques and Interviews from the Zapatista unrelenting civil disobedi- National Liberation Army. Page 2 JUSTICE RISING Big Media Interlocks with Corporate America by Peter Phillips ainstream media is the term often used to Mdescribe the collective group of big TV, radio and newspapers in the United States. Mainstream implies that the news being produced is for the benefit and enlightenment of the mainstream popu- lation—the majority of people living in the US.