Originally published on Mar 20, 2023
Disclaimer: This is very long. From a historical perspective, I touch on many handfuls of topics here and there are a few “side” discussions. In a way, this is as coherent as a fast-food joint that serves lasagna, but, from another perspective, I have successfully developed a holistic discussion.
If you ever meet me, I will most likely tell you that I’m studying international relations, which is a hybrid of history, political science, and economics, but I’m actually planning to go into journalism in the future. If you then tell me that you, too, are going into journalism, then I will ask you to become besties with me because you are one of few that I’ve met. Perhaps it’s because I’m not enrolled in journalism school, but the reality is that traditional journalism (television and newspaper) in recent decades has been shrinking as new social media platforms rose to prominence. Prior to the internet, traditional media was the only major source of information and entertainment, but new internet platforms greatly diversified the consumption of media and took over the market of traditional media. Even without mentioning the dramatically decreased demand for traditional journalism, working for traditional journalism is also becoming less appealing. Because most traditional media outlets often rely on significant infrastructure, such as television infrastructure and newspaper printing presses, that can only be afforded by large, centralized corporations, traditional media has too rigid a structure to attract independent journalists who thrive in the limitless social media. More worryingly, the pay is not appealing. A quick search on Glassdoor shows that the current average salary of journalists in Canada is around $54,000. These numbers are not only below average Canadian salary, but the distribution of journalist salary shows that the field lacks advancement potential — over 50% of reported salaries are between $40,000 and $55,000.
Some may look at this reality and think: so what? By laws of the free market, whatever lacks in competitiveness will naturally see less demand and make room for products that the consumers prefer. Besides, what I’m describing here is not the fall of journalism, but the fall of traditional media. The field of journalism, in fact, may have been booming as social media lowered the barrier to entry. However, it is precisely the change in how information is transferred and our ability to extend our influence that created a unique time where journalism (and I will continue to argue for a particular method of journalism) is needed more than ever. And I do mean “ever”. We like to emphasize our argument by the use of this word; it tells the reader that they live in a unique time and that they should heed the advice of a unique claim. Most of the time, however, this word merely serves a rhetorical purpose and is often not quite substantiated. But, as I shall demonstrate, the reality we face is indeed unprecedented and our challenges unique to our circumstances. Specifically, we are seeing increasing political division across the globe, especially in the global north. Transnational phenomenon requires transnational explanations. Here, I propose two specific explanations: advancement in technology facilitated individual political power and global stagnant economic growth polarized pro-globalization neoliberals and anti-globalization conservatives.
Intro
In recent years, many people have felt the effects of political polarization and political antagonism. Though this reality seems to be introduced by the Trump administration, political division not only has been steadily increasing in America since the 20th century, but Europe is also seeing increasing political division. A study by the Policy Institute of King’s College London examines political division in US, where political ideological distance between the democratic party and republican party has been increasing steadily since the late 1960s. While the 90th congress of 1967–1969 saw overlapping distribution between the two parties in policies, where the most progressive republican and the most conservative democrat shared agreements, the 115th congress of 2017–2019 saw no overlapping. Similarly, Americans are more likely to have closer friends that identity with their political leaning and over half surveyed Americans would describe those who belong to the opposing party to be “closed-minded” and “dishonest.”
Source: Divided Britain? Polarisation and fragmentation trends in the UK
While political antagonism is less pronounced in UK and France, a political division along the lines of education, age, and occupation has emerged. In the 2017 UK election, nearly 60% of voters aged 18–34 voted for the Labour party, while 55% of voters aged 55+ voted for the Conservative. In an article by the Guardian, the French 2022 election saw Emmanuel Macron attract 70% of the over-65s and 68% among 18–24 years old voters, both demographic share the common trait of not participating in the labour market. Most notably, a divide along the lines of wealth and income is increasingly prominent. An overwhelmingly 78% of French earning more than 2,500 euros a month voted for Macron, against only 44% of those earning less than 900 euros a month.
Of course, a democracy, or in fact any polity that operates upon the agreement of the many, is perhaps defined by its tolerance of disagreements. It is not the first time America, or any other democracies, have faced political divide. But while we can console ourselves with the fact that the American regime has celebrated its 246th birthday and that ideological roots of democracy are even older, modern democracy that features universal suffrage is actually not even a century old. Italian political scientist Stefano Bartolini examined the process of democratization in Europe and compared how enfranchised electorate (eligible voters as a percentage of adult population) expanded. Until the first world war, electoral reforms in most European states involved only men and they sought to remove non-gender related restrictions, such as owning property, education, and age. By 1914, electorate in European countries averaged only around 30%-40% of the entire adult population. It then took a bloody four-year conflict, which killed an entire generation of men and brought women into factories to sustain production, for Germany and the UK to grant women suffrage and expand the electorate to 70%-90%. Italy, France, and Belgium, however, followed only in the aftermath of the second world war. Similarly, in the US, suffrage was extended to women by the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, then Native Americans in 1924, but it wasn’t until the Civil Rights movements of the 1960s that “one man, one vote” truly became national.
From a different perspective, even if we assume universal suffrage had been properly established since the first world war, the strength and quality of democracy was rarely challenged globally in the way that it is today. Regardless of regime type, there are two forces that can unite a modern state: the desire for development and the desire for self-preservation. While development provides the economic growth that can mitigate and reduce social division, the desire for self-preservation unites the nation to protect their shared life. Prior to urbanization, that shared life is national and cultural identity; after urbanization, that shared life is the wealth of modernity. The vicissitude and turmoil of the 20th century activated both forces. The first and second world war were about preserving national and cultural identity from the Germans and Japanese and, as post-war economic development and urbanization transformed the world, the cold war was about protecting the established modern life from opposing ideologies (capitalism for the USSR and communism for the West). Since the end of the cold war, however, the world entered into a brand new, unprecedented era defined by peace and economic development.
Globalization and democratization reduced inter-state war and shifted much of the political weight away from the elites and into the people. Not only was national security no longer the major concern, but economic development quickly urbanized much of the world’s population and facilitated greater wealth and social mobility. The political implication of which is a growing middle class that holds significant political weight and is mainly concern about economic development. For the first time in the history of human civilization, the world entered into an era of minimal inter-state war, high rates of democratization, and a significant political focus on economic development for the many. It truly is a unique time, which makes the political phenomena of Trump’s popularity and political divide all the more urging of discussion.
If we imagine democracy to be a town council meeting involving all residents, then there are two aspects from which we can evaluate the state of the democratic discussion. First, what are the concerns of the residents? In other words, what makes the residents “scream” at each other and the council? Often times, people only know they have a problem, but have minimal clues about what exactly it is and who caused it. Politics can be understood as an extension of economics and people are fighting over the power to decide who gets what. To answer this inquiry, we should examine the changes in global economy.
Second, what form of communication do the residents use? Why did they choose to “scream” or use certain languages? The mechanism through which ideas are exchanged can provide insight into communication behaviors. As technology advancements in the past centuries had the most significant impact on communication methods, we should specifically look at how the internet impacts individual expression and relationships. Furthermore, many have highlighted certain institutional structure as contributing factors of political divide, but I am disregarding the institution because I consider the exact mechanisms of the democratic process to be secondary to the aforementioned factors. Laws and rules are only as good as the loyalty and intention of the people implementing it.
Why are people frustrated?
The industrial revolution of the 19th century initiated the most historically, socially, and economically significant venture of humanity — modernization. A good measure of modernization is urbanization rate. Though urbanity simply means high population density, it is only sustained by the sciences and technologies of modernity. The construction of modern skyscrapers, for examples, required steel frames, more powerful water pumps, and electric systems, all of which emerged in the 1800s. In 1800, 7.3% of the world’s population lived in urbanized areas, then 16.4% in 1900, then 29.1% in 1950, then 49.8% in 2000, and, in 2007, urban population surpassed rural population. Behind modernization is economic development and the constant desire of creating more wealth; however, while they seem like constant and predictable concepts, the theories and ideology that guide economic progress is constantly changing and, with it, the distribution of wealth.
Until the end of the second world war, global economics was dominated by classical economics, which advocated for free markets and competition and believed that the market is self-correcting. After the Great Depression and the war, Keynesianism, which argued that government intervention can stabilize the economy, emerged as the dominating paradigm for understanding economic activity. During this period, modern tools of monetary and fiscal policy, such as the control of interest rate, government spendings, and taxes, were developed, social protection were expanded, and union coverage peaked. These policies significantly decreased global wealth inequality. However, the social and economic turmoil caused by the Vietnam war and the oil crisis in the 1970s led to a general rejection of Keynesianism. The sharp decline of the Soviet Union, which was the leading representative of state control, in the late 1980s further vindicated the belief that government intervention is a failing concept. In response, a new paradigm, known as neoliberalism, which inherited classical economics’ conviction in free market, was introduced by leading politicians of the 1980s, such as Margret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. Under neoliberalism, free trade and minimal government intervention was once again promoted.
Meanwhile, a number of ASEAN countries had achieved some levels of industrialization by 1990, and, with vast labor forces, they were the most cost-effective producers of low added value goods. This incentivized business in developed countries to offshore their production, which facilitated the emergence of multinational corporations and greatly reduced the size of manufacturing sectors in developed countries. In 1967, the manufacturing sector in the United States employed about 27% of all workers; in 2015, it employed only 14%. The offshoring of production facilitated two trends in global wealth distribution: as inequality between countries decreased, inequality within countries increased.
Souce: World Inequality Report 2022
Greater wealth inequality within countries was further exacerbated by the rejection of government intervention and unionization. In 1965, almost a third of workers in the United States belonged to a union, while only a tenth of all workers remained in 2015. In response to this transnational change in wealth distribution, there has been a transnational rise in populism. If we consider wealth inequality to be the source of political conflict, and that the international conflicts in the past were mostly characterized by the Global South’s desire to obtain independence and economic development, then decreasing inequality between countries will reduce inter-state conflicts, while increasing inequality within countries will once again highlight class differences. Anti-establishment and anti-elite sentiments are indeed growing in United States and Europe, and, for the first time in decades, there has been a decline in globalization. If the 20th century was about the oppression and resistance of the Global South, then the 21st century is about the oppression and resistance of the lower class.
Why are people “screaming”?
With an increasing political division, there is no doubt people are unhappy about their circumstances. But while an economic recession certainly explains their frustration, it doesn’t completely justify the pervasive antagonism in the current political sphere. Just like in our relationships, some people have disagreements and some have fights — it is how we communicate, and not what the disagreement is, that makes the difference. While things like our preferences may originate entirely from our personality, habits of communication are formed largely by our environment. Because the purpose of communication is to connect with others and that we seek to maximize the efficacy of our communication, we adapt to what is most accepted by our environment, which can include the method of communication (text, in-person chat, call, etc.) and what our subject accepts. For example, if my parents expect me to show enthusiasm in my communication, yet text is notorious for its limitation on the expression of emotions, then I will either choose to videocall or elaborate myself more in text. It’s just like driving is to travel across land, so the quality of the road can determine our driving habits.
So, what does the environment of communication in our political discussions look like? If you ask anybody about how we communicate these days, “social media”, or specifically the internet, will most definitely be the popular answer. Indeed, the internet may have brought about the largest change to the conditions of human relations since the invention of cars. Often times, the general perception is that the invention of these tools largely reflect advancement in technology and science, but people rarely consider the change in conditions of human association brought about by economic and technological changes.
Here, communication and expression does not refer to our daily interaction with those that are around us, but the extension of our ideas. It is the imposition of our cultural, political, and philosophical influence upon others through our communication. Introducing a new cultural celebration to a new town, discussing political values with neighbors, or writing a book on cultural experiences are examples of such communication. Speech is the most used method of communication, but we often need other tools to facilitate the extension of our ideas beyond our immediate social circle. From pigeon posts and mailmen riding horses to the printing press and the television, much of our advancement in technology were to expedite our ability to exchange ideas. From a historical and social perspective, I consider all these technologies public communication apparatus. The internet is the ultimate platform of communication through which the individual engages with and is influenced by the group.
The history of public communication apparatus
Canadian philosopher Marshall McLuhan famously argued that technologies are extensions of the human body — shovels are extensions of the hand, transportations are extension of the feet, and television and projectors are extensions of our imaginations and words. Similarly, the internet is an extension of the human body, and it specifically changes the methods of human association and communication. In fact, most advancements in technology are most significant not in its technological aspects, but how it transforms our ability to spread and exchange our ideas. The invention of wheels and automobiles allowed us to spread our ideas across the continent, and the invention of cross-ocean ships allowed our ideas to traverse the globe.
In many instances, advancement in technology seems to facilitate physical power, which then leads to exploitation and colonization. The Age of Discovery of the 15th to 17th century may be historically significant in the sheer profit extracted by the Europeans and their destruction of native civilizations. But from a holistic perspective, it is the forced dissemination of European culture and assimilation of the locals that produced a historical impact. America was forever changed not because its gold was robbed or its habitants were killed, but because European culture took over.
This extension of European influence has significant implications for modern day international politics as well. US’s present-day dominance, for example, cannot be explained without considering its cultural, political, and ethnic roots in western Europe. America transformed itself from a dozen colonies run by militias to the largest global economy not only in a mere 144 years (1776–1920), but it also consolidated its power during the era of “balance of power” international politics. During this era, the politically divided European states would form coalitions only when a regional hegemon emerges. Yet, America’s rise to global dominance was miraculously peaceful and saw minimal interferences from established European powers. Nowadays, Europe is no longer the economic and military hegemony that it once was. Yet, under the American led world order, it continues to enjoy political influence that is beyond what it can afford. America’s cultural similarities with Europe will continue to secure their political alliance.
But how do technology advancements change human association? From the perspective of the individual, cars allow their idea to travel hundreds of miles, ships thousands of miles, and telegraph millions of miles, without transporting their physical body. From the political perspective, this means that technology amplifies individual’s capacity to exert political and ideological influence. This reality, until recently, was uncommon. For thousands of years, only the ruling class controlled the public communication apparatus — only they had access to education and the prerogative of writing the books of law and history. The masses, at this time, were purely subjects of political rule and could exert little political power not only because they didn’t have the tools to express their ideas, but they also had little economic significance to afford political influence.
However, the industrial revolution, which most prominently features the dramatic increase in production capacity by the use of machinery, introduced an array of changes that increased the political influence of the people. Firstly, because more productivity means more profit, there is an incentive to increase production, and factories paid more and hired more workers. More salary to the working class means that they quickly accumulated significant economic resources to exert political influence. Secondly, because industrial production uses machinery, skilled and educated workers that can quickly learn to use, fix, and improve the machineries were in high demand. Industrialization both created an incentive for and, with the wealth generated, afforded mass public education. Prussia was the first to implement a modern compulsory education system in 1763, fifty years after the first steam engine was invented in England. Research done by the University of Cambridge shows that in 1800 around 40 percent of males and 60 percent of females in England and Wales were illiterate, but by 1900 illiteracy for both sexes had dropped to around 3 percent. Education gave the people the ability to engage in political and social discussions. Lastly, industrialization facilitated the inventions of cheaper and more accessible forms of public communication apparatus. Newspaper, radio, and television allowed the masses to participate in social discussion.
But until the internet, public communication apparatus still wasn’t universally and easily accessible to the mass, and the threshold to influencing public opinion was rather high. You needed to be at least well educated and have some sort of expertise or credentials to be able to publish your thoughts in newspaper or appear on television. Furthermore, personal mail can take days and weeks to arrive and the major sources of information to individuals were schools, books, and television — the operation of all of which relied on big corporation and the state. The expression of thoughts beyond your immediate circle, during this time, was expensive.
The internet and the new public communication apparatus
In 2001, the first 3G network, which allowed mobile internet access and the transfer of files over data, was launched in Japan. Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter were launched in 2004, 2005 and 2006 respectively. In 2007, Apple announced the first iPhone. In 2000, when Pew Research Center began tracking internet usage in America, half of all adults in America were online; in 2021, 93% of all adults use the internet. The most significant effect of the internet and social media is that the cost of communication became incredibly cheap, empowering our ideas to overcome distances of time and space.
As a form of power, communication was no longer exclusive to the educated elites, but became available to the people. As a form of tool, it was no longer reserved for government and academic uses, but it now mostly serves the entertainment needs of the people. From many perspectives, the internet greatly facilitated positive human experiences. It offers us the convenience and enjoyment of new forms of expression, new sources of entertainment, and new channels of communication, which has also facilitated incredible humanitarian projects. But all forms of power are double-edged swords. It also allows the expression of and appeals to the lazy, the imprudent, and the ugly side of human nature. This can be observed from three perspectives.
Firstly, the lack of a communication hierarchy or regulation can promote chaos. The internet is comparable to giving everyone at the council meeting a megaphone; it surely guarantees that the head of council cannot overpower the residents and that the residents can organize among themselves when the council fails to act, but, without regulation and a mutual agreement on order, human nature is more likely to respond to that environment with imprudence. Two scenarios can happen: firstly, the residents understands that everyone has equal communication powers, so it is determined that the first to speak and the loudest speaker can garner attention quicker. Secondly, this can quickly saturate and overwhelm residents’ senses. They hear amplified voices coming from every direction, which they react either by exiting the discussion or by amplifying their own voice.
Secondly, as the internet became most people’s main channel of communication, it became subject to the habits, or deficiencies, of humanity. Features of humanity, such as impatience, selfishness, and imprudence influenced the environment of the internet, while the pursues of drama, agreements, and sense of belonging shaped the structure of the internet. We want to maximize the excitement of the information we receive, because we seek a sense of novelty, and we want to minimize the efforts needed to interpret that information, because we are lazy. Another example is that agreements often see the most engagement and disagreements the least, despite the latter being far more valuable, simply because it is against human instinct to focus on disagreements.
Lastly, this can also be observed in the design of the internet. The free market pioneered the development of the internet and it was, indeed, an effective innovator. But its pursue of individual consumerism created an individual-centric and unregulated environment. The internet was constructed upon the notions of personalization, customization, and creating a space for everyone. This means that many discussions are sectioned by interest or background, while cross interest discussions are limited. Headlines that deliver the most “punch” using the fewest words, and pictures and videos that appeals to drama and shock are prioritized. Twitter, for example, has a limit on the number of characters in a tweet.
These realities then determine habits of communication. There are two general assumptions that users of the internet can subconsciously uphold. Firstly, what we see on the internet is the entire world. We interpret our real-world experience to be a reference of the compatibility between the group and ourselves. If ten people today complimented my outfit, then it must mean that most people I interact with (meaning, in my city or in my social group) would appreciate my sense of fashion. There is a certain ratio between what we experience (ten compliments) and what we infer and assume about our world (people around me agrees with my fashion). In our real world, our experience is limited, so our estimations are often modest. On the internet, we saw promises to connect us to every corner of the world and expose us to an unlimited number of perspectives and experiences. In reality, however, we interact with only a very small number of other internet users. A misunderstand of this can lead to an unreasonable ratio between our experience and our assumptions. We may get a hundred compliments from the internet, but we should understand that it is not a representation of the general consensus.
This can create the perception that what we see on the internet must be representative of the entire world and that most people share the same values. Not only do the people naturally respond more to agreements than disagreements, but the “algorithms” of our social media also process the information that we received, maximizing our sense of belonging and agreement with others. This encourages people to ignore disagreements (those that disagree with me are lunatics) or react strongly when they eventually do.
Secondly, the rejection of nuanced and long reasoning and the embrace of short and punchy headlines promotes contention and an illogical focus on identity. In a world of limited use of characters, arguments must be summarized and presented without explanation or evidence. This means that readers must make assumptions about the claimant and, because the drama and excitement of disagreements are more appealing, readers naturally assume disagreements. Similarly, the pursuit of short and snappy dismisses the importance of explanation or support of evidence. The only available information through which readers can evaluate the validity of the argument is the identity of the claimant. This mechanism prioritizes the identity and perspective of the claimant as supports for an argument, rather than the logic and evidence used.
These habits of communication can be observed in the political sphere. Throughout President Trump’s 4-year presidency, he tweeted more than 25,000 times — an average of 18 times per day. You can most certainly argue that Twitter was a tool of governance for the most powerful man in the Western world; he notified his citizens of reports, criminal allegations, congratulatory messages, government updates, and so much more. Yet, Twitter, even after its first character expansion in 2017, allowed only 280 characters, including spaces and punctuation, in a single tweet. On average, this is enough for 40–70 words.
This communication mechanism can produce strong political implications when we consider the reality that Trump was the one of the most politically dividing state officials in recent decades. Many of Trump’s tweets were so succinct that it includes merely an unsubstantiated and unargued opinion. Until 2016, the most used word throughout Trump’s Twitter career had been “great”. During his election campaign against Hillary Clinton, his most popular choices of adjectives included “crooked”, “bad”, “crazy”, and “weak”. Over the years, Trump’s choice of words in his tweets has gradually become more and more negative as he continue to rely on using a handful of vocabulary in his tweets. I’m sure this also corroborates our memories of Trump’s bizarre tweets, but this demonstrates that not only did his tweets often conveyed sentiments, but the sentiments also seemed to be the main message. What did his use of “great” achieve? What arguments does it bolster? I’m sure we all have a mutual understanding of that. But even if he were polar-opposite, the communication mechanisms of the internet and the features of humanity naturally bolster the delivery of impetuous emotions, rather than prudent reasons.
I should clarify that I am not against the internet and I truly believe that it has benefited humanity more than it has caused chaos. Even if the internet has more “cons” than “pros”, regression is never the answer for progress. We must recognize the new problems introduced by the new forms of communication and proactively engage with it. Currently, we lack an understanding of the social, cultural, psychological, and political impacts of this new technology and some of its mechanisms have produced negative and unregulated social consequences. From my perspective, there are two ways to achieve regulation: government intervention that could be interpreted as censorship, or we can try to educate the general public and facilitate the understand that the power of expression and political influence is now universal, but we need to learn to control it.
Enter: Journalism the moderator
The reality of our world is dire, but political reconciliation must occur so that collective long-term planning and progress may survive. This brings me to journalism. The functioning of our complex world rests upon division of labor and journalism is the bridge that connects social groups that vary in interest, size, and power, from small social units like families to large social units like an entire state. I make the distinction between small and large social units, because I want to avoid using the individual-state dichotomy that is often associated with politics. There are two reasons. Firstly, the state is not the only large social unit that has political influence. Larger ethnic groups, corporations, and wealthy families can all exert significant political influence. Social units form because of one or multiple mutual interests; some are cultural interests, some economic, and some political. Depending on which interests you look at, every small social unit can belong to an array of different larger social units and there exists an immeasurable number of different social units. Secondly, the individual-state dichotomy assumes that they are directly opposing of each other and there exist a natural hostility between them — if left unchecked, the state will encroach individual freedom. Because there exist many more social units than just the state, it is unlikely that two social units have entirely opposing interests. Rather, relationships between social groups are constituted by a mix of aligning and opposing interest that forms the nuanced and complex social reality that we see. The complex nature of this dynamic is precisely why journalism is needed.
Source: me
Journalism not only informs the smaller units of what is going on in the larger society, but, more importantly, journalism also explain the significance and impact and the interest groups involved to the small entities, so that they can make inform voting decisions and more effectively push for policy changes. More specifically, this is done by connecting seemingly unrelated events and constructing a logic chain that demonstrates a model of a specific aspect of our society and its underlying operational logic.
The current field of journalism does a very good job of informing — describing what happened, providing context that is only immediately related to the incident. However, I see a deficiency in the lack of explaining and construction of a social model. Two issues arise from this deficiency. Firstly, the importance of an event can only be revealed when the connection to the reader is made. For events that seems unrelated to the average citizen, a news article that focuses only around the immediately relevant contexts does not invite attention. Secondly, when the implication of the event is made clear and relevant to the reader, there often lacks a social model that includes other social groups into the discussion. Two consequences arise from these two issues.
First, lack of a social model cannot effectively demonstrate the complexity of our modern society and cannot facilitate an understanding of why something happened. The modern world is very complex and interconnected. Depending on our job, our preferences, and the people and services engage with, every one of us interacts with very few aspects of the modern society. But just because we don’t interact with other parts doesn’t mean they don’t influence us. Everything, and I do mean every single thing, that we interact with has been blessed (or cursed, depending on how you see it) by the touch of modern science, government regulation, and other sorts of collective enterprise and cooperation. It is our ability to organize and plan in higher and higher levels of social organization that provided the prosperity of human civilization. Without connecting seemingly unrelated, but critical, pieces of our society together, not only may people lack the understanding of why something is happening, but they may also have the wrong perception of collective organization.
For example, an article criticizing our education or health care institution cannot be well understood by the public without investigating the origins of those institutes, why they were introduced in the first place, how has their function and purpose changed over time, and why has it become obsolete. Without a holistic examination, we are prone to erroneous perceptions of collective organization and it is delusional to want to change our society without understanding its complexity, what goods are we already enjoying, and what are we willing to pay more for. The traditional method of journalism that relies on the experiences and expertises of a few individuals reflects the assumption that few individual, regardless of their knowledge, can correctly reflect, pinpoint, or explain modern world social phenomenon. But this is hardly the reality. The world today is interconnected, multilayered, and the individual experiences, especially those of ordinary citizens, not only fail to provide an explanation for social phenomena, but fail even to provide a coherent understanding of what the conflict is and what needs to be fixed. Journalism in the modern world should be multidisciplinary and should deemphasize personal experiences as the key to explaining the world.
Second, every news article that focuses on one particular social group will see their respective social group congregating under that particular article and advocating only for their own interests. From a distance, every interest group is asking for more and everybody is agreeing that every interest group should get more. But that is not a constructive “so what” to end at, because, unfortunately, the pie of resources available globally (global GDP) is only growing at a rate of 3%-5% per year and there isn’t enough to go around. To arrive at a worthwhile solution, we must bring everyone together and discuss what cost are we willing to bear and who should the first to get the resources.
Source: me
On a side note, many consider the duty of journalism to be monitoring the use of power by the state. A mechanism to check power is definitely crucial to sustaining a healthy relationship between the state and the people, but I want to deemphasize, again, the dichotomy of individual versus state. Perhaps in the distant past where aristocracy and monarchy were ubiquitous regime types, there existed a clear line between the state and the people. But no modern political actors, whether it’s the state or the people, exist in a vacuum and can claim to be untethered from social influences by other actors. Both the construction of the modern world that we are currently living in and the construction of an even better future requires cooperation between all social groups. Additionally, as our local and global political landscape become saturated by polarization and hostility, continuing to follow the individual-state dichotomy will not induce cooperation and reconciliation.
To adequately complete these tasks, good journalism requires two skills: good understanding of opposing perspectives and social structure, and good research skills. We can imagine journalism to be the moderator of a panel discussion that consists of all social groups. To fulfill the duty of moderating, journalists need to understand and manage the differences in Perspective. Firstly, journalists need to understand their position between social groups and that their duty is to inform and provide explanation to all parties. Obviously, journalists come from certain backgrounds, so it’s ludicrous to suggest that they should operate without a predetermined perspective, or bias. But they should actively engage with their perspective by understanding how it influences their work. Secondly, in all societies conflict and misunderstand almost always overshadow agreements. Most social groups are too preoccupied trying to secure their own interest that they often refuse to consider the interest of other groups. The burden, then, lies on journalism to understand where differences in perspective come from, how that difference impacts discussion, and how to manage it. An effective way to reveal the perspective and biases that influences our judgements is to change the actors involved without changing facts. This reveals whether our judgement is guided by perspective or facts. I discussed this more in my other post, “Differences in Perspective.”
Secondly, a robust understanding of how our society works is required. This involves not only understanding the structures of our society, such as political structure, industry structure, and class/demographic structure, but also the conflict of interests that define a certain social structure. Admittedly, however, what qualifies as a “good” understanding of social structure is up to debate and this undoubtedly involves knowledge in a plethora of fields — knowledge that takes a lot of time to accumulate. Indeed, we can’t know everything, which is why research skill is the second crucial component to journalism.
Luckily, we live in an age of the internet, where most information can be found by the search engine within half a second. A university level survey or intro course, which requires a commitment of around 36 lecture hours and 10–15 study hours for finals, provides enough expertise on the subject to provide the general public an adequate explanation. Similarly, with most information available online, it is also possible to acquire insight into a field that is well beyond what the average citizens has through a couple days of good research. If an expert of the field is consulted, then the time required to gain that knowledge is greatly reduced. Regardless, mature research skills are required to understand what knowledge you need to learn to construct a social model that can effectively explicate a seemingly unrelated and unimportant event.
In practice, this often means constructing a social model around the topic of discussion that encompasses beyond the immediate field of the topic and includes significant historical, economic, and social contexts. This is because everything is interconnected to everything else, and to properly explain the beginning and ends of it requires reaching beyond what is immediately relevant — otherwise you will be left with strings untied and unexplained. If our government is drafting changes to our immigration policy, then its significance can only be made clear by investigating the change in political discourse, how does immigration impact our country's labor force, and what does this say about the overall circumstance of our country. Are we in a recession? If so, how does a change in immigration policy impact our economic performance? This blog, for example, is arguing for the significance of journalism today by investigating how human association has changed throughout history.
Conclusion
There is no denying that the world we live in is grand in both depth and width. Never before in human history have we ever lived in similar conditions. In these times of constant change and progress, we must bear a historical understanding of our conditions. While certain aspects of our circumstances may share similarities with certain periods of the past, it is crucial to recognize that modernity is such a different beast and that no era of the past, no prophets or wise men in our history books can help us tame its power. We must conduct our own calculations and our own experiments to arrive at our own conclusion. Journalism could be that experiment lab, that calculator, that platform though which social discourse can occur and understandings of our conditions can mature. However, while people have generally measured the quality of journalism by its truthfulness, we must recognize that, in a complex modern world with uncountable numbers of interest groups, “no lie” is no longer a useful parameter. Instead, we need journalism that is rich in explanatory power and comprehensiveness. Ultimately, it is up to our ingenuity to navigate the uncharted and treacherous waters that is the future of humanity.
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