The Magic
Bullet
The role of
the media in promoting good governance is very crucial as all the features of
good governance are enabled by a strong and independent media within a society.
Only when the media is free to publish, express, monitor, investigate and
criticize the public administration’s policies and actions, then can it act as
a link between the citizens and the state and the government is able to
identify public’s interest and
articulate policies for the same.
Independent
media are like a beacon that should be welcomed when there is nothing to hide
and much to improve as the media allow for ongoing checks and assessments by
the population of the activities of government and assist in bringing public concerns
and voices in front of the government by providing a platform for discussion to
avoid any kind of communication gap between the two and so that the aspirations
of each individual and society is taken into consideration and are accommodated.
If the media are to function in the public interest, governments have to
protect the independent functioning of the media and allow various viewpoints
to flourish in society. Media also helps in peoples participation in the
decision making process as greater participation by citizens allows greater
transparency and can help ensure that political decisions are adapted to the
needs of the people affected by them and it is also important for democratic legitimacy,
which depends on the investment people have as citizen in their own governing.
Now we will look at the two countries, India and china and do the media in the
respective countries helps promote a good governance or not?
The Chinese
Media consists primarily of television, newspapers, radio, and magazine and now
internet which is under the supervision of Chinese republic is home to one of
the world’s most restrictive media environments. The already limited space for
investigative journalism and politically liberal commentary shrank during 2014,
continuing a trend of ideological tightening since Xi Jinping assumed the
leadership of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 2012. The situation is such that
professional journalists from established news outlets were subjected to
long-term detention, sentencing and imprisonment for expressing their views
publicly on the media and most often the government utilizes financial
incentives to manipulate journalists. The Chinese government doesn’t promote
any means of transparency and efficiency through media and set strict
regulations on subjects considered taboo by them, including but not limited to
the legitimacy of the communist Party. The Chinese government deploys myriad
ways of censoring the Internet as The Golden Shield Project, known as the Great
Firewall, is the center of the government's online censorship and surveillance
effort which limits the public’s ability to express their view but nonetheless
text messaging over cell phones is helping in the transmission of some of the
news. The governance is affected in a way that Citizens are not aware of the
functioning of their own government and thus cannot contribute in decision and
policy making processes, they are unable to raise their voice if not satisfied
with the governance and mostly the functioning turns out to be corrupt since
there is no public pressure to check it’s functioning. The government has
developed the world’s most sophisticated and multilayered apparatus for
censoring, monitoring, and manipulating online content. The Chinese media is
restricted for the interest of the communist party but hardly do they know that
it is curbing the voice of the public and it’s done on the cost of people’s
right to expression and speech.
Since India
is a true democratic government, it has a pluralist media and is one of the
most important reason why democracy is a successful in such a diverse country.
The media here is fair and each and every individual has the right to express its
own views and interest through media and can approach the media for any help
like to raise its concern towards the functioning of the government or any view
about the policies of the state. Here is the scenario where media helps in
representation of different interest of several communities as the media is not
answerable or restricted by the government. Media also helps in agenda setting
and then working on the prioritized list supported by the common public. In
India media is used to demonstrate, fight, debate and discuss several types of
issues regarding any sect or affair of the society which ultimately helps in
the policy making by the government. As many individuals raise their voice for
or against any system or functions of the state, it helps the government to
figure out the interest and aspirations of the public and to accommodate it to
its best. Thus, transparency between the media and the government leads to an
efficient and anti- corrupt system. The concerns of the minorities to the
majorities, poor to the rich, Disabled to the abled are acknowledged by the
government through the media. E.g. the Jan lok Pal Bill which was highly
supported and criticized by large number of public, was only conveyed to the
state and the public through media. So according to me “Media is democracy’s
magic bullet” in case of India.
As to me
it’s perfectly quoted “Criticism is the true test of democracy” and wherever
the public is restricted to criticize the governance of their state, it doesn’t
survives the true test of democracy.
Reference
What about Chinese commentary on social media, which is far reaching than traditional media?
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