>>REVIEW
FIGHTING FOR AIR: THE BATTLE TO CONTROL AMERICA’S MEDIA
Eric Klinenberg
Henry Holt, 352 pp.
In 2002, a train derailment in Minot, North Dakota caused a plume of toxic anhydrous ammonia to waft over the community. Yet, despite the imminent danger residents faced, they didn’t hear emergency broadcasts on local radio stations. That’s because emergency response officials couldn’t reach anyone at the six local radio stations, all owned by Clear Channel. Clear Channel owns 1,200 radio stations across the U.S., but often has minimal local staff at each station.
Eric Klinenberg opens his book Fighting for Air: the Battle to Control America’s Media with this story as one example of how growing media monopolies in the States are threatening the public good and the state of democracy. The book is an alarming read, especially because Canada’s media landscape is also becoming increasingly concentrated in the hands of large media conglomerates such as CanWest Global and CTVglobemedia.
Klinenberg makes a strong argument that quality local journalism plays a crucial watchdog role and can also help shape the public agenda and public opinion. "No matter if the object of investigation is development and sprawl, corrupt city governments, organized violence, racial discrimination, self-interested medical researchers or public health crises, penetrating local journalism contributes to the collective welfare of communities and residents… The presence of large, diverse, aggressive and independent local journalistic staffs, and the constant threat of critical attention that they impose, provide a strong disincentive for powerful institutions and individuals to engage in harmful, unethical or illegal conduct."
He points out that often important national or international trends or events are first reported in local media. For example, the civil rights movement in the U.S., the emergence of the Ku Klux Klan and the beginnings of the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
Klinenberg chronicles how radio, TV and newspaper reporting jobs have been slashed and burned as media outlets have been snapped up by large media conglomerates. This has led to less local coverage and more national wire copy in an effort to bleed out more profits. Newspapers are seeing the greatest carnage. Between 1990 and 2003, the number of newspaper jobs dropped from 455,700 to 381,300 in the U.S. The cuts are happening despite the fact "daily papers routinely generate profit levels that dwarf those in other businesses, including Fortune 500 companies… and even big oil companies."
Surprisingly, Klinenberg points out that the biggest media monopoly in the U.S. is in the alternative newspaper sector, where one chain owns 25 per cent of all alternative papers.
As jobs are slashed, the quality of journalism on offer is also in decline. The most disturbing example he cites is the use of video news releases, prepackaged stories complete with video footage put together by government agencies and businesses to promote their own agenda. Klinenberg says video news releases are regularly aired in newscasts without any warning to viewers about what they are. Viewers are also in some cases conned into believing they’re watching a local TV newscast when, in reality, one team of anchors is recording broadcasts for various U.S. cities from a central location.
New media, such as the Internet and satellite radio, aren’t necessarily the solution because, Klinenberg says, big media is also gaining control over these two mediums. He points out that telephone and cable companies are using "all their political muscle to crush Internet freedom" by lobbying for federal legislation that would allow Internet providers to "block, slow down or charge extra" for access to goods, services and content.
However, Klinenberg’s book isn’t entirely depressing reading – the general public is pissed off about growing media concentration and is fighting back. It’s an issue that’s even united left and right, no mean feat in the U.S.
Klinenberg describes the fight over media concentration as "the fastest-growing bipartisan social movement in the U.S." Hopefully, Canadians also start paying attention and stop being so apathetic on the subject. |
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