Maybe, back in 2020, the board of the Daphne Caruana Galizia inquiry should have corrected something Joseph Muscat declared about the media. We might have been spared the embarrassment of Muscat’s successor, Robert Abela, spouting the same howler as though it’s a basic axiom of democracy.
When Muscat appeared before the board, he read from a prepared text. According to an eyewitness, Paul Caruana Galizia, Muscat’s hands were visibly trembling. But what he told the judges needed a lot of nerve.
Muscat ticked off the judges for (among other things) not inquiring into certain media institutions. You have been tasked with looking into state responsibility, he admonished, and, yet, you’ve ignored the media, which is often regarded as the fourth pillar of the State:
“[A]llow me to add that since the times of Edmund Burke, the definition of the State was widened to include the media. The fourth estate has a crucial role in any democracy.”
But democracy and the State are not the same thing. In practice, they have a tense relationship. When Burke (allegedly) described the press as the fourth estate, he was comparing it with the House of Commons and the House of Lords – the representatives of society, not the State.
The point: the press is powerful precisely because it’s not part of the State. It’s independent. Journalists help the public keep an eye on what’s being said and done in its name. The role of the press is to empower citizens.
In some European languages, the press is called “the fourth power”. Here, the comparison is with all three branches of government ‒ legislative, executive and judicial. Even in this context, care is taken not to describe the media as part of the State. In western democracies, the term “state media” remains a slur; it means “propagandists”.
Co-option within the State is considered to be a corruption of real journalism. In practice, even in liberal democracies you can always find some media organisations that serve government or other powerful interests. But to the extent that they’re servile, they are lackeys, not pillars of freedom.
What has earned the press its recognition as the fourth estate (or power) is its independence. Anything less is betrayal of its promise.
In relation to journalism, State and democracy need always to be distinguished. The president, Myriam Spiteri Debono, drew the distinction nicely in her inaugural speech: “I emphasise that the media, together with the three organs of the State, is the fourth pillar of democracy.”
Four democratic pillars but three State organs.
However, State and democracy have, again, been confused by Abela. He was asked about the non-implementation of the reforms, urged by the Caruana Galizia inquiry, to strengthen the media and democratic scrutiny.
Boiled down, his reply was: Be careful what you wish for. With rights come obligations, regulation, checks and balances, as there are for the three branches of government.
Journalists need to have the freedom to operate and freedom from threats, corrupt inducements, sanctions and unnecessary obstacles- Ranier Fsadni
In short, we got a lecture on checks and balances from the head of a government that doesn’t respect them. He also insinuated that journalists are asking for special privileges that call for corresponding new obligations.
Actually, it’s not just journalists doing the asking. The inquiry worked on behalf of the public. And what’s being urged are not new rights but guarantees of the fundamental freedom of the press. It’s what journalists in free societies enjoy as a given: a safe environment in which to operate and in which they can do their work, subject to all the laws that already regulate their profession.
Understandably, the reaction from journalists and media specialists focused on Abela’s warning about tighter regulation. However, that necessary reaction was also a distraction.
It allowed Abela to get away with framing the issue as a matter of finding the right balance between journalists’ demands and the interests of democracy. It’s a frame that would only make sense if journalists were a branch of the State. Before such distortion, we need to make the principled case.
First, the freedoms of choice and of expression are inseparable from press freedom. Without proper information, our choices and opinions can be more readily manipulated by hidden interests.
A properly functioning media system is the ecology of freedom of thought and democracy. It is not the perk of a profession.
It is a public good, like the natural environment, from which the entire country benefits.
Second, a free press helps constitute us as a public and republic. It is fitting that the constitution declares a free media system as a pillar on which our freedom and autonomy rest.
Third, given the importance of their work, it follows that journalists need to have the freedom to operate and freedom from threats, corrupt inducements, sanctions and unnecessary obstacles.
Yes, with freedom comes responsibility but we have European models for how this can be done while respecting autonomy. The prime minister is expected to tell us how he is going to free PBS from its chains; he should not be warning us he might need to harness the independent media.
Fourth, in a functioning media system, freedom of information should be the default principle. If a government is forcing media houses to squeeze information out of it at great financial risk, after being made to pursue every legal remedy, that government is not democracy’s friend.
That is the principled, constitutional case for strengthening the media. We can obviously debate alternative remedies. But we can’t debate alternative principles without weakening democracy itself.