Navigating the Maltese Mediascape
Editors: Joseph Borg & Mary Ann Lauri
Publisher: Kite Group, 2019
Navigating the Maltese Mediascape is a first-rate work by first-rate professional experts in the field – with excellent, original, well-researched and futuristic insights into a topic that deserves all the attention it can get. It is a fascinating collection of papers by an array of some of the most knowledgeable professionals on the local and international media scene.
Robert Caruana Dingli’s A Gust of Wind and Rain, featuring one of his main targets, Augustus Bartolo. From The Malta Punch – Carnival Number, February 1922.It contains a wide range of subjects touching most aspects of the media yet the most common denominator is the close relationship between media and democracy.
Media play a critical role and a crucial part in shaping democracy from the times of the first printing presses to the inventions of radio, television and the internet. Media is an important mechanism to deliver information to the citizens in terms of political, social and economic current activities happening in Malta and beyond our shores. This has been the main function of what I call the old media, one-way communication to the citizens.
The introduction of the internet has changed this into a two-way communication between the citizens and media, which has become the focus of global attention today. The media is becoming more pervasive nowadays than they were back a few decades ago. The availability has expanded and usage of mass media is a fact of everyday life.
This collection of papers is vast and varied and like the best of thrillers has kept me riveted for hours on end as I am sure it will do all its readers.
A quick glance at the subjects researched and discussed so eloquently include an intriguing analysis of the role of the Catholic Church in Malta’s media system, a history of technology and how it is shaping our socio-behavioural norms, media regulation and the avant-garde proposal (I totally agree with) of having one single effective independent regulator.
We must not forget that freedom of expression is a fundamental human right
It also covers the importance advertising plays in our economy, the initial optimism of social networks creating more democratic participation fading into fake news and data misappropriation, a critical appraisal of the Media Defamation Act 2018, humour and cartoons dating back from 1839, meagre protection of freedom of expression since 1961 and an analysis of Malta’s media law.
Other hot topics include safeguarding journalistic sources and the allowance of political advertising by non-mainstream political parties, children’s rights to participation, protection and provision in the digital world, the much-discussed blurring of offline and online worlds, behavioural economics and media consumption, libel perspective from the bench and a paper on poverty and the media.
No book on media in Malta can be written without mentioning the subject of violence towards journalists that sadly culminated with the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia on October 16, 2017.
We should all remember that journalists are simply carrying out their job irrespective of whether one agrees with what they write or not. We must not forget that freedom of expression is a fundamental human right. It also underpins most other rights and allows them to flourish. These papers are a living example of speaking one’s mind freely on important issues related to the media.
Congratulations to the editors and publisher of this most interesting collection of papers and to the authors themselves for their excellent, professional and down-to-earth expositions.
Philip Micallef is a former executive chairman of the Malta Communications Authority.
Kite Group is offering a 30 per cent discount on all titles purchased online at www.kitegroup.com.mt.