It would seem that while we remember the 25th anniversary of the MacBride Report on communication and information, there is not much to celebrate. UNESCO led 25 years ago the highest and largest assault against the hegemonic control of information flows by industrialised countries, the United States in particular. The international organisation achieved early in the 1980s the establishment of regional news agencies capable of counteracting, in a rather small measure, the abundant flow of news distributed through the AP (Associated Press), the most powerful still today, and the UPI (United Press International) which disappeared in the mid eighties. At a given time both agencies carried 90% of the flow of news worldwide. UNESCO contributed to the creation of ALASEI (Agencia Latinoamericana de Servicios Especiales de Información), and other similar news agencies for Africa and Asia. During the following years, ALASEI produced thousands of special features that were distributed to mass media throughout the region, thus offering a different and more appropriate perspective on regional politics, economy, society and culture. UNESCO also supported the development of national communication policies, which did not exist before in most Third World countries.

The strident withdrawal of the United States and England from UNESCO, in disagreement with the measures favouring the New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO), left the UN organisation deprived of significant funding and had impact on programmes such as ALASEI, that eventually disappeared. The only independent world wide agency, which has survived and has managed to maintain both its quality and the principles that motivated its creation is Inter Press Service (IPS). Other than this, a few national agencies such as Notimex (México) and Prensa Latina (Cuba), kept swimming crosscurrent.

ICTs for community and communiction
In a more conservative and tepid mood, UNESCO tolerates today, the privatisation of frequencies used by community radio stations in the Third World; in the name of press freedom defends the freedom of media owners, and signs agreements with Microsoft, ignoring its own commitment with open source and free software alternatives. Even though, UNESCO is still among the most interesting organisations within the UN system, it is the agency that contributes with knowledge and protects cultural diversity and the world heritage. The paradox is that in the communication sector of UNESCO, the United States now imposes technocrats of its choice to prevent anything similar to what took place twenty-five years ago.

After twenty-five years, we continue raising similar banners: the right to information and communication. The control of information by multinational companies goes much further today than three decades back, largely thanks to the advances in technology, which allows concentrating mass media in the hands of multinational companies. Other than the Associated Press, still dominating the market of press agencies, we’ve got CNN, which alone exerts an almost absolute hegemonic power over the planet, with its multiple regional networks in various languages. In countries such as my own, Bolivia, information structures are weak, television channels download material from CNN to cover international news, often without even making the effort of elaborating its own analysis.

We are certainly worst now in many ways; the concentration of the information sector in fewer hands is higher, and through the privatisation of the frequency spectrum most national-state and public radio and television media have virtually disappeared. Under the influence of large multinational conglomerates, information is no longer considered a cultural factor in development but just a market commodity. There are, however, two new encouraging elements that have emerged since the 1980s; on the one hand, the emergence of new technologies of information and communication (ICTs), too often visible in a discourse with little content, and on the other hand, the renewed participation of the civil society, which keeps a watchful attitude on the ways our future is being designed. The first of these two facets has a double edge: ICTs are like a knife, they are not good or bad per se, but because of the use we make of them. Technological advances are fabulous, and they amaze us. Those privileged enough to access them feel bewildered by its potential. However, it is not true that in their current configuration the new technologies are the universal remedy for the failures of development in Third World countries. We are certainly better since the international debate is around the right to communicate of the common people and civil society and not only about the right to be informed, and since this debate now takes place at the core of the civil society, the difference in content is substantial. The right to information refers to ‘access’ whereas the right to communicate refers to ‘participation’. Access has much to do with a gracious concession from above while participation re-aligns the axis of decision-making from the power of a few to the consensus of many.

Right to communicate
Twenty-five years ago, it was a few progressive individuals at UNESCO and the non-aligned governments that prompted the situation analysis (the report from the commission chaired by Sean MacBride, 1974 Peace Nobel Prize winner) and the necessary measures aimed to re-establish the balance in information exchanges. However, that international discussion developed mainly at the highest circles of political power and thus when the undertaking was threatened and eventually buried by the United States, nobody came out to defend it. The problems signalled by the MacBride report intensified over time.


Source: www.prh.nooaa.gov

Under the influence of large multinational conglomerates, information is no longer considered a cultural factor in development but just a market commodity.