The way in which the media covers Spanish politics has received a lot of attention recently. Accusations of bias, hard to believe I know, have been freely made and with the country in an election campaign there is a greater focus on the coverage given to each political party. An interview recently on the state channel RTVE 1 with the secretary general of the Partido Popular, Maria Dolores de Cospedal, sparked a big row. De Cospedal backed claims made by other members of her party that the channel's news coverage is biased against the PP. The journalist conducting the panel interview/discussion, Ana Pastor, subsequently came to the defence of her employers.
What made the event unusual and more newsworthy was that Pastor spoke back against the politician. Interviews with Spanish politicians tend to be notoriously soft, and it's extremely rare to see an interviewee being given a hard time. Pastor had already gained some kudos a few months ago for a robust interview she did with the Iranian president, and I remember thinking at the time that it was just a pity that journalists here couldn't do the same with their own politicians. In the case of the De Cospedal interview the PP was naturally outraged that one of their leaders couldn't launch accusations on TV without being being answered. Of course they are more used to the manipulative and servile approach adopted by the regional channels they control, such as Telemadrid or Canal 9 in Valencia.
RTVE may not yet be the model of objective journalistic coverage but there is no doubt that it has been significantly less partial under Zapatero than it was under his predecessor. I still remember the Aznar years and those news bulletins that would almost always begin with the depressing words "el presidente del gobierno ha dicho". The post of head of RTVE was more or less interchangeable with that of being Aznar's press representative, and it was this kind of direct political control that has become the model for the dreadful pseudo news coverage that has become the norm in Madrid and Valencia. Zapatero cannot be accused of operating the same kind of policy and the top job in the corporation was agreed with the PP. The latter party just adopts a standard policy of accusing all the media who do not directly favour them of being biased.
Thankfully, there have also been hopeful signs of resistance from sections of the media to kid glove treatment of politicians. The increasingly common habit of press conferences being called where no questions are permitted from journalists has finally produced a backlash. Many individual journalists and some associations have signed a petition under the name of #sinpreguntasnocobertura where they call upon all members of the profession not to cover political events when journalists are not allowed to ask questions. It's a welcome step against the increasing management of political coverage by the parties, who already get their canned segments of speeches carried automatically by news bulletins.
Politicians on all sides can act in this way, PP leader Mariano Rajoy seems to give at most a couple of press conferences a year but there are also government ministers who adopt similar tactics with their public declarations. For the campaign to be truly effective it also needs the politically docile sections of the press to back it too. This presents difficulties for a certain brand of journalist. A press interview a few days ago with Valencian president Francisco Camps included a gem from the interviewer about how he didn't want to press Camps too hard on the Gürtel corruption case because he was not a Navy Seal! The battle has to be fought within the profession itself as well as against those who seek to manipulate media coverage in their own interests.
9 comments:
Interesting post, as always, thank you. I hope I was not alone in being unaware of the new journalists lobby... probably because I pretty much gave up reading the press here some yearas ago through abject boredom and TV news has the capacity to enrage. With some experience in "emerging" economies I think this is just another phase of Spain's growing up. In developing countries the norm (though not the rule) is that political leaders are drawn from the echelons of successful businessmen with time and resources on their hands. Sadly, few of them are overnight converts to an overwhelming desire to "give something back" to the people that contributed to their fortunes. The corruption endemic in Spanish politics is also a function of the broader dilema in European (and perhaps global) politics. The calibre of the average political leader has been in decline for many years and like any major corporation if incompetence enters at the top then you are hardly creating a breeding ground for future "statesmen". So, political incompetence or corruption must both necessarily be veiled in smoke, mirrors and outright lies. Neither incompetence nor corruption can comfortably withstand a free and probing press, where intellect and reasoned, objective analysis might seriously jeopardise that veil. Good luck to them... they have my support.
Graeme,
Have you seen Real Madrid's official celebrations dedicating the Copa to the Madrid Town Council and Regional Government?
As far as I could tell, most of the day's schmoozing took place on Gallardón's turf; i.e. in his capacity as mayor of the city... and yet Aguirre had to get in there; Pedro Jota's Marca, tellingly, splashing her mug and not the Mayor's on the front cover holding aloft the trophy.
No wonder Higuaín and some other Madrid players were said to be a little short of enthused at having to stage these photo-op freebie for egomaniacal, parasitic politicians.
The extent to which local big-wigs and señoríos in Spain harness (daresay, soil) football in such a shameless well is at best unedifying.
Restored anonymous comment from Blogger outage:
Interesting post, as always, thank you. I hope I was not alone in being unaware of the new journalists lobby... probably because I pretty much gave up reading the press here some yearas ago through abject boredom and TV news has the capacity to enrage. With some experience in "emerging" economies I think this is just another phase of Spain's growing up. In developing countries the norm (though not the rule) is that political leaders are drawn from the echelons of successful businessmen with time and resources on their hands. Sadly, few of them are overnight converts to an overwhelming desire to "give something back" to the people that contributed to their fortunes. The corruption endemic in Spanish politics is also a function of the broader dilema in European (and perhaps global) politics. The calibre of the average political leader has been in decline for many years and like any major corporation if incompetence enters at the top then you are hardly creating a breeding ground for future "statesmen". So, political incompetence or corruption must both necessarily be veiled in smoke, mirrors and outright lies. Neither incompetence nor corruption can comfortably withstand a free and probing press, where intellect and reasoned, objective analysis might seriously jeopardise that veil. Good luck to them... they have my support.
Surely some of this comes from the failure of the Transición to break sufficiently with the past in a whole number of sectors. Old habits acquired from the dictatorship were allowed to survive with the result that there is only questioning of power on tribal lines. Combine this with the growing trend of parties successfully managing media coverage and you end up with bland interviews and a culture where journalists challenging politicians is not the norm.
Restored comment from Roberticus:
Graeme,
Have you seen Real Madrid's official celebrations dedicating the Copa to the Madrid Town Council and Regional Government?
As far as I could tell, most of the day's schmoozing took place on Gallardón's turf; i.e. in his capacity as mayor of the city... and yet Aguirre had to get in there; Pedro Jota's Marca, tellingly, splashing her mug and not the Mayor's on the front cover holding aloft the trophy.
No wonder Higuaín and some other Madrid players were said to be a little short of enthused at having to stage these photo-op freebie for egomaniacal, parasitic politicians.
The extent to which local big-wigs and señoríos in Spain harness (daresay, soil) football in such a shameless well is at best unedifying.
Sid Lowe's Guardian article on Barcelona's title made an acerbic comment about Aguirre and photo-opportunities.
@ ejh
Yes, Sid is quite withering of Aguirre's ubiquitous mug.
The greatest example of this woman's rampant self-regard and considerable lack of humility was ahead of the final Clasico game at the Camp Nou when she predicted that the "ire of the Barça supporters will be directed at me".
Funny, I thought their eyes would be focused on Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and co.
Yes, I still remember the Tour de France celebration where Espe paraded in her yellow jersey, whilst somebody who may actually have won the race lurked uneasily somewhere in the background. But she doesn't bring much luck to the team when she attends the games, she wasn't at the Copa del Rey final but she did make it for the Champions League. Look what happened. Coincidence? I think not.
I'm sure she'll be rushing to be photographed with Contador again if and when he actually gets thrown out of the sport.
Lowe
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