Media and Good Governance in Nepal

--Shrish S. Rana

1. One is tempted to indulge in a deviation of sorts at the very outset. Irrigation engineers are only now admitting that long practiced and farmer managed irrigation systems have their engineering and management utility and the modern trained irrigation engineers and managers can best serve the purposes of irrigation when working with the farmers and absorbing their know-how in long-held engineering and management practices. Years of development experience and study in the more exact science of engineering has of course helped in the scientific conclusion on the utility of farmer managed irrigation systems. This has of course had to be at considerable cost to development investments. However, this relatively new inference, derived scientifically has nevertheless been made possible because of the science of engineering and management. Imagine for a while that the engineer is a social engineer and not an irrigation expert. Fresh out of school or college, the social engineer begins applying fresh learnings on social engineering on the society with inadequacies not dissimilar to the irrigation engineer. It would serve the purposes of this paper if the example cited here acts as an intellectual stimulant in exploring the ponderables in the Nepali case. While certainly not pleading that one of the world’s most ancient independent countries was governed well, Nepal was certainly governed by itself and even the surfacial studies on Nepali government before the 1950s suggest a manner of governance distinct to Nepal alone. The Rana oligarchy was, in very definitive terms of even modern jurisprudence revoked by King Tribhuvan upon return from New Delhi in February 1951 by citing that he had taken back what his forefathers had granted them, but what of the outstanding institutions outside them. By the modernist, ‘educated’, manner of judgement, the Nepali system must certainly have proven so dissimilar to modern institutions of governance to have been so thoroughly junked outright in the attempt at social engineering that has taken place since. Both from the point of view of media and governance, if not good governance, can the social engineer in our case venture to undertake, as did the irrigation engineers and managers, scientific studies of its impact and consequences?

2. "For far too long, the people of Nepal have remained pawns of history. For far too long they have been reading what others have written for them. And for far too long they have been following agenda set by others. It is now time for them to wake up to the new challenge of the day and begin writing their own history. For this to happen, a new sociology of nationalism and internationalism will become essential." These words come from Ananda Aditya’s paper " State Size, Location and Growth: Deliberations on the Prospects of Nepal’s Development" at a September 20, Nepal Foundation for Advanced Studies (NEFAS) seminar on a decade of governance in the country. In a well argued thesis that comparative analysis suggests that Nepal’s size and location need not impede growth, Aditya’s implication that not enough homework has been done by Nepalis on Nepal deserves some thought indeed. Since his paper was on the security aspect of a decade of governance in Nepal, the impact of such inadequacies on good governance should surely provoke thought. Its relationship to the media should appear obvious here.

3. As for the media, one finds it useful to recall a similar Telegraph seminar in December 1996 where, in a paper entitled "Role of Political Education Through the Independence of the Media", this writer quoted Victor Gunewardena’s report "Press As Promoter" (Coordinating Group for Studies on South Asian Perspectives, pub. 1993 by FES) where he refers to the influence of political parties on individual publications being an important feature of the Nepali media. This served to stress a point on the extent of Nepali media independence as also, in the context of this paper, called for thought " over the effect of political education provided by the media here." "… the more serious study demanded here is the effect of a partisan media politically educating its readership" , one argued. "The influence of such information as that provided by the Nepali media in Nepali political behavior and understanding can thus prove a subject of analytical study. Such a study could then also explain the virtual absence of national policy issues in the Nepali media. It is by and large absent from our politics. Nepali journalism has yet to take up serious discourses, for example, on the matter of national security issues, defense, economic policy issues that together establish a national consensus among the educated on exactly what our national policies should attempt. A partisan, political media may prefer not to do so given the political advantages. But the effects of such on the political education of the masses certainly deserve study." this writer stressed. In the context of the subject matter of this paper, one does call for studies on its impact on governance. Indeed, the concluding paragraph that follows is as much relevant to this paper: " Democracy, or political development, presumes that a politically aware society encourages the population to identify with national causes so that they may provide the required participation for nation-building. It is proposed here that an independent media can best help serve this purpose. This, in essence is the role prescribed it in a democracy."

4. In all fairness to Gunewardene, he called this partisanization of the Nepali media " a temporary and transitory phase". One has, in a December 1995 paper "Problems and Prospects of Independent Newspapers in Nepal" for the Telegraph, again, referred to the growing investments attracted by the media sector arguing "The operation of newspapers by organizations employing professional journalists makes it possible to presume that, at one stage in time in the least, professionalism will prevail." This is evidently not to be so for the moment however. The contents of the very first chapter "Nepali Journalism Today: Problems and Challenges" of the Twenty-fifth Annual Report of the Press Council (1999-2000) are revealing in this context. A rough English translation of the article’s very second paragraph, the first citing welcome developments over the decade such as media look, numbers, investments, reach, circulation and the likes, reads thus: " However, if one is to see the qualitative aspects of Nepali journalism, there is little room for satisfaction. Papers continue to be focused on party interests and the interests of factions and sub-factions in the parties and the parties and editors and publishers continue to justify its need. The papers should not only represent public opinion but also help generate it. Although the creation of public opinion has at times been done, Nepali journalism is representing the political parties rather than public opinion. It has now become common place for papers billing themselves as ‘independent, fair and fearless’ to exude partisan essence and, in reality, a situation is being so created that independent, fair and fearless journalism needs be redefined."

5. For those acquainted with the media sector in Nepal, the Press Council’s conclusion in the article that government and society are as responsible for this sorry state as are the editors and publishers come as no surprise as does its conclusion that this has eroded public confidence in the media. For purposes of this paper, however, the Council’s list of current media problems in the country should also be of utility. The chapter lists 1) the right to information and information flow, 2) shortage of investments and its impact, 3) inadequate professional commitment, 4) inadequacies in advertisement policies and 5) unsystematic distribution system as basic problems. It goes on to list three basic challenges that impede the development of healthy journalism: a) eroding public confidence and (the prevalence of) political influence, b) flaunting of the code of conduct and c) security of journalists.

6. In all fairness, the honorable Press Council that has curiously, under the multi-party dispensation, been headed by a government appointee outside the judiciary contrary to previous practice, has been fairly perceptive on the media woes. In all fairness again, at least the Press Council if not the press or the media appears clear of the media role in society and good governance. Indeed, the very terminology of news in Nepali "Samachar" (sama = equal + aachaar = behavior) is a prescription all its own for independence. Moreover the Sanskrit motto under the mast of Nepal’s oldest newspaper (Sarwe bhavantu sukhina…) suggests that Nepali journalism, at its very inception stages, was thinking very much along the lines of the American Society of Newspaper Editors’ prescription that " The primary purpose of gathering and distributing news and opinion is to serve the general welfare by informing the people and enabling them to make judgments on the issues of the time." ("Playing It Straight" by John Hulteng , the Globe Pequot Press, 1983). That these evidently long held professional principles have yet to apply in our context calls for further study indeed.

7. So much for the media and the much talked of links between media and politics, media and democracy or media and government. But what of governance, particularly good governance? In terms of the arguments over the near obsessive external influence in Nepali social science it is little surprising that Nepali intelligentsia today also must echo the current focus on terminologies such as good governance, civil societies, accountability, transparency and the likes. Having merely a couple of months ago participated in one NEFAS seminar on good governance, I find this underscored by my participation here, this time on the media. After having heralded the near-worldwide entry into the "third wave" of democracy so profusely, Western political pundits marking the wide variations in the practice of democracy in countries of the ‘new wave’ were bound to strengthen their credibility with cautionary inferences in treatises such as "Is the Third Wave Over?" (Samuel Huntington) or "Three Paradoxes of Democracy" (Larry Diamond) and the likes (see separate issues of Journal of Democracy). Distinctions have been made between ‘liberal democracies’ and ‘electoral democracies’. This scribe in his NEFAS paper found it suitable also to quote Robert Kaplan’s thesis in his article "For the Third World Western Democracy is a Nightmare" that the " rote prescription for ‘newly liberated’ nations –elections within one year, followed by stability— is more likely to be linked to chaos than to stability".( International Herald Tribune , Dec. 30-31,1995—Jan. 1st 1996). Suffice it to say that issues of " governability" (to use Larry Diamond’s terminology) are now replete in democracy, social science and development vocabulary as distinct from democracy itself. It is here that emphasis on governance, good governance, on civil society and accountability and transparency carry meaning. To little surprise therefore, by 1997 the UNDP had made its definition of good governance : "the exercise of economic, political and administrative authority to manage a country’s effort at all levels. It comprises mechanisms, processes and institutions through which citizens and groups articulate their interests, exercise their legal rights, meet their obligations and mediate their differences". The South Asia Human Development Report 1999 also prefers to cite the World Bank prescription for governance—a) the form of political regime, b) the process of exercise of authority in the management of economic and social resources for development and c) government capacity to design, formulate and discharge functions.

8. By most standards of course students of the Nepali scene are not all too happy about the manner of governance of the country. As one did cite in the paper on governance for the NEFAS seminar, by the standards of constitutionalism, representative government, elections and the likes initially prescribed for democracies, the Nepali exercise has been quite worthwhile indeed: two general elections, one mid-term election, two local level elections, majority party rule, minority party rule, coalitions, judicial interpretations of the constitutional process, political parties, party elections. For the media, moreover, constitutional guarantees of the right to publication and the non-confiscation of press and the likes have actually helped spurt the spate of quality investments visible in the media – daily color broadsheets, weeklies, glossy magazines, private FM channels, cable television and private television productions in Nepal TV, etc.(A Nepal Press Institute publication "Media Nepal 2000" edited by P. Kharel, Jan. 2000, sheds excellent light on the matter of media development in this context.) On the other hand, regardless of the structural aspects of our democracy, the behavioral aspects emphasized in the definitions of governance that now emanate in social science of late certainly leave our system desperately wanting. Standards set for ‘civil society’, the need for transparency and accountability go much beyond the repeated injunctions and censures of the parliament’s Public Accounts Committee. The impact of such on Nepali society surely approaches the ‘chaos’ envisioned by Kaplan.

9. Since the Nepali media is as much part of this society and, as the discussions above suggest, it remains also in very close proximity to the politics of this society, it is possible to suggest here the need for study on how much it is a contributor to the chaos as also how much it is a victim of such. An article " Communication and Community Conflict" by Philip J. Tichenor, George Donahue and Clarence N. Olien reprinted in the Telegraph (Dec. 4,1996) stresses that " Information appears to be generated and disseminated as a result of joint activity of professionals within the mass media channels and professionals who have advocacy functions for interdependent special interest groups." This suggests a limit to the independence of the media by its own. This is further reinforced by the argument in a paper by Joseph Klapper in the opening chapters of "Media Power in Politics" (ed. Doris A. Graber, pub. Macmillan India Ltd., 1994) that a " large portion of the information available… depends on an information delivery system which reflects the pluralistic organization and vested interests of the society in which it exists." It is here that one must call for serious study on the Nepali media especially as regards to governance too. Given that, even after a decade since the existing political dispensation was introduced, the actual legislations on the constitutional right to information remain still a matter for government promises, it is surely possible to suggest that this tells a story all its own in the manner of Nepali governance and the media in Nepal.

11. This paper perhaps will be incomplete in light of the media-governance nexus being discussed here in the Nepali context if one is not also to touch upon an area of possible study deliberately or otherwise rendered vague in the context of transparency and accountability. Just as the political sector appears hesitant on making public commitments on having their accounts publicly audited and their papers transparent (the delay on the bill regarding the right to information cannot but also be related), the media including the Press Council Report refrains from discussing in length the Audit Bureau of Circulation measures and its efforts, or lack of such, in roping in the media for audited accounts.

12. It is the effects of such a glaring absence as a functional audit bureau for the media that merits probing into. Good governance in the ‘liberal’ democracies would be well nigh impossible in the absence of public audits of the sort, be it political parties or the media. The media has no doubt attracted considerable investments under the decade-old multi- party dispensation. The media as industry presumes that its investments will be justified by the economic benefits accrued to it by its reach. The larger and more paying its reach (circulation, listenership, audience) the more paid advertisements are attracted justifying its investments. Be it government or private, how does the source of advertisement authenticate the reach? This aspect of the Nepali media leaves one wondering as to the nature of the growing investments in the Nepali media. This evident anomaly here would be as much a subject for study in the light of the media as such in Nepal as it would also be a matter to be taken up for probes into its effects on Nepali governance.

13. To conclude, one must go back to the beginning. This is to do with the farmer managed irrigation system where the modern irrigation expert, in the quest for development effect, concludes that mastery of modern engineering knowledge must be added to by local expertise. The social engineer in the Nepali context appears yet to recognize the possibility of existing local expertise. Even more dangerous perhaps is the apparent lapse in the social engineer’s grasp of modern expertise itself. Although both the media and the government sector today are not hesitant in echoing the need for good governance, the continued absence of the developed mechanisms for such in both the media and government could surely not be without reasons. It is the reasons that one must set out to discover.

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