This lecture discusses the concepts of freedom of expression, freedom of speech and freedom of the press. I argue they are not the same thing. I also talk about freedom of speech and freedom of the press under capitalism and conditions of class struggle. I am a Marxist, after all.

1. 
What is freedom of the press
A quick guide to “freedom” and” unfreedom” in communication theory
A/Prof Martin Hirst,
Deakin University, July 2013
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2. The Orwellian moment
 Free speech is about
speaking truth to power
 Gramsci’s notion of “good
sense”
 NOT “common sense”
 Freedom of speech is
universal, but it is
restricted in many ways
 Moral restrictions
 Economic restrictions
 Political restrictions
This is the Orwellian moment in
history. politics, political ideas
and ideology are not what they
seem and confusion rules.
Where ruling ideas are internally
conflicted, as they are put
forward in the media and through
education, free speech takes on
a new dimension.
Ticktin 2009, p. 524)
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3. Freedom of expression, freedom of
speech and freedom of the press
 Freedom of expression is a fundamental condition
of human existence – it is inherent
 Freedom of speech is constrained by social
conditions
 Freedom of the press exists only for those who own
one
 The ruling class no longer really needs freedom of
speech for subordinate groups
 The capitalist press is ‘free’ to publish propaganda
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4. Freedom of expression
 Article 19
 Everyone has the right to freedom of
opinion and expression; this right includes
freedom to hold opinions without
interference and to seek, receive and
impart information and ideas through any
media and regardless of frontiers.
 The UN’s 1948 Universal Declaration of Human
Rights
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Freedom of
expression is held to
be universal.
A right that everyone
has, regardless of any
other condition.

5. Article 19
 Freedom of
expression to be
effective must rest
on other inalienable
human rights
 The right to work
 Free from violence
 No hunger, etc
Everyone has the right to freedom of
opinion and expression; this right
includes freedom to hold opinions
without interference and to seek,
receive and impart information and
ideas through any media and
regardless of frontiers.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
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6. Freedom of communication:
a materialist schema
1. We communicate to survive as a species
2. all class societies exhibit shared dynamics in relation to control of
communicative behaviour – favour ruling class
3. capitalist relations of production determine the specific political-
economic dynamics and contradictions in communicative behaviour that
are overlaid on but not do not wholly displace (1) and (2)
4. Marxism recognises the class interest of the proletariat in relation to
freedom of communication, its ideological expressions under capitalism
and in relation to developing political consciousness in subordinate
classes
(Adapted from Macnair 2009, p. 567)
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7. Marxism & Freedom of Communication
 You can protest all you want, so long as it is ineffective
 Media applies ridicule – ‘Occupy’ – ‘keep off the grass’
[C]ommunication is a relation between humans, not the
action of an isolated individual. My freedom of
communication is impaired if I may write, but may not
publish; if I may sing satirical songs, but only in my bath.
(Macnair 2009, p. 569)
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8. Capitalism and freedom of expression
 Absolutely agree that freedom of expression is a
fundamental human right
 It’s all fine in theory, but what about in the real
world?
 The right to freedom of expression is experienced
under social conditions of the class struggle
 There is a fundamental class inequality in the
application of any universal right enshrined in the
UN Declaration of Human Rights
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9. Materialism and freedom expression
 The universality
of human rights
cannot be
expressed
within the limits
of capitalism
 Freedom
expression is a
ruling class
freedom in a
class society
The term „freedom of expression‟ can be
understood as the expression of the full potential
of the talents and abilities of the individual.
It is clear, that in this sense, it can only be
expressed in a socialist society.
It is, in fact, one definition of a socialist society.
(Ticktin 2009, p. 513)
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10. Communication and accumulation
 Scientific labour
 Discovery and research
 Technical labour
 Economic exploitation of science
 Managerial labour
 Command and control
 Intellectual labour
 Reproduction of S/r
 Ideological labour for
capital
there is a necessary conflict
in capitalism between the
need for freedom of
expression for the purposes
of accumulation and the
need to maintain control
over the same process of
accumulation both for the
individual capitalist and for
the class as a whole.
(Ticktin 2009, p. 516)
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11. 
Political economy of
free speech
„the analysis of the various
subtle and less subtle political
economic forms of control over
modes of expression and of
criticism within capitalism and
of capitalism’
(Ticktin 2009, p. 515).
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12. Marxism and free speech
The class which has the means of
material production at its disposal
has control at the same time over
the means of mental production,
so that thereby, generally
speaking, the ideas of those who
lack the means of mental
production are subject to it.
(Marx & Engels: The German Ideology)
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13. Free Speech is a class issue too
 The right to assembly
 Union access to
workplaces
 IR
 Unfair Work Australia
 Strike-breaking
 Fascism
Freedom of speech or expression or
communication (however you want to
call it) is dependent on power, control,
resources and access (Macnair 2009).
In a capitalist world all these equations
are in fact unequal; there is a ruling
class and there are subordinate
classes.
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14. Free speech a revolutionary demand
 Emerging bourgeois class
demanded free speech so
that it could organise
itself against autocracy
 Needed allies amongst
proletarians and allies
 For a while at least
 Marx & Engels both took
issue with censorship in
their own daily
journalism and other
writing
 Also argued for an
independent workers’
press
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15. The bourgeois origins
of the free press
Newspapers were critical to the
organising of the bourgeois
during their revolutions of the
17th & 18th centuries
Editors among the first organic
intellectuals of the bourgeoisie
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The French Revolution, the bourgeois revolution,
par excellence, placed the question of the rights of
man on the agenda.
(Ticktin 2009, p. 516)

16. The property franchise still exists
 In late capitalist society the
right to speak has been
expropriated and made
beholden, in most cases, to
property rights
 Commercial in confidence
 Trademarking and branding
 State rights to secrecy and
diplomacy
 Cabinet confidentiality
The bourgeoisie needs freedom
of expression but it also
destroys it in the name of capital
itself.
(Ticktin 2009, p. 522)
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17. Freedom of expression no longer
 Need to control accumulation overrides
commitment to freedom of expression
 Vertical control over media messages to subordinate
classes
 Not just simple ‘manufacture of consent’
 The dialectic of the front page
 Informed horizontal control to manage its affairs
 ‘executive committee of the bourgeoisie –
propaganda department
once a ruling class cements its control and firmly grasps the
reins of political and economic power, it no longer needs to
exert the universality of human rights in practice
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18. Simple commodity speech
 Advertising
 Marketing, PR
 Sponsorships
 Advertorial
 Product Placement
 Political speech and the
‘permanent campaign’
 Naomi Klien ‘shock
doctrine’
 Spin and ‘fake news’
A candidate for president of the
United States today has to
spend tens of millions of dollars
a week for more than 52 weeks
to have any chance at all of
even being one of two rival
contenders.
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19. The unfreedom of the press
Freedom of the press is contradictory
in a capitalist society because it is
freedom of ownership that relies on the
„unfreedom‟ of those who do not own a
press.
Freedom of the press in a capitalist
social formation implies and, in fact,
depends on, a lack of freedom of
communication for the working class.
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20. No free speech in the news industry
 formal democratic structures, institutions and principles in a
capitalist society are not enough to guarantee freedom of
expression for everyone
 a glaring contradiction that is visible to Marxists, but that is
generally hidden behind an ideological veil of free speech, or
more specifically ‘freedom of the press’
 this paper starts from a critical political economy approach to
the major news media and commodified news information.
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21. The social relations of news production
The distinctive feature of capitalist dynamics in
relation to communication is the fact that
communication itself becomes a sphere of
capitalist activity.
(Macnair 2009, p. 574)
The hierarchy of the market comes
to be expressed in bourgeois
intellectual and cultural institutions.
(Ticktin 2009, p. 526)
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22. The right to publish
 Within capitalist relations of
production the right to publish
information and distribute it
freely is tied directly to a
property right.
 Ownership of the means of
news production gives that
fraction of capital or ruling
class the right to publish
 This is a direct translation of
the bourgeois property relation
to ownership of capital
Freedom of the press is
manifestly specific to
capitalism and the period
of the emergence of
capitalism.
(Macnair 2009, p. 568)
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23. Press freedom is a property
right
 Freedom of the press has an
economic imperative under
capitalism
 Editorial functions subsumed
under commercial functions
 Media is interlocked with
other forms of capital
“Freedom of the press is
guaranteed only to those who
own one.”
A J Liebling
“The press is not only free, it is powerful.
That power is ours. It is the proudest that
man can enjoy.”
Benjamin Disraeli
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24. The right to edit
 Editors are the senior managers of ideological apparatus
on behalf of capital
 Well-paid, subject to whim of proprietor or board
 All, or at least most, tend to behave in accordance with
the requirements of capital
 Within the relations of production they perform a
managerial and political role on behalf of social capital
 Advertising + the feigned editorial independence of a
‘free press’ are the glue that hold it together
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25. Journalism and the labour process
 Newsworkers occupy several discrete and overlapping
fractions of the new middle class
 The work of journalists at the coal face of producing news
and current affairs is proletarianised
 Their class location with economic relations of news
production aligns them with working class interests (union
membership for example)
 Their location within the social relations of news production
sees a partial alignment with ruling class interests
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26. Contradictory class positions
 News workers – new middle
class / petty bourgeois /
 At top of scale managing
capital interests
 Directing resources
 Economic relationship of wage
labour
 Productive and unproductive
– paid out of circulation
 At bottom of scale
(proleterianising?)
 Social relations of production
complicated
The attitudes, doctrines and
theories propounded by the
capitalist ‘intelligentsia’ reflect
their contradictory situation.
(Ticktin 2009, p. 518)
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27. Bosses slam media rules
 Media reforms proposed by
Communications Minister Stephen
Conroy
 A Public Interest Media Advocate
(PIMA)
 A ‘public interest’ test for media
mergers
 A statutory commitment to
maintain journalistic standards
 Threat of losing a privilege in
relation to privacy law
“Australian media bosses have
slammed the Gillard government’s
wide-ranging changes to media rules,
saying a new regulator to oversee
print and online news content and a
public interest test for mergers are
unnecessary and a threat to free
speech.”
AFR, 13 March 2013, p.1
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28. Press tsar to regulate standards
 Regulator at ‘arms length’
from government control
 Australian Press Council
comes out against the
legislation
LABOR has infuriated
publishers by proposing a new
federal regulator to oversee
press standards and rule on
mergers, as part of a wider
overhaul to be rushed through
parliament, despite fears it
could trigger a $4 billion
television takeover.
The Australian, 13 March 2013,p.1
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29. Free press in the liberal-
democratic paradigm
A free press is an essential feature of
a healthy liberal democracy.
Media outlets should always feel free
to criticise politicians and others in
power without any fear of
retribution.
James Paterson, 13 March, 2013
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30. MEAA response to Conroy
 ‘sweeping, intrusive and fail to respond to changes
in our industry
 Does not address real concern about attacks on
freedom of the press:
 ‘the growing practice by wealthy Australians
attempting to use injunctions, defamation and
other court actions to prevent proper journalistic
investigations’
 Opposed to PIMA, supports industry self-regulation
 Does not protect journalists who refuse to divulge
sources in line with the Code of Ethics
 Does not protect whistleblowers
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31. Freedom of the press in Britain is freedom to print
such of the proprietor's prejudices as the advertiser's
won't object to
Helen Swaffer
There are laws to protect the freedom of the press's
speech, but none that are worth anything to protect
the people from the press
Mark Twain
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