A general overview of press freedom, presented virtually on the World Press Freedom Day 2022

1. Press Freedom Scenario:
Nepal and Beyond
Bhanu Bhakta Acharya, PhD
Adjunct Professor
University of Ottawa, Canada

2. World Press Freedom Day
• UN General Assembly announced the day on May 3 in 1993,
• as a response to a call by African journalists who produced the Windhoek
Declaration in 1991 on media pluralism and independence.
• Reasons to celebrate May 3 as press freedom day:
• to celebrate the fundamental principles of press freedom
(nationally/globally),
• to evaluate press freedom in the country and around the world, and to
defend the media from attacks on their editorial independence, and
• to pay tribute to journalists who have lost their lives in the exercise of their
profession.

3. ‘Journalism under digital siege’
• A consequence of Covid-19 pandemic
• Its impact on media and journalism (e.g., fake news, disinformation, misinformation)
• Challenge of identifying real or fake news on digital platforms;
• A huge confusion between journalism and social media activism
• Regulated: Gatekeeping process, professional values, ethical standards, teamwork
• Anarchism: Individual, arbitrary, lack of accountability, beyond users’ control
• Most responsible journalism is very urgent today than never before.
• Restrictive legislation on fundamental freedoms,
• Social media regulations (“duty of care”)
• Internet regulations (pro-government rather than pro-public)
• Cyber security (technically vulnerable)

4. Setting the Scene
• We, 21 contributors, recently published
a book called “Global Perspectives on
Journalism in Nepal” from Routledge
• First book of its kind on Nepali journalism
targeting international audience
• Perspectives: Professional, Academic,
Socio-Political, and Technological.
• Covers all media genres, policy to practice,
classrooms to newsrooms, and
watchdogging to lapdogging.
• Different chapters of this book suggest that
Nepal is at the crossroads, confused and
directionless due to technological diffusion
in journalism, and lack of professional
practices and work traditions.

5. Professional Perspective
• Chaotic situation in Nepal and elsewhere due to:
• explosion of number of outlets with new technologies.
• Yet to develop institutional/professional foundations;
• everything new, and everyone is experimenting with newer technologies.
• Gatekeeping is vanishing on digital platforms;
• Limited or no gatekeeping mechanism; one-person-led micro-journalism;
• Misinformation/disinformation/fake news is a serious epidemic;
• Digital platforms were controlled by others
• Unlike traditional platforms, tech giants control digital platforms.
• Our (users/journalists) content can be moderated, altered or even deleted by someone else
without our notice.
• National interests are overwhelming;
• Professional values of journalism are undermined;
• If we see Russia-Ukraine war, pro-Russian and pro-Western biases are clearly visible and
observable.

6. Academic perspective
• Lack of media literacy/ethical awareness
• Differences among social media, blogs and online news media;
• Many still believe Facebooking /Twittering is a form of journalism;
• Learning by doing approach
• More practitioners than professionals
• (Rishi Dhamala’s class on media ethics by PCN recently)
• Slow academic endeavours
• University curricula are very slowly updated than market demand;
• Consequently, arbitrariness is threatening to the credibility of journalism
• Theoretical teaching/ no practical exercises;
• Lack of qualified human resources
• Teachers are themselves politically bias; their track of ethical practice is very poor;
• A huge gap between newsrooms demands and classroom supplies.

7. Socio-political perspective
• Political influences in journalism
• Media/journalists are often used as political tools;
• See Russia-Ukraine war; full of biased reporting;
• news media spread political propaganda;
• Full of biases and prejudices
• Nearly a century ago, Joseph Goebbels, propaganda minister of Nazi Germany,
exploited news media for political advantages, saying that government must use
news media to serve their interests, and that the public would believe big lies if they
were repeated often enough.
• Government propaganda as news.
• Modi government and Indian media on Russia-Ukraine war. Media backing
government voice in the world’s largest democratic country.

8. Technological perspective
• Rapid migration on digital platforms
• Traditional media migrating to digital platforms so rapidly that
they don’t have enough time to experiment, assess, and adapt
• Online news portals yet not fostered a professional work environment
• Internet has not only revolutionized news reporting, production, and
dissemination
• There is a vacuum of legal measures and ethical values to bring the full breadth of
digital journalism in accord with professional standards.
• Unanswered ethical questions:
• Vague understanding between journalism and communication; news reporting &
social media posting; journalists & citizen journalists?
• Do internet-based radio/television need licensing? Why? Why not?
• Shall citizen journalists be considered as journalists? Provide the same access to
information? Provide the same privilege? Yes/No?
• How to verify the authenticity of news content collected via crowdsourcing?

9. Expectations of this slogan
• Social media platforms should increase transparency
• to stop the spread of disinformation and to promote trustworthy information instead.
• Duty of care: Internet/tech companies require to do more
• to tackle disinformation, online hate speech and potentially harmful content
• to protect women journalists who are violently targeted online and offline
• Privacy standards must be strengthened
• With regard to control data retention, artificial intelligence, spyware, and arbitrary surveillance;
• many outlets continue to bleed advertising revenues to Internet companies
• there should be strengthened legal protection for journalists to keep their sources confidential
• Legal actions are needed
• to prevent and prosecute illegal surveillance of journalists
• to prevent and eliminate online attacks against journalists, orchestrated campaigns of harassment,
intimidation, and violations of privacy.
We all have a role to play:
Member States, Internet intermediaries and civil society all have a role to play to break
the digital siege on journalism

10. Thank you for listening