The arrogance of administrative power
- By Chen Yizhou
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China.org.cn, June 17, 2011
At the recent forum on "Scientific Understanding of Food Additives" organized by the Ministry of Health and the State Council's Office of Food Safety, Mao Qun'an, director of the Publicity Center for the Ministry of Health, said that a healthy platform for media reporting was being established, including a black list of journalists aimed at preventing the news media from deliberately misleading the public by propagating false information. Mao said that news media reports on food safety have led to enormous negative effects on the development of China's food industry.
Recently, all kinds of scandals about food safety have been publicized by the news media, leading to a dramatic fall in public trust in food safety. Perhaps for this reason, there is a perspective that says journalism is a double-edged sword: on the positive side, it can satisfy the public's right to information, but on the other hand, excessive reporting about problems with food safety can lead to social panic, resulting in a harmful domino effect. Without a doubt, the Ministry of Health's official position is a version of this "logic," and the decision to establish a "black list of journalists" manifests, in a certain sense, an attitude of excluding the supervisory role of public opinion, reflecting a profound arrogance of power.
Should the media report on problems with food safety? There should be no need to debate this question. Journalists are neither "detectives" nor "public procurators," so they should be treated with a tolerant and rational attitude in case some "bias" be discovered in the details of their reports on food safety. Of course, this does not exclude the possibility of certain journalists deliberately misleading the public with ulterior motives, but this kind of unscrupulous journalist lacking professional ethics could only be a minority. Should we throw the baby out with the bathwater?
Actually, if a problem with food safety occurs, it is legal, reasonable and appropriate for the media to follow up with reports, ensuring the public's right to information. If there is a plethora of reports, it is because there is a plethora of problems. If such incidents occurred and the media kept silent, that would be a true cause for concern. I am doubtful about claims that "news media reports on food safety have led to enormous negative effects." Such statements underestimate the intelligence of the public.
Without supervision, discursive power may be abused. This saying is true: no matter what kind of power, if it is not supervised, there is the possibility of abuse, and the supervisory power of journalism is, of course, no exception. Perhaps the arrogance of the power to establish a "black list of journalists" tells us that the biggest problem of media supervision is not the abuse of discursive power but its repeated restriction by administrative power. Instead of "supervising the media," it is much more important to protect and ensure that the media itself has more supervisory freedom through the legal system. We should not doubt or reject the supervisory value of journalism as a whole just because of a few false reports.
To look at this from another perspective, how many hidden sources of food safety problems have been revealed by this barrage of media reports? How many starting-points for policy-making and administration have such reports provided to the authorities of public food safety? At present, journalism has already become a mainstay of public supervision, especially in the realm of food safety. Chief Henrik of the Local Crimes Division of the Sk?ne County Police Department, Sweden, once said that "Sometimes news media reports interfere with our investigation of a case, even by reporting false information, but this does not mean we should restrict journalism. The value of journalistic freedom is higher than that of any particular case, and its benefits ultimately outweigh its costs."
Of course, the Ministry of Health's establishment of a "black list of journalists" seems more like a sort of warning, and it will be difficult to put into practice. However, the administrative attitude behind it contradicts social civility and the ethics of power; it is extremely dangerous.
(This article was first published in Chinese, and translated by Matt H.)
