A Crisis of Coverage
Daniel Liu considers the role of the Fourth Estate in a crisis.
From the footage of the ‘tank man’ during the Tiananmen Square Massacre, to the fall of the Twin Towers, the news media provides us with powerful images that shape history. As the much-vaunted ‘Fourth Estate’, the media has a tremendous impact on nearly every aspect of our lives. Its influence can be characterised as the “CNN effect” of round-the-clock global news coverage.
Normally, the media operates as a powerful tool for presenting balanced debate. With public demand for facts and information, the media’s investigative capacity is its most valued service to the citizen, as well as an invaluable commercial asset. But during times of crisis, such as the outbreak of conflict, terror attacks, or sudden economic upheaval, the media tends to overreact. The Fourth Estate’s exaggerated response to crises is conditioned by a market environment that rewards hyperbole and dramatisation.
Media Hyperbole
The media’s over-dramatisation of events for the sake of increased viewership and advertising revenue can exacerbate crisis situations. A shining example comes from the media’s response to the ongoing Global Financial Crisis. In late 2007, as governments attempted to boost consumer confidence via economic stimulus packages, cable networks such as CNN and Fox News actively exaggerated the ramifications of the crisis. Arguably, their overtly negative tone contributed to the further erosion of consumer confidence as the economy worsened.
A similar problem arose when the same networks jumped on the sound bite of “pandemic” during the swine flu outbreak this April, grossly exaggerating the number of infected people in its early stages. In fact, this tendency is so systemic that Dr Christian Enemark, Co-Director of the National Centre for Biosecurity, opines that “during outbreaks, you would expect a degree of sensationalism from the media”.
“The media’s over-dramatisation of events for the sake of increased viewership and advertising revenue can exacerbate crisis situations.”
Official Bias
Journalists often rely on “official sources” from large, well-established organisations. The problem with this approach is that journalists often become the mouthpiece of the particular organisation they rely on for information.
This is especially true during conflicts. The need for evidence from reliable sources during conflicts predisposes journalists to view the military as one of their few legitimate sources of information. The 2003 Iraq War saw the rise of the Embedded Journalist, who experiences combat with the troops and depends upon the military for both information and protection. As US Army Times reporter Sergeant Gina Cavallaro remarked, “they’re [the journalists] relying more on the military … and as a result, the military is getting smarter about getting its own story told”.
This phenomenon also contributed to the media’s failure to report objectively in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis. Programs such as CNBC’s Squawk Box and Boomer Nation relied on sources within the corporations they investigated. Testimonies from Chief Executive Officers of companies such as Lehmann Brothers were valued over insights from third-party analysts. This led to situations where presenters such as Fast Money’s Jim Cramer assured his audience that “Bear Sterns was fine” when, in reality, the bank was critically exposed to the subprime credit crunch, declaring bankruptcy six days later.
Valuing Action Over Discourse
The questions journalists mostly ask is ‘what?’, ‘who?’ and ‘when?’. ‘How?’ and ‘why?’ questions are often left out of the reporting process. Overvaluing action and events over process-based news causes journalists, during times of war, to abandon reportage on diplomatic efforts in favour conflict coverage and the situation on the ground.
Although strong proponents of the peace process, networks such as CNN and Al Jazeera could not resist the lure of live action coverage when fighting broke out in Gaza in December 2008. Night after night, both networks showed coverage with only the few pictures of combat available to them, rather than focussing on diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis.
What emerges from this analysis is that the Fourth Estate does not exist in a vacuum. As the media is ultimately answerable to the public, consumer sovereignty can hold the press to account. Official bias and events-based reporting can only be overcome if the audience demands a change in the culture of journalism and journalists accept their responsibility not only as fact-checkers, but as opinion-makers too. Only then will the media truly be capable of putting a crisis in perspective.
