What Is The Newspapers Role in Our Democracy?

[Brad King]

Last semester (I'm already thinking in terms of the scholastic calendar), I attended a very frustrating event at The Kettering Foundation, a think tank that explores the connection between media and democracy in the United States.

The two-day seminar focused on this question: how can newspapers facilitate democracy?

The event was frustrating because it was staffed by academics (boo) and editorial writers (boo), but only two folks who were digitally oriented.

I did -- as you might imagine -- not fare so well at the event because I was discussing how newspapers could incorporate things like Alternate Reality Games, MeetUp.org and other such online-to-offline tools that could help inform AND engage the local community.

This was brushed aside from the first moments (and I think Chris Graves might be able to back me up on this, but possibly she has a different take).

I have been honked off since the symposium ended, but working on the book raised the question again: what role -- if any -- should a media company have in facilitating democracy?

Maybe I was blown off because newspapers shouldn't -- or haven't -- actually enabled people to get together to act. They are passive participants in democracy, not willing and active participants.

Doesn't Web 2.0 change that? Shouldn't it? The idea of a participatory culture is one that demands we step up and acknowledge that we participate.

Or have I gone off the deep end?

[David]

Politicians never respected newspapers. They were just smart enough to be afraid of them.

If you buy my argument that social media doesn't scale (at least not the way old media does) then it's possible politicians feel they can safely ignore some Second Life protest with 20 people.

But, and here's where it gets fun--if we can figure out how to get social media to scale, or at least politicians to fear it, then it will work again fulfilling newspaper's original purpose -- to hound the privileged, the cheats and the liars. Oh, and to report sport scores and movie reviews.

-- David

[Brad King]

Ah see, I don't care about Second Life. I'm more concerned about life in towns. Here's something I posted over on my blog about what LOCAL coverage should look like in a Read/Write world.

The first thing I would do is get all my reporters and editors together to discuss exactly what government and private organizations are important in each community. We would put together a database outline of what records need to be made available: legislation from local governments, crime, volunteer organization records, school boards, utility services, important companies.

Once we had all of that outlined, I’d set my junior reporters to fill that database with legacy records, gathering up as much data as possible. Making sure we had everything filled up so that it was functional in terms of finding information.

Then, I’d create an API so that people could mash that data however they wanted, while also creating a series of map overlays that would enable me to see patters (think of it this way: a map that tracked city repairs on top of a legislative map that outlined what monies had been allocated to city development for instance). From there, we could begin to see patterns emerging on how government and public life templated itself onto specific communities.

Once that was done, specific stories would begin to emerge from that database, which would be more systemic stories about what was happening — while also making the raw data available to the community, which in turn would give the community an opportunity to interact with the data as well.

The next thing I would do is set up at ARG-like community-based game that focused on two things:

1. creating content that is neighborhood specific (such as taking pictures of dangerous or damage roads for instance, and uploading them to flickr, tagged and geo-located in a specific way);
2. from there, I would hold a competition that the neighborhood with the most content would get not only a series of stories written about it — but would grab citizens who participated the most to file stories and be compensated for it.

I would also build in functionality that allowed people to post on a blog about their neighborhood, setting up tags so that it could easily be parsed out. I may even look into setting up a NING group for neighborhoods so that people could be involved in specific topics.

You’d also want a MeetUp functionality.

[John Borland]

I disagree that newspapers (or more generally, the media) has played a passive role in democracy. Though this may be more of a semantic disagreement than anything. And David -- I think there is some truth to your statement about politicians and respect, but it's not entirely true. I covered politics for several years up in Sacramento; politicians, and agency types, have a complicated relationship to the media, certainly fearing them in parts, but using and respecting good reporters in a kind of symbiotic relationship.

But Brad, to your larger question. To function *well*, a democracy ought to be composed of people who have a reasonably accurate, reasonably informed picture of the world around them. You can't trust politicians or government to provide that, so the media is necessary. A multiplicity of sources may help hone that picture -- or it might simply provide a chaos of conflicting voices, in which it's impossible to determine what is actually true.

In theory, newspapers, with an ethos of professional responsibility, ought to provide that. In practice, our market-based media is primarily responsive to market demands, and provides a lot of sensationalism and cat-in-a-tree stories, rather than meeting its democratic function.

But some still do. To your point of passivity: Local papers still cover city government, write editorials, sponsor town-hall type meetings, and this kind of thing. They investigate school board scandals, give people letter-writing and op-ed platforms, and launch campaigns to get stoplights in place. It does happen, in ways that the old communications platforms might allow.

That's why I'm a bit surprised that papers would dismiss the ARG or meetup-style activities so completely out of hand. The idea of a participatory culture isn't new at all -- it's really what this country (the USA) was founded on. Passivity has become more of a norm as we've retreated to suburbs and fractured communities -- but even there, neighborhood groups and civic organizations are stronger than people give them credit for, I think. The media hasn't been a natural leader in these things, partly for fear of losing "objectivity," -- but being a facilitator for participation in no way damages credibility. Hell, throw up a pro-Obama and a pro-McCain meetup. Bring both sides of an issue together to work out the pothole issue, and make the politicians come to you.

I guess the difference is this. Newspapers haven't been passive participants in democracy. But they haven't been active participants in *mobilization.* If they can be made to see that they can provide the infrastructure and impetus for mobilization, without having to take one political side or the other, then they can certainly play a larger role in that participatory groundswell.

[Brad King]

I don't know if I believe they haven't been passive, but to your point, I don't think they are necessarily inactive.

Let me pose a question that may clarify what that means: if you and I sit in a bar, for instance, and discuss the candidacies of two opponents, are we being passive in our participation of democracy?

I think there are two divergent answers:

The first is no, we are actively engaged in the politics of the moment and our discussion is pushing forward our involvement. I don't think I could dispute that (which I think is analogous to your point -- although possibly I have set up a straw man argument...)

The second is yes, we are limited in our scope because it's simply a conversation. We have no idea if that conversation will lead to action -- and moreso, we haven't facilitated any action. Now, we may act -- but we just as easily may not act. My argument would be that our actions, while secondarily may lead to action, are not tied directly to action.

I think my proposal is that newspapers -- and media outlets -- should encourage through advocacy participation in the process through emerging technologies, and not simply rely on their conversation.

I would think newspaper endorsements and editorials hold less sway over the electorate today than ever before. But creating communities that pushed for change -- that, I think, would make them more relevant in the modern world.

As a last though, I don't dispute your notion that newpapers have been involved in democracy. If my post came off that way, I apologize. My point was simply that in a modern world I believe they still believe the importance of a one-to-many message holds sway.

if it did, candidates wouldn't be using these technologies with the veracity that they do to connect directly. They would be tapping into pre-existing communities.