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From Never Again

Still in progress.. (still to be tied into the themes from my own thoughts!)

For the last ten years, I have been involved in three spheres: journalism, history and politics. At various points I have been disillusioned with all of these areas, taking myself out of the mainstream of my chosen career of journalism. It has only been since learning from other members of the Never Again network that I have been able to find reasons for my own sense of exclusion from the fields I was so enthusiastic about. Politicians and journalists currently operate in very rigid, top down structures in which a small elite set the agenda, make the decisions and in some cases preside over systems in which no individual person has responsibility for their actions.

On the other hand, professional historians seem to have abdicated their responsibility to involve themselves in creating societies of people equipped to question and understand the human past. I only felt this after seeing the exception: finding myself in an adult evening class which challenged me far more than all my state history learning through degree level. The most powerful historians seemed to me obsessed with point-scoring rather and must be involved in creating curricula that demonstrably fails to give the British people any meaningful understanding of their past. History seems to be taught to form nationalism above understanding of our shared past.

Large scale 'evil' such as crimes against humanity cannot happen in isolation, by just one evil person. They have to involve compliance and cooperation by people working systematically. The Rwandan genocide is an example of how government, history and the media can form a lethal combination:

• generations of divisive teaching and the use of history as a tool for creating 'the other' and denying the minority group its humanity (this removes the natural human revulsion to murder); in the case of Rwanda, the Tutsi were collectively referred to as 'cockroaches.'
• a government and system of leadership that can incite killing on a mass scale utilising as many murderers as murdered. No system for reporting the crime, and nobody to listen.
• an internal media which broadcast incitement to genocide and an external media which simplified the conflict and was ignored by those who might be able to stop it

Rwanda may provide the extreme example, but in my own experience politics, journalism and the media are flawed and I believe their elistist structures are to blame.

• None allow for meaningful debate and dialogue.
• Changing the agenda is rarely even on the agenda.
• A voiceless mass is excluded from participating in all three.
• All prop up each other's world view, creating a sense of identity that only alienates and confuses any positive sense of Britishness or internationalism that could exist.

In journalism and politics, many of the most important decisions are made by a tiny group, with little or no reference to citizens and little accountability. In a previous age, perhaps it could have been justified that a small group make decisions on behalf of the many. But we are increasingly seeing tools and technology that hold the answer to this lack of citizen participation.

I would like to look at a microcosm level in Never Again how we can develop a citizenry that can have its voices heard, how to include all people with varying access to participatory tools through partnerships with other people the tools that exist already and, above all, how humanity can override structure.

In relation, I will probably leave behind history for the time being, and concentrate on journalism and politics, mainly in the UK, as integral functions of society and power.

What are the power structures which influence outcomes in that sphere?

For journalism, the main power is held by those who make decisions on the news agenda. This is influenced by a whole number of factors, including market forces, economic fulfillment of the parent corporation's alternate subsidiaries, and the need for readers, (to be continued...)

What outcomes are made possible and impossible because of those forces?

What are the barriers created by those power structures to peace?

What are the power relationships which create opportunities and barriers to visions for positive political change?

What are the national, regional and international barriers to putting humanity at the core of conflict prevention, of development and of politics itself?

Thinking towards change

Our emerging new global society is more multi-directional than ever before. The most effective use of this is not to think that citizens can do everything, but to identify the core skills and uses of experts and the core skills and experts of citizens. So, for example, good journalists are trained and talented in reporting news that is in the public interest. They probe the issues which citizens have a right to know and politicians generally want to hide. However, once they have done so, and remembering that a reporter is a citizen as well as a journalist, it is time for the journalist to step back and let the citizen hold the politicians to account. When the line betweenthe media and citizenship gets blurred, a confused media emerges which thinks it should be telling people what to think instead of letting them make their minds up.

We see through the success of projects like Wikipedia or in Britain, Timebank, or even simply on the blogosphere, the fact that people are willing and able to give their time freely for a variety of reasons. People enjoy feeling part of a community and when given the chance, want to contribute to that community. On many levels, blogging is simply the modern equivalent of the chat over the garden fence—albeit on a much larger scale—but even at its most trivial-seeming, these conversations hold the key to participation as citizens.

It is interesting to see how some public authorities join in this movement, not as antagonists of public opinion, not as advertisers of themselves, but bridging with their constituency. This is the case, in Chile, of senator Fernando Flores.

Blogs by those in power show a willingness to get into a conversation with citizens, that the barriers are breaking down. The main body of bloggers is on the citizen side, but they are clamouring to be heard and they may well influence each other more than those in power can. There has been a growing divide for years between politicians and citizens, certainly in Britain, and unless politicians start to listen, they will find themselves frozen out by an electorate which is more organised and more in touch than they can possibly imagine with their focus groups and reliance on the mainstream press.