The First Amendment; Cairo Conference

The eastern Public Radio Network in cooperation with the Institute for democratic communication at Boston University now presents the First Amendment and a front page wrote a weekly examination of civil liberties in the media. In the 1970s the host of the program is the institute's director. Dr. Bernard Rosewell. Ordinarily for the first amendment for free people. The moderator a host for the series Dr. Brenda Grubin we're reversing things today. Isabelle cabman's speaking Ordinarily I'm in the background and production by guest for this program is its usual host Dr. Rubin who has just returned from a conference in Cairo and Egypt an international news media and the developing world that took place early this April of 1978. And it seems like a good subject to

talk about for this program. Can you give us some background on the conference itself. Is this a one of a series of conferences. And if so where does this fit in the picture. Well first let me say that I'm delighted that you are moderating and to answer your question specifically there was a previous conference held by the sponsor of the sponsor for this conference. One of the three sponsors in Cairo was the Fletcher School lawn diplomacy Tufts University a second sponsor was the Middle East News Agency and the third sponsor was the University of Cairo school of mass communications at quite a combination and there was there was a conference last year in New York which said the preliminary stages for this particular conference on on third world first world relationships are news. This all goes back to Nairobi in 1976 a conference in which UNESCO is very much involved in at that particular conference. The Soviets pushed a

resolution which sent a shudder down the spine of every newsman in the western world because part of the language of a resolution which did not pass but still lingers in the background. So has this language and I quote states are responsible for the activities in the international sphere of all news media under their jurisdiction. End of quote. Well that this means pretty much that the Second World concept of news through national news agencies keep out as many foreign correspondents as you can bottle up as much as you can. Should be the rule for all the developing world at a series of other conferences. This has been debated in Colombo Sri Lanka and New Delhi. And in Costa Rica. But the situation now seems to be that the lingering fear in the western world of this resolution has caused a re-examination of First-World relationship. The developed countries relationship to the

third world the developing or the less developed countries. And so this particular conference is really to open a dialogue between us. I think we were the major domo of this conference with the Egyptians and that itself all goes well for the future. That lady if you were willing to be cohosts. So there were 33 countries represented here from Latin America the Caribbean Asia and Africa and also a strong contingent of Americans scholars like that will resume with the elder solo pool. Alex Edelstein Rosemary Rodgers and heads of newspaper chains including the publisher of The Boston Globe David Taylor are the assistant to the managing editor of The Herald. Dwight Sargent many of those names are familiar to those right listeners in these areas. Joe Kingsbury Smith of the Hearst newspaper chain. Longtime correspondent the head of AP U P ironist news service time bureau

chiefs. All of these press groups male specific sit you if you want of this meeting. The last thing it was for was something called a non-aligned news pool of third world countries which was established with its operating headquarters in Yugoslavia and the idea is that the Third World has a story to tell by itself when this dialogue opened. It was by the way Bill based on a lot of research papers The New York meeting the third world so why don't we have research papers. So the first world delusions them with research papers. But the papers pretty much were on data. Just what is the cost of international transmission of news. Who does it how much news is carried by each wire service and that sort of thing. Now the the issues at this conference were pretty well stated by many of the Third World people. One of the I guess the basic

things that they said was that the development story is not well told. I don't know if you know any more than I do what the development story is. It depends on your point of view. Well I think actually the fact that I know little about as I do tends to answer that segment is not well told Dodd know more about it. You know they want in third world countries they want sympathetic analyses and news straight news broad broadcast through print or any other medium of what they're trying to do. The progress they're making in agriculture health welfare in politics and in political parties in large projects like steel mill ambitions or oil development projects or whatnot. And they criticize us for in the first place tending not to tell the story at all. Now again one issue is how much how much of receptivity is there amongst Third World

newspaper readers will say or television people for news you know before we go any further into the into that question that there's there's a question that lurks in the back of my mind. We hear so much about third world. And we all have a general sort of vague idea of what is meant by third world. What are the first and second. Well and how do they fit into this this attitude of the third world about media coverage. Let's just start with the presumption that all of these definitions are idiotic and so that certain Third World countries in certain ways are first world. For example if they show the objectivity told the press that is the same that generally held in the United States we would say in that regard they first were first world up pretty much the developed states the developed countries in the band Europe the United States including Japan highly technological States.

The second world is loosely defined as the communist system even including the the protagonist or the antagonised the Chinese the Russians and the Yugoslavs and so on and so forth. I imagine they would first and second in reverse order they would use people who may share technological prowess or maybe not but whose attitudes toward civil liberties and freedom of the press for example are not the same as ours. And third world are those countries. I think it's safe to say that this is sometimes called a north south dialogue. The technical technological states are usually in the in the above the equator. Are those countries in the developing areas of Africa Latin America Asia which have just begun the whole process of industrialization and are trying to catch up with the rest of the world. Low standard of living by comparison of the technological states low

standard of services for example one one statistic that came out that it costs about two hundred and thirty nine times the cost of a telephone call in certain parts of central Africa than it does in the United States. That's one of the reason that people don't make telephone calls especially with the average income might be 100 and some dollars a year or two hundred and some dollars a year. That's pretty much the the world's. The question came up I think for a reason that may sound trivial but I think there's something behind it that is for example I have a sister and her family living in Oregon. And one of the things that they have discovered in hunting for a house to live in is the fact that most of the houses they inspected and considered have very tiny cramped kitchens simply because everybody has domestic help and the domestic help doesn't need comforts apparently in the in the social attitudes. But here is a country

a small country perhaps not as well developed as some of the giant powers that we're talking about in the so-called first world of which may not be well well-developed but in which practically everybody has domestic servants in the home. How do they rank. Well they would rank pretty high. This would be a little different than for example my observations in the new Indonesia where people have servants in the home have really tens twenties dozens of surgeons back there but all of those people are living pretty much on the dole. So the job is subsistence you pay the food and so on and so forth. Now the third world countries criticize us because they say that we don't tell their story sympathetically they wonder how much we care about the deeper story. And they tend to feel that we concentrate on our news men concentrate on the sensational or the stories of revolutions or great storms people being swept away and so on and some of them say that that some of our facts are incorrect.

For example whatever the facts are the delegate one of the delegates from Bangladesh a leading newspaper man said that in the western world the press consistently referred to Bangladesh as the world's food basket case that everybody has to be sustained from outside sources. And in his view the truth of the matter is reported in early April this of 1978 in Cairo was that there's a glut of rice and so on and the government has to cut back so that the farmers can keep their price at a level that they can make some some money with. There's a direct contradiction is a direct contradiction. And they also suggest that that our Western press services represent cultural imperialism. On the other side of the of the West we're very much worried that the there might be a dramatic cutback in Nairobi sentiments or the Soviet resolution proposed resolution ever to pass.

There might be a dramatic cut back on the right of news to cover stories around the world. Indeed one of the I wrote the Nigerians representing the new National News Agency which is going to be in full fruition in the fall so that when we get our new service going fully we probably will make it very very difficult for foreign correspondents to get visas because people like floorless the the European correspond to the New York Times immediately sprang back and say and said well that that is silly. On the one hand you say the developing story is not being told well enough. On the other hand you say that we ought to keep correspondence from brought out the answer to that one was by some of the developing people or people from the developing states. And these are all leading news people in one way or another government official. They said well that that may be so but you need a cultural affiliation you have to

be born in that country to understand it to understand this process cause the answer to that is that if you understand it too well you don't ask General So-and-So a question you don't ask but the Likud Party you know about not asking about the slums or the health conditions. Whereas people from the outside will ask those questions. But I think that there there is a threat possibly to international business and there is a threat to international travel and a threat to the flow of information to the developed world. Now certainly I would think that our own station here WGBH is atypical. For example we on the television side run lots of things about the developing world not out of curiosity but as a basic guide to understanding our fellow human beings on the commercial side they run far fewer. There are few newspapers that provide very much about the developing world. I think the New York Times now runs

about an average of 13 percent news of news that is not from or about the United States but foreign news on the developing world. That's a very high figure for an American newspaper. I'm going to say very few run that higher percentage I would think. One of the reasons I like to read the New York Times among other sources every day is because these stories are so absolutely fascinating. Didn't Herbert cam believe her but I'm sure he can win a Pulitzer Prize this year. Yes reporting on the boat people. Right. And the story recently of a man born in India in when he was born he was in debt literally to the money lender and when he dies he'll be in debt to the money lender. Now why these background stories now. What do we do about these charges that we're unsympathetic if we talk about the poverty or the the the lack of development or about the wrong emphasis.

According to the reporter it really seems to me that the first step is not so much a matter of what we do cover it as is what we don't want what we don't cover. So a man by the name of Roger Tarion Roger Tarion used to be the executive editor of UPI United Press International and he is currently professor of journalism at Fresno. I guess he's one of the most respected people in the business. He came up with a suggestion. He said Why don't we form a new news pool in addition to the world press surfaces of the Western world. In addition to the non-aligned news pool operating through Yugoslavia in addition to the what the communist world provides Middle East news services all the national news services and let's say that this news pool will concentrate exclusively upon soft news. No there's no political news no news that is hard news no event. It was and let's have a delegation of reporters experienced reporters come from the southern world or the south

the developing country and from the north and he picked about eight countries in each section. Representative V.S. I start with these Let there be at least one reporter from each of those countries subsidized for the first year to work at least one year in a country other than his own in the developing world subsidized by his newspaper his government radio television chain or whatnot and have them feed in addition to other stories. These stories they dig out and he says the addition of 16 to 20 reporters exclusively devoted to developmental news could transform our whole Western picture of what's going on. I suspect he's already quite right there. We mulled about it. We mulled about it. One of the interesting things about being in Cairo if I can digress for a moment was was the ability to to peek around a little bit in the city to look at the

inhabitants and to. Of course we did all the direct good things when we had a moment. We like all of the tours we climbed into the Great Pyramid up the shaft into Tatane commons room where he was Escondida after death right. Very perilous climb that is to and on the last day we we saw President Siddharth he asked us to come by and and meet with him. It was very interesting to me that we made the classic mistake that everybody was complaining about. Now the Egyptian Gazette in the days that we were there each day had headline stores a paper in English about Saddam being in the desert just specifically being in the new Valley where he has his high hopes to try to change agriculture to try to feed the Egyptian people. And there are 42 to 44 million of them and a high birth rate. So a lot depends upon getting some foodstuffs. The headlines read something like Siddharth in new Valley says agriculture

our biggest asset. Next day Sadat described new plan for agricultural planning in New Delhi. When we met with him at his palace our delegation we asked him the usual questions all about the Middle East. Are you going to deal with Mr Begin. Will you have commercial relations. What are your hopes for peace. Attitude toward the hard line Arab states. There wasn't a question that wasn't the usual stuff that you see every day about the Middle East when we're finding out of the room. I was no more purpose Acacius than anybody else. Falling out of the room I said By God. Aren't we a bunch of dummies. We could have asked him a question that he obviously wants to get to the world audience or one of us should have gone up there and said Mr. Sadat President Sadat. What are you trying to do in the new Valley. For 44 43 or 44 million people what does the Agard What are you doing to feed

your people doing to feed your people. We didn't ask that question and the only way that I can excuse it. I think that like other people as sophisticated as we were we were in Cairo mostly the working sessions for all the time that we were there day to night. A matter of fact I never saw so many disciplined people outside of a formal boarding school in my life. We really worked there about 95 us and we we struggle with one another and delighted in it. But I think in a certain way we were more curious to hear Siddharth and the way I put it. We use that as an excuse to say that we succumb to what I would call rapture of the Nile. But as we look to the future I think that that these three groups in this particular case the Middle East News Agency the Flight School of Law and Diplomacy and the University of Cairo should be commended Now there was a tremendous amount of

American interest Ford Foundation had a representative at the meeting the senior American representative to the American delegation to UNESCO's was at the meeting. Barrie you go to flew from Nigeria where he left the presidential party after Carter visited Nigeria flew to Cairo. He is I gather the president's liaison to the State Department community. The George Crolla was there who is one of the senior advisors to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. And and so I think the basic question is What are we going to do about these complaints. How far can we meet the complaints. I was just going to ask you in the course of the dialogue at the conference where the Third World people in any way satisfied that said that some of their complaints would be met.

As a matter of fact I was amazed at the cordiality. Now whether it was the predominance of these research papers for the first day and a half I don't know they may have been stunned in third third world people who might have thought this was some kind of a ploy. But actually it wasn't the end of the second day as just as a matter of chance. I was asked to chair a workshop which was attended by most of the delegates for the professionals the news professionals had which we could get out of our system. The the the feelings that we had pent up in each other. I think there was great cordiality because of the caliber of the people there for example George Fergus was there. George Borges former managing editor of The Hindustan Times who was arrested by Indira Gandhi and thrown into the hoosegow. Definitely one of our great heroes. And people like Mr. King Guana of Kenya Radio Service

and others even even one or two people for example the representative Mr. Dorion from UNESCO's who was criticized for some because of an alleged tilting of UNESCO's into more political realms than it should be in or others like that. We there were no resolutions. I think that helps a conference. If you start there are no formal resolutions so we could talk and I think that maybe the Soviets have done us all a world of good by threatening our concept of the free press by making us go out there and earn our daily bread to get the support by making that free really functional the way it should be. That's right. And by making us realize that in every era of reporting you should never take it for granted. And I personally feel that that they do have a case because we

look at them from the point of view of a developed country with tremendous political stability. I know since 1963 a lot of people felt differently. But even with all of the tragedy and trauma we have tremendous political stability and we're talking to people who might have had six governments in 11 years and the U.S.. So when they get a bad story for example the Nigerian whether he is right or wrong alleged one of the Nigerians alleged that the Nigerian Civil War was triggered off by a bad story that emanated from a Western correspondent suggesting it be our friends people living in the offering and citizens of other parts of Nigeria were in brawls with one another and that there was racial strife then that came back into the country he alleged and pretty soon people began to believe it. And they were at each other's throats. If you tell them they're fighting they started fighting. Now it seems it seems something that I would like to look into the fact

of but if he believes it or if it is true or both are the case yes we ought to know we ought to know now. As a teacher of communications in international development I really think we've had a very poor effort that we look back on. We have outstanding reporting by a small group of reporters. There is less there is less and the cadre of foreign correspondents than there used to be for television for radio everybody saying how expensive it is and I think it probably cost a minimum of 100000 dollars to maintain a correspondent anywhere in the world. Well the economics of living there but the necessity for having the people there in order to have the understanding that we must have somehow the financial problems simply have to be solved. And I think that we ought to look upon it as reverse provincialism. We like to think of ourselves as cosmopolitan but the very fact that you do think of yourself as

a cosmopolitan person means that you are definitely a provincial because no sane person would would ascribe goodness to themselves or whiteness of intellect to themselves. It has to be somebody else from the outside. And I think we are very provincial. We are living in our own world. When I have traveled to different parts of the world like like Malaysia or Indonesia or Japan or Egypt or parts of Europe I find that your eyes are open you say to yourself that is not a statistic passing by. Thats one of those people whose average income is two hundred and thirty one dollars a year. There goes a person whose basic source of protein is peanuts. And many of the fellow in the Nile delta in the Nile the whole Nile strip there are getting their protein from peanuts. And when you even do a thing like look out of the window as you come down and you see this massive

desert fringing right on the edges of Cairo Cairo literally goes to a block and a half it seems from the from the pyramids. That's how far I could see a car. I can see the piers my hotel room when I was there. It's literally Giza the edge of Giza. And then you travel on another two miles half miles something like that and you're at the pyramids. One wonders whether they shouldn't put the city in the desert and use that wonderful fertile land to grow things. There's a real point there I think in that view. In a conference of this sort find yourself with the opportunity of face to face confrontation on an individual basis with with a representative of say a third world country although I still boggle at these definitions. First Second there are several if you stopped you suddenly realize how really provincial we are. If you think you realize that within our own

country there are at least 15 major areas which regard themselves as the basic core. They the America the United States of America. People in the Midwest think there's people in the southwest. These people in the South think these people in Boston know this is an absolute poverty fact. Right. Right. Then you begin to realize that there are other people have other points of view and it seems to me that the value in this kind of a conference is the personal contact and the opportunity to realize these other points of view and perhaps to begin searching your own self with some of the answers to some of their complaints and some of ours. One of the things I brought back with me was an increased consciousness that we ought to look into our own third world or perhaps will say American mass media's third world that people who are ignored in the daily press here Chicanos Hispanics Chinese Cubanos American

Indians you name them. Absolutely. So many of them and such an enormous amount of work to do at home without forgetting the enormous amount of work that remains to be done in establishing the kind of contract that must be established if we're going to communicate the needs of all the world not just the first world second world third world. We need to begin to break down those barriers so there isn't the first second and third. Bill I wish you had been with Cairo. You're an asset. I'm sure. I'm afraid our time is just about run out. I'd like to. I hope we can perhaps spend time for another program or two following some of the lines that have been suggested in this brief conversation. They guest for First Amendment of the free people on this program has been the one who is ordinarily a toast Dr. Bernard Reuben. I build cavernous sitting in to ask some of the questions that have arisen in my mind. Hearing just details about this conference in Cairo the international news media and developing world conference.

Eastern Public Radio Network in cooperation with the Institute for democratic communication at Boston University has presented the first amendment and the free people a weekly examination of civil liberties in the media. In the 1970s the program is produced in the studios of WGBH Boston. This is the eastern public radio network