‘Bias’ and ‘Objectivity’ in media practice

‘Bias’ and ‘Objectivity’ in media practice Dr Wallace Chuma

Introduction • The idea of media power and influence on social and political practice informs debate around media bias and objectivity • Applied to media, bias refers to one-sided interpretation of an event/issue • Effect is to present one side in favourable/unfavourable light. Such mediation is deemed to affect democractic practice

Cont… • Applied to news, bias is problematic because it deviates from the notion of objectivity, upon which media can lay claim to truth and public trust • Media normally make distinctions between opinion and fact • Assumption is that facts are both objective and balanced.

Cont… • Objectivity entails allowing news values to determine the coverage of an issue. Also entails giving sufficient (though not necessarily equal) treatment to different, sometimes conflucting elements of a story. • Balance entails giving equal coveraghe to all parties to an event. • Objectivity and balance should be viewed as ideals

Types of Bias • McQuail/Street typologies of Bias include: • Partisan Bias • Propaganda Bias • Unwitting Bias • Ideological Bias

Bias Cont… • The bias debate is hotly contested everywhere. • Issues of methodology have to be considered • Consider the Racism and the Media debate in SA in 2000? • Or the arguments by Mbeki, Zuma and Nzimande about media bias against the ANC? [see ANC Today]

Bias watchlist • Language use by journalists is at the core of bias or charges of bias • Consider these examples: • A headline “Illegal immigrants invade South Africa”; or recent BBC documenary “No more Mandelas’ • Choice of adjectives: Zuma’s ‘rowdy supporters’, Zimbabwe’s ‘farm invaders’, etc.

Cont… Bias also consists in what is not said or who is not quoted/cited in text. See Example of story: President blasts Makoni.

PRESIDENT Mugabe has described Dr Simba Makoni, who broke away from Zanu-PF to challenge him in the March 29 presidential election, as a "political prostitute". In an interview …on the occasion of his 84th birthday, Cde Mugabe said Dr Makoni’s method of seeking the highest office in the land was "absolutely disgraceful" because he neither has a party nor the support of the people Herald, 22/2/08

"What has happened now is absolutely disgraceful. I didn’t think kuti Makoni after all the experience could behave like the way he did and in a naïve way too Cde Mugabe said the Zanu-PF election campaign would focus on resisting the British regime change agenda as long as they continued on that path. Cont…

Turning to the economy, the President said inflation was the biggest problem causing untold suffering to Zimbabweans "It means purely we have got to enhance production, make the goods available as cheap as possible. But we need to work with people who also understand that." Cont…

Deciphering Bias • Who is quoted, who’s not? • What’s the content of the quote? • What’s the content of the journalist’s ‘authorial’ voice? • Are certain (ideological) positions, realities taken for granted, as the norm? • Is it possible to be bias-free, to be objective, balanced, neutral?

‘Bias’ and ‘Objectivity’ in media practice