huridocs-tech Minorities in the Era of Modern Electronic Media

Edited/Distributed by HURINet - The Human Rights Information Network
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## author     : bieberf@ceu.hu
## date       : 21.11.99
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CENTER FOR DOCUMENTATION AND INFORMATION ON MINORITIES IN EUROPE -
SOUTHEAST EUROPE (CEDIME-SE)
P.O.Box 51393, GR-14510 Kifisia, Greece
Tel. 30-1-620.01.20, Fax 30-1-807.57.67
e-mail: office@greekhelsinki.gr web page: http://www.greekhelsinki.gr

MINORITIES IN THE ERA OF MODERN ELECTRONIC MEDIA AND THE
INTERNET

(Presented by Nafsika Papanikolatos, Coordinator of
CEDIME-SE and Spokesperson of Minority Rights Group -
Greece, at the Seminar on "The Role of Minorities in
Electronic Media and Transfrontier Broadcasting," Szeged,
Hungary, 29-30/10/1999, in the framework of the Joint
Program between the European Commission and the Council of
Europe on "National Minorities in Europe")

In his seminal study Imagined Communities: Reflections on
the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 1992)
Benedict Anderson shows how the advent of print helped
"create the possibility of a new form of imagined community,
which in its basic morphology set the stage for the modern
nation" (p. 46). Already "the Reformation (à) owed much of
its success to print-capitalism. Before the age of print,
Rome easily won every war against heresy in Western Europe
because it always had better lines of communication than its
challengers" (p. 39). Thanks to Gutenberg's invention,
however, "Luther became the first best-selling author so
known. Or to put it another way, the first writer who could
'sell' his new books on the basis of his name" (p. 39). The
imagined community of Christendom was forever shaken. Its
decline was subsequently helped by "the elevation of
[various] vernaculars to the languages-of-power" (p.42)
replacing Latin.

"These print-languages laid the bases for national
consciousness in three distinct ways. (à) Third,
print-capitalism created languages-of-power of a kind
different from the old administrative vernaculars. Certain
dialects inevitably were 'closer' to each print-language and
dominated their final forms. Their disadvantaged cousins,
still assimilable to the emerging print-language, lost
caste, above all because they were unsuccessful (or only
relatively successful) in insisting on their own print-form.
(à) Hence the struggles in late-twentieth-century Europe by
certain 'sub-'nationalities to change their subordinate
status by breaking firmly into print - and radio" (p. 45).

Indeed, the development of electronic media has made it
possible for 'subordinated' groups to reach wider audiences.
Moreover, as the technological development made printing and
broadcasting cheaper, minority media started emerging in
large numbers. For example, minority or migrant radio
stations thrive in numbers in many Western countries.
Nevertheless, they are usually local which limits their
access to their potential audiences. As for the print media,
distribution is still expensive, which means that minority
or migrant newspapers cannot again reach easily their target
groups. Finally, and most importantly, all scholarly studies
by communication analysts have shown that access of
disadvantaged groups to the mainstream media, where they
have a chance to present their arguments to mass audiences,
is limited if non-existent.

Enter the Internet revolution, which can be for all modern
subordinate cultures almost what the print revolution was at
the time for the vernaculars in their struggle with the
dominant Latin culture: a means to achieve parity with
(rather than replace as in the case of the print revolution)
majority cultures in the Third Millenary. The key reason is
that access to Internet is almost free or in any case very
cheap. Computers with the necessary software can be
purchased for less than $1,000. Telephone costs for the
necessary e-mails are usually lower than those of a
four-member household with teenage or young children. If one
accepts some advertising, or better if s/he finds some
provider or server with a sense of mission, listserves and
web pages can come for free.

Such facilities mean that a piece of news can be distributed
literally around the world through an electronic message
(e-mail) instantly and almost for free. If it is well
documented and newsworthy, it can quickly lead to a spiral
of reactions, perhaps even an electronic campaign, that, in
some instances, may even change the course of events shortly
after the message is sent. Should the messenger prove
his/her credibility, future such messages will be
automatically considered credible without much additional
research, and lead to similar reactions and campaigns.

On the other hand, when such information is stored in web
sites, easy and -again- free access to them makes the work
of all those who want to react in a comprehensive and
credible way much simpler, as it secures instant access to
crucial background information. Powerful search engines tend
to make access to minority sites very easy. Nowadays, even
photographs (worth a thousand words as it is well known) may
be easily available in such sites (though they need much
more space than texts).

So, for example, imagine a journalist dedicated to the cause
of minority rights and justice who wants to write a powerful
front-page story on a massacre of Serbs or Roma today, or of
Albanians yesterday, in Kosovo. S/he needs to show it is not
an isolated case but is linked to previous atrocities in
this region, whether of the last year or the last century.
There is a lot of relevant information available in the
Internet, and, ten years from now, it is expected that s/he
would be in fact "embarrassed by the vast choice of
available material." It needs be mentioned here that the
Internet has been used extensively during the Kosovo crisis
and many NGOs from the embattled Yugoslavia managed to make
their voice heard only through that medium, even when
eventually some of their statements were published by
traditional print media.

The problem, though, for this person will be to sort out
what is and what is not credible. Especially when the topic
is not as hot as the Kosovo conflict, but rather as obscure
as, say, to use current examples from Greece, the
forthcoming trials of a Buddhist meditation center in
Halkidiki (1 Novemebr 1999) and of a Pentecostal priest from
Salonica (5 November 1999) -both charged with illegally
operating houses of worship- or of an Aromanian (Vlach)
activist accused of having spread false information by
distributing a publication of the European Bureau of Less
Used Languages that mentioned the (officially unrecognized)
minority languages in Greece (9 November 1999). It is a sure
bet that all of you will find these -unbelievable for a
democratic country- trials newsworthy but could not really
'sell' them to publishers or directors if you fail to
explain what kind of sensitivity and past history makes such
human rights violations possible.

A quick glance at the joint web site of Greek Helsinki
Monitor and Minority Rights Group - Greece could provide the
answer. A report on Greece's Vlachs or on religious freedom
in that country would give you the missing information. Let
us now turn to a brief presentation of the CEDIME project,
along with its Balkan Human Rights Web Pages and Balkan
Human Rights Listserve. The Center of Documentation and
Information on Minorities in Europe (CEDIME) aims to provide
comparable, comprehensive and continuously updateable
information in the Internet on, ideally, all ethnonational,
ethnolinguistic, and religious minorities in Europe. To
secure high quality, these presentations will be reviewed by
many area experts before final publication. On the one hand,
there will be presentations of accumulated credible
scholarly knowledge about each minority, along with
extensive bibliography and contact addresses of minority
institutions, including media and web sites. Plus, in a
listserve will be distributed daily postings on minority
related credible information, including of course human
rights violations, that will serve as updates of the
presentations and will be eventually incorporated in them.

At this stage, the project is seeking the necessary funding
for the creation of a European seat (possibly in Geneva) and
some half-dozen regional teams. Among the latter, the
Southeast European one is already functioning on an
experimental basis with the Web Site and Listserve mentioned
above. In the coming weeks, the first comprehensive
presentations of religious and ethnonational minorities in
Bulgaria will be made available at the web address:
http://www.greekhelsinki.gr/english/reports/CEDIME-Reports-Minorities-in-Bul
garia.html
In the meantime, a presentation of the project and some
general articles about minorities and minority rights in
Europe are available at the web address:
http://www.greekhelsinki.gr/english/organizations/cedime.html
while information about minorities and minority rights in Greece, in
different formats, is available at:
http://www.greekhelsinki.gr/Minorities_of_Greece.html .
Finally, again in the coming weeks, state reports to the
Council of Europe pursuant to the Framework Convention for
the Protection of National Minorities, along with
corresponding alternative, 'shadow' reports prepared by
NGOs, will be available at:
http://www.greekhelsinki.gr/english/reports/CEDIME-FCNM.html.

In this effort, as well as in all other efforts of
minorities and minority rights-oriented NGOs to make optimal
use of the revolutionizing Internet so as to help achieve in
the end equal access between minorities and majorities, the
crucial term is 'credibility.' Majorities have fully

benefited for over a century of their domination of the
print media, so that today, although they are still
producing ample and often gross propaganda, they have also
achieved a high level of scholarly work that sets the
standard of credibility, both in scholarship and journalism.
Minorities that are now given a means that may help them
bridge the gap have a serous handicap. They cannot afford to
first go through the broadcasting of what looks today as
primitive, vulgar propaganda, and then reach a similar level
of scholarship and credibility with the majorities. If they
do so, they will miss the opportunity. Instead they must
very quickly adapt to the demanding norms of this end of the
second millenium.

In the nineteenth century, when modern nations were
emerging, nationalism was everywhere very aggressive,
intolerant and oppressive. That meant that even academic
scholarship was busy in constructing myths and inventing
traditions, both perceived then as necessary for the
survival of the new nations. One century, dozens of wars,
and millions of victims later, this primitive form of
nationalism is considered unacceptable. This may be seen as
somewhat unfair for the contemporary, reactive and defensive
minority nationalisms. On the other hand, the mellowing of
most majority nationalisms in contemporary Europe makes it
possible for minorities to voice their concerns and advocate
passionately their rights without resorting to archaic,
inward-looking, self-congratulatory, but totally inefficient
if not outright counter-productive means. The large number
of international human rights documents and mechanisms
available, along with their interplay with international
politics, provides a formidable arsenal to minorities and
human rights defenders.

Unfortunately, when one surfs the Internet, s/he will find
countless primitive nationalistic pages in alleged defense
of minority rights. Their web masters believe that they are
thus providing historical service to their minorities.
Nevertheless, by being instead masters of deceit, they make
their pages useless to those who want to advocate minority
rights. Often, they motivate the creation of pages of
majority counter-propaganda and listserves or chats where
the hate speech exchanged sometimes rivals the one produced
by the racist, xenophobic if not neo-nazi pages. In reality,
their only achievement may be a virtual and verbal fighting
over again of the turn of the century bloody battles for the
emancipation of modern states.

One may finally wonder whether the Internet is becoming a
new medium or more a modern tool to disseminate widely
information to be used by the print and electronic media
(radio and television). It seems that the trend is for the
web to incorporate other media. Already many newspapers have
full electronic editions, which -for the more sophisticated
ones- is more developed than the traditional print editions.
While radio and television stations can now broadcast though
the Internet as well. This access to the web helps these
media reach audiences they had no chance to be exposed to
before. But, in the future, when better software will
dramatically improve the ability to listen to and/or watch
electronic media, 'traditional' media will become just part
of the immense menu of the Internet.

So, here are some recommendations to minorities, minority
rights groups and minority media how to make best use of the
new powerful medium of the Internet to help promote the
rights of these minorities and eventually contribute to the
development of multicultural societies in the European
states.

1. When reporting a human rights problem, stick to the
facts. Do it in such a way that independent cross-checking
could confirm the veracity of the story. Include
'journalistically' detailed information (date, names of
actors, place, exact quotation of crucial excerpts from a
statement, an indictment or a verdict). Add, when available,
independent confirmation (by a local reporter, some state
agent, etc.). If not an isolated incident, briefly summarize
related background. Avoid emotional, ideological or
otherwise loaded language. If the local incident appears to
be in contrast with the prevailing trend, do mention it (it
will make the authorities less defensive in their answer).
If you want to make it an action alert, provide names,
titles and addresses and/or faxes and/or e-mails of those to
whom complaints need be sent. Finally, if useful background
is available in the Internet provide the full (not just the
main page) address.

2. Have a list of e-mail addresses ready to which you will
distribute the statement. Include all related listserves
that could redistribute and web sites that could post. Put a
short but self-explanatory title in the subject line. Try to
discover servers that may offer you possibilities of free
access for your own listserve or make space available for
your own web pages. If you have the latter, make such
statements easily accessible with a 'what's new' page for
recent statements and a chronological and/or thematic
subdivision and/or index.

3. If you have your own web pages, try to post there only
material that is credible. In rare cases when something is
important to make available though not so credible or even
polemic, post it with an introductory note distancing
yourself from the content. Background historical and
cultural material about your and other minorities is very
useful if it can meet an independent scholar's test of
objectivity. When referring to controversial historical
events, always include the other versions even if not
favorable to the culturally 'authorized' one.

4. In your texts, if you want to be considered a bonafide
minority rights advocate, you must always 'side' with the
international norms with universal value, rather than with
the usually parochial policy of your 'kin state.' Sometimes
this even means challenging the prevailing national myths in
the latter. For example, Turkish minorities in Bulgaria,
Greece and Macedonia must understand that their struggle is
closer to that of the Kurds in Turkey, as well as of the
Bulgarians in Macedonia, the Greeks in Albania and Turkey,
and the Macedonians in Albania, Bulgaria and Greece, rather
than the oppressive policy of Turkey towards its own
minorities.

5. Minority media are urged to make their information
available in web sites. Modern software allows swift
Internet adaptation of texts and layouts prepared for
broadcasting of printing. Many scholarly studies of
minorities have used past issues of minority newspapers as
an invaluable source of information, even when they had
obvious one-sidedness. Sometimes, minority media were the
only ones reporting minority-related events that majority
media ignored deliberately or out of lack of sources. Such
references allowed researchers to help trace related
developments that have in some cases provided very important
insights to minority issues.

6. Since the Internet is not yet totally free, especially
for large web sites as the regional and the media ones,
sponsors, including the Council of Europe and the European
Union, as well as their 'common offspring' the Stability
Pact, are urged to provide funding for such projects. They
should include the necessary training for inexperienced
minority activists or journalists to help them use software
that has become indeed very friendly to all users and no
longer requires computer experts. The Balkan Human Rights
Web Pages have indeed been developed by three consecutive
web site managers who had no knowledge of how such work was
done before they started working on them, following a
rudimentary few-day training backed at the beginning by an
occasional outside advisor.




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