CMPF Summer School for Journalists: Investigative journalism in France

Best Practices nb#2

Investigative journalism

Case in France

Melissa Chemam

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Summer School for Journalists

CMFP, Florence, June 2012

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Investigative journalism is not as developed in France as in the US or the UK. But legally, laws exist to protect journalists and their sources. It’s more in practice that it becomes sometimes dangerous for the investigative reporters to try and protect their rights, contacts and sources.

The Press Freedom Law of 29 July 1881 passed under the French Third Republic intended to liberalise the press and promote free public discussion. The new law swept away a swathe of earlier statutes, stating at the outset the principle that "Printing and publication are free".

But in 1893, following French anarchist Augustin Vaillant’s assassination attempt, the first anti-terrorist laws were voted, which were quickly denounced as ‘lois scelerates’, threatening the media freedom. These laws severely restricted freedom of expression, permitting widespread censorship of the press. Since then, the country has been battling to protect the rights of journalists to investigate political stories. Censorship was current during World War I, for instance, and it led to the 1915 creation of the Canard enchainé weekly, which used and still uses today satires, cartoons and games of words to pass through censorship.

Though the press is largely unrestricted by law in France, indirect pressures are still denounced by some journalists. They comes from state members in order for instance to prevent publication of materials against the interests of the government or influential industries. Involvement of the government and major industrial groups with press organisations also occurs regularly. The business groups Dassault and Bouygues are for instance well know to be close to the main right-wing party and own many newspapers and TV stations favouring their candidates during elections or the government’s policy when the right is in power. 

To avoid such bad practices, newspapers have developed editorial committees and other tools to protect themselves from owners’ involvement in their investigation.

An example: In 2010, French investigative journalists were accused of uncovering two scandals involving Nicolas Sarkozy during his pre-presidential career, involving ‘L'Oreal’ heiress Liliane Bettencourt and an arms contract in Karachi, Pakistan. But the accusations themselves were finally published all over the press and thus were heralded as a triumph for press freedom. Newspapers and websites like Le Monde, the investigative news website Mediapart, and the satirical and investigative weekly Le Canard Enchainé, gave French people revelation and their reporters exposed the meanderings of the Bettencourt and ‘Karachigate’ scandals.

The culture of investigative journalism seems to have taken root in France, but the collision between politicians and journalists remains slippery. Many French journalists and politicians study in the same universities and gather in the same networks, which is demeaning their independence.

Nonetheless, mainly in the print press, investigative journalists still cherish their independence and do not hesitate to defend it when necessary. In 2010, for instance, shareholders in the French newspaper Le Monde denounced then President Nicolas Sarkozy’s attempt to interfering in interfering in the process of selling their newspaper.

But Le Canard enchaîné, a weekly 8-page newspaper remains the main source of investigation in France. It is very independent and unique in many ways, as it has no website and carries no advertising. Above all, it is the only newspaper in France that practices ongoing investigative reporting about politics.

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Sources :

http://www.dw.de/dw/article/0,,14773845,00.html

http://cpj.org/blog/2011/09/spying-on-media-exposes-french-governments-dark-si.php#more

http://www.ambafrance-uk.org/Freedom-of-speech-in-the-French.html

http://gmc.sagepub.com/content/5/3/368.short

http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/arss_0335-5322_2000_num_131_1_2663 : Les révélations du "journalisme d'investigation", par Dominique Marchetti, Actes de la Recherche en Sciences Sociales, Année 2000, Volume 131, Numéro 1

CMPF Summer School: Status of journalists (Best practices)

Best Practices nb#1

Status of journalists (professional and/or non-professional, including bloggers)

Case in France

Melissa Chemam

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Summer School for Journalists

CMFP, Florence, June 2012

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I have been a journalist for seven years, trained in Paris and I have been working as a journalist in France for three years before I moved to report from abroad and finally worked for British media. From this experience, what I can underline as a good practice in France is that the status of journalists is pretty well defined and protected in this European country. Journalist is a respected profession in France, though many struggles especially freelancers and bloggers. Journalists have a specific status and laws are into place to try to protect their work and their independence.

This status of journalists has been defined pretty early in France, in the late nineteenth century and is pretty much the same nowadays. It comes from the 1881 Law on the Freedom of the Press voted on July the 29^th 1881, under the French Third Republic - often called Press Law of 1881. The law defines the freedoms and responsibilities of the media and publishers in France and provides a legal framework for publications. It also therefore regulates the display of advertisements on public roads. It has been amended several times since its enactment, but remains in force to the present day.

The text established a number of basic principles, which liberalised the publishing industry, as the law requires only that publishers present their names to the authorities with two copies of their work. The authorities were denied the power to suppress newspapers and délits d'opinion - crimes of opinion, or types of prohibited speech – was then abolished. It also attributes to journalist a professional card, the ‘press card’, and grants them with a tax allowance, two measures aimed at protecting them from financial struggle in order to insure a better editorial independence.

Another important law define the press’ legal framework in France in the audiovisual field, dating from 1982. It made radios and televisions opened to private operators, completely revolutioning the French broadcasting landscape. A large number of other rules finally protect freedom of expression for every kind of press in France.

Finally a Charter of the Professional Duties of French Journalists was adopted by the National Syndicate of French Journalists in 1918 and revised and completed by the Syndicate in 1938. The Loi Guernut-Brachard passed in 1935 also defined the collective labour contract for journalists. The statute was revised in 1956 under the leadership of Marcel Roëls, and then in 1968, 1974, and 1987.

 

However, we must note that the media landscape in France has changed a lot in recent years: the press is trying to conquer the web (with many popular websites such as Rue 89, Mediapart, etc), the arrival of 14 new, young and very active channels shaking ageing TV landscape with its five major channels, and new technologies “redefining the status of journalists”, according to the European Journalism Centre. “Paradoxically, the press is not doing well but more and more people are trained in journalism schools, while logs are an increasingly legitimate source (and more reactive) than newspapers on certain specialities”, it stated on its website.

According to the BBC country profiles, “France enjoys a free press and has more than 100 daily newspapers; most of them are in private hands and are not linked to political parties”. But it is, in fact, a difficult time for journalists who have encountered a true identity crisis in France.

We can add along with the European Journalism Centre that “the present media landscape in France has its cultural roots in the postwar period, when the state decided to regulate an industry that lost credit after the collaborationist Vichy regime. The state is hence still very present in the written press (via a recently renewed system of subsidies), the TV (with France Televisions as a major actor and its president almost directly appointed by the state), the radio (Radio France group has two stations in the top five in terms of audience), the cinema (with a complex system of subsidies handled by the National Cinematographic Center, or the CNC), and more recently on the Internet (with regulations on cultural products, downloading and property rights known as Hadopi). State-level decisions regarding French media are thus awaited with impatience and are often very important moments”.

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Sources:

http://www.pressreference.com/Fa-Gu/France.html

http://cpj.org/blog/2011/09/spying-on-media-exposes-french-governments-dark-si.php#more

http://www.ejc.nl/

http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/

CMPF Summer School for Journalists

More details on the Summer School for Journalists organised by the Centre for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom and the European University Institute in Florence...

We were 32 participants from all over Europe, including Turkey and Kosovo, to take part into the workshop organised from June 11 to 15 in Florence, Italy. 


Details here:


http://cmpf.eui.eu/training/summer-school-2012.aspx

The aim of the School was to identify and shape a common culture and approach to freedom and pluralism of media across Europe, based on theoretical principles and best practices as well as the exchange of ideas and points of view.

Specific focal areas of the summer school are the governance of journalistic activity and the role of investigative journalism for media freedom and democratic dynamics.   

For five days we listened to media and new media experts, from Pier Luigi Parcu to Steven Barnet from the University of Westminster, including Tom Rosenstiel from the Pew Research Center in the US, Alexander Stille rom Columbia University, USA, Dirk Voorhoof from Ghent University, Belgium, and Beata Klimkiewicz from Cracow, Poland.

We are now trying to build a network to try to keep on working on these issues. 

In this goal, our colleague Laura Schneider, PhD candidate at the University of Hamburg, is now conducting a survey on media freedom. If interested, you can find how to participate here:

http://ww3.unipark.de/uc/hh_fak5_lschneider/a55d/ospe.php?SES=f69970775c24983c5840e6831679d5f1&syid=277116&sid=277117&act=start

 I will publish the two presentations I wrote about France in the next blog posts.


Cheers.


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http://cmpf.eui.eu/Home.aspx 

El Campo

http://toutelaculture.com/2012/06/el-campo-un-huis-clos-dans-la-campagne-argentine/

My latest article, reviewing the Argentinean film 'El Campo', in French, for the website Toute La Culture:

‘El Campo’ de Hernan Belon, réalisateur argentin de documentaire et fiction né en 1970 et formé en Espagne, est un premier long métrage de fiction pour le cinéma. Investigation sur la place d’un homme et d’une femme dans leur propre couple, autour de leur petite fille et au sein d’une maison nouvellement acquise dans la campagne argentine, il s’agit d’un drame psychologique au ton inattendu, mystérieux et presque inquiétant. Un film sensible et intense.
Sortie le 13 juin 2012.


http://toutelaculture.com/2012/06/el-campo-un-huis-clos-dans-la-campagne-argentine/

On media freedom

Hello folks. 

I arrived in Florence, Italy, for a seminar on press freedom and legal frameworks for media pluralism and freedom of expression in Europe and the Western world. 

I will share some thoughts in here soon. 

For more:http://cmpf.eui.eu/Home.aspx

Journalism in Africa, FCAEA's view

OFF THE RECORD, TONIGHT THURSDAY, JUNE 7

Here is the words from the Foreign Correspondents Association in East Africa, FCAEA,
based in Nairobi, about journalism in Africa:


"The debate over journalism from Africa has heated up over the last few
weeks in the cybersphere, and we're taking it live this week at our
off the record briefing. Join your voice.

Our featured speaker for the night will be Howard W. French. He has
been an associate professor at Columbia University Graduate School of
Journalism since 2008. For many years, he was a senior writer for the
New York Times, where he spent most of his nearly 23-year career as a
foreign correspondent working and travelling to over 100 countries on
five continents including Africa.

We're also going to welcome representatives from non-governmental
organizations including Crisis Action as well as a few local
personalities in the journalism scene.

If you haven't been following the conversation here's some reading
material to catch you up!"

How Not to Write about Africa, Foreign Policy, Laura Seay, April 25
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/04/25/how_not_to_write_about_africa?page=full

How Do Journalist Write About Africa, Global Post, Tristan McConnell,
May 29
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatches/globalpost-blogs/commentary/journalists-africa-reporters

Nine Signs that Journalism on Africa You've Just Encountered is Trash,
Huffington Post, Imran Garda, June 4
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/imran-garda/nine-signs-the-journalism_b_1566815.html

In the thoughts of others: Salman Rushdie

"I’ve gotten more interested in clarity as a virtue, less interested in the virtues of difficulty. And I suppose that means I do have a clearer sense of how people read, which is, I suppose, partly created by my knowledge of how people have read what I have written so far. I don’t like books that play to the gallery, but I’ve become more concerned with telling a story as clearly and engagingly as I can. Then again, that’s what I thought at the beginning, when I wrote Midnight’s Children. I thought it odd that storytelling and literature seemed to have come to a parting of the ways. It seemed unnecessary for the separation to have taken place.

A story doesn’t have to be simple, it doesn’t have to be one-dimensional but, especially if it’s multidimensional, you need to find the clearest, most engaging way of telling it".

Salman Rushdie, The Art of Fiction No. 186

Interviewed by Jack Livings

'El Campo', Argentinean movie by Hernán Belón

I will be at the press screening of Argentinean feature film 'El Campo' this Thursday at 1pm in Paris.

'In The Open' is the English title.
The movie is to be released in France on June 13.

Watch the trailer here:

http://www.bodegafilms.com/elcampo/

 Here is the plot summary:

Elisa, a thirty-eight-year old woman, leaves for a week with her husband and young daughter on a vacation to a house in the country.
Everything is going for her: she has a successful professional career, loves her family, has enough money for a comfortable life, and has plans for the future.
After arriving to the country, a strange feeling takes hold of her.
She starts feeling the presence of something that moves the treetops at night, makes the dogs howl, and wanders like the breath of a ghost across the infinite countryside.
A stinging feeling that kills all her certainties.

Argentinean director and screenwriter Hernán Belón co-wrote his feature film debut with Valeria Radivo. It is an Argentinean-French-Italian co-production which had it's world premiere at the International Film Critics Week in Venice 2011.

It tells the story about Elisa and Santiago and their little daughter Mathilda, who leaves their life in Buenos Aires and goes on vacation to a house they have rented in the countryside. The married couple are as happy as any couple in love could be, but already after the first night in their new temporary home, Elisa begins to feel uncomfortable about the place.

More here:

http://www.fipresci.org/festivals/archive/2011/venice/critics_week_pcasella.htm

Ahead of the UN Rio + 20 Summit

Hello folks,

this week I'm working on Ethiopia and food security issues ahead of Rio+20 UN Summit.

If you want to share thoughts, feel free!

I visited Bio Economy Africa's farms and projects in Addis Ababa and Assosa in May and met with lots of farmers who have been train to produce more, better and more scientifically and organically.

If you want to know more, get in touch.

Writing about Africa: More on the debate...

Another article reopening the debate about how badly Africa is covered in the media.

I am really interested in the topic, even if I have only lived in Africa for a year, working from Nairobi and reporting about Africa for three years. My idea is that we can only improve.

How not to write about Africa in 2012 – a beginner's guide

by Binyavanga Wainaina

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/03/how-not-to-write-about-africa

I could not agree more with the first sentence of the column:

"Nairobi is a good place to be an international correspondent. There are regular flights to the nearest genocide, and there are green lawns, tennis courts, good fawning service".

Binyavanga Wainaina is the author of memoir 'One Day I will Write About This Place' and a Kenyan satirist, as he calls himself on Twitter. He is also Director of The Chinua Achebe Center for African Writers and Artists at Bard College.  He is the founding editor of the literary magazine 'Kwani?' and won the Caine Prize for African Writing in 2002.

 This sentence is harsh for Western media and catchy but so true:

"There are five or six places that have not been fully pacified inside the vision of the world as run by the victors of the cold war: North Korea, Gaddafi (that has been dealt with), Somalia, Afghanistan, the women of Africa, and the poor poor people of China, slaving away under the most terrible conditions doing confusing things like refusing to evolve into Europe. Big places where history is still alive – like Russia, China, the Middle East – are to be feared and demonised. Why can't the Egyptians vote for a nice, safe, British-trained economist who once worked for the World Bank?"

Then he continues further:

"If there was a new map, Africa would be divided into three:

1) Tiny flares of horribleness – Mugabe, undemocratic, war, Somalia, Congo;

2) Tiny flares of wonderfulness. Mandela, World Cup, safari. Baby4Africa! A little NGO that does amazing things with black babies who squirm happily in white saviours' hands because they were saved from an African war. My favourites are clitoraid.com and Knickers 4 Africa – which collects used panties for African women;

3) The rest. Lets call this the "vast grassroots". This part of Africa is run by nameless warlords. When the warlords fall, these places are run by grassroots organisations that are funded by the EU and provide a good place to send gap year kids to help and see giraffes at the same time. Grassroots Africa is good for backpacking because it is the real Africa (no AK47s to bother you, no German package tourists). The vast grassroots exists to sit and wait for agents of sustainability (Europeans) to come and empower them".

Because he concludes and again, I so agree:

"What cannot be said is that history came surging to the present. Market capitalism is shaking, and all of a sudden the vast grassroots has oil and copper, and willing, driven and ambitious hands". 

Which consequently leads Binyavanga Wainaina to add:

"It is not a surprise that, in these days, there is a vast and growing new middle class across the continent: the British, American and European media houses have lost us. Our own are booming, and we are finding deals with CCTV (China) and al-Jazeera. We fly Emirates and Kenya Airways. We make deals with those who see a common and vibrant future being a platform for engagement".

A must read for anyone interested in today's Africa.