Media in the Arab World
The media in the Arab world, which is the subject matter of this research, has especially been faced with a lot of emerging issues. It has determined how issues are implemented and how people interact and are viewed. With the recent historical developments such as the 911 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the general focus on the Muslim world especially in the so-called war on terror, the media in the Arab world has become shaped by political matters even as it is has shaped politics. The paper explores the Arab media in terms of its power, limitations, and how it is significant and different from other related media around the world. It discusses whether or not media outlets in the Arabic World such as Aljazeera and Al-Arabiya have done their work well, and how this has impacted on society. The research also includes findings on issues such as the Arabic media and the role it has played in shaping the outcome of different wars fought in the Arad nations, and how these have in turn affected relations between the west and the Arabs and how the Wests association of Islam and terrorism has been addressed by the different media outlets owned or run by or for Arab audiences.
Literature Review and Hypothesis
The media in the Arab world has shaped the way politics are played in the entire world, and how the rest of the world relates with the Muslim World. The way in which the media has been acting has presented both challenges and opportunities to people in the Arab world and the West. According to sources inside Aljazeera, a Qatari-based and one of the leading media outlets in the Arab world, the role that the media in the Arab world has played to bring about a change of opinion about Islam as a religion and its relationship with the rest of the world is astronomical. This is indeed true considering the rise of Aljazeera and other media outlets like Al-Arabiya.
According to Al-Imarat Markaz (2006) in the book Arab media in the information age, the role that the media has played will, however, be viewed or attested to differently depending on some interrelated factors. For instance, the role that Aljazeera played in the post 911 terrorist attacks and the resultant Afghanistan battle between Western allied forces led the US and the Taliban has been different depending on who is giving their views. Many Arabs all over the world including those living in the West will readily agree that the channel helped give the world a clear picture of what actually went on in the country. On the other side, most Westerners are not very comfortable agreeing to this fact. Instead, they will point out that most of the reporting that was done by Arabic media was biased and in favor of one side. This can be attested to by the recommendations that have from time and again made regarding the need for Arabic media to be free from censorship and influence from the government, or to be free from all forms of political meddling.
This has in turn raised the debate regarding the neutrality of the Arabic media channels in their reporting, and how this has affected the outcome of many political events there. There has been an insistence by these channels that neutrality is all they seek, and that they only play the role of providing in formation to people. Understanding this is a critical to a comprehensive review of the events that have taken place in the media in the recent days and well before. In her book Arab media and political renewal community, legitimacy and public life, Naomi Sakri (2007) points out that the issue of Islam, religion and terrorism has been at the forefront in determining how the media in the Arab world has shaped the political landscape around the world. While the West has often almost attributed religious terrorism to Arabs, this fact has been denied by most people in the Muslim world who claim that the fact that the Arab community have a formidable media base capable of offering a stiff challenge to Western media has caused this misconception.
Hafez Kai (2001) in Mass media, politics, and society in the Middle East cites the Wests lack of political grounding in the Arabic world as the main reason it has continuously discredited the media there, often criticizing it for bias. Of all the media outlets in the Arab world or those broadcasting for the Arabic world, it is Aljazeera that has been very vocal and that has shaped the most people and events. Aljazeera is particularly noted to have been very vocal in the fighting in Afghanistan since 2001, a fact that led to its emergence as a real important political tool (Hafez, 2001). This is as far as shaping political outcomes is concerned. According to the channel itself, all its broadcasting aims at giving all credible information about anything, and that it never is influenced by political meddling or the pressure to please anyone. It has been responsible for helping all Muslims and Arabs to get news about fellow brothers and sisters, some of who might have been branded terrorists and banished from society by the West, from wherever they might be (Aljazeera, 2009).
The media in the Arab worlds is closely regulated in terms of what is reported and how it is reported. If the sentiments of Pippa Norris (2003) as contained in his book Framing terrorism the news media, the government, and the public are to be taken and followed, then the Arab media will only become free to the extent that the people, usually personified here by the political leaderships and systems in different countries, will feel free enough and secure enough. This security will apparently have to come from the way in which enemy media owners or the perceived aggression from Western nations specially the United States is brought to an end. Recent developments in the media will best demonstrate this aspect.
The Elections in Iran
The recent presidential elections in Iran that returned to power president Mohammed Ahmadinejjad can demonstrate what regulation is the Arab media is all about. Although some will deny that it was actually an attempt to gag the media, the way in which opposition protesters especially the supporters of the opposition leader Hussein Musavi were forcefully repelled in their attempt to protest and the way this went unreported casts a cloud of doubt at the freedom of the media. It remains a concern of the West that in this age and time freedom in the media is still far from being achieved in the Arab world. Of course the Arab World in general and Iran, led by the Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khomeini, denounced the West for instigating the riots, and the western media for blowing matters out of proportion (Aljazeera, 2009).
The Afghanistan and Iraq Wars
These are the other developments that point our not only how Arab media is different from Western media but, and this is more important, how lit remains under the tight control of political regimes. The Taliban used the media to promote its radical ideologies, and to ensure that no information went out unregulated. Most of the information that often went into the limelight was that from al-Qaeda, or that condemning or refuting Western actions and allegations, respectively. The Qatari-based Aljazeera channel, which broadcasts mainly in Arabic, is known to have instigated an anti-Western verbal war, concealing true facts and only releasing what was from the Taliban or from Al-Qaeda. In Iraq, there was a repeat of similar trends, but the huge presence of other stations like Al-Arabiya and Western media helped check Aljazeeras monopolistic powers. On the whole, therefore, the Arab media is different from the western media in that it is closely monitored by political regimes, and is not allowed to report freely (Al-Jenaibi, 2008).
Methods of Collecting Data
The need to have a clear understanding of the matters surrounding Arab media outlets called for the use of appropriate, concise and reliable methods of collecting data in order that the final results obtained from the analysis of this data could be authentic enough and as reliable as possible. To be able to collect the most authentic results, more than one primary methods of data collection was used. As a check against possible large margins of error, secondary sources were used. This is a very critical and important subject matter. The method of data collection adopted had to reflect the individual opinions as much as possible. However, understanding that it is virtually impossible for all people to give their opinions, the researchers took the initiative to use an alternative method to back up the main one. The main method that was used to gather the information was direct interviews of people.
The researchers targeted 8 Arab nations, all members of the Arab League, located in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East and 2 Western nations the United States of America and Britain. For each of the countries, a sample of people was randomly picked from different places in the country and, without any particular reference to a specific media organization and questions were posed to them concerning how they viewed Arab Media. No distinction was made between those broadcasting in Arabic and those that use different languages, or between those based at home or abroad. What was insisted on, however, was the need to give a plausible response regarding how the media had impacted on the lives of the people. The information that was required from these people included what they thought the Arab media in their countries meant to them, how they would like to see the media operating, and what significance the media had to them, their families, and their immediate society. The research also focused on finding out how the media was limited in its endeavor to provide information, and how this could be corrected.
That aside, questions were asked about the power that the media had in the specific country, and whether any limitations were placed on the media in the country. The countries that were surveyed are Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Egypt, Algeria, Syria, and Pakistan. To support this direct interviews, an observation was made over a period of five years from may 2000 to May 2005 with a view to establish how the media in these 10 countries interacted with the people, how much trust people had in them, and how the media played it role in shaping the society through information delivery. Finally, the research observed the level of freedom of the Arab media in each of these countries and compared it with what most people had indicated in the interview. As a control measure, the research used secondary sources mostly data from statistical abstracts and books on the issue.
Results and discussion
As projected earlier, the views differed greatly based on which nationality the respondents were from or where the observation was made from. This was on almost all subject matters except one the role placed the Arabic media. Everyone, including those from Western Nations, agreed that the Arab media played a very significant role in shaping society as a whole, and that the media is a key determinant of the direction that the majority of the people and hence the entire country pursues (Rugh, 2004).
All those from the western world, however, were critical of the manner in which Arab media is controlled by respective states, and made to adhere to unusually strict methods of broadcasting. They indicated that unlike the Western media that enjoys freedom of operation and all they do is without much political meddling, Arabic media is only allowed to broadcast what is sanctioned by the states (Karlekar, 2008). Regardless of whether it is a state-owned media organization or not, and as long as it is licensed by the government (every media house has to be licensed in order to operate), it has to follow laid-down regulations that include broadcasting only what is allowed.
Even without asking for this specific information, most, almost 90 of the respondents from Arab nations cited Aljazeera and Al-Arabiya as the leading media channels in the Arab world, and the ones playing the greatest role in the shaping the lives of people. They cited the specific war time role which was fought in Afghanistan, and how Aljazeera was the only reliable media outlet for relaying information about the fighting even from the very frontline of the battle. They indicated that as the western media, led by the BBC and CNN, was only giving a Western, biased version of virtually every event, Aljazeera and Al Arabiya came in handy (Aljazeera, 2009). The fact that it was only through the efforts of Aljazeera that some credible information such as the fate of Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden was able to be accessed kept coming to the fore. There was a firm insistence that the Arabic media has been free by a minority of the respondents, and this matched with earlier projection. It was also discovered that most of the media organizations owned by the government or the state are solely responsible for most of the alleged manipulation, but this was all right as long as the required objectives are good. A majority seemed to imply that control and regulation can never totally lack in even the most Free State. In addition to this, they cited the need for an owner to have a power over what is owned. However, the respondents, both from Western and Arabic nations, came to the agreement that non-state, free, satellite stations were a lot freer and in their broadcasting they followed what is right reporting without any bias (Al-Imarat, 2006). Such media channels usually have so much freedom that they can afford to criticize the presidents of the countries in which they operate and get away with it. This, most respondents pointed out, is in line with what they expect from the media (UNDP, 2005).
A rather interesting observation that was made during the period of the research is that the relationship between the West and the Arabic media is somewhat frosty in times of conflicts but thaws when all is right and no controversies exist. However, this changes when battles and confrontations emerge (Haugbole, 2009). A case in point is the incidence where key Western diplomats, including former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, former US Secretary of State Collin Powell, and former US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld all had cordial relations with the popular Arabic language broadcaster Aljazeera, and even recorded interviews with it. However, matters changed when during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars the two sides broke ranks, each accusing the other of breaching the terms of their agreement to corporate (Haugbole, 2009). Aljazeera was specifically accused by the West of misreporting events in both wars, and for allowing itself to be used for political gains by Arab governments (Aljazeera, 2009).
State Security
The role that is played by the media in enhancing the security of the nation is a fact kept cropping up during the interviews. It was an issue which seemed to present a real challenge to government. This arose from the question posed regarding how significant the Arab media is to the society. Over 60 of the respondents cited state security as a key role that the media plays in the society. Again, reference was made to the war in Afghanistan and Iraq as best demonstrating how this role is played. The Taliban used the power they had to control the press so much that prior to the invasion of the country by US forces pursuing Al-Qaeda and their allies, it was virtually impossible to have anyone believing anything else other than what was said by the Taliban. The fate of Osama Bin Laden remained a mystery for a long time, and even to this day owing to the ability by the leading Arab media channels to work to conceal this information (Sakr, 2007).
The security of nations like Saudi Arabia and Iraq has for a long time remained under the control of the media. The media directly influences how information flows from the state to the people, and even how this information comes in. This effectively keeps the people controlled and following the way of the government. It was also observed that nations that control the media so much may not have as much security as they actually seek unless other mechanisms to ensure security are also put in place. The security available is threatened by the likelihood of a revolt by the people against the state (Burke, 2009). Where information is tightly regulated and its flow to the outside world closely monitored, the assurance of security is possible but it all depends on how the people are handled. The media in Iran has been doing this well enough until recently when the people could not take it any more. They went as far as defying the most supreme authority in the country, the Ayatollah.
The role that is played by the media in the society in bringing about social influence is great and varies among different media organizations. Arab media has come under the limelight in the recent years mainly as a result of the role it has played in shaping the way the war in Iraq and Afghanistan has been and is being fought. The Arab media has been able to work under the close control and scrutiny of the respective governments, and different reasons have been offered to account for this. Of the many reasons, the critical security of the state has been cited as calling for a measure of control to be put in place so that information flow is regulated and closely monitored.
The power of the Arab media has been a matter that has been usurped by the respective governments, with most media outlets broadcasting only according to the laid-down rules and procedures. However, in certain instances, the media has found space and has openly and freely carried out its operations without the interference from anyone. These have even gone ahead and criticized the political leaders in such states without anything being done against them. On the whole, the Arab media has played a significant role in shaping the societys direction and especially how people respond to and perceive matters of international interest. Although viewpoints regarding the exact significance of Arab media differ among people, most agree on its critical role, whether it impacts negatively or positively on the people
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