Vargas Llosa says democracy is the best defense against propaganda and nationalism

His latest historical novel tells of CIA misinformation campaign

Mario Vargas Llosa, a Nobel laureate in literature, has just published a historical novel, Tough Times ("Tiempos recios"), whose plot is based on the 1954 overthrow of the democratically elected government in Guatemala that was engineered by the CIA.  

For the novelist, that conspiracy has many echoes today in the status of news media organizations and the abundance of information and disinformation available to the general public.  

During a publicity tour in Spain, Vargas Llosa gave an interview to El Pais, arguably the country's most prestigious daily. He said that the 1954 coup in Guatemala was masterminded for the CIA by a public relations expert named Edward L. Bernays, whose nickname was "the clever puppetmaster". Bernays's philosophy of communication could be boiled down to a phrase: propaganda will prevail over the truth.

In fact, the media campaign described in the novel was based on what really happened. A propaganda campaign persuaded the elite of Boston "that the interests of the United Fruit Company are the same as the United States, and that the recently inaugurated democracy of Guatemala puts them in jeopardy because of their dependence on the Kremlin". In fact, Soviet influence was exaggerated or non-existent; the government's land policies threatened United Fruit's business interests.

Versión en español

Letters to a newspaper publisher III: A shameful scandal right under your nose

How should a media executive manage the business during a time of disruptive technological change? Alfonso Nieto attempted to answer that question in his book "Letters to a newspaper publisher," written in 1987 when newsrooms in Spain were moving from typewriters to computers. His comments have acute relevance today.  

Alfonso Nieto, photo University of Navarra

In this letter to a fictitious newspaper publisher, titled "A Shameful Scandal", Alfonso Nieto criticizes media executives who are focused only on the bottom line without paying attention to the quality of the content in their own publications. (The scandal is a defamation lawsuit against a reporter.)

Nieto also emphasizes the importance of hiring journalists with high ethical standards. "This profession is so prominent that it should exclude those of mediocre character who are untrustworthy, resentful, or selfish" (p. 58).

The top executives of the media organization have the responsibility to communicate clearly the editorial standards of the organization, Nieto says. Without that, there is disorder in the newsroom. In the absence of clear direction, each section editor creates their own fiefdom, and "this disorder is the key that opens the door to misinformation and mistakes" (pp. 59-60).

What causes market bubbles, and are we in one?

An all-star group of media economics experts gathered at the University of Navarra Dec. 13 and 14 to exchange ideas and research results on the role and behavior of media during periods of economic or financial boom and crash.

Their approaches were varied: historical, media effects, content analysis, journalistic practice, political economy, etc.

(The full program is here.)

Many of the presentations centered on media coverage of the global financial crisis of 2008-2009 and its impact in countries including Ireland, England, Greece, Spain, the U.S., the Netherlands, Germany, and Denmark. The papers provoked lively debate among the participants, since there was significant time between presentations for questions and comments.

The studies used ingenious research methods and rigorous statistical analysis to tease out surprising insights. I had the unenviable task of providing a summary at the end, on a Friday night, in just 10 minutes. So here is the cheeky result, with apologies to my learned colleagues:

Cause of bubbles: audiences
    •    Overwhelmed by complexity
    •    Uninterested in economics
    •    Ignorant
    •     . . . even willfully ignorant
    •    Lazy, complacent
    •    Delusional

Causes of bubbles: journalists
    •    Overwhelmed by complexity
    •    Lacking training in economics
    •    Excessive sourcing from handful of public officials and financial industry experts
    •    Excessive sourcing from charlatans posing as experts
    •    Overworked, underpaid, forced to write click bait
    •    Self-censorship, serving ownership interests
    •    Uninterested, ignorant
    •    Lazy, complacent
    •    Unethical
    •    Sometimes corrupt

The dirty words journalists have to say without blushing

The following text is a translation from the Spanish version of a lecture I gave at the University of La Sabana in Bogotá, Colombia, on Aug. 22.


My lecture, in Spanish, starts at the 6-minute mark of the video.

Journalists today have the opportunity to create the future of the industry. But to do so, we have to change some of our long-held beliefs and attitudes. We have to create new business models (O, those awful words!) and learn to say some words without blushing.

This need to change comes about because of the nature of our profession, which for most is a vocation. As journalists we have to keep our distance from political and business interests to maintain our credibility. Still, as a group we can be arrogant, self-righteous and holier-than-thou (I include myself in this criticism). We tend to view ourselves as high priests of an exclusive profession and bearers of a special ethical standard that few others can live up to. We see ourselves as purer, more objective, less affected by the prejudices of the mere mortals we cover.

That is at least part of the reason we have trouble in the new world of entrepreneurial journalism, where we can start and run our own news operations. If we want to go out on our own, we have to recognize for the first time that journalism is a business and that someone has to pay the bills. All of this involves getting our hands on the first dirty word: money.

1. Money. The very word makes us cringe because we associate it with dirty things like influence peddling, lobbyists, bribery, corruption and other topics of our investigative journalism.

But money is the fuel that drives any journalism organization. Without money, journalists can't be paid a decent salary. They can't buy a house, clothing, food, medicine. Without salaries for talented, experienced people, there is no high-quality journalism.

Plagiarism has profilerated; you can avoid it

Giving credit to others enhances credibility, trust

We are not born knowing common courtesy. Someone has to teach us, and then we have to practice it.

We also are not born knowing what plagiarism is, and those of us who haven't learned to avoid it could be in big trouble.

Plagiarizing the work of others will get you expelled from a university, fired from a news organization, or dismissed from public office

The issue of plagiarism is especially relevant at the moment in Spain, where high-ranking officials in two major political parties have had to respond to evidence of plagiarism — here and here — revealed in investigative reports by the web publication eldiario.es and the TV station La Sexta.

(See some other examples at the end of this post).

Today it is so easy to copy and paste material digitally that some are getting sloppy and careless in newsrooms and academia.

Here are some guidelines:

• On the most basic level, it's common courtesy. Don't take credit for someone else's work.
• Put direct quotes in quotation marks and name the source. 
• If you have paraphrased a direct quote, be sure to name the source at the end of the paraphrase. 
• If you make extensive use of a source, mention the name of the author in every paragraph.

A finger in the eye for Spanish journalists

Arsenio Escolar, photo by 20minutos

Versión en español

HUESCA, Spain -- At first, there was timid, nervous applause from the journalists, professors, and students who were listening to harsh criticism from a respected colleague, Arsenio Escolar, the editor of 20minutos, a free distribution daily that is one of Spain's major digital outlets.

Maybe they were recognizing themselves among those who were being criticized.

In a call to arms, Escolar urged Spanish journalists to stop being so obsequious to the powerful and to call attention to growing inequality and poverty.

"We need a journalism that is fair, transparent, distant from power, ethical, and social," he concluded in the inaugural address at the XVI Digital Journalism Congress in this resort town in northeast Spain.

An optimistic book about the collapse of print media

Bernardo Diaz Nosty published a book last year that chronicled the sad history of the collapse of print media in the developed world over the past 70 years.

It wasn't bad enough that revenues had tanked and readers had fled, he said. The worst part was that news media had lost their credibility. Being the optimist that he is, he believes that credibility can be recovered by a return to the ethical principles of high-quality journalism.

The importance of ethics to the future of journalism has lately become a theme developed by many, including the French journalist Jean-François Fogel.

Diaz Nosty is head of the journalism department at the University of Malaga in Spain, and his book has the title (translated) The Press in the New Information Ecosystem: 'Stop the Presses!' (La prensa en el nuevo ecosistema informativo "Que paren las rotativas" it's available free in PDF from the publisher, Fundacion Telefonica). I heard him talk at Tecnologico de Monterrey in Mexico as part of a press tour of Latin America promoting the book.

Who's a journalist? Only the public can decide

Versión en español aquí.

Jean-François Fogel has the best description I have heard of the new relationship between journalists and the public in the world of digital media.

Simply put, only the public can decide whose work deserves the respect and attention we previously gave to journalists working at major media. It is the public who decides if a particular voice among the billions on the Internet has the credibility, ethics and independence that we expect from journalists.

Really, any person who publishes on the web and follows the standards of professional journalism can be considered a journalist, Fogel said in an interview. And what are those standards?

"Journalism is, of course, a disinterested voice. It isn't a voice that urges the purchase of something or a vote for someone or a particular behavior. It's an independent voice that can't be tied to an association, a brand or an organization. It's a responsible voice that expresses itself about things that are relevant to a society. In the world of digital journalism, a journalist is a person who speaks from an ethical point of view."

What makes a professional journalist? Ethics

With all types of people publishing news and information on the web, how do you distinguish who is a professional journalist?

After all, bloggers have broken some big stories before mainstream news organizations, for example. Many of them bring value to their work. In other words, how do journalists justify calling themselves professionals, and how do they differentiate themselves from amateurs and drivelers?

One important way is by their adherence to ethical standards of the profession. Another is by knowledge of how to investigate and verify information. Professionals with the highest standards should be dedicated to more than being first and generating page views.

How to sell advertising without selling your soul

(Versión en español aquí.)

Fayerwayer is one of the most popular blogs in the Spanish speaking world because of its frank and conversational commentaries about the latest gadgets and software. 

Its founder, Leo Prieto, of Santiago, Chile, tells an instructive story about how the blog's first advertiser created controversy among his collaborators and the blog's loyal followers. (photo from www.endeavor.cl)

Prieto started Fayerwayer (a phonetic spelling of "firewire" in Spanish) in 2005 because he was dissatisfied with what he saw as a lazy, mindless rehash of press releases in most technology blogs and print publications. 

He decided he would actually try out the products and services and see if they were as described by the public relations and marketing specialists.