Analysis
The political climate in general and the structure of the media in particular does not offer favourable conditions for professional journalism to thrive.
The majority of journalists are relatively young and it is thus easy to exploit them or make them “work a lot for much less” than their more seasoned colleagues. It was noted that there is little difference in the wages paid to reporters working for mainstream or alternative media outlets (between 800 and 1,500 TRY, 285 to 535 Euro) and despite the low pay, journalists “have to put up with pressure out of fear of not being able to find another job”. One journalist who resigned from the newspaper where he had worked during the Gezi protests said that he “really couldn’t take it anymore”, adding that reporters who spent their entire professional lives under pressure and the fear of losing their jobs did not cover certain incidents even when conditions allowed, because they didn’t want to “stand out”.
In Turkey, journalists’ understandings of professionalism causes them to see their occupation as one that can be carried out independently of the ideology of the newspaper for which they do reporting. A panellist pointed out the case of the Akşam newspaper whose owner Çukurova Holding was taken over by the Saving Deposits Insurance Fund (TMSF) in May 2014 after the company failed to pay its debts: “Even though the staff did not change, the newspaper as it existed before TMSF seized it turned 180 degrees from its original position, which means they managed to get the same staff to produce an entirely different newspaper.”
Panellists noted that in other cases there has been an almost complete turn-over of staff at media firms with close ties to the ruling party over the past few years, with long-term employees losing their jobs to new recruits. Especially in media houses known for being part of the “pool media”, journalists previously unknown in professional circles have begun to work and found a place for themselves thanks to their political alignment rather than their journalistic capabilities or qualifications. The same process of establishing a homogeneous, politically affiliated staff in a workplace has also happened at TRT. At the broadcaster’s news centres, not a single journalist who started working there before the AKP came to power has remained on the job. All former employees have either been replaced by new staff, given lower positions, or forced into retirement.
The mainstream media, for example, did not cover the Gezi Park protests at all. Many reporters wanted to cover the events and in many cases did so, but their editors did not use the stories they produced. A journalist on the panel stated that during the protests, there were enough journalists and photographers in Taksim Square and on the streets, but that they didn’t do any real reporting; they merely consoled themselves with the idea that they “went, saw, and wrote” and hence were “psychologically at ease”. The same journalist added that colleagues responded to the fact that the news they had written was being censored by editors by saying, “I’m a professional journalist and I get paid a salary, so I’ll go work somewhere else,” and in doing so, saw their profession as a “safe haven”. A panellist who worked for a mainstream newspaper at the time of the protests stated that the items in the paper’s website archive were later changed by removing the word “resistance” and in some cases stories were removed altogether. The same panellist said that “reporters and editors did not take a very solid political and ethical stance” because they succumbed to the pressure and tended to respond to “the impositions made upon them as if they were merely a kind of unavoidable occupational hazard or a twist of fate”.
Participants who were involved in reporting on the Ergenekon and Balyoz trials (a major issue in Turkey for the past 5 years as they concern upper-level military officials accused of plotting to overthrow the government) said that some newspapers presented the evidence produced in court as if it were true, thus “misleading” readers. A jurist on the panel pointed out that the “documents” reported on in the news were not verified to establish to what degree they were either real or “fabricated”; as a result, the principle of the presumption of innocence was violated and those on trial were being “condemned” in the eyes of the public. Another panellist stated that the news published on the basis of “briefcases full of information” that arrived at newspaper offices “were later turned into allegations that made their way into court files”. In this way, the ruling party directly “used the press for its own ideological ends”.
Panellists noted further instances of unethical practices in journalism. Newspapers close to the government have used “fabricated and fictional” news that include “hate speech” in their titles and content. For example, Takvim published an “imaginary” interview with CNN International editor Christiane Amanpour in the
days following the Gezi protests in 2013, in which she allegedly said that CNN spread “lies” in regard to the events and that “they did it for money”. Later the paper stated that the “interview” was meant to be “sarcastic”. Another example cited was an interview with Noam Chomsky published in the newspaper Yeni Şafak in which the philosopher and political commentator was quoted as having said things that he did not say; subsequently efforts were made to rescue the situation through a statement claiming that “the translation from English was done according to the implied meaning”. According to journalists on the panel, because such fabricated news occur so often, “news concerning discrimination against women and violations of women’s rights is more or less second-class”. It was also said that “ideological manipulation” and direct interventions carried out by the government in power have led to a situation where “the ethics of journalism are no longer open to debate”.
Scores:
Individual scores:1 Country does not meet indicator 2 Country meets only a few aspects of indicator 3 Country meets some aspects of indicator 4 Country meets most aspects of indicator 5 Country meets all aspects of the indicator
Average score: 1.2