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International Communications Law Freedom of religion, speech, press and assembly are firmly established in international law through:
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Media law is a area where serious contention threatens that broader cooperation, and the process of harmonizing world media law has barely begun. While the hardware is in place, the cultural and legal "software" to make it run smoothly is a distant dream.
Although most of the world's nations have some form of democratic dialogue, a significant minority -- especially in the Arab world and in Asia -- resort to prior restraint, censorship and repression to force an apparent concensus.
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VINDICATED -- Prof. Deborah Lipstadt of Emory University (Atlanta, GA, USA) celebrates outside London's High court April 11, 2000 after she won a libel case brought against her and Penguin Books, by David Irving, a controversial British historian. Irving wrote that it was impossible for the Nazis to have killed so many people in the Holocaust. Lipstadt subjected the work to serious factual criticism. (AP Photo/Adam Butler) Emory University maintains a web site on the trial. |
Another issue involves the selective use of libel and defamation law to punish political speech. As Matthew Pollack notes in an article: Libel plaintiffs resort to British court system:
"Since 2002, Khalid Salim a Bin Mahfouz, a Saudi Arabian businessman and banker, has sued or threatened to sue for libel at least 36 times in British courts. Every media outlet or publisher he sued or threatened to sue has apologized, retracted and paid fines."
One response was a state of New York law entitled the Libel Terrorism Protection Act which gives American defendants protection from libel suits brought from other nations with fewer free speech protections. More recently, the Oxford Program in Comparative Media Law and Policy studied the difference in the costs of a defamation lawsuit in European nations.
The new technology that allows proximity of cultures through the international communications system has contributed to the difficulty. Cartoons run by a Danish newspaper in 2005, for example, would not have provoked outrage in the Moslem world twenty years beforehand. Recently, German newspaper Die Welt asserted that "the standards that Muslims require are overtaxing for open societies."
But the question of harmonization of international media law is a thorny one with no apparent set of solutions.
What is International Law?
International law is technically defined as the "body of rules and principles of action which are binding on civilized states in their relation to one another." (Brierly, 1963). In effect, it is a group of treaties signed by nations. Quite often, in complex areas, it is more than one treaty, and becomes a "convention" that involves continuous negotiations. (See the UNICEF definition of key terms on international treaties).
While international law may be defined in a narrow sense, as being limited to the body of treaties about trade, health, travel and so on, it is also increasingly defined in a broader sense, as the duty of all nations towards each other and towrds the natural rights of all citizens.
Basis of International Law: The UN Charter
The cornerstone of international law is the United Nations Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The section that applies to free speech and the mass media, the Charter's Article 19, states:
Article 19 - Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
United Nations member states are bound to uphold these and other rights in the Charter. Even so, there have been numerous occasions when individual nations have suppressed dissent in their own media, routinely blocked access to international media. The International Court of Justice and Human Rights does not review violations of Article 19.
The non-governmental organization Article 19 keeps track of repression of free speech around the world.
European Law: The EEC Convention and the Protection of Human Rights
The Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of May 5, 1963 is a second major international cornerstone of free expression. The convention is binding among member states of the EEC and it is different from Article 19 in that it is enforced through the European Court of Human Rights. All EEC member nations may have their national laws challenged by any European citizien on human rights grounds. While the court tends to honor national laws, clear conflicts with human rights law have led the court to overturn some national laws in favor of international laws. The Convention reads as follows:
Article 9 – Freedom of thought, conscience and religion
1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance.
2. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.Article 10 – Freedom of expression
1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.
Religious Freedom
The US State Dept. issues an annual report on world religious freedom, noting: "religious freedom is cherished by most as a foundational human right, and restrictions on faith and practice are an affront to human dignity."
Recent developments;
In 2008 Saudi King, Abdullah Abdul Aziz al Saud, spoke at the UN about the dignity of religious differences. Some thought it was genuine enough, but probably part of a ploy to put a global blasphemy law on the table. (Other links here:
World Press Freedom
One of the most important components of an open society is its freedom of political speech as expressed through the news media. Not surprsingly, freedom of the press is constantly under attack in countries where totalitarian governments are in control. In many cases journalists are killed, jailed, tortured or exiled.
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Reporters without borders / Reporters sans frontieres tracks world press freedom and threats to journalists. White symbolizes a good situation (Canada, EEC), gray is satisfactory (US, Spain), pink shows noticable problems, red shows a difficult situation (Russia, Iraq), and dark red shows a very serious situation (China, Cuba, Columbia). A similiar group, the Committee to Protect Journalists, reports that 56 reporters will killed and hundreds were attacked in 2004. |
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Freedom House surveys broad general freedoms worldwide, including freedom of religious expression. Green is free, yellow is partly free, and purple is not free. |
Key differences: Defamation law around the globe
MEXICO changed its 1917 statute on criminal libel in 2007. The Committee to Protect Journalists said this effectively eliminates criminal defamation, libel, and slander at the federal level, making Mexico the second country in Latin America to repeal criminal libel laws. However, libel law is secondary in many nations, since outright government persecution of journalists can usually take place without sanction.
SINGAPORE officials often use libel law to silence critics. For example, an article about nepotism in Singapore's government, published in the US by Bloomberg, led to a libel suit by Singapore's Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore courts. The Bloomberg service settled the case for over $550,000 in a widely criticized "swift capitulation."
THE GREAT FIRE WALL OF CHINA One of the worst modern scofflaws with respect to Article 19 of the UN Charter is the government of the People's Republic of China. While suppressing dissent and controling news is nothing unusual for the PRC, its attitude towards internet search engines such as Google and Yahoo has become increasingly repressive. Search engines have only been allowed to do business in China only if they cooperate in blocking anti-government sites and in identifying and locating political activists. For American firms, this activity is considered deeply disgraceful. According to an article in the London-based Financial Times, "Beijing’s internet controls ... raise deep moral issues for western democracies, whose capital markets help fund the local enterprises that make the censorship system work and whose own multinationals have tailored their operations in China to avoid upsetting the party commissars. Those issues have been highlighted ... by US congressional hearings at which Yahoo, the internet portal, has been strongly criticised for helping Chinese authorities track down local dissidents." In some cases, search engines like Yahoo and Google turned over names of Chinese dissidents, which led to their arrests.
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PHILiPPINES -- "Every defamatory imputation is presumed to be malicious, even if it be true, if no good intention and justifiable motive for making it is shown..." The International Federal of Journalists says these laws are outdated and excessive.
CANADA -- Libel law is commonly used by government, political and religious groups against their critics, and often against defendants outside Canada. Even the Prime Minister used the law to sue critics in the liberal party in 2008. Many feel that the Canada should reform its libel laws.
UNITED KINGDOM recognized a need to protect journalists in 2001, when a new defamation law extended the doctrine of privilege to publications.
AUSTRALIA passed a uniform Defamation Act in 2006, saying the old law was “tilted too far against free communication.”
RUSSIA -- A Commission to defend Russian history is advocating the criminalization of history that question the role of the Soviet Union, President Dmitry Medvedev has set up a commission to investigate and analyse attempts to "falsify history against the interests of Russia."
INTERNATIONAL OVERVIEW of libel law is available on a web site set up by Dr. David Donnelly of the University of Houston, who is Project Manager for the Media Libel Web Site.
Clashes of Culture and the New World Information Order
In some instances the justifications for these violations of the UN charter have been based not on political oppression but rather on a clash of cultures. Nations that are not European in orientation have sought protection from what is called "cultural imperialism" -- the erosion of local culture with the glamorous and relentless consumerism and sexuality that pours out of Hollywood.
Initial debates over the emergence of an international media law came to a head in 1983 with the UNESCO report of the McBride Commission on the New World Information and Communication Order. but the debates were heavily influenced by the political divide between the US and Europe on the one hand and the Soviet Union and China on the other. In most instances, measures to enforce protection against cultural imperialism have also (or perhaps mainly) been used to stifle legitimate opinion and expression.