Bernard Margueritte, Chairman of the International Communications Forum, the global media think-tank which is a programme of Initiatives of Change, addressed a one-day media conference organised by The Royal Society of Edinburgh, in the Scottish capital, 9 March 2004. The aim of the conference was to consider the break-down of public trust in the media, and whether or not standards and quality of journalism properly serve the public interest. In Scotland, concerns have been voiced about the relationship between the Scottish media, the Parliament in Edinburgh and the public, as well as about the concentration of media ownership.
'Isn’t it time we asked what our mission is supposed to be?' Margueritte asked. The media had two main tasks, he said. The first was 'to give our audiences everything they need to know (and not just everything they want to know), in order for people to know what is happening and why it is happening, so that they can make up their own minds'. The second task, he said, was 'to report about faraway countries, to bring closer to their audience the civilisation and culture and also the problems, fears and dreams of those faraway people, so that all can move from understanding to mutual understanding'. 'The illness of our age,' Margueritte said, 'is not a lack of information but a lack of meaning.'
'The media can and should play a prominent role in the battle to build a better, more human world,' Margueritte concluded. 'But for that, we have to re-find our dignity and sense of mission. We in the media do have to change our vision and look in the same direction as the people of goodwill on this planet. What we are in is not only a fight for better media, but a call to replace the civilisation of materialism, hedonism and consumerism by the civilisation of respect for the human person, the civilisation of love. This should be one of the main tasks of the media at the beginning of this new century. At stake is our own credibility, as media people and as human beings, and at stake is the future of our societies and our world.'
The conference chairman, James Naughtie, a BBC Radio 4 presenter on the Today current affairs programme, commented, 'You have lifted our thinking to a higher level.'
The other main speakers were Professor Philip Schlesinger, head of the Media Research Institute at Stirling University; Lord Steel, ex-presiding officer, Scottish Parliament; and Alastair Campbell, ex-Downing Street Director of Communications. Four panel discussions each comprised a mixture of journalists and politicians.
Margueritte, who lives in Warsaw where he is the doyen of French journalists in Eastern Europe, was received by the Lord Provost of Aberdeen, Liberal Democrat John Reynolds, in his chambers. Margueritte also addressed media students at the Robert Gordon University; visited the offices of the Aberdeen Journals and spent an hour with Press & Journal editor, Derek Tucker. He spoke at a public meeting organised by the Aberdeen branch of the Christian Socialist Movement and preached at the morning service in the Aberdeen city centre church of St Nicholas.
The invitation to Margueritte to address The Royal Society of Edinburgh media conference came from Magnus Linklater, a columnist for The Times, London, and Scotland on Sunday, who is a member of the Society media committee.
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