“What is wrong cannot be made right”*? – Why has media reform been sidelined in the debate over

“social justice” in Israel

Amit M SchejterPenn State and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev

Noam Tirosh

Ben-Gurion University of the Negev

*Ecclesiastes 1:15

The summer of 2011

Media system in transition

• Magazines, book publishing, pay TV and online news portals demonstrate healthy competition

• concentration in the newspapers and broadcast television markets seems to be declining

• contemporary digital media is formulating into a vertically integrated, highly concentrated distribution system

“the hegemony of old existing power centers is reproduced” (Caspi, 2011)

Digital divide persists

• Highly controlled audiovisual sector

• 85 percent of Israelis with above-average income can access the Internet from home; only 55 percent of those with below-average income can do the same (Dror & Gershon, 2012)

• DD predictors: education, income, age, Jewish ethnic origin (Mizrachi, 2005)

July 14, 2011: The people take to the street

THE STUDY

• Has the need for media reform been presented as an issue in the social protest of 2011 and its aftermath?

• If so, how? And if not, why?

Four policy-related by products of the social protest were studieג

1. The official government policy paper2. The “alternative” protesters’ policy report3. The protesters’ “media initiatives”4. The platforms of the political parties in the

2013 elections

Findings

• The “official committee” was a “technological utopianist” and utilized “social media” to communicate with the public.

• ““The new Israelis demand that their voices are heard, not as a one-time act during a demonstration, but in a structured and routine manner in the new “agora.”

• Recommendations: None

Findings

• The “alternative committee” calls for “services to citizens.” No details, no discussion of the ills of the media/ICT system

• The protesters stick to “alternative media” production. No activity created to propose media reform.

• The parties discussed lowering mobile phones prices, using media more efficiently for external propaganda, media bias. Recommendations: None

WHY?

• The neo-liberal takeover of the discourse• The protest movement as middle class• The inability to “see through” the media as a

system, when using it as a tool• The disbelief in structural change

Thank you