The fable of the servant and of the fourth state power

Once upon a time there was a democratic country with two large parties governing the people from parliament. Everyone called parliament the first state power. The wise people of the parties drew up and integrated their plans for the nation in wonderful political programs, that is, messages to the people. And, when the time came, the people would vote for the best program; the winning party would form the government for a period of four years and would carry out all the things it had promised in its program. The government was known as the second state power. To make sure everything happened as it was supposed to and that there was no deception, there was also a third state power, the judiciary.

Citizens in the cities and provinces needed information and news about what the government was doing and about what alternatives were being put forward by the opposition, this press performed this function. The press communicated news and messages to the people from politicians. To this end, the press might be thought of as a kind of servant. Of course, like any servant, it whispered from time to time in the kitchen and in the pub about its masters - this was called comment. But, at the end of the day, it knew how to separate work, the news, from pleasure, opinion. In short: The media saw itself as chroniclers and harbingers, the guardians and sometimes even as the (highly regarded) court jesters of our kingdom. And so it was that they referred to themselves proudly as the fourth state power, despite the fact that there is no reference of this in constitution.

And so ends our wonderful tale from democracy's golden age, when everything was so simple. The government governed, the opposition opposed, the courts acted as a perfect counterbalance and the press reported "all the news that is fit to print" (the famous statement that appeared daily on the front page of the New York Times) so that the people knew what was going on. Does this reflect reality today? No, what we really mean is: The debate about reality today? Parties in crisis, the government using the media for its own ends. The media blurs the lines between opinion, news and entertainment; they are only interested in optimizing viewing figures and profits. Checkbook journalism exists and politicians have even talked about cattle-market journalism. The media is only interested in reporting about personalities, political rows and scandals, about that referred to as political symbolism, and not about reality. Modern-day newsrooms are expected to supply infotainment. The courts are helpless to do anything else but to go with the flow or to even make erratic judgments. The public is manipulated and taken for a ride by all involved. Indeed, it won't be long before people begin to believe that all the world's troubles can be made to "go away" simply by changing channels - much like "Mr. Chance" in the famous film.

And what is the moral of this tale? Don't trust those old fables! Believe neither the fairy tale about the press as a servant to its political master nor the one about it being the fourth state power, as the loudest mouthpiece of the public. Neither of these ideal models has ever existed (...). Things have always been far more complicated. One should also be suspicious of the new science-based myths about future media power and fractal politics in cyberspace from CNN and Berlusconi. In actual fact, by looking back at the history of the media it is clear that even a figure such as Bismarck could hardly be regarded as being more virtuous, as far as manipulating the media is concerned, than today's politicians, and even Machiavelli knew all the tricks of the trade.

(...) Symbolic politics is nothing new (...). I would prefer to draw attention to the many small but concrete changes that have taken place. Real revolutions are, in actual fact, far more rare than their protagonists would have us believe. What we want to know is what is really going on between the parties, the media and the public?

Four models

The basic question is: Who is really setting the political agenda? The parties, the media or the public?