overview or Americasby Suzanne Bilello
Buoyed by a tenacious civil society anxious to realize the rewards of democratization, the press in Latin America continues to hold governments accountable and challenge corruption in the face of ongoing efforts by both public officials and criminal gangs to thwart these democratic impulses.
Despite the remarkable transition to democratic rule throughout Latin America, many of the region's fledgling democracies still lack vital governmental institutions to support these regimes. Legislatures and judiciaries are too often politically compromised, and many countries suffer from the absence of the rule of law. Moreover, there is a residual undercurrent of intolerance toward the news media on the part of governments throughout Latin America-a reminder of the not-so-distant past when journalists were frequent targets of assault, repression, censorship and the humiliating acquiescence of self-censorship under the region's numerous dictatorships.
But compared to the rest of the developing world, the press in Latin America today-with the exception of Cuba-has a remarkable breadth of freedom and, for the most part, a greatly diminished threat of imprisonment or physical attack.
At the time of the Committee to Protect Journalists' inception 15 years ago, Latin America was the most dangerous place in the world to be a journalist. Government-sponsored death squads used violence and murder to control the press. In the 1980s, drug mafias waged brutal campaigns against journalists in Colombia, claiming scores of victims. And more recently, left-wing guerrillas and right-wing paramilitary groups in Peru and Colombia have stalked the press.
Today, the journalistic climate is arguably more benign, but the problems the press now confronts are far more complex. CPJ's work in Latin America now involves navigating in an environment of punitive civil and criminal libel suits, direct and indirect financial pressures against publications and broadcasters, and the ongoing threat of the criminal underworld and their protectors in corrupt criminal justice systems. Organized crime rings, paramilitary groups, and police continue to impede journalists' work and endanger their lives. In 1996, CPJ has confirmed the murder of a Colombian journalist. As this book goes to press, two murders in Guatemala are under investigation.
In Cuba, the only country in the hemisphere with no press freedom, the independent press movement has survived a crucial year. Despite threats, harassment and repeated detentions by the state security police, a small but growing group of Cuban journalists continues efforts to carve out a livelihood independent of the state-controlled media, yet at a comfortable distance from organized dissident factions at home and abroad.
Disturbingly, threats against the press in Latin America too often come from public officials in democratically elected regimes in the form of libel suits and restrictive press laws. In Peru, four journalists are currently in prison on trumped-up charges of collaborating with terrorists. In Brazil, the congress is considering dozens of bills that could restrict an otherwise free environment for the press. Many Brazilian journalists and media owners alike interpret the congress's efforts to pass restrictive press legislation as punitive, since the Brazilian press has aggressively reported on government corruption. In Argentina, President Carlos Menem, arguably the most litigious head of state in the hemisphere, has brought dozens of lawsuits against journalists. In a major victory for press freedom in Argentina at the end of the year, a judge ruled against Menem in a lawsuit he brought against columnist Horacio Verbitsky and the editors of the newspaper Página 12.
In delivering her December ruling before a courtroom filled with journalists and some of Argentina's intellectual luminaries, the judge upheld the right of the press to report, declaring that journalists have an obligation to inform society. A free press, she said, "is a necessity in a democracy." Although it's been 14 years since Argentina's military dictatorship collapsed and the nation ushered in democratic rule, the acquittal in Menem's suit against Página 12 marked the first time an Argentine court so unequivocally acknowledged the centrality of a free press.
In 1996, Guatemala's 36-year civil war came to an end with the signing of a United Nations-brokered peace accord. Unfortunately, the accord's general amnesty is likely to leave the murders and disappearances of numerous journalists unresolved and unpunished and the culture of impunity that plagues many countries unchallenged. Similar accords in other countries, including Argentina, El Salvador and Chile, have resulted in a troubling irresolution and lack of accountability regarding journalists' fate.
Despite these vexing problems, the press in many Latin American countries enjoys unprecedented freedom and plays a vital role in setting the national agenda. Opinion polls in several countries reveal that the press is held in such high esteem by the public that it outranks all other national institutions, including the Catholic Church, in prestige and credibility.
In the absence of government safeguards, Latin American journalists are taking an increasingly active role in protecting themselves and press freedom in their respective countries. Independent associations now exist in Peru, Colombia, and Argentina to monitor press conditions and act on behalf of threatened or harassed journalists. These groups include the Peruvian Institute of Press and Society, which, since its inception in 1994, has helped fuel press freedom through its timely intervention in press attacks and the use of its moral weight to rally international support. In Argentina, the Association for the Defense of Independent Journalism, founded one year ago, succeeded in drawing national and international attention to President Menem's legal assaults on the press.
The robust growth of media companies throughout Latin America is another indicator of expanding press freedom in the region. New outlets, including radio programs and publications in indigenous languages, are emerging, increasing the diversity and accessibility of the news media.
In a recent discussion on the press in Haiti, a country that is slowly emerging from the trauma of decades of dictatorships, a foreign correspondent who has covered the country for years said that while overall conditions have vastly improved for the press, the shadow of the past is never far away. He emphasized the need to be vigilant of what gains had been achieved, and that his remarks could apply to the press throughout Latin America. "People are still very sensitive to any gathering of the clouds," said the reporter, who is based in Port-au-Prince. "We are not that far from hell, so we feel the heat."
Suzanne Bilello has been program coordinator for the Americas since February 1996. Prior to joining CPJ, Bilello was a staff reporter for Newsday, covering international business and immigration. She has written about Latin America for 15 years and was the Mexico City bureau chief for the Dallas Morning News from 1983 to 1987. She received several international awards for her coverage of the 1985 Mexico City earthquake. In 1988, she received an Alicia Patterson Fellowship to examine the roots of Mexico’s political and economic crisis. She is fluent in Spanish and is a graduate of Barnard College and the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism.
Mira Gajevic, a former research associate for the Americas, researched and wrote some of the 1996 cases for the region. She has a master’s degree in political science from the University of Mainz in Germany and is fluent in German and Spanish. She is currently a reporter with Deutsche Presse Agentur in Germany.
CPJ’s work in the Americas in 1996 was funded in part by the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.