Is Conrad Black Canada's most powerful man?

The concentration of ownership in the Canadian newspaper industry has led to a hegemony of ideology by the most powerful owners. This situation is endangering national identity and under-representing and misrepresenting Canadian citizens. Canadians are not accurately represented in print media today because of the inordinate amount of control that large newspaper corporations have in shaping public opinion. The original function of the free press has been forgotten: maintaining democracy through the free exchange of ideas and opinions on the printed page has become obsolete, even mythical. The ideas and opinions expressed in newspapers presently are generally those of the majority shareholder, or those which follow the ideology of that person. Conrad Black owns Hollinger Inc. and is the majority shareholder in Southam Inc., two of the largest newspaper corporations in the country. Through these companies, Black controls most of Canada's daily newspapers. Newspapers today maintain the "status-quo" which is tailored by those in control, in accordance with their values, ideology, and preferences which work to the detriment of Canadian culture and identity.

Power-holders in the private sector are generally unregulated due to their substantial revenue and political influence. Paul Desmarais of Power Corp., who only recently sold his shares in Southam Inc. to Black's Hollinger Inc., is consistently one of the Liberal Party's largest financial contributors. Neither the Liberal Party nor the Conservative Party have implemented recommendations from the 1970 Davey committee, or the 1981 Kent Commission, which both were concerned over the concentration of ownership in the newspaper industry. Southam's president once stated that they contribute to the Conservatives and the Liberals because they "believe in the Canadian two-party system." Ironically, Canada had three major federal parties at the time, and he had excluded the NDP. The NDP stands in contrast to those two parties, because they do not accept donations from big business. They do not represent corporate interests, therefore corporations have nothing to gain by financing the NDP. When big business gives money to the Liberals and Conservatives, it is more an investment than a donation and is evident in the lack of regulation which has led to the increase of newspaper monopolies. In 1983 former Cabinet minister James Fleming held hearings and drafted legislation after the 1981 Kent Royal Commission had died at the end of a late 1983 parliamentary session. He had watered down Kent's proposals, but was mysteriously removed from Cabinet before the proposed legislation was even brought forward. He was warned by some senior bureaucrats that he was working on "something very dangerous," because of the political power and influence of newspaper chain owners.

Peter Desbarats, a senior consultant to the 1981 Kent Royal Commission on Newspapers and dean of the graduate school of journalism at the University of Western Ontario wrote in a recent article:

"The nightmare scenario of 1981 is unfolding, except that the players are different and the concentration is even more massive. Apart from the Toronto Sun group of newspapers, the dwindling remains of Thomson's Canadian newspaper empire, a few regional clusters and an insignificant number of independents, Conrad Black owns the nation's daily newspapers. He has made history by becoming the first publisher to establish a significant presence in both English and French Canada."

In 1981, it was Thomson and Southam and their growing chain ownership which prompted a call for a royal commission on newspapers. Today, however, newspapers are concentrated in the hands of one person, who has gained a monopoly over Canadian presses. Black's recent increase in his Southam Inc. shares rose from 20.5 per cent to 41 per cent which has resulted in a chorus of calls for newspaper regulation. Cabinet ministers who watch over the mass media have stated that they have no plans to challenge Black's expansion. Page one of the Kent report stated: "Freedom of the press is not a property right of owners. It is a right of the people. It is part of their right to free expression, inseparable from their right to inform themselves." People are still able to inform themselves by reading newspapers, but it is what they are being informed of that is the point of contention.

Due to chain ownership and the concentration of ownership by Conrad Black, it has been evident that one group is consistently dominant across a range of issues. The conservative-elite world view influences not only what is written, but how it is currently written in most daily newspapers in Canada. Black has established a hegemonic monopoly in the Canadian newspaper world. He has strong views and values, and intends to express them through his papers. In 1981 Black enforced the printing of a column by the right- wing Fraser Institute in all Southam dailies. Southam donates large blocks to this institution that promotes a corporate world view to the detriment of women, immigrants, minorities, welfare recipients, workers and other groups that are not part of dominant ideology in Canada. This appears to be a conflict of interest; newspapers should be committed to unbiased coverage, but by helping to finance and further the agenda of the far-right-wing organization, Southam has disregarded this tenet of the newspaper world.

Hegemony combines persuasion from above with consent from below. The extreme concentration by Conrad Black in the Canadian newspaper industry creates a hegemony of ideology: he is free to advertise his conservative-elitist views throughout his papers as if it were fact. Once this status- quo is established, it becomes common sense, rather than a corporate class ideology which represents only a small percentage of the population. It is through this ideology that people make both their lives and world intelligible. If hegemony within the industry were diffused, the alternatives would be accessible and would become part of the status-quo. With many ideologies available, it would not become "common sense" to conform to just one view. One ideology may dominate others, but it would not virtually rub them out of existence, as is the case today. To argue a case against hegemony is to lapse into some kind of conspiracy theory about a consciously manipulative, diabolic elite. The hegemony over ideology in newspapers limits the range of ideas by which people can understand themselves and the world around them which is harmful to the Canadian cultural environment.

Newspapers tend to hire reporters and editors who already hold similar views to the owner or the perspective of the paper, while maintaining that they are not stifling the free exchange of ideas. Hollinger president David Radler recently stated, "What are we supposed to do, just shrink and fade away? Look, there's no conspiracy, OK? [Black] is only one man. All our newspapers will have strong local publishers." One is prompted to re-examine what Radler means by "strong," because prior to Hollinger's further investment in Southam, he had said, "I am ultimately the publisher of all these papers, and if editors disagree with us, they should disagree with us when they're no longer in our employ." Perhaps Radler is not referring to the strength of publishers in the area of editorial quality and commitment to covering local news competently while exploring a variety of viewpoints. Perhaps Black's chief lieutenant is referring to their strength in slashing staff and re-organizing newspapers and making profit top priority, while maintaining the hegemonic ideology of the corporate class.

The commodification of the print industry has marginalized the diversity of views that once existed, when the press was not such a censored forum. The absence of this forum has terminated the advancement of the spread of knowledge. In today's world the public is dependent on knowledge carefully selected and regulated by large, privately owned corporations. The necessity for an open exchange of ideas in print does not reconcile the necessity for newspapers to attract substantial amounts of advertising revenue. The newspapers sell neat packages of information that appeal to a vast demography; this sells the paper to all types of people and, this in turn, attracts advertisers for the different markets that are reached by the mass-appeal newspapers.

The net effect of profit pursuit is the affectation of representation of Canadian values and perspectives. They are subordinated to the dollar and dissolve in the presence of the hegemonic "status-quo" established by those who have the money to do so. Canadian writer Margaret Atwood states:

"The reader looks in the mirror and sees not the writer but himself; and behind his own image in the foreground, a reflection of the world he lives in. If a country or a culture lacks such mirrors it has no way of knowing what it looks like. If, as has long been the case in this country, the viewer is given a mirror that reflects not him but someone else, and told at the time that the reflection he sees is himself, he will get a very distorted idea of what he is really like."

The Canadian newspaper is failing to play the mirror, reflecting back at the average citizen an accurate image of his or her cultural environment. Canadians are not sure what they look like. Their identities are foreign to them. They know that they are outsiders in relation to the U.S. They know they are inextricably unsatisfied. They know that a concentration of ownership is not a good thing. But they do not know who they are as cultural and political creatures. The press has not allowed Canadians the luxury of a diverse, minimally biased, political, economic, and cultural news coverage.

The Kent Report states that the press should not be dominated by the powerful, or subverted by people with concerns other than those proper to a newspaper serving a democracy.

The press once served as a forum where serious public debate and a vast range of ideas were published; people were able to form their own opinions after considering many differing ideas presented in a fairly open forum. The opinions of others would help to form a diversity of well-informed views. This spread of knowledge was the basis for early democracy. Certain citizens gained enough education to govern affairs in the name of their peers, and other citizens were able to make informed decisions on who to vote for. The newspaper industry is essential to Canadian democracy; are we without a crucial factor for the operation of our political system? In today's world, newspapers only inform the public about those issues that owners and big business consider important. The free exchange of ideas has become a myth, created by the lack of government regulation in the newspaper industry.

The growing concentration of the newspaper industry by one man is a dangerous precedent. One ideology has been made to seem "normal" while ideologies which differ from this are regarded as "alternative" or out in "left field." The corporate agenda has become the only one that matters, and this is reflected in the content of newspapers today. Biased news is portrayed as fact, and certain news stories are left uncovered because they may not agree with the interests of big business. Generally, if it works against profit, it doesn't get printed.

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