Hatoyama and the Japanese media courtship of officials sources

Communication is the "Achiless' heel" of Japanese

interaction with the outside world.

Interesting event we held at my press club the other

day, about the Kisha Club system and what it means for

foreign media.

Not so many people attended, sign that there are less

and less foreign journalists in Japan, but I was much

curious to listen to the debates since I share the co -

chairmanship of the Foreign Correspondents' Club of

Japan Freedom of the Press Committee.

The end of the Kisha Club system in Japan? Not really

I say. The censorship continues and it remains a

challenge to exercise the job of journalist in Japan.

Why? For decades, institutions here in Japan,

government, ministries, agencies, corporations

entertained a cosy system of relations between the

speakers and the press.

Half a dozen of national dailies and same amount of

TVs, including the national state channels, maintained

a biased influence to control the knowledge of the

public, through the vernacular and the foreign media.

Kisha clubs were the only ones allowed to say what

Japanese and foreigners have to know about Japan.

Sometimes, it went very far as the DPJ recently

clarified. Japanese Foreign Minister Okada

demonstrated how authorities could disguise truth and

cheated their own fellow countrymen for years as we saw

with the Japan US nuclear secret pact story.

Needless to say that it is still extremely difficult

for the foreign media to find their way into this

labyrinth and it would be necessary to implement new

measures for setting or reinforcing such organizations

whose mission is to help the foreign media. Reporting

in Japan is tough : language and customs barrier, lack

of communication, lack of rational explanation,

hardship in getting an interview with facts rather than

emotional statements, hardship to build a journey in

Japan to get appointments (people refuse if you are a

foreigner) etc. In a world where a journalist office

consist into 1 person nowadays, what is needed is an

interface. I have one here, very efficient :

The interesting professional structure is the Foreign

Press Center of Japan which I know well and used for a

decade to work daily on common issues and to access to

interviews or to the highest level of power in the

archipelago. Located in the press center building in

Kasumigaseki. Foreign Press Center : http://fpcj.jp/

Access to information is the main issue in Japan

In 2009, the Democratic Party of Japan came to power

after half a century of conservatives rules. The prime

minister Hatoyama and his close allies, Okada and Kan,

pledged to remove any barrier to access to information

for all journalists. In fact, it failed as an overall

reform yet. Here is a description by the New York

Times reporter in Japan :

"Japan’s new government is challenging one of the

nation’s most powerful interest groups, the press

clubs, a century-old, cartel-like arrangement in which

reporters from major news media outlets are stationed

inside government offices and enjoy close, constant

access to officials.

The system has long been criticized as antidemocratic

by both foreign and Japanese analysts, who charge that

it has produced a relatively spineless press that feels

more accountable to its official sources than to the

public. In their apparent reluctance to criticize the

government, the critics say, the news media fail to

serve as an effective check on authority.

The assault on the exclusive access the press clubs’

members have long enjoyed is part of the new

government’s drive to end the news media’s cozy ties

with authorities, and particularly with Tokyo’s

powerful central ministries."

Still, private firms do not show any strong commitment

to transparency and adhere to new policies, and keep

the curtain closed on free media access or even worst

as it was said at FCCJ press panel on the Kisha Club by

Tetsuo Jimbo, Editor in Chief of Videonews.com : "firms

choose who they will inform and select to release the

information."

" Tetsuo Jimbo, the founder of an online media company,

Video News Network, praised the new government’s

efforts. But he said most news conferences remained

closed to outside journalists like himself. He noted

that the Democrats had opened the proceedings at only

four ministries and major agencies, and had failed to

fulfill a campaign promise to open the prime minister’s

news conferences."

Who are you?

An other trick to avoid the access to all media to

events is to set rules that are not fairly played. At

Obama recent press conference at the prime minister

office in Tokyo (Kantei), the Japanese media and the

foreign media were offered 2 questions each to the VIPs

Obama and Hatoyama.

But the Japanese press "Kisha Club Captain" (Japanese

press club front man) who works with Fuji TV asked 6

questions in allocated time. Irritating for all media

present.

When players forget to play by the book, there is

something unhealthy and the betrayed are not only the

foreign media and the companies that are not present

"in the first circle", the main victims are readers,

listeners, viewers, deprived from a variety of free

access to information. Japan has still a long way to

go to resolve problems related to freedom of the press.

It requires increased assistance to foreign media and

expertise in handling international communication with

genuine experienced people.

Also new technologies will explode the blockade set by

punchers to freedom of the press, in power since "the

postwar Japan’s “iron triangle” of Liberal Democrats,

bureaucrats and big corporations."

21st Century & "Japan communication?

We can broadcast, twitt, blog live nowadays... Still,

Japan, claiming it is a genuine democracy and often

makes this distinction with other Asian nations, does

not see that the main issue remains about freeing

access to news sources and end the "Iron-Curtain"

practices.

Japanese politicians and stubborn bureaucrats &

officials should do their homework, they should

understand how world media work. They should

understand what ethics mean, they should offer the

information in a professional formula that guarantees

equality of distribution, accountability, fairness and

honesty. Especially because the information (not the

'infotainment' or the ads pledged to the PR industry)

is spreading fast, reaching quasi instantly your

hand-phone, palm, whatever screen.

Beyond the "communication boom", it is primordial to

strengthen the role of qualified and 'public interest

orientated people' who know how to design, dispatch and

distribute verified and balanced news for the foreign

media. In this regard Japanese authorities have yet to

analyze their media strategies and offer more

incentives and funding. Otherwise? Foreign media will

look at China to open their office, Hong Kong,

Shanghai, Beijing, Seoul. Japan will remain an

isolated aging invisible archipelago lost on the

Pacific.

But it takes experience, knowledge and strategies to

attract foreign media journalists and writers. Knowing

or discovering Japan arcane reality is not just a

journey to Kyoto or Hokkaido, it takes much more, it

takes content and information, more than a snap-shot to

be lost on a hard disk of a computer. To achieve this,

some people, as I said before, have recipes. It is not

just a matter of subsidies, or being cheap on budgets,

it is a matter of talent in organizing and operating

press communication for most 'informative' and precise

reports.

Maybe the Japanese Kisha Clubs lost some of their

censoring power, but it is up to the Japanese political

authorities to show where Tokyo stands from now on.

Especially in a nation, Japan, where communication is

not necessarily verbal, clear sign that communication

is the "Achiless heel" of Japanese interaction with the

outside world.

This is my experience after 2 decades in EU and the Far

East media world, anchoring and moderating events and

news-shows.

The NYT paper http://tinyurl.com/yjl5sw2

Foreign Press Center : http://fpcj.jp/

Illustrations from Ebina Mitsuru and Kang Kong (CCLPM)