The series – a co-production between Radio Australia and the University of Sydney - examines the role of media in democracy with particular reference to Australia’s neighbours in Southeast Asia. Program 3: The Asian way.

From the mid 1960s, few regions in the world displayed the political stability of Southeast Asia.

Several ASEAN countries experienced rapid economic growth and an expanding middle class. In these politically authoritarian but economically dynamic states, the media often conformed to the state’s expectations.

Doctrines such as Asian values were sometimes invoked to support this and to argue for the inappropriateness of Western notions of freedom of the press. In the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis, ‘the Asian way’ has been downplayed.

The series – a co-production between Radio Australia and the University of Sydney - examines the role of media in democracy with particular reference to Australia’s neighbours in Southeast Asia.

Transcripts of the programs are released progressively at the ABC website.

The full transcript for Program 3: The Asian Way, broadcast on March 24, is available at http://www.abc.net.au/ra/media/radio/s257122.htm

The following are excerpts from Program 3: The Asian Way, dealing with Singapore and Malaysia.

The interviewer is Peter Mares.

MARES : Hello, I’m Peter Mares. Welcome to On The Record – Media and Political Change.

Last week, we looked at development journalism – the notion that a responsible media can foster national unity and promote economic growth. It’s an ideal that was quickly co-opted by some governments in the Asia Pacific region to justify restrictions on reporting. We also explored the way in which legislation is used to curb freedom of expression.

Today, in program three – ‘The Asian Way’ – we look at constraints put on the media in the name of ‘Asian Values’.

While its origins are unclear, the term ‘Asian values’ has gained currency in the last decade or so. There’s debate over its exact meaning, but most analysts agree that “Asian values” can be summarised as emphasising consensus over conflict in decision making, as showing deference to leaders rather than criticism, and as putting the family and society ahead of individual rights.

Garry Rodan is Associate Professor in the School of Politics and International Studies at Murdoch University and has written extensively on the political economy of Southeast Asia.

RODAN : The essence, as I see it anyway, of the idea of Asian values was an opposition to liberal democracy. It was more a statement about what Asian political systems should not have, than what they should have. It was in effect a rationalisation for not allowing more political pluralism, certainly not more competitive politics. This was depicted as being antithetical to Asian ideas of consensus and co-operation. Now these things are highly problematic. The idea that an Asian political system is more oriented towards consensus than say, a western European political system. After all, if you don’t have mechanisms to consult, incorporate, give expression to the various interests and indeed conflicts of interest throughout society, how can you ever ascertain a consensus or arrive at a consensus if there is not wide and routine representation of conflicting interests. So, the concept of a free press was quite commonly depicted by advocates of Asian values as part and parcel of that sort of competitive, fractious, liberal democratic system that is not suited to the Asian approach to politics.

MARES : Singapore’s first Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, now Senior Minister in the People’s Action Party government, is a key proponent of Asian values. On Australian television in 1999, he had this to say, in a response to a question suggesting that ‘the Asian way’ was a thing of the past.

LEE : That is another myth that I’ve championed the Asian way. All I’ve done is to point out that we have certain historical traditions and habits and values. Therefore it is not easy just to become like the Americans. Wherever possible if it’s going to help us to improve our wealth, our well-being, we will incorporate whatever the Americans or anybody else offers us, but to throw away ourselves and become somebody else, that’s not possible. Asians, I better not speak about all Asians, there’s a lot of other people in Asia who might think differently, but I do know from my experience meeting Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Vietnamese, that east Asians have a deep and abiding faith in their own cultural values and traditions because these values and traditions have seen their societies through ups and downs, floods, famine, pestilence, drought and the family and the extended family and the obligations to each other have been able to help them survive these crises.

MARES : Lee Kuan Yew. Francis Seow is a former Solicitor General in Singapore and author of the book To Catch a Tartar : A Dissident in Lee Kuan Yew’s Prison.

SEOW : I don’t want to detract in any way the economic success of Singapore or some of the other achievements which Singapore has acquired under Lee Kuan Yew under his leadership, but there’s a big but to this. At what price? You see he propagates all these false and fallacious arguments or thesis like Asian values as if those values are only peculiarly Asian. Those values are values valued by every civilised person throughout the world. When he talks about Asian values, what he’s talking about is authoritarianism, that you must respect him, respect his authority, you do not challenge authority.

MARES : Dr William Atkins conducted research into the Southeast Asia media while at the University of Sydney. He now works as a media consultant. He says the notion of ‘Asian values’ has been used by various governments in the region to argue that a western style free press is not appropriate for Asia.

ATKINS : The whole development of Asian values was very much a construct to contrast the methods and approaches of western journalism to this consensual style of politics and there were many examples, in the 80s in particular where Western journalistic practices deeply irritated the governments of Malaysia and Singapore in particular and that heightened this formation of an Asian values.

REPORTER : “Dr Mahathir focused his attention on Australian journalists. They mock, vilify and insult me he said, it’s not the Asian way. Dr Mahathir accused Australian journalists of lacking manners and said for that reason Australia’s claim to be an Asian nation had no meaning whatsoever.”

MAHATHIR : We can’t do anything if people have no manners. I mean children, you can smack them, but whole nation or the journalists of a nation who have no manners, it’s very difficult who resort to personal vilification and all that.

MARES : Malaysia’s Dr Mahathir Mohamed and Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew, have been the most vocal proponents of the Asian values theory, presenting it as a common bond that unites countries in the region in opposition to the West.

But the notion of Asian values fails to take account of the differences that exist between Asian nations on all sorts of issues.

As an example, William Atkins cites the execution of a Filipino maid, Flor Contemplacion, in Singapore in 1995, an event which strained relations between two members of ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

ATKINS : There was a case of a maid from the Philippines who was based in Singapore who was found guilty of the murder of a child in her charge. Eventually she was hanged. Over the course of many months there was a high level diplomatic dispute between the Philippines and Singapore over the way the case was handled. Over the media coverage, the media coverage in fact became a diplomatic incident within itself. The Philippines media in the view of Singapore became extremely excitable about the issue and the Philippines journalists, newspaper columnists, television stations took a very aggressive approach to the story and were accusing the Singaporeans of being out of touch, that Flor Contemplacion was in fact not guilty, that she’d been set up, that the Singapore Police were corrupt and so forth. It really did lead to a high level diplomatic dispute in the way that the media coverage unfolded. For instance, in the Philippines newsreaders wore black armbands, there were accusations in the newspaper about corruption in Singapore and to be accused by an ASEAN neighbour of corruption and of malpractice in the police force and in the judiciary was seen in a very poor light there. So when this issue finally was resolved it was resolved at the highest level where Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong and President Ramos of the Philippines had to talk and sort this out and in fact there was an exchange of things like press clippings and videos in order for them to understand one another’s perspective and on the national day speech that Goh Chok Tong gave the following year he made the point that the Philippines and Singaporeans have completely different values. Now I think that was very instructive in that it suggested that there wasn’t a clear ASEAN or Asian consensus on some matters when it came to the press and the discussion of important social issues.

MARES : William Atkins

. …….…. (next excerpt follows)

Singapore specialist, Garry Rodan again.

RODAN : We don’t hear quite the same amount of rhetoric about Asian values in Singapore today, partly I think because the currency of these ideas was undermined to some extent by the Asian crisis because in the lead up to that crisis of course Asian values were depicted in a very positive light. These were the things that were supposed to have underscored the very impressive rapid economic development in the region. When the crisis broke the idea of Asian values was linked by many critics of the way in which economies and societies have been run in Asia with nepotism, cronyism and other ailments of these economies. I’d like to emphasise that there’s nothing that I have said yet that should be concluded, there is no change in Singapore. There is change even at the level of reporting. If you look at the Business Times, for example the government owned newspaper, it’s more critical about the corporate sector and scrutinises things more so than it did before the crisis, but the real issue is whether the change that takes place, the political accommodation to the different sort of society that Singapore is now from what it was 20 years ago, whether that change is going to incorporate a more competitive political system or whether it’s going to involve more extensive forms of political co-option and it’s quite clear that competition, the whole point of the PAP’s reform agenda and the way it’s trying to manage change is to limit competition to within PAP controlled institutions. You might report on poor political performances premised on the idea that well, we have to fix these things up to fix up the PAP, not to replace the PAP.

MARES : Garry Rodan. In Malaysia however, ‘Asian values’ are still very much a part of the political rhetoric. Kean Wong is based in Kuala Lumpur where he’s a correspondent for the BBC’s World Service and for the Economist.

WONG : In Malaysia at least the Prime Minister, Dr Mahathir has, while not used that loaded phrase that much any more, feels however still quite vindicated of what others as well would consider quite radical proposals during the economic crisis back in September 1998 when not only did he sack his Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, Anwar Ibrahim, but he also brought in capital controls which in economic terms dramatically transformed the nature of Malaysia’s economy from one which was fairly open with a fairly open liberal trade and financial regime into one that ran counter against this globalisation idea being propagated by the IMF and by the United States. But since that time Malaysia’s economy has recovered and the stock market has begun to grow greatly again and Dr Mahathir feels that his measures, though unusual at the time, have been vindicated and that of course is certainly reflected by the Malaysian media which has been quite triumphal I suppose about proving what they would call, you know, the evil west wrong, so in terms of creating a different alternative financial governance, Dr Mahathir has actually been strengthened in some ways when he resumes perhaps this rhetoric in proposing some sort of an Asian values democracy.

MARES : Kean Wong points out that many people are prepared to trade off civil liberties in return for economic benefits.

WONG : One thing that the middle classes in most countries I think in southeast Asia have proven is that as long as there’s some sort of delivery of the economic goods and as long as growth continues and people become more comfortable and more and more people are leveraged into this ‘fabled’ middle class of great consumer materialism and so on, I think the demands of say free and uncensored information come in a very distant second.

MARES : The challenge for Malaysia’s civil libertarians is convincing people that a free and open media is no threat to economic stability and can in fact promote development.

Chandra Muzaffar from the Opposition National Justice Party.

MUZAFFAR : We have to show them that we are capable of providing that stability which they value and yet guaranteeing political and civil rights and I don’t think it’s difficult at all and one of the arguments I use very often, you know, this is the argument to which Armatya Sen, the Nobel laureate has made in many of his writings. The virtue that’s inherent in freedom is this – that if you want development that really benefits the human being you also must provide for freedom. Why? Because if you look at something very, very concrete there hasn’t been a single society in history which has been free where the people have gone hungry. His point is that, you know, you look at India. For all its economic problems there’s never been a famine in democratic India. Why? Because the moment it happens it gets reported. There’s no way you can hide a famine. The opposition will talk about it, the media will talk about it, but famines have occurred in recent times in a country that is sometimes trotted out as an example of a country where there has been development. In other words, you know, you sacrifice freedoms but there is development, meaning by which China. China of course, growth, development, but China has gone through very serious famines and those famines are not even known to the people. More than 10 million died in one of those tragic famines during the Mao years. People didn’t know about this great tragedy because there’s no free press. It is in democracies that you can ensure real development.

MARES : Chandra Muzaffar also points to the pattern of ownership and political patronage which inhibits critical analysis in Malaysia’s mainstream media.

MUZAFFAR : Companies affiliated to or aligned to the establishment own almost every major newspaper in every language in the country and that would be what – Malay, Chinese, Tamil and English. For instance, if you take the English newspapers – The New Straits Times is linked to UMNO which is the mainstay of the ruling coalition. You know, the Sun is owned indirectly by a tycoon who is very, very close to the establishment, so ownership is yet another mechanism of control in the country. The other thing is self-censorship. When you are in this sort of situation you decide to be cautious, over-cautious one would say. It’s not a question of protecting your rice bowl, you know, as people sometimes say well, you know, they have to look after their rice bowl. I mean this is more than a rice bowl that they’re talking about. When it’s all these creature comforts that they have become so used to, you know, palatial mansions and, you know, luxury cars and certain lifestyle, you know, they don’t know how to give up those things because those things may be threatened if you take a position.