The old model of journalism as business is busted

Last week Edward LUCAS, editor at The Economist and senior vice-president at the Center for European Policy Analysis, invited by hromadske.ua, gave a talk in Kyiv titled “The New Cold War: Who Is Going to Win and What Are the Possible Outcomes?” The renowned British journalist is an expert in energy policy, cyber security, intelligence, Russian foreign and security policy, as well as politics and economy of Eastern European countries. Perhaps the best-known among his numerous publications is his book The New Cold War: Putin’s Russia and the Threat to the West. Lucas is also The Day’s author: at our paper’s request he has constantly provided commentary on a variety of topical events across the globe. So The Day took advantage of the famous journalist’s arrival (which is a rare occurrence) to present him with the book A Case Without a Statute of Limitations in English which, citing editor-in-chief Larysa Ivshyna’s words, “explores one of those stories which, despite its antiquity (and it dates back to more than 15 years ago), still keeps Ukraine in the past.” Lucas accepted the book with gratitude and agreed to answer a few questions concerning the responsibility of Western journalism for spreading Russian influence in Europe, pro-Russian lobbies, Russia-exported corruption, and on how journalists themselves must fix this state of affairs.

“Journalists must decide whether they are part of entertainment business or part of public life. If you are part of public life, you must have courage and bear responsibility. And if you are part of entertainment business, you must have no privileges, no responsibility,” says Lucas. “If we analyze the ethics of journalism and its business model, we will see that at the moment the old business model is busted. Obviously, the media in the private sector are experiencing real problems.

EDWARD LUCAS, EDITOR OF THE ECONOMIST, WAS VERY PLEASED TO ACCEPT THE DAY’S PRESENT: THE BOOK A CASE WITHOUT A STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS IN ENGLISH. FOR THE EXPERT WHO HAS A DEEP INTEREST IN THE HISTORY OF OUR REGION IT WILL BE INTERESTING TO LEARN ABOUT PARTICULAR MOMENTS IN UKRAINE’S MOST RECENT HISTORY WHICH WERE NOT COVERED BY THE WESTERN PRESS / Photo courtesy of the author

“If we have public or philanthropists’ funds, or some other revenues from commercial activity, it should be clearly understood that it is not part of entertainment business.”

So don’t you see any solution or way out for Western journalism to play a positive role in the education of the masses and make the elite and the politicians follow the declared values?

“The idea of journalism is the development of thinking. Journalists bear responsibility for contributing to public culture and the development of public opinion. I like this idea. As I have already mentioned, there exists a massive dichotomy in journalism: we are either part of entertainment business or part of public life.”