Journalists and Politics

Journalists going into politics is not a phenomenon unique to Slovenia. Before embarking on their political careers, such well-known leaders as Winston Churchill and Al Gore worked in journalism, as did such notorious politicians as the French far-right Éric Zemmour and Sarah Palin, who worked as a sports journalist before presidential candidate John McCain pulled her out of anonymity. Most would probably agree that it would have been better if Sarah had stuck to her first love, as she would probably have done less damage there, with all due respect to the journalistic profession. The recently deceased President of the European Parliament, David Sassoli, also worked as a journalist for many years, and among politicians still living and active, Boris Johnson must of course be mentioned. BoJo was a Brussels correspondent and columnist for the British Daily Telegraph. He wrote his last column for the paper just before the Brexit referendum, which was his springboard to the top of British politics, from which he recently fell so ingloriously. Johnson was the same kind of journalist as he is a politician: rotten and mendacious. But in Johnson’s case the immorality was not a consequence of his move from journalism into politics, but of his personality. So neither his case nor the other transfers mentioned are an argument for sweepingly condemning anyone who decides to take this step. There is no reason why a good journalist cannot also become a good politician.

Things get complicated when a politician wants to return to journalism after his career, and this is precisely what bothers many commentators about the latest moves in Slovenia. Incidentally, this is apparently what Boris Johnson is thinking about these days, perhaps out of love for the journalistic profession, or perhaps also because the Daily Telegraph paid him 270,000 pounds a year for his weekly columns. With that money you can afford a lot of active holidays in Jezersko. Comparisons with other countries are interesting, but neither Churchill nor Sarah Palin, and still less Boris Johnson, can give us a definitive answer as to whether such transitions are acceptable or harmful—for journalism, for politics and for democracy. They are certainly always complicated and sensitive, above all because independent media in a democracy are one of the pillars of the system of oversight of politics. Moves from one status to the other, and especially back again, therefore raise legitimate questions about the risks to the system of oversight and safeguards without which democracy cannot function.

In Slovenia’s case we also have the specific problem that we are a very small pond in which many fish know each other. The effectiveness of oversight of democracy here is objectively limited even if no journalist goes into politics. An even bigger problem in Slovenia is that politics has such a bad reputation. For many, politics really is a whore, as my late grandmother Anuncijata liked to say, and anyone who goes from journalism into politics does not take a job but, at least in the eyes of many, sells out. Politics has an extremely bad reputation in Slovenia. Anyone who enters it risks being marked forever. This is a serious problem, as it encourages negative selection of those to whom we entrust the running of the state. The problem is that we will not solve the bad reputation of politics by condemning journalists who go into politics or take jobs in it, but only by improving people’s trust in it. We need better politics and better politicians. To achieve this, one of the necessary conditions is that as many people as possible with knowledge, integrity and standing enter politics. Journalists included. The argument related to their role in overseeing politics cannot be taken as absolute. If the anathema on political engagement applies to journalists, why not also to judges and civil society activists? Police officers, doctors? Will we really get to a better democracy by sweepingly blocking the way to it for many people who are qualified and have already proved it through their expertise and principled conduct in their own field?

In my opinion, that is not the right way. The sensitivity of such transitions is a reality, so individuals who choose to make them take on personal responsibility and must accept that their conduct will be monitored even more closely and carefully by the public. We also urgently need a series of systemic and social changes. The greatest responsibility lies with politics, which alone can regain lost trust and reputation. If, for such a large part of the public, politics remains nothing but a rotten puddle, then let us not complain that there are so many shady characters, village eccentrics and mediocrities in politics. The journalistic guild also bears great responsibility, as it must insist uncompromisingly on respect for the professional rules and ethics of its profession. Both regarding those who are “only” journalists and especially regarding the “special returnees” who would like to come back from politics into journalism.

That does not mean that journalists should not have their own opinions and beliefs. In Slovenia we are trapped in a binary polarization between the concept of “independent” journalists without values or ideology and the concept of a “balanced” media space in which journalists are merely socio-political workers and obedient foot soldiers of one political option or another. The first is fiction; the second is the antithesis of democracy. There is nothing unusual or undemocratic about a journalist having political beliefs. The same goes for media outlets. For most media in developed democracies, it is known whether they lean left, center or conservative. What matters, of course, is that they understand the basic rules of journalism, such as the difference between reporting and opinion, and consistently respect journalistic ethics. For more than a century, the British Guardian has carried the motto “Comment is free, but facts are sacred” in its masthead. The problem arises when an individual or an outlet subordinates journalistic professionalism to ideology and writes at the dictation of its political godfather and master.

Another big problem, not only for Slovenian journalism but for democracy in Slovenia, is the precariousness of the journalistic profession. Journalists in Slovenia generally have less trouble paying for active holidays in Jezersko than paying their bills. This is, on the one hand, a major existential threat to journalists and, on the other, a danger to democracy. Precariousness creates vulnerability to pressure. And as for moves into politics, journalists should decide on them because they believe they can still achieve and prove something in that field, not because otherwise they cannot survive or escape pressure, smears and threats. We will not have a better democracy in Slovenia by denying journalists a priori the possibility of going into politics, but when we manage to raise substantially the level of political culture, professionalism and integrity. Above all among politicians, but also in the media. We ourselves can do a lot for this too. After all, we still have the opportunity and the right to choose for ourselves whom we read, listen to, watch and vote for.