The journey from there to here – with plans in motion to celebrate the IFJ’s centenary – has had plenty of twists and turns. World war two created an interregnum; the cold war led to a split that endured, nominally at least, until 2016.
More surprising than the bumps in the road, or, indeed, recent issues that affect the international body, are the continuities that resonate through this turbulent century.
The IFJ’s inaugural objectives included: safeguarding the freedom of the press, ensuring fair pay for journalists, and establishing means to differentiate professional news gatherers from hobbyists. At early meetings delegates fretted about the spread of fake news, training for media workers, and the risks posed to their jobs by technology. A recurring debate in the early days was the likely impact of ‘radiophonic’ journalism. Surely people would soon forget how to read, so easy was it to obtain news from the new ‘speaking boxes’, some said? The equal treatment of women reporters was another topic that has featured on agendas form the start.
An early issue concerned the status of a Paris-based union of Russian journalists. It was waved into membership, before others denounced the emigre grouping as representatives of a ‘Tsarist clique’. It was advance notice of the issues that geopolitics pose for any representative organisation with global aspirations.
Not only are the issues remarkably similar to those that animate us to this day, the national organisations at the heart of the IFJ are also familiar to modern eyes. Among the early participants were unions from: Germany, Austria, Australia, Bulgaria, Spain, Finland, France, Great Britain, Latvia, the Netherlands, Greece, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Czechoslovakia, Spain, Norway and Switzerland. Of those who have served as President of General Secretary in the intervening century, the vast majority have come from those countries.
Such continuity might be dismissed as happenstance. I suspect, however, that something far deeper is afoot. Journalism is an unusual trade. Like all workers, we make our livings within volatile economies. Journalists, however, face unique challenges. We compete with each other to succeed. Ill-considered governments, and powerful individuals, try to control what we say – sometimes by violent means. Even our employers are vulnerable to pressures constraining their commitment to free expression.
Despite the intrinsic competitiveness of our work, however, journalists have long responded to these pressures collectively. Within workplaces, employees have formed committees to put their case to management. Nationally we have created unions. And internationally, we have sustained the IFJ. No where does this shared, collectivist impulse, shaped by our shared work experience, feel like a unique point of kinship than at the IFJ’s triennial Congress. A sea of faces, representing every creed, skin tone, religion and cultural background come together. Whatever might be the political differences that we debate, some hotly contested, uniting us all is that deep kernel of understanding that standing together is the most effective way to protect and promote journalists.
The briefest surveys of current work shows how effective that can be: schemes to directly support journalists in Afghanistan, Ukraine, Africa, and Latin America. A determined campaign for a UN Convention on the Safety of Journalists. Proceedings lodged at the International Criminal Court in respect of the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh. Safety training, union building and pay equality initiatives all ongoing. Historic achievements, would fill many more paragraphs.
A centenary is an important maker for any association. Longevity, particularly in an organisation sustained by individuals’ voluntary contributions, demonstrates an approach to our priorities that, over the long-haul, has been recognised as resounding as it has effective.
It is also an important point for a ‘family’ to come together and reflect on the past, particularly the recent past. Such are moments to consider whether contemporary methods are fit for the future. For these deliberations to be truly effective, we need input from every member of the collective – those who recently been at the helm, and those who advocated a divergent approach. Only by synthesising all of that experience can we fashion a plan that will deliver quality journalism, and its necessary precondition, fair working conditions for journalists.
The threats confronting us seem extraordinary. Established media faces a crisis of trust. Economic change has undermined long-standing media business models. Populism and demagoguery appear ascendent. And Artificial intelligence poses risks the enormity of which we are only beginning to grasp.
Is that a more worrisome backdrop than that facing our predecessors in the 1920s? I will leave that question to the historians. What I am certain of, however, is that the most effective response will be one that draws on the greatest possible pool of talent and commitment, and pulls together our movement, as happened a century ago.
Do that now, and who knows, the IFJ might make its second centenary. I have no crystal ball, but I confidently predict that, at heart, many of the issues facing journalists in three or four generations time will be familiar. For there to be hope of reaching that point, though, we must make a good fist of the next decade and the one after that. I implore all who know in their hearts that they and their organisations are part of this continuum, to recommit themselves to our common endeavour and guide our first steps into our second century.
Tim Dawson is deputy general secretary of the IFJ.