Environmental journalism in Turkey

4. Environmental journalism in Turkey

In Turkey, the entrance of environmental problems into mass media coverage took place in the 1970s, and henceforth communities began to have insights into the issue. However, this awareness has not taken place among all communities but only among those living in metropolises that are directly exposed to problems like air pollution, first and foremost, and marine pollution. The public community has developed sensitivity to these problems, as they have become facts of daily life. Rather than comprehending the problem as a whole, however, this sensitivity has had a fragmented quality unfolding itself as individual complaints about air pollution, seas unsuitable for swimming, uncollected garbage and noise. Only at the end of 1970s, the 1980s and afterward, have environmental problems begun to be approached from a more holistic perspective. Although there is a holism in the sense of being aware of all these problems, there is no wholeness in the point of comprehending the source of the problems and producing solutions (Özdemir, 1988).

The following is a list of the characteristics of the approach to environmental news in Turkey: (1) Over the years, the amount of environmental news has increased, but the space allocated has decreased.

Environmental news reports are often single-column news. Generally in summer months, these reports are given broader space, because the agenda of the press is less dense in summer. Environmental news reports are the primary news of the weekends for the same reason (Karasinir, 1991);

(2) Environmental news reports have begun to find a place in certain pages. Under the title of green page or green screen, reports on the environment have acquired a new dimension. Like economy and foreign news, the issue of environment has gradually become a subject matter and a journalistic branch of its own right (Öztürk, 2009);

(3) News reports relating to the environment are characterized by tabloidization; (4) Actions and the contradictoriness of actions carry environmental problems to columns. News about young

people handcuffing themselves to the Ministry of Energy and clashing with police, and news in opposition to this order take place in newspaper columns (Koçak, 2006);

(5) There is no consideration given to the relation between environmental pollution and natural balance. News reports have no holistic structure. News relating to the environment is given singularly and detached from the environmental processes and basic factors giving birth to them. News follow-up is not carried out;

(6) Authorities in news reports are central government and local administrations. NGOs are given very little place. The amount of environmental news has been increased by successful PR studies by NGOs making studies on environment. The number of news items relating to TEMA foundation has been increased to 2,638 in 2008 (Güder, 2008);

From local to global: Can local journalism be a new approach to environmental awareness?

(7) In spite of its help in the information phase, the press has no contribution to solving problems. It presents environmental protests as the work of “hippie youth”. There is stereotyping in the representation of environmentalist protests. Environmentalist actions are given through tabloidization rather than focusing on the problem (Öztürk, 2009);

(8) The mass media has done almost nothing to disclose this situation and question the underlying reasons, and in my opinion, it is likely to maintain this attitude until problems intensify or a disaster threatens; (9) In recent years, the written and visual media have been observed to approach environmental issues with an increasing interest. The mass media now is not unconcerned about the effects of climate change and NGO activities that make environmental problems visible. Between 1998 and 2008, the largest amount of global warming news was attained in 2007, and in the same decade, news of renewable energy peaked in 2008 (BETAM, 2008).

Disasters or threats of disaster have almost always been the single largest factor in determining the timing and intensity of the media’s interest in environmental problems. As with most other social issues, what distracts the media’s interest away from these problems is not a decrease in the intensity of the problem, but the appearance of issues deemed to have greater and more immediate importance and be more newsworthiness. The media has succeeded in legitimizing the interest shown in the issues within governmental circles: The environment now possesses an institutional “identity” in governmental departments and various formal and informal organizations. It is crucial, though, to notice the defensive, rather than corrective reactions of the processes of legitimization and institutionalization. Institutionalization of environmental issues has two important influences, both of which effectively supported the governmental power to decide. Firstly, by internalizing the decision-making process within the government machine, (1) it has created the (mis) impression that the government has taken the essential steps to decrease environmental problems, thus it allowed the government to gain the approval and the support of the community which has no power to do anything about the basic causes of these problems; and (2) it has comforted the public and strengthened its belief in the government’s absolute benevolence as the defender of the public interest. Secondly, it allowed the government to negotiate with private economical interest groups (with minimal constraints on the undesirable aspects of their behaviors) about the conditions under which the business world and industry would adapt themselves accordingly, and to carry out these negotiations secretly, under a series of challenging, formal and informal, blockages in order to prevent the public’s access to these information (Parlour, 1980).