04: Pluralism and Diversity
Distrust in the media has grown in recent years, and is often fuelled by a sense that media conglomerates act as “gatekeepers”, that they control the news agenda, keep silent on some topics, and provide limited, inaccurate or biased information on others. Ensuring a range of media outlets under different owners, and covering more African languages, is one way of giving people a choice in following what they regard as reliable.
To do this, suitable policies are needed to prevent or dismantle monopolies through competition law. And there is a need to offer special support for new businesses to enter the media arena – print, broadcasting and online media.
CONCENTRATION OF MEDIA HAS AN ECONOMIC LOGIC
For media businesses, there are considerable benefits to concentration. Just as in any other sector of the economy, it makes it hard for other players to enter the market, while providing the dominant players more profits. If consumers have few other options, a media house may be able to charge higher subscription or user fees – and higher rates to advertisers.
The key factor in the media business is the cost of production of quality content. Conglomerates benefit from scale by re-using and repurposing content for publication in the various outlets they own.
The same goes for the costs of distribution. Bigger print runs – with one and the same content input – mean bigger profits for larger companies. Small print publications or community radios, on the other hand, often find it difficult to stay afloat because their business scale is too limited to afford these costs. Digital channels provide a cheap distribution alternative to all, but the fact is that large marketing and promotions budgets are required to become visible in the flood of other content online. And when platforms are gatekeepers, media outlets are at their mercy.
Concentration of media is dangerous – for democracy
Concentration and conglomeration is how the media industry will develop if market forces are left to play out unchecked. In a democratic society this must not be allowed to happen. It’s also bad for the economy, which is more vibrant when competition is enabled.
Ownership of communications infrastructure and institutions should be multiple, not concentrated in a few hands. Ideally, with a variety of media and different media owners, as well as a good choice of Internet services, there will be strong competition to serve audiences and improve quality of content across the board. And there will be no monopoly pricing for connectivity or content services.
Like cellphone number portability between different operators, there should also be Internet service interoperability whereby people can move their content and contacts across different platform companies, as well as communicate seamlessly between them. This would crack open space for online media to compete with platforms that currently keep users “hostage” in “walled gardens”.
Pluralism of ownership will also provide some protection against a powerful interest, for example a ruling party or major advertiser, seeking to control the media sector – directly or indirectly – and so suppress or push certain content from behind the scenes.
How to support media pluralism
On paper, the need for media pluralism is acknowledged by a number of continent-wide declarations. The most important document is the 2019 Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa. Its Principle 11 reads in parts:
“State or private monopoly over print, broadcast and online media is not compatible with the right freedom of expression.
States shall take positive measures to promote a diverse and pluralistic media, which shall facilitate the promotion of free flow of information and ideas; transparency and diversity in media ownership; local and African languages, content and voices.”
This and other statements can be used to lobby for legislative measures to ensure media pluralism. The objectives of such a campaign could be:
- A broadcasting or communications law, and regulations, that impose limits on media ownership concentration, and/or limits on the percentage of the print, online and/or broadcast market that a single private or commercial operator can control. And which rules also require transparency of who owns what media.
- A law or regulation which limits ownership of various types of media (print, broadcasting, online) in one hand (cross-ownership) or that serves to block a media company takeover or merger on grounds of anti-competitive impact.
- The establishment of a funding mechanism and agency to support small media start-ups. This may be financed, for instance, by levies on large private or commercial media operators.
THREE SECTORS OF BROADCASTNG
A mix of public, community and private/commercial broadcasting contributes to pluralism of the media.
Public service broadcasters
The key form of public media in democratic states is the public service broadcaster, also known as the “PSB”. Most African countries don’t have PSBs in the real sense of the word. Most national broadcasters, often referred to as ‘public’, are in fact controlled by governments.
This is in stark contrast to the African Union’s Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa says:
“States shall establish public service media governed by a transparently constituted and diverse board of adequately protected against undue interference of a political, commercial or other nature. The editorial independence of public service media shall be guaranteed. Public service media shall be adequately funded in a manner that protects them from undue interference.”
PSBs must be accountable to the public at large, not to the government. They should be governed by an independent board of representatives of the public and accountable to the legislature, not a minister or the head of State; have management accountable to the board, not to government or the ruling party; and have independent editorial decision-making, without external direction.
Public funding, usually to a substantial degree, will come either from allocations from the ‘public purse’ (taxpayers’ money) or from licence fees paid by households.
The purpose of a PSB, compared to the other two sectors, is to be above commercial considerations in its programming, and to provide full services to the entire population of the country in all its diversity.
Community broadcasters
The role of community media is to ensure that local communities get the information they need to participate in civic life, and to empower these communities to freely express themselves in their languages.
Community media are owned and controlled by the communities they serve. They should be not-for-profit, must be governed by a board composed of local community members, and have a high percentage of content focused on the community, including content produced by community volunteers.
Because of their frail economic base, community media are often at risk of being captured by external political actors or by community members themselves who seek to misuse the channel for direct or indirect private commercial or other purposes. Communities are well advised to resist such attempts.
Private/commercial broadcasters
Such outlets have an important role to play in a democratic media environment – adding diversity and, ideally, providing stimulating competition for all three sectors of broadcasting media.
Some of the best news and information content in many African countries is provided by privately-owned radio and television.
Private ownership does, of course, pose specific problems. Some private media are owned by influential business tycoons, politicians or would-be politicians, and serve narrow interests. Others are captured by advertisers (including government as a major advertiser) and/or public relations interests. This may impair editorial and journalistic independence, and lead to audiences being informed poorly and in a biased manner.
An independent broadcasting regulator could take “preventive measures against the undue concentration of private broadcasting ownership, including through non-award of licences and non-approval of subsequent acquisitions or change of ownership” (Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in Africa). For more details see INFO BITE on regulation of print and broadcast.
Online platforms and public service
All these services use a wide range of distribution technologies. They also go online on social media channels to reach wider audiences. In the process they become dependent on intermediary gatekeepers who compete for advertising and operate algorithms that promote sensational rather than public interest content.
In Resolution 631 adopted in March 2025, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights observes that these online services “are not regulated to meet public interest benchmarks, such as requirements to provide information and factual news, education programmes, youth services, local content and languages, and impartiality on elections coverage”. The commission concludes that “these developments are putting in jeopardy the viability of public service and community broadcasters to deliver public service content in African languages and particularly to vulnerable communities”.
Therefore, the commission mandates its Special Rapporteur to consult with all relevant African role players in this field “to assess their concept of public service content in current times”. Civil society should get involved in this process. And use this opportunity to lobby for an independent and strong public service broadcaster.
DIVERSITY OF VOICES
Plurality of media is a necessary precondition for diversity of content and voices. The media landscape in its entirety should reflect the diversity of the people – both within the organisation and in their output.
The representation of women in the media is a fundamental case in point. In most media houses worldwide, there is still a glaring lack of gender equality. Women hold few senior editorial positions, there is a lack of affirmative action policies to address this. Sexual harassment (by internal and external actors) is a deterrent for women to join or stay the media profession.
The lack of equality of female media workers translates into women’s voices being underrepresented in media content. The latest figure available in this regard is reported by the Global Media Monitoring Project 2021: The proportion of women as subjects or sources stagnates at 22%; almost seven in 10 female news subjects and sources are portrayed as homemakers. According to other studies, men’s views are still favoured when discussing ‘important’ issues like politics, business, conflicts and current affairs.
IN SUMMARY
A flourishing media landscape in a democratic society is marked by plurality of outlets and diversity of content. Together, these two characteristics will allow for the fullest possible representation of all sections of society and their various information and communication needs. If they are missing or in doubt, the ability of citizens to practice their right to freedom of information and expression will be in danger.
This INFO BITE is selected from the online course on Media
and Digital Policy in Africa, offered by Stellenbosch University
in association with Namibia Media Trust.
There are free and paid options available for the full course.
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