‘One thing is clear: that between the life of the townsmen and that bridge, there existed a centuries-old bond. Their fates were so intertwined that they could not be imagined separately. Therefore the story of the foundation and destiny of the bridge is at the same time the story of the life of the town and its people, from generation to generation’ (Ivo Andri?).

In 1566 the Ottoman architect Mimar Hajrudin built a stone bridge over the Neretva River in Mostar in present-day Bosnia. In time the bridge became a symbol of long-standing tolerance among its people – Bosnian Croats (predominantly Roman Catholic) and Bosnian Muslims. Then, in 1993, during a war in which some 150,000 people were killed, the old bridge was destroyed by artillery and tanks in an act of cultural vandalism. Eleven years later, engineers built an exact replica using stones from the old bridge and white marble from the quarry that had supplied the original. The bridge reopened on 23 July 2004.

From intolerance to tolerance

Mass and community media feed people’s insatiable appetite for news and entertainment. More often than not they reinforce worldviews, attitudes, and perceptions. Less often do they challenge assumptions and prejudices. Clearly, when media are independent of government or corporate pressure, when they actively pursue a public service ethic, there is a greater chance that they will present alternative points of view, investigate, ‘name and shame’.

But, as many media pundits point out, when national or transnational media conglomerates own and control the overwhelming majority of newspapers, magazines, film, television, radio, and book industries, public service notions quickly disappear from view. Since tolerance and intolerance are embedded in culture – in language, education, politics, religion, social relationships, and story-telling – if those responsible for the media choose, or are persuaded, to reflect intolerance, intolerance flourishes. Conversely, if they reflect tolerance, tolerance flourishes.

Of course, tolerance is a problematic concept. Does it mean ‘putting up’ with something or someone (negative tolerance), or does it mean genuine acceptance (positive tolerance). The concept is perhaps best described in UNESCO’s Declaration of Principles on Tolerance (1995):

‘Tolerance is respect, acceptance and appreciation of the rich diversity of our world’s cultures, our forms of expression and ways of being human. It is fostered by knowledge, openness, communication, and freedom of thought, conscience and belief. Tolerance is harmony in difference. It is not only a moral duty, it is also a political and legal requirement. Tolerance, the virtue that makes peace possible, contributes to the replacement of the culture of war by a culture of peace.’

Achieving tolerance requires several steps involving culture, religion, language, story-telling, and communication in its broadest sense in order to grapple with complex issues and to frame different understandings. As the following example shows, those who work in the mass media can certainly help increase levels of tolerance in society by doing just that.

Ben X

At the 2007 Montreal World Film Festival the runaway winner of the Grand Prix des Amériques, the Ecumenical Jury Prize, and the Public Award for the most popular film of the festival, was Ben X, directed by Nic Balthazar (Belgium).

Having begun a career as a film critic and a television game show host, Balthazar was asked to write a book for young people. He had just read a news item about the suicide of a young man with autism, in which the boy’s mother said, ‘Nothing can ever comfort me.’ Writing his book, Balthazar realized that while it might not offer comfort, it could offer understanding and sympathy to this woman. He called the book, ‘Nothing Was All He Said’. After publication, he was asked to write a stage play based on the book and later decided to turn the book into a film.

In early childhood Ben was diagnosed – ‘labelled’ in the context of the film – with a mild form of autism. His mother is determined to help him survive the terrors of a technical high school where the greatest dangers he faces are the bullies who torment him and the classmates who laugh at his suffering.

Ben does not know it, but there are adults and young people who want to connect with him. His mother, above all, constantly demonstrates her love by putting up with his compulsive patterned behaviour and sending him off to school every day with a hug he does not return. Two teachers show their compassion for Ben, and several of his classmates seem to want to support him. But he ignores them all.

In the sanctuary of his bedroom, Ben acts out his frustration and anger by connecting with the animated characters he encounters in ArchLord, his favourite interactive video game. The film includes segments of Ben’s ventures into cyberspace in the role of ArchLord, the ‘absolute ruler’ of Chantra, who takes control of his world by destroying monsters.

A young cyberspace woman, Scarlite, fights by Ben’s side. She becomes so real that in a local coffee shop they discuss his obsession with suicide. Scarlite makes a strong case that suicide is not a good solution to anything. Ben knows Scarlite is right. Their inspiring story ends with Ben and Scarlite joining forces with his parents to change his future.

The film explores harassment, suicide among young people, drugs, isolation, lack of understanding, divorce, being different, aggression, and the urge to conform. It does so in creative imagery and language that will resonate with audiences everywhere, condemning insensitivity and complacency and challenging viewers to rethink their own prejudices. It promotes greater tolerance. But is that enough?

From tolerance to reconciliation

‘And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time’, writes the poet T.S. Eliot in ‘Four Quartets’. Reconciliation may be just that: setting out on a journey and arriving back where we started having learnt to recognize it anew. In other words, reconciliation is a process, and the mass media can help or hinder it.

There are many ways mass and community media can promote greater understanding by providing balanced news coverage and alternative points of view, highlighting examples of tolerance and seeking out real-life stories of people working for positive change. By touching people’s hearts and minds, mass and community media have the power to shape the way people think and behave.

Propaganda and misinformation were rampant in Bosnia in 1991-92, before and after the onslaught by Serbia. In the northern part of the country people were inundated by programs put out by Serb media intended to incite hatred and violence. Media were manipulated to sustain public support for policies and strategies whose price was human suffering and crimes against humanity. No wonder that the demolition of the Mostar bridge became a media ‘event’ symbolizing a rupture of community and a breakdown in communication.

More recently, community radio in Bosnia has offered a means of rebuilding trust and a sense of community. The BBC World Service Trust project ‘Our Town our Future’ used radio drama and community outreach to promote democratisation, good governance and the rule of law in Bosnia-Hercegovina . The drama series ‘Where to turn?’ was broadcast once a week on 28 local radio stations in Bosnia-Hercegovina from September to December 2005.

Set in a local authority in Bosnia-Hercegovina, the series targeted an audience of municipal workers, their families, local politicians and the wider community who used their services. The programmes aimed to raise awareness of governance and the best practices of municipal authorities. Its strength lay in the use of satire and humour to address serious issues. Each episode focused on a different theme including transparency, accountability, employment of women, illegal construction and the problems faced by returnees.

Community involvement in the development of the radio series was actively encouraged through local consultation and work with focus groups. The drama series was accompanied by live phone-in discussion programmes in which listeners discussed and debated the issues raised by the drama as well as possible solutions. These programmes were broadcast immediately after each episode by all of the local stations taking part in the project.

If we are to speak in any meaningful way about strengthening positive tolerance and moving toward reconciliation, we have to recognize that the first tentative step is to restore communication. If reconciliation aims at mending broken relationships, then the causes of that breakdown, and the responsibilities for conflict, have to be communicated. And since a breach of trust often precedes a breakdown in communication, trust has also to be re-established.

In turn, trust can only be created if there is truth-telling and, crucially, if the human dignity of everyone involved in a dispute or conflict is fully recognized. These, too, are aspects of genuine communication, which is a key moment in the process of reconciliation.

Building bridges to reconciliation

Mass and community media can help build bridges. As such the people who work in the media bear great responsibility in terms of accuracy, balance, fair-mindedness, and advancing notions of what constitutes good citizenship. According to Javier Ciurlizza, these can only be developed by:

·Improving the training and professional skills of journalists, especially on questions of ethics, democratic principles and human rights;

·Strengthening self-regulation mechanisms, broadening the mandate of regulatory bodies to include the media’s duty to keep public opinion informed;

·Developing codes of ethics that bring all the media under one umbrella;

·Incorporating principles of transparency and professional decision-making in the way the media chose to cover particular themes;

·Developing ways for citizens to monitor media coverage of ethical questions and citizens’ rights;

·Including regular sections in which readers, viewers and listeners can make critical observations and responses to media coverage.2

But there is no guarantee that building bridges will do any good. After all, as the old saying goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. Similarly, you can lead people to one end of a bridge, but you can’t make them cross. In Mostar, scene of the rebuilding of the ancient bridge linking two communities, there are still divisions. The east bank is dominated by Muslims; and the modern core to the west by Croats. When the bridge was re-opened, the then director-general of UNESCO, Koïchiro Matsuura, said that it was a ‘symbol of reconciliation’. But that is not entirely true.

The new bridge will not heal the deep psychological trauma wrought by ethnic cleansing and the separatist tendencies that still stir beneath the surface of Bosnian society today. It will not solve the social exclusion and poverty facing young and old in a country where women especially are still suffering. According to the UNDP’s 2007 report on Social Exclusion in Bosnia and Herzegovina:

‘Gender-based differentiation is more strongly expressed ten years after the war than during the pre-war period, because of the war itself and the explosion of radical nationalism. The social and political climate directly arising from these forces has blocked progressive change. Compared to the social dynamics in greater Europe, morally and socially Bosnia-Herzegovina remains in a backwater.’3

The city of Mostar is still divided along ethnic lines. Its education system, its health system, even its sports clubs are not ready to let bygones be bygones. And many people are unwilling to meet half-way, let alone cross the bridge to the other side. Those working in mass and community media can encourage people to take seriously the possibility of reconciliation. They can explore, question, strengthen understanding and tolerance. Stone by stone they can help construct a better world.

Notes

1. The Bridge over the Drina, by Ivo Andri?, originally published in Belgrade, Yugoslavia (1945). London: The Harvill Press (1995), p. 21.

2. ‘Verdad, comunicación y reconciliación’ by Javier Ciurlizza, Director of Peru’s Institute for Democracy and Human Rights at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru. April 2005. http://palestra.pucp.edu.pe/index.php?id=123

3. http://hdr.undp.org/docs/reports/national/
BIH_Bosnia_and_Hercegovina/BOSNIA_AND_HERCEGOVINA_2007_en.pdf

The World Association for Christian Communication (WACC) promotes communication for social change. It believes that communication is a basic human right that defines people’s common humanity, strengthens cultures, enables participation, creates community and challenges tyranny and oppression. WACC is currently organizing an international Congress on the theme ‘Communication is peace’. It takes place in
Cape Town, South Africa, October 6-10, 2008. For more information and pre-registration visit: www.waccglobal.org/congress

By Philip Lee, Deputy Director of Programmes, World Association for Christian Communication (WACC)
Email: PL@waccglobal.org