When Media rivalry begins;

A political economy discourse

BY

Zanab Arshad Malik

MS.11. MEDIA STUDIES

Riphah Institute of Media

Studies (RIMS)

Abstract

The study is focused on evaluating that how political economy

works with media organizations in Pakistan. Also, this study

focuses on measuring the relationship between the different media

channels and why they have such rivalry against each other.

Results prove that media fall a prey to commercial imperatives to

get more business which is the root cause. This study uses the

first data to examine the impact the economy has on the media and

to what extent it makes media practitioners to go even beyond the

limits. Qualitative research and textual analysis has been

conducted to analyze the data collected from two runners up TV

channels. An exploratory attempt to figure out current situation

which is creating fuss, it is the case of a news network, a big

media group, who performed a role which is criticize able. This

paper views the commercial and economic determinants of news

production. Journalistic routines and practices are revolving

around the economy, which makes news networks stand against each

other to break the ones hegemony by criticizing or maligning.

1. Introduction

In any region, the media defines the society’s perceptions, ideas

and also have the tendency to shape it. In Pakistan its media

represent its society as it is the only way out to express ones

view point in this day and age. Political economy theorists

believe that mass media is far from performing an autonomous role

in society; it dynamically frames issues and promotes news

stories that serve the needs of the elite class.

The pay the piper approach defines it incisively; economy

controllers or holders are the actual rulers. Deregulation,

convergence, technological shift and a trend of giant mergers

dramatically changed the paradigm of media in past three decades.

In consequences media adopted oligopolistic approach to engulf

small industries, on the other hand, these small industries also

have no way to survive until and unless they shake hands with big

media conglomerates, not standing shoulder to shoulder but having

parental supervision under their umbrella. Every new day there is

a new media channel comes into existence, declaring itself an

impartial, trustworthy and truth oriented medium. They claim they

will work for the public, will reveal the truth, but then they

slowly move toward making money and all pseudo claims remain

unfolded as they were before their existence. The whole game

circles around the economy.

1.1. media before 2002

Media in Pakistan dates back since 1986, door of opportunities

opened for TV channels when Dish Antenna was introduced. Before

this advancement only traditional media prevailed, it enjoyed its

time in full glory before 2002, when General Pervez Musharraf

issued the ordinance giving permission for the launch of private

TV channels. Hundreds of channels were seen on TV screens when a

cable system jumped in. Since 2002, electronic media in Pakistan

has become more powerful and independent with the increasing

number of private television channels that has grown from just

three state-run channel in 2000 to more than hundred in 2014. In

the stern competitive environment that followed commercial

interests becoming vital and quality journalism started to be

replaced by sensationalism. They fall a prey to the commercial

imperatives. The television sector experienced a media boom,

elite class came to know that the media is serving two purposes;

first, it is giving the platform to rule over the layman by

imposing ruling ideas and second is the economic perspective

which can make one a millionaire overnight.

1.2. After 2002 Geo TV

Geo TV was established by Jang Group in May 2002 and was owned by

an Independent Media Corporation that already had its own reputed

and well received newspaper. It came with its best with new

journalistic trends encompassing emotional dramatization,

sensational reporting that made public to become its fan. On the

other side it had strong background, resources, business

divisions and unique ideas to deal with the human psyche in order

to grab their attention. It did not have to struggle hard to

attract business or audience because the brand name already

existed had a sterling reputation. Observing this success

everyone having a feasible magnitude of resources or financial

strength opened their media outlet that gave way to competition

and led to business rivalry. Driving ideology that sits behind is

the political economy. This rivalry gets heated when two media

share the same platform and the same content to choose with

similar strategies.

Geo TV claims that they are the pioneer when it comes to first

leading private news channel. In its early days, it starts

getting ‘awards of quality’, ratings gets higher and higher,

widest distribution on cable systems and by now it has around 14

channels that cater to every aspect of life from music to news,

and drama to infotainment etc. This tremendous success made them

vulnerable in the eyes of competitors, who started eyeing the

opportunity to pull their leg. Other channels that were already

engaged in skirmishes with Geo, kept on doing. Hostile

environment and business rivalry between them is on its peak

since its inception. Geo got immaculate success by establishing

its hegemony over other channels that was unbearable for them.

Common people have nothing to do with this, but what would happen

when they will get simple information in a sensationalized

manner? They will unconsciously raise voices that will resonate

with the voices inside the head of the other media channels.

1.3. Current situation

In Pakistan, luckily Geo remains successful in gaining what seems

like an unassailable hegemony over other media channels and the

sole reason seems the notion of political economy, which assumes

that it places priority on understanding how economic power

provides a basis for ideological and political power. Some

researchers speculate about how alternate forms of culture and

innovative media uses are systematically suppressed. A set of

political economic theories directly challenges the status quo by

exposing elite manipulation of media and criticizing both

hegemonic culture and cultural commodities.

The Jang Group is not naive enough to be oblivious of the fact that

they are being targeted. Geo TV already was not enjoying smooth

sailing when one of their senior journalists sustained a murderous

attack. They started airing accusations that the country's spy agency,

a government institution, was behind this attack on their most reputed

and well known presenter. It started reporting against a government

institution calling it freedom of expression. In return that gift

agency has charged the Geo network with serious allegations, and

complained in PEMRA against Geo. Geo came under heavy criticism

from rival TV channels, including ARY, which is the second

largest media group in Pakistan and Lakhani group’s Express TV

who were looking forward to this kind of opportunity to speak

freely against their biggest contender.

Certain private media houses start attempting to damage the Jang

Group, ARY recently has aired a string of talk shows against

Jang-Geo in which wild allegations, mostly old and discredited

were repeated. History tells that there were always hidden hands

behind Geo by deliberately targeting the Jang-Geo Group. But this

time they got opportunity to attack on Geo’s power.

Every media has some universal rules or journalistic precepts to

follow, in which impartiality comes first leading by ethics,

truthfulness, and freedom of expression. Every media use these

precepts according to their own agenda and their own need,

ideally this should not be happening but every channel has its

own interests. If Geo TV reports the ‘attack on its journalists‘

in a negative light and puts allegations on a government

institution- according to ARY News and Express TV-then the

question arises that what other channels are doing to Geo?

Every media has some universal rules or journalistic precepts to

follow, in which impartiality comes first leading by what makes

them to start speaking in the same tone against them? What are

the common grounds on which all channels are standing for the

same cause? Being news media, the only sole aim should be to

serve the social purposes and to make public awareness about the

information that is important for them to know, not to start a

crusade against other media or initiate in house politics.

What is worse? They start calling it freedom of expression to

cover up their bitter truths. The common ground for all media

channels is the business and commercial imperatives. ARY and

Express TV challenged Geo TV’s hegemony and the pseudo war has

been generated, only to grab the attention of business and to

throw the hegemonic media channel ‘Geo’ away or some other

agendas to reach for

Keywords: political economy, media reporting for business, agenda

setting, media hegemony

2. Literature review

2.1. Hegemony

The idea of Gramsci, Hegemony -simply means leadership based on

the consent of the public. Hegemony is created by intellectuals

which briefly defines itself is “the dominantGroup’s ‘deputies’

exercising the subaltern function of social hegemony and

political government” (Gramsci, 1988) - in the realm of civil

society when they succeed in extending the ideology or world-view

of the rulers to the ruled, securing the consent of the masses.

Alternatively, if control via hegemony is unsuccessful, the

dominant social group utilizes other attractive or sometimes

conceives measures located in political society to maintain

control.

.2.2: Hegemony

Antonio Gramsci’s most significant contribution to 20th century

Marxist thought was “hegemony”. He presented the humanist version of

Marxism which focused on human subjectivity instead of following

materialistic approach. It is the predominance of one social class

over others. The term embraces political and economic control and has

the ability to promote its own opinion to impose on those who are in

subordination by accepting it as a common sense. It involves willing

and active consent by creating image of oneself in the way that people

no longer have the ability to think what is right and what is wrong.

Common sense which is not rigid, a party or a control group

continuously needs to transform it. Consent is what you need to win

and constantly re-win.

The idea of Gramsci, Hegemony -simply means leadership based on the

consent of the public. Hegemony is created by intellectuals which

briefly defines itself is “the dominantGroup’s ‘deputies’ exercising

the subaltern function of social hegemony and political government”

(Gramsci, 1988) - in the realm of civil society when they succeed in

extending the ideology or world-view of the rulers to the ruled,

securing the consent of the masses. Alternatively, if control via

hegemony is unsuccessful, the dominant social group utilizes other

attractive or sometimes conceives measures located in political

society to maintain control. Gramsci presented the idea of social

struggle which cannot be understood without knowing its main elements

that run the society. The dynamic of a society can only be explicit

in terms of a system where the dominant ideas of ruling class work

hard to secure its control over the working class, its subordinates or

another pressure group that has the ability to threaten them. Dominant

class has the power to make subordinate groups accept the ideas,

values and leadership, and the reason behind it, is not only that

dominant group is powerful physically or give threat intermittently to

control their target public but also have economic domination. Control

group have the power to persuade the other classes of society to

accept its moral, political and cultural values. Pressure group not

always is peaceful toward their target group, it combines physical

force or coercion measures to get consensus. Hegemony is always re-

adjusted and re-negotiated even subordinate group muster up courage

and get silent consensus to stand against that dominant group. Still

the pressure group does not leave practicing in hegemonic way

Jang Group is a giant media conglomerate in Pakistan. First time

ever in history, its hegemony is facing unrelenting challenges by

other media houses that have been eyeing a weak link for a very

long time. Geo TV provided a chance this time with the full gusto

when they reported that their senior anchor journalist got

injured in an unsuccessful assassination attack. ARY News and

Express TV took Geo TV’s perspective in a negative light and

started propagating against the giant media house. They came out

all guns blazing by challenging Geo TV’s power and hegemony

openly.

2.2. Political economy

A lexicon of economic terms tells us that political economy is

the science of wealth and deals with efforts made by humans to

supply wants and satisfy desires (Eatwell, Milgate and Newman,

1987).

2.3. Agenda setting

Dr. Max McCombs and Dr. Donald Shaw coined the term agenda setting as

an idea that the media don’t tell people what to think, but they are

successful in telling what to think about. The more media write about

a topic, the more the public cares about it. (Rogers, Dearing et al.

1993; Eilders 1997). Kingdom have the view that the power of media is

limited due to the short attention span of the media always running

from one crisis to another, thereby diluting its impact on the slow

workings of democracy (Kingdon 1984; Dearing & Rogers 1996; Protess,

Cook et al. 1991).

Another weakness of the media, says Kingdon (1984), is its propensity

to play up the most spectacular stories, while these levels tend to

take home at the close of the policy-making process, and not at the

start.

Kevin Latham (2000) Explained that Newspapers, television and radio

stations have become increasingly driven by economic imperatives

rather than ideological ones from the mid-1980s, with even more

dramatic commercialization following Deng Xiaoping's southern tour in

1992.

He studied china’s socialist market economy, as per Kevin, with the

proliferation in cable TV set in the mid-1990s; Hong Kong television

has become officially available to the populations in Guangzhou. The

popularity of Hong Kong television was the tug of war among

television practitioners of television.

Media production was being commercialized nationally and many of the

conflicting pressures on Guangdong’s journalists are similarly bearing

down upon media producers in China. Also, Craig A. Depken, II and

Dennis P. Wilson (2004) in his study suggested that advertising is

commonly delivered in a vertically dependent market: advertising firms

pay for access to an advertising delivery vehicle to contact potential

and actual clients that affects readership.

They reason that if advertising is tough or good that depend on the

perception of the reader and finally it causes an impact on magazine

who has accepted to conform to what advertisers demands who is

indirectly linked with reader or consumer’s choice.

If profit and the business are the sole purpose behind media, then

media’s aims itself get suffered. Also the study of Esther Gal‐Or

(2006) depicted that merging is profitable if merging media firms gain

a relative bargaining advantage vis-à-via advertisers in the

negotiations for advertising space. He argues that higher levels of

competition make media mergers more profitable. When a media merging

process gets started, then competition rises and makes all media minds

upset with how to compete with their rivals.

According to Esther gal-or The U.S. television industry recently took

in two large-scale mergers formed by CBS and Viacom in 1999 and AOL

and Time Warner in 2000. These mergers have already altered the

competition for advertising space, as control over program

provision and distribution has been consolidated. In his paper,

he investigated possible incentives for mergers which are to

maintain fulfilling consumer’s desire.

Media develops consumer taste and then work according to it. By this

process, gradually it starts achieving its target audience in the

numbers of millions and billions. When advertisers search for media

vehicle which is the best and can spread its product or idea to

millions of consumers, it definitely falls for that successful

channel. For this purpose media try to grab the audience by creating

sensationalism or pseudo claims.

Then what simply happen is that each consumer has a willingness to pay

off its attention for a station whose programs constitutes a perfect

match with the location of the consumer. In recent years Professor

Robin Mansell conducted a new study about media, he maintains that how

new media influence the political economy (Robin Mansell, 2004).

There is a sign of a desire for a restoration of a more measured

account of developments in new media. In the field of internet studies

there is likewise a little explicit discussion of power.

The internet is sometimes characterized as a post modern, ironic,

cosmopolitan hybrid medium or as progressive technologically enabled

medium (van covering 2003). Tim Watts, a veteran San Francisco

broadcaster Program Director, mentions, in his article ‘’ media

control, you are not getting the truth ‘’ as per his approach if not

getting truth then every news is the story which gets constructed by

the media practitioners. What's the reason can be behind the

construction of news, which is not solely based on truth.

As saying of John Swinton, former Chief of Staff for the New York

Times in an address to the New York Press club. 

"There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, in

America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it.

There is not one of you who dare to write your honest opinions,

and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in

print.

I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I

am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for

similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to

write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for

another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one

issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would

be gone. The business of the journalists is to ruin the truth; to

lie outright; to corrupt; to revile; to grovel at the feet of

mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily staff

of life.

We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance.

Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property

of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes." Foster cambell

narrates that In 1981 internal memo from Michael Eisner, former

CEO of the Walt Disney Company described the concept of media

economy "In March, 1915, the J.P. Morgan interests, the steel,

shipbuilding, and powder interest, and their subsidiary

organizations, got together 12 men high up in the newspaper world

and employed them to select the most influential newspapers in

the United States and sufficient number of them to control,

generally, the policy of the daily press.... They found it was

only necessary to purchase the control of 25 of the greatest

papers.

An agreement was reached; the policy of the papers was bought, to

be paid for by the month; an editor was furnished for each paper

to properly supervise and edit information regarding the

questions of preparedness, militarism, financial policies, and

other things of national and international nature considered

vital to the interests of the purchasers." As per , Foster

cambell ,’’ the five major media corporations in the U.S. – Time

Warner, The Walt Disney Company, News Corporation, Viacom, and

Bertelsmann – are owned and operated by a small group of

financial elite whose interest lies in selling certain products

and messages that will support their agenda for not only

maximizing profit, but also centralizing control of the

population. They are not adequately informing the population.

Instead they are breeding a culture of inadequately informed

people by failing to cover stories that are important in order to

protect their own interests. (Foster cambell).

In another study Lev Manovich (2009) asserts that today

strategies used by social media companies often look more like

tactics in the original formulation while tactics look like

strategies. Since the companies that create social media

platforms like face book, flicker, YouTube etc, make money from

having as many users as possible visit them by serving ads, by

selling data about usage to other companies, by selling add-on

services, and so on, they have a direct interest in pour users as

much of their lives into these platforms as possible.

Consequently, they give users unlimited storage space for all

their media and the ability to customize their online lives, for

instance, by controlling what is seen by whom, by giving them

access to comment, like, dislike in simple meaning they have

made these platforms interactive and by expanding the

functionality of the platforms themselves. Then there starts a

cold war between these platforms. They try to build their

audience to get more ads and commercials or business. Such things

made them to do even what leads harmful for society or can to

hedonism.

In his study Xueying Luo Examine the impact the ownership has on

the economic goals of ethnic newspapers. He draws a comparison

between 24 newspapers owned by ethnic media groups (media-by) and

24 newspapers for ethnic groups (media-for) showed a pattern

consistent with media-for newspapers being more interested in

making a profit. He analyzed the differences will from a

perspective of media economics. Diuguid et .al. (2000) further

support Xueying Luo idea that media firms can play an important

role in the creation and maintenance of the communities that they

serve (Diuguid & Rivers, 2000; Viswanath & Arora, 2009).However,

these firms must also find economic success in order to survive.

Owners of ethnic media are likely to be motivated by some

combination of the desire to maximize profits and the desire to

serve their communities. Napoli (2005) had the same concern that

media stand apart from other industries from an economic and

social perspective because they have dual roles. One is to

generate profit by building audience and another is content

production. (Napoli, 2005, p. 275). This was well illustrated in

Baker’s (1994) study that shows, newspapers skew editorial

content to attract high-income readers who are attractive to

advertisers and give special coverage to some particular

political party and discard low-income readers who are not. As

per his views if editorial gets screwed then it simply notified

that news gets manipulated according to the agenda of that

particular media and become news stories. Evidences tells us that

after all media works for money, sets agenda and propagate too,

because for media, organizations whose profit-maximizing goals

incentivize them then other goals. Finally the stage comes when

there is a viewpoint prevail that particular media is on its

height of success.

A television critic BILL EWALD and an advertising expert GEORGE

T. CLARKE discuss the political and social consequences of

advertiser-financed mass media

I an answer to the question of EWALD, Clarke replied figuratively

,’’ Well, I think we would both agree that the basic

reason is costs. The cost of maintaining the tremendously

valuable news, services provided by television, radio,

magazines and newspapers is so high that, without

advertiser support, they simply could not be made available

to the average American’’. They support media and, media give

feed to audience. the choice ultimately comes from the

people who listen to the programs, not from the

advertisers who simply cannot sell products unless they

please as many people as possible (BILL EWALD, GEORGE T. CLARKE,

1960). He further explains that costs are climbing all the time.

And as your costs go up, the tendency for advertisers to

seek the largest possible audience and play it safe will,

if anything, accelerate. While it is true that newspapers

often provide excellent news coverage, they do not provide

the "free competition of ideas" that democracy require.

H1: After a comprehensive literature review on the relationship

between media and economy we can argue that Express TV and ARY TV

has commercial imperatives to demonize Geo

3. Methodology

This is an exploratory effort to figure out some of the basic features

which hold and influence the economic setting of mass communications

in Pakistan. How rivalry begins and how media channels try to win

public consent by demonizing each other setting up an agenda. In

Pakistan Jang group is the leading media conglomerate that has

its own media outlets in every medium. It gets funded and donated by world’s renowned corporations and has set its image as a

trustworthy news media. Geo, a news channel of Jang Group, possesses

hegemonic nature that makes advertisers to pursue it. Geo covertly

exercises to seek the attention of business by producing

sensationalism. Sensational reports and dramatic political news

usually work in winning the consent of the audience even if they seem

to complain, on the contrary, that the media should report ethically

and they don’t want to see the pseudo reporting. But it’s a fact that

media practitioners know and use these tricks to play with human

psyche.

For qualitative research and textual analysis of talk shows in

the prime time of two channels, ARY News and Express TV that are

considered to be the rivals of Geo TV, I have chosen a time slot

of 0600pm to1200am. This duration comprises of five talk shows

from ARY News and Express TV each. While carrying out textual

analysis researcher analyzes unit of analyses by taking into

consideration the sources of news, what agendas they followed,

the language, topics or titles they have chosen for the program

and guests whom they have invited to talk about a particular

issue. The data has been chosen by using non probability sampling,purposive sampling, which involves the nonrandom selection of elements

based on the researcher's judgment. Five talk shows from ARY news

named “11TH HOUR” BY WASEEM BADAMI, “Off the Record” Kashif Abbasi,

“Ab tak” Sadaf Abdul Jabbar, “Sawal Ye Hay Dr”. Danish (Ali Haider),

Mubashir Luqman, Khara Sach, are taken and five from express TV

titled, “TAKRAR” by Imran khan, siyasat or canon”by mid peerzada, “Kal

take”by Javed chuadhry, “to the point “ by shahzaib khanzada, Baat se

bat” by Dr. Maria Zulfiqar from 19th April to 26th April.

3.1. Data analysis:

As the purpose of this study was to explore how a particular news

media constructed a pseudo reality against the Pakistanis sensitive

security institution and then how it gets severe criticism by other

media groups who has some monetary purpose behind.

We used a discourse analysis approach to examine textual and

structural features in the ARY and EXPRESS TV channels’ talk

shows. Antaki, Billig, Edwards and Potter (2003) caution,

however, that any discourse analysis must be conducted in a

thorough and rigorous manner, as simplistic text summarization,

taking sides, or lack of substantiation may severely limit the

theoretical value of any analysis. For this reason, we haveendeavored to be objective, to fully analyze each text, and fully

support each analytical claim. The process of analysis proceeded as

follows: First, the selected speech was read to identify portions of

text that described business or smelt like agenda.

4. Results

In Pakistan, Geo TV is a leading News channel with the most viewership

and for the same reason obviously gets more business. There are other

channels that unconsciously follow Geo TV and adopt its trends to gain

audience attention, but none of them have come in front line yet. Leg

pulling is the prevailing custom among media channels and in-house

politics makes them more satanic in news reporting. Every channel hasa potential to propagate a piece of news with a negative or a positive

spin. Two big channels succeeded by Geo TV get analyzed. To determine

the fact we first calculate the language intensively for each

observation included in guests, news sources, topic of the talk show

and an agenda which is prefixed.

After somewhat a genetic analysis of one week current affairs talk

shows (the text was read four times) on the rivalry between news TV

channels, a valuable data was achieved which can be presented in the

shape of addressing the three hypotheses.

HQ: 1 other channel challenged geo’s hegemony

HQ: 2 channels have rivalry between each other and the purpose

behind is the political economy

HQ: 3 every channel has an agenda behind its every movement

(REFER TO APPENDIX)Analyzing ARY tv shows from19th April to 26th April reveals that the

shows were bent on to malign Geo primarily with anonymous and unknown

sources, pro-army and vindictive guests on the show being asked to

give their opinion and instead of focusing on the tragic incident of

murder attack on a senior journalist and sympathizing with him and

evaluating its consequences on journalists’ security and profession in

the future, the whole emphasis was laid on pro-army propaganda and

censuring and picking apart Geo with guest kept asking for taking

strong action against Geo even revoking Geo`s license of media now they should claim that they are pioneer in this kind of reporting too,

The language used gives clearest indication of the purpose behind the

shows mainly suggesting that an attack on Hamid Meir is condemnable

but more condemnable is the wrong reporting and charging an Pakistan’s

security institution for wrong allegation, glorifying the role of army

vis-a-vis rebuking Geo for claiming that they are the pioneer of

reporting or in every field of media now they should claim that they

are pioneers in this kind of reporting too, and Geo did not create

such hue and cry and started such blame game over attack on Raza

Rumi--- another liberal journalist, but why they allege security

agencies with attack on Hamid Mir, Geo Tv should be credited with

starting this new tradition in Pakistan media of putting rough guess

as news and criticizing security agencies blatantly without any

evidence, and projecting the idea that Geo`s agenda must be to weaken

defense institute as they get funds and money from foreign aids who

are considered country’s enemy,

Geo sell agenda of their payers, Geo used Hamid Mir issue to further their own agenda, Geo is anti-state,  attack on Hamid

Meer can also be a conspiracy,  Bad editorial practice, Geo’s character is doomed, Geo has a Pharaoh like attitude, Geo became judge itself, Shutting down Geo won’t affect rest of the media soit should be shut down , Geo’s lies never see an end ,Geo has gotforeign investments moreover PM’s meeting with Hamid Meer is giving out a wrong message  to prove that media military relationship are not in good terms so in that way real issue of Attack on Hamir Mir went into oblivion. In the similar fashion Express tv adopted the same mode of

demonizing Geo TV for not playing ethical role, Anti-Geo and anti

govt. rhetoric prevailed. Suggesting that continuous compelling

pictures cannot be allowed in any situation, allegations on a

respected institution of country is condemnable, fans of geo are

hurt , this is an Anti Pakistani activity, questions were raised

like why only Geo claim that they are speaking truth and are on

the hit list of security agencies? Why Jang group did not become

petitioner itself of this case? Guests opined that Geo group has

strong viewership, they can shape agenda, Pakistan gets 30

percent weaker with Geo’s act, and attack on a person should not

allow anyone to attack on state institutions. level of

polarization and distrust is rising, Geo spread Chaos, Geo should

be accountable, Every media group needs proof before airing some

news but Geo is exception,  this is difference between geo TV and

other media group, the guests they called were all biased in the

against of Geo. Their topics and the agenda were already set by

them which were only to speak against geo. Sources to collect

news were self reported. If we say that well there was an issue

and what geo did was wrong but to using their media to speak

against another (Geo) media is unjustified. There must be another

reason behind which is described by the political economy theory

in well manners. The results support our hypothesis that media

works for ownership, economy and sets its agenda before making a

story. Its hegemonic nature addresses social problems but do not

fulfill social responsibility which does not alleviate the

severity of social problems but exacerbate it. If geo has spread

chaos and other channels give it a boost that must have a bad

impact on society and in international sphere as well.Now the purpose behind of doing such activities by the channels,

against Geo is getting unfold. ARY and express TV has an agenda to

malign and demonize Geo to break its hegemony to achieve business by

the role of political economy, a study of various moments, including

“commodity” which means: production, distribution, exchange, and

consumption for the sake of the economy to get more commercials and to

attain more attention of the audience. Getting most share of

audience is not the big deal to achieve now a day when media

claim to be a so called truth purveyor. There are many ways to

achieve this goal; one of them is to call bad names on someone or

some institution, what Geo did to Pakistan’s security institution

and what other channels did to Geo.

5. Discussions

Considering the issue from the business standpoint its evident that

when there is competition at its peak as in media business in Pakistan

for the last decade, it’s imperative for every competitor to be at its

toe when it comes to gaining a competitive edge through being unique

and surpassing others in terms of infrastructure and quality of your

products and that what Geo has been able to do successfully since its

inception.

So quite understandably in that scenario other competitors are

left with two options; first to improve themselves and bring

about changes in their infrastructure, outlook and management

style to deliver better quality of products, i.e., news items,

talk shows and other programs on national and local issues,

obviously it requires huge resources, state of the art

infrastructure,

well trained, hardworking and loyal employees and taking lots of

risks on the other hand second option is to counter the market

leader through a combined effort by leg pulling, smear campaigns

and looking for its mistakes to capitalize on and making sure to

disrepute it as much as possible; that’s what actually happened

in Geo case, Geo after the assassination attack on its senior

journalist , went totally berserk, it started an intense

malicious campaign against the prime spy agency of Pakistan and

its head without any supportive evidence and brought its

reputation in question for more than eight hours continuously

which was totally uncalled for and against the journalistic

norms, its eccentric behavior is debatable whether it was out of

rage or some other reason but there kick in the propaganda other

media outlets had already started against Geo by labeling it pro-

India and anti-state and wanting to destabilize the country, So

already the certain negative image of Geo in that regard was

conveyed to people by anti-Geo elements; with this blunder of Geo

to incriminate Pakistan’s security institution and its head, the

notion that Geo is anti-Army, anti-Pakistan and pro-India got

currency in masses and all other media houses made sure that this

grand opportunity provided by Geo itself should not get wasted

and the likes of ARY, Express TV grabbed the opportunity by both

hands and created mayhem over Geo`s irresponsible and eccentric

media trial. They lashed out on Geo with ferocious zeal, every talk show condemned Geo and didn’t even stop short of calling a Geo`

traitor`. Analyzing the prime time talk shows topics and guests of

these channels after the incident, it buttresses the claim that all

these rival channels consider it a golden opportunity to decimate Geo.

6.

Conclusion

The relationship between news networks, news, economy and commercial

imperatives indicates that apparently media work for the public and is

being socially responsible, but this is a commercial business behind

media to make work in that particular manner. This is complex

relationship which one cannot get easily understand. The whole

journalistic field cannot be swallowed without having an idea of

commercial process which shapes the news production. The competitive

environment of the market increases the pressure on journalism and

making them to compete over getting audience ratings. This not only

leads them to create homogenized culture media but also provide them

to have the taste of being popular among the audience. By keeping this

economic climate in mind news networks have become wholesalers and

packagers of news stories. The news network reflects the economic values which have helped shape the conditions of the market

environment and played a crucial rule in business interest. News has

become central to the media power and the corporate needs of the

media. Now public service ethos is getting diminish and is being

replaced by profit motives. News channels or networks become a

marketplace of ideas which sell ideas and make their ideas more

stylish, crispy or sometimes controversial to attract more audience.

And this is the point from where media rivalry begins and it

makes all news networks stand on one platform to only think that

how to attain more and more business to earn more name and more

popularity. Even in some situations they go against each other

and try to demonize. This is what happened in Geo case, its no-

brainer now that it was a huge mistake on the part of Geo to

react like they did after the attack on Hamid Mir, to incriminate

prime spy agency and its head on the screen for long eight hours

transmission was not the most sensible thing to do at all and

totally against journalistic ethics. But the question arises here that what make other news networks to

leave their routine tasks and start criticizing Geo. Geo has a history

of doing aggressive media trials of politicians and institutions, but

this time it has gone too far and one can expect that this episode

will prove rather helpful in order to discipline our media generally

and Geo especially, all the media outlets including Geo should

understand that their basic role is to provide information to the

masses and help them shape their opinion and to aware those in power

to people`s issues and equip them to make better decisions in favor of

populace, expose corruption and mismanagement in Govt.

departments etc.

Hence it is proved as we discussed earlier that it is all about

business and economic interests. News networks are now business

houses. Viewership is their product which they sell to advertisers for

commercials. Geo is considered a market leader and all other channels

are runner up. If it is only viewed by business point of view, then it

is some old guerrilla marketing tactic by runner ups to pick fights

with the market leader to make it controversial and defocused only to

gain million dollar free attention. In this game runner ups have nothing to lose but to gain whatever in their favor is. Other channels

or runner ups were already busy with hitting Geo’s credibility, but

now as its bad time is there and they have made a mistake, these

runner ups find the best opportunity ever to break its spell on the

audience.

7. Limitations

Few limitations of this study were observed. First of all, the

behavior of other major channels and news agencies were not

included in this analysis.

Second, due to the constraints in the lawsuit, the Sample size

and the number of the units of analysis used in the study are

small, so the generalizability of these determinations is also

limited which cannot be generalized on whole media.

Unit of analysis taken by the researcher are few and basic. There can

be many more units of analyses which can be brought under observation

in future researches. Not Statistical or quantitative but qualitative

results have been produced, usually content analysis contains

quantitative results and statistical tests normally require a larger

sample size to ensure a representative distribution of the population.

This study is timely, only generalizable for a particular time

frame. We have collected the data around the dates, right after

the incident happened. Proximity caused to bring less of data As

it is a textual, content analysis, a purely descriptive method.

It describes what is there, but may not reveal the underlying

motives for the observed pattern. The analysis is limited by the

availability of material. The observed trends in media may differ

from reality.

It was felt by the researchers that there is a broad space for

research in this area, but the deficiency of resources can bring

a serious restriction.

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ine

Appendix 1

ARY TV

ARY NEWS19th April to 26th April

TALK

SHOWS

SOURCES GUESTS AGENDA TOPICS

“11TH

HOUR”

BY

WASEEM

Self-

reporte

d

informa

kashif abbasi,

shahzaib

khanzada ,

harron ur

Pro Army

propaganda.

To prove that

hamid meer per

hamlA.

Naya pendora box

BADAMI

“Off

the

Record”

BY

Kashif

Abbasi,

“Ab

tak”

BY

Sadaf

Abdul

Jabbar

“Sawal

Ye Hay”

BY

Dr”.

Danish

(Ali

Haider)

,

“Khara

Sach”

tion,

Army,

other

Media

rasheed,

Sheikh

Rasheed,

Rashid Lateef,

Arshad

Shareef,

Muneeb farooq,

Mazher Abbas,

Lieutenant

General

Retired Amjad

Shoaib, Saleem

Bukhari, Ex

Director

General ISI

Hameed Gul,

Javed

Chaudhry,

Ansaar Abbasi,

Shahid Lateef,

Arshad Shareef

,Rashid

Qureshi, Ijaz

Haider,

Shahzaib

Khanzada ,

media military

relationship

are not in

good terms.

Civil govt.

and military

relationship

is not going

well.

Pro Army

(Better word

would be Pro

Establishment)

.

Sarcasm,

Criticism on

Government.

To prove Hamid

Meer’s

innocence

unlike jang

group.

khul gaya

Media Military

Relationship and

Civil Government

Relationship with

Army.

Attack on Hamid

Meer.

Media Military

Relationship and

Civil Government

Relationship with

Army

Hameed Gul’s visit

to ISI.

Trend of baseless

criticism on Army

, Hamid Meer’s

first “Official

Statement.

BY

Mubashi

r

Luqman,

Mazhar Abbas,

Uzma Bukhari,

Shoukat Basra,

University

students(youth

) Mazher

Abbas, Nadeem

Raza, Tahir ul

Qadri, Senator

Babar Awan,

Asad Kharal,

Akeel Karam

Dhedi, Abid

Saqi, Ashraf

Chohan, Sabir

Shakir

Talk on Hamid

Meer attack

not on

editorial

policy.

Personal

attacks on

individuals.

Anti-

Government.

Hamid Meer, PM’s

visitation to Hamid

Meer

Journalism

forgotten in the

midst of

vindication.

Roller Coaster ride

of Baba Ji and

Freedom of

Journalism, murder

of journalists,

Language:

Attack on hamid meer is condemnale but more condemnable is

the wrong reporting and charging an Army institution for

wrong allegation

They glorify not report

Geo always claim that they are the pioneer of reporting or

in every field of media now they should claim that they are

pioneer in this kind of reporting too

They did not report killing attack onraza roomi but then why

on hamid meer

Now take this credit on your name that you have bring this

tradition in the media

Geo tv make a rough guess as a news

Meer’s issue get suppressed and they create another issue

Geos agenda must be to weaken defense institute as they get

funds and money from foreign aids who are considered

country’s enemy

Geo sell agenda of their payers

Rabi inni lima inzalta ileya min kherin fakeer

Fouj is the crown of our head

Prime minister is quite

Without evidence they blame army

Only they took amir meer ka beeper they did not took dg isi

‘s beeper

They hit this issue flamboyantly and even till the limit of

tazheek

Geo claim that akhbar navees he sab kvh ha baqi kch nh ha

Against of Journalistic trends

They tried to malign a consolidate institution

Geo is anti state

ARY always worked good in his history

Geo mis handeled the issue

If anyone else have been atacked then they would not have

done any such thing like that they did for hamid meer

Anchor said that I have never been told by any of my

channel’s producer or director that u have not to show any

solidarity with the channel

ISI is being portrayed as target killers on Geo

To make a news they can even kill themselves

Geo group is filling the pipeline with water instead of

petrol only to cover the story

Geo is spoiling their forefathers’ asset

Judicial Commission cannot help

One cannot present their own desire as an opinion or news

Creating anti army thinking is an open propaganda

They are presenting non issues as issues and issues as non

issues

According to Geo, Geo gets carried away

Any other channel cannot do such things, only Geo can do

this kind of things

Geo itself is not sincere with Hamid Meer and they are

conspiring against him

Geo is only creating hype

No FIR till now

Premature act of Geo

They took 5 minute beeper of Mr. Amir and the rest of the

coverage was of eight hours

This is a propaganda to divide political parties

No doubt that attack on Hamid Meer can also be a conspiracy

Prime Minister is on Hamid Meer’s side and Army Chief is

leaning toward ISI

Bad editorial practice

Geo casted aspersions on a security institution

PM’s meeting with Hamid Meer is giving out a wrong message

Geo’s way to cover a story is the same as you are watching

an Indian channel

Geo committed a blunder

Real issue was the assault on Hamid Meer but it was

suppressed and a new war was started

They made this a Government vs. army issue

It seems that they just wanted to scandalize security

institution

They have made mistakes one after another, first 8 hours

coverage, then allegations on army, and then asking ISI head

to resign from his post

Geo made its own screen an FIR, police and the Judge

That is pure negative campaigning

Wali Khan Babar’s murder was not presented the way they are

presenting Hamid’s issue

Geo puts blame on PEMRA that why didn’t they stop them

Geo is traitor

Geo should apologize

Few rotten eggs are spoiling the name of entire journalism

FIR in the name of unknown people

All of this is a drama to gain importance and attention

They are working on an agenda

They have some cloak and dagger

Geo has a threat perception. Anyone can have this perception

by keeping their actions in mind

We are just bringing up plurality of opinion

Geo asks ISI chief to resign instead of asking to resign

Alleging one can be a news but one institution cannot make

its own policy

This is misguiding, misleading, disappointing

Geo spoiling the reputation of entire media

Demeaning and dishonoring noble and straightforward people

is Geo TV’s custom

Analysts sitting on Geo TV don’t only analyze but pass their

judgments as well

Geo claims that they are running the whole country

Meer Shakil ur Rehman should shut down the channel now

Why doesn’t he resign himself from an institution of pseudo

journalism?

Asking for resignation on the basis of mere allegations is

Geo’s new ingenuity

Allegations were propagated for 10 hours

This is a hidden agenda

Allegations were proliferated

They advertised the news

This isn’t how journalism works

Wrong way to present news

Pakistan enemy

Pakistan traitor

Track record told that whenever Geo comes in a commanding

position it exercises totalitarianism

Geo is a mafia

Geo is acting like Pharaoh

Geo derailed and demoralized state institutions

Government had its eyes closed and journalists with sense of

honor like us were working

Geo is following a political agenda

Geo is a rogue institution

Geo gets money to speak against ISI

This is an awkward attempt to demonize an honorable

institution like ISI

They have made Hamid Meer a scapegoat

Geo is spreading lies and uncertainties

Geo also committed blasphemy

Babaji did not come to meet Hamid Meer yet

PEMRA gives 14 days not usually it is of 7 days

How would Allah condone them?

Pakistanis have recognized their enemy now

Geo’s character is doomed

Geo has a Pharaoh like attitude

Geo became judge itself

Shutting down Geo won’t affect rest of the media so it

should be shut down

Geo’s lies never see an end

Geo has got foreign investments

Head of hypocrites will get his salary doubled now

He has proved his loyalty to his masters

Geo gets foreign aid

Shame on you Baba ji, how much more money you’re going to

take

Geo’s agenda is to create war like situation between

Government and army

Express tv

EXPRESS NEWS

19th April to 26th April

TALK SHOWS SOURCES GUESTS AGENDA TOPICS

TAKRAR” by

Imran khan

siyasat or

kanoon”by

moeed

peerzada

“kal tak”by

Self-

reported

informat

ion

Army

other

Media

Arshad insari,

Zaeem kadri ,

Sharmeela farooqi ,

Imran Ismaeel ,

Shahzaib khanzada,

Rehman Malik

Arif Hameed

Bhati ,Umer

Cheema , Wasie

Demonizing

geo TV for

not playing

ethical

role

Agenda is

to prove

jung group

hamir meer pr

hamla ,

Hamid meer ka

bayan

geo ka kirdar,

hamir meer pr

javed

chuadhry

“to the point

“ by shahzaib

khanzada

“Baat se

Baat” by dr.

Maria

Zulfiqar

Jaleel , Ayaz Ameer

,Shahid lateef,

kamar uz Zaman

kaira

babar sattar, ayaz

ameer, fawad

chuadhry

kashif abbasi,

abdul kyum sidiqui

General rtd.

Hammed gul , Arshad

Sharif(Anchor),Moed

Farooq(Anchor),Shah

zad

Chaudhry(Def.Analys

t),Naseem

Zehra(Sen.Analyst)

Asma Shirazi,

Waseem Badami &

Fariha Oris, Syed

Zaid Hamid Defence

Analyst and Mian

Javed Latif PML-N

Rana Muhammad Afzal

PML-N, Senator

guilty and

to prove

hamid meer

innocent.

Anti Geo

and anti

govt.

To malign

public

against

Jung group.

Pro army

hamla ,

army+ govt+geo

media

sahafat me sach

kia or koumi

mufad kia

WHY pemra is

quiet,

government vs

ISI ,

Zahid Khan ANP and

Ali Muhammad Khan

PTi

Laguage:

continuous compelling pictures cannot be allowed in any

situation

allegations on a huge institution of country is condemnable

In this meantime geo should not allege an institution. they

should have let it cool

Fan of geo are hurt

Jald bazi, ilzam tarashi is an awkward and an embarrassing

deed

Allegations on ISI and rest groups are ignored by Geo

Politicians and isis chief both are different. If media is

alleging politicians but they canot point their finger on DG

ISI

This is an Anti Pakistani activity

Why jung roup did not become petitioner itself of this case

Why only geo claim that they are speaking truth and are on

the hit list of ISI

Geo group has strong viewership they can shape agenda

This is irresponsible

Isi kism ki harkaten kr kr k ham ne riysat e Pakistan pe

trust kho dia ha

We have lost our trust

We talk what we want to talk

Pakistan gets 30 percent more week with this geo’s act

Fard pr hamly ka jawab riyasti idarey per hamla kyun

Level of polarization and distrust is rising

They spread Chaos. Geo should be accountable

The is attack is below the belt

They are continuing this drama since long,

He is not innocent unless proven guilty

Geo has only doubt and decided itself that isi is guilty

Geo TV has done drama

GEO DID IT JUST FOR GETTING MORE AND MORE RATING

This is pure agenda by geo

Inteha darjey ki bewqoofi

Pore isi ko dnya bhr me bdnam krne ki sazish ha

On the bases of some Dubious mandate one media cannot do

such thing it’s a state’s security institution not an

individual

Every media wants prove before airing some news. this is

difference between geo tv and other media

If its geo’s journalist then geo can cross any limit but if

it comes on us then it ll be called like any private

channel’s journalist