Introduction
In the recent years, the term “good governance” is being increasingly used in Nepal. It has been the topic of discussion at many workshops, seminars and meetings, where bad governance is regarded as one of the root causes of Maoist conflict and other evils in our country. Then what is good governance?
The concept of “good governance” is not new. It is as old as human civilisation. Simply speaking, good governance means process of decision making and the process by which decision are implemented in a right and equitable way. It incorporates executive, legislature and judiciary and refers to robust interaction between these formal institutions and those of civil society.
According to the Governance Working Group of the International Institute of Administrative Science 1996, “Good governance refers to the process whereby elements in society wield power and authority, and influence and enact policies and decisions concerning public life, and economic and social development”. So, good governance can only flourish in a state where there is rule of law, transparency in the activity of the institutions like judiciary, executive, legislature, administrative bodies and other related bodies that are responsible to the people. Besides, access to the information and development of the civil society are essential for good governance.
Since good governance is related to decision-making and implementation of the decisions, it involves formal and informal actors. Government is one of the actor. Other actors involved in governance vary depending on the level of government that is under discussion. Media, political parties, international donors, multi-national corporations, local bodies at the village level, community-based organisations, international and local non-governmental organisations, research institutes, finance institutions, etc. are other actors in good governance.
Similarly, the World Bank says, “Good Governance is epitomized by predictable and enlightened policy making; a bureaucracy imbued with professional ethos; an executive arm of government accountable for its actions; a strong civil society participating of public affairs; and all behaving under the rule of law”.
Good Governance in Nepal
Historical Background of Good Governance
Though the concept of good governance is getting prominence in the recent years in our country, it began as early as our nation was founded. The saying that Nyaya Napaye Gorkha Janu (When you are deprived of justice, go to Gorkha), which was propounded by the late king Ram Shah, hints us that the concept of good governance began way back to over 300 years old. The Dibya Upedesh of late Prithvi Narayan Shah stressed on rule of law and corruption free society and empowerment of people, which was a big stride of the late king towards good governance.
During the Rana regime, good governance remained badly ignored. The Rana rulers worked for their own welfare and benefit. But good-hearted Dev Shumsher tried to render good governance to people at the cost of his premiership. He set up complaint boxes at different places in a bid to listen people’s voice, which was definitely a remarkable step towards good governance.
The establishment of democracy in 2007 B.S. (1951A.D) after deposing the autocratic Rana regime opened the gate for good governance in Nepal. But, the instability still prevailed in the country where people’s rule was undermined leading to the establishment of Panchayat System. Even some efforts were made to establish good governance even during the Panchayat System, but power holders did not work towards rendering good governance. The restoration of democracy in 2046 B.S. (1990 A.D) was expected to change the situation but the expectation of people for good governance suffered a set back. They were made to bear the brunt of bad governance characterized by internal conflict, political instability and corruption. Good governance is still a matter of dream in our country.
Present Situation of Good Governance
In the recent years of internal conflict and rampant corruption, good governance is getting prominence in rhetoric. The revolution change of regimes in Nepal can be considered as consequences of lack of good governance, and bad governance is the root cause of more than seven year old Maoist rebellion.
The Human Development Report, 2001 of Nepal has attributed to lack of good governance for its poor human development index. Discussion on good governance occupied most time during the meeting of Nepal Development Forum held in Kathmandu last year. Major donor agencies and international financial institutions of Nepal are forwarding good governance as a pre-condition for their aid and loans to Nepal in the recent years.
After the restoration of democracy in 1990, the discussion over the issue of good governance has been given top priority by the donor countries, politicians, and even the King himself as an essential factor for the development of the country. It is a tragedy that its discussion has limited to theory. In the last thirteen years of democratic system, political instability coupled with rampant corruption marred the country, which shadowed even some efforts towards good governance. Corruption remains as a major hurdle for good governance in Nepal. ‘Corruption Culture’ has developed from grassroots level offices to Singhdurbar, derailing the democratic process in the country.
An important factor for good governance is ‘civil society’, which is yet to evolve in our country. The government can do nothing alone unless civil society develops. To develop the civil society and strengthen good governance, people must be well informed i.e. people should have access to information. Article-16 of the Constitution of the Kingdom of Nepal 1990, has granted ‘Right to Information’ to the people, but the exercise of the Article is yet to be fully realized. A bill guaranteeing the Right to Information has not been formulated even after 13 years of the promulgation of the Constitution. The bill is expected to ensure free flow of information and thus will play an important role in creating an informed civil society.
In absence of a right to information bill, transparency has suffered a major set back. Consequently, people are being deprived of decisions, decision making process and the implementation of the decisions, and even the whole decentralization process has been derailed. Above all, rule of law, which is the crux of democratic governance, has been badly jeopardized.
Role of Media in Good Governance
To begin with, good governance consists of three ingredients: the state, the civil society and the private sector. All three are critical for sustaining human development. Each has its own strength and weakness. And a major objective of good governance is to promote highest possible constructive interaction among these. In this context, the role of media can not be ignored. Media provides platform to the ingredients of good governance to interact to each other. Besides, media surfaces weakness and strength of each and binds them together.
Therefore, the role of media helps in bringing about participation, strategic vision, rule of law, transparency, responsiveness, consensus orientation, equity building and inclusiveness, effectiveness and efficiency and accountability, which are characteristics and objectives of good governance, in overall functioning of a government. So, our concern here is to see, how media as an important actor of good governance, plays role to ensure these ideals of good governance, especially in our own context.
Before we discuss the role of media in good governance, it is inevitable to talk on democracy, without which good governance becomes a matter of distant dream. To obtain the above-said objectives of good governance, democracy is a must. It is simply because without democracy, free press cannot be imagined. We did not have free press during the Panchayat system. The credit goes to democracy for the present fast development of media in our country. Without free press, good governance cannot even be thought of. Free press is fundamental to democracy and democracy is needed for existence of free press.
To encourage good governance and enhance democracy, the role of national and local level media is highly important. Freedom of expression and right to information are fundamentals of democracy. These rights can be safeguarded best by both national and local media.
Local media should concentrate on the local issues and emphasize on the problems of the locality whereas national media should play role on bringing out national issues, and thus should ensure that no national and local issues go uncovered. The more information provided to people, the easier it would be to make decisions. So, both the national media and local ones should perform their duties to promote well-informed civil society and help in overall development process of the country. It is because informed people will make informed decisions and thus media plays a crucial role in strengthening democracy.
Likewise, media also safeguards people’s right to information. People know whether decision making and their enforcement are done in a manner that follows rules and regulations or not, through media. Thus media is an important actor of good governance for maintaining transparency in decision making and their enforcement. Media ensure that information is freely available and directly accessible to those who will be affected by such decisions and their enforcement.
Good governance requires fair legal frameworks that are enforced impartially. It also requires full protection of human rights, particularly those of minorities. Impartial enforcement of laws requires an independent judiciary and an impartial and incorruptible police force. Media performs as a watchdog to maintain rule of law. In the recent years, Nepalese media have unearthed irregularities of judiciaries, and even raised voices for an independent judiciary. More interestingly, Nepalese media have been exposing unwanted interference of politicians to police institution, which shoulders major responsibility to maintain law and order in the country. But our media have not been able to ferret out corruption in the police administration, which is one of the most corrupt institutions, according to this year’s Transparency International Report. Likewise they have not been able to unearth corruption done by judges and irregularities in functioning of courts as well, which has affected good governance.
In the democratic system of governance, government, civil society and private sector are entitled to be accountable to the people. Not only governmental institutions but also the private sector and civil society organizations must be accountable to the public and to their institutional stakeholders. Who is accountable to whom varies depending on whether decisions or actions taken are internal or external to an organization or institution. In general, an organization or an institution is accountable to those who will be affected by its decisions or actions. Accountability cannot be enforced without transparency and the rule of law. It is the job of the media to unearth absence of accountability of stakeholders of national life, and to make them aware of their own responsibilities to the public.
In the same way, participation of people in decision making and implementation of the decisions is a key cornerstone of good governance. Participation could be either direct or through legitimate intermediate institutions or representatives. It is important to point out that representative democracy does not necessarily mean that the concerns of the most vulnerable in society would be taken into consideration in decision making. But, participation needs to be informed and organised. For this media has role of supplier of needed information. To some extent, our media has contributed to in this regard, but it is not up to the mark.
Different stakeholders of a community possess different interests. They exchange their interests through media. Thus, media plays the role of a mediator of these diverse interests to reach a broad consensus on what is in the best interest of the whole community and how this can be achieved. Good governance requires a broad and long-term perspective on what is needed for sustainable human development and how to achieve the goals of such development. This can only result from an understanding of the historical, cultural and social contexts of a given society or community on the basis of information supplied by media.
A society’s well being depends on ensuring that all its members feel that they have a stake in it and do not feel excluded from the mainstream. This requires all groups, but particularly the most vulnerable, have opportunities to improve or maintain their well being. Our media have been repeatedly raising cases of gender inequalities, racial and other type of discrimination and injustices in our society. Media ensures that voice of voiceless is also heard and that the views of minorities are taken into account and that the voices of the most vulnerable in society are heard in decision-making. In other words, media bears social responsibility as well.
Effectiveness and efficiency are important elements of good governance. Good governance means that processes and institutions produce results that meet the needs of society while making the best use of resources at their disposal. The concept of efficiency in the context of good governance also covers the sustainable use of natural resources and the protection of the environment. In the recent years, journalists are using their pens in favour of sustainable development, which is also an agenda of Millennium Goal set by the United Nations.
From the above discussion, we cab conclude that media is essential actor of good governance and without media; good governance cannot be achieved at any cost. Though the media is ranked after the executive, legislature and judiciary, its contribution to good governance is not less than that of the three estates of a state.
Challenges of Nepalese Media in Promoting Good Governance
Though Nepalese media are contributing their best to promote good governance, it is not sufficient. Media have their own limitations for not being effective to boost good governance. The reasons are as follows:
1. Lack of a Right to Information Bill
2. Absence of information culture
3. Media in the hands of bureaucrats, politicians and elite
4. Lack of communication infrastructure
5. Poor economic condition of most media and the people
6. Limited coverage of media
7. Lack of qualified hands in the profession of journalism
8. Absence of mission journalism (Journalism devoted to good governance)
9. Orthodox mentality of government bureaucrats
10. Ineffective government spokespersons
11. Internal Conflict (Maoist Conflict)
12. Low literacy rate
13. Absence of empirical media studies
Therefore, if good governance is to promote in Nepal, media should be enabled by addressing the above-mentioned bottlenecks of media sector.
Conclusion
In the modern era, each state strives for good governance. Though some detractors of good governance say that good governance is an ideal concept and cannot be attained, every country (should) strive for it. All the ideals envisioned by good governance may be hard to implement in practice, but the best way is to keep on trying.
Good governance can best prosper in democratic environment where free press exists. Similarly, without good governance, democracy cannot be consolidated. Democracy in our country is weakening. We can attribute bad governance to for it. We know that media is needed for a well-functioning of democracy and to ensure good governance. Thus, democracy, good governance and media are complementary to each other.
In our country, the situation of democracy and good governance is very pathetic. But, media are encouragingly developing. Thus, media has a greater part to play to strengthen democracy and good governance.
But, our media have not been able to promote democracy and good governance as they have their own limitations and weaknesses. It is high time to exert concerted efforts to bail out our media from a host of bottlenecks and thus ensure that they play role on promoting democracy and good governance in Nepal.
Bibliography
Pro-Public – 2058; Ashal Sashan
Millennium Goal, UNO
Rio Declaration of Earth Summit;1992
Kharel P (ed.) 2002; Media in Society
Kharel P (ed.) 2000; Media Nepal 2000
Yadav, Lal Babu; Role of Media in Promoting Good Governance
Rana, Shrish.S; Media and Governance in Nepal
Baral, Lok Raj; Good Governance, Means of Communication and Conservative Culture
Shah, Ram Babu; Media and Democracy
Khadka, Kedar; Interview
Transparency International Report, 2003
The End
Seminar paper on "Role of Media in Good Governance" prepared by Ujjyal prajapati and kiran chapagain .
In the recent years, the term “good governance” is being increasingly used in Nepal. It has been the topic of discussion at many workshops, seminars and meetings, where bad governance is regarded as one of the root causes of Maoist conflict and other evils in our country. Then what is good governance?
The concept of “good governance” is not new. It is as old as human civilisation. Simply speaking, good governance means process of decision making and the process by which decision are implemented in a right and equitable way. It incorporates executive, legislature and judiciary and refers to robust interaction between these formal institutions and those of civil society.
According to the Governance Working Group of the International Institute of Administrative Science 1996, “Good governance refers to the process whereby elements in society wield power and authority, and influence and enact policies and decisions concerning public life, and economic and social development”. So, good governance can only flourish in a state where there is rule of law, transparency in the activity of the institutions like judiciary, executive, legislature, administrative bodies and other related bodies that are responsible to the people. Besides, access to the information and development of the civil society are essential for good governance.
Since good governance is related to decision-making and implementation of the decisions, it involves formal and informal actors. Government is one of the actor. Other actors involved in governance vary depending on the level of government that is under discussion. Media, political parties, international donors, multi-national corporations, local bodies at the village level, community-based organisations, international and local non-governmental organisations, research institutes, finance institutions, etc. are other actors in good governance.
Similarly, the World Bank says, “Good Governance is epitomized by predictable and enlightened policy making; a bureaucracy imbued with professional ethos; an executive arm of government accountable for its actions; a strong civil society participating of public affairs; and all behaving under the rule of law”.
Good Governance in Nepal
Historical Background of Good Governance
Though the concept of good governance is getting prominence in the recent years in our country, it began as early as our nation was founded. The saying that Nyaya Napaye Gorkha Janu (When you are deprived of justice, go to Gorkha), which was propounded by the late king Ram Shah, hints us that the concept of good governance began way back to over 300 years old. The Dibya Upedesh of late Prithvi Narayan Shah stressed on rule of law and corruption free society and empowerment of people, which was a big stride of the late king towards good governance.
During the Rana regime, good governance remained badly ignored. The Rana rulers worked for their own welfare and benefit. But good-hearted Dev Shumsher tried to render good governance to people at the cost of his premiership. He set up complaint boxes at different places in a bid to listen people’s voice, which was definitely a remarkable step towards good governance.
The establishment of democracy in 2007 B.S. (1951A.D) after deposing the autocratic Rana regime opened the gate for good governance in Nepal. But, the instability still prevailed in the country where people’s rule was undermined leading to the establishment of Panchayat System. Even some efforts were made to establish good governance even during the Panchayat System, but power holders did not work towards rendering good governance. The restoration of democracy in 2046 B.S. (1990 A.D) was expected to change the situation but the expectation of people for good governance suffered a set back. They were made to bear the brunt of bad governance characterized by internal conflict, political instability and corruption. Good governance is still a matter of dream in our country.
Present Situation of Good Governance
In the recent years of internal conflict and rampant corruption, good governance is getting prominence in rhetoric. The revolution change of regimes in Nepal can be considered as consequences of lack of good governance, and bad governance is the root cause of more than seven year old Maoist rebellion.
The Human Development Report, 2001 of Nepal has attributed to lack of good governance for its poor human development index. Discussion on good governance occupied most time during the meeting of Nepal Development Forum held in Kathmandu last year. Major donor agencies and international financial institutions of Nepal are forwarding good governance as a pre-condition for their aid and loans to Nepal in the recent years.
After the restoration of democracy in 1990, the discussion over the issue of good governance has been given top priority by the donor countries, politicians, and even the King himself as an essential factor for the development of the country. It is a tragedy that its discussion has limited to theory. In the last thirteen years of democratic system, political instability coupled with rampant corruption marred the country, which shadowed even some efforts towards good governance. Corruption remains as a major hurdle for good governance in Nepal. ‘Corruption Culture’ has developed from grassroots level offices to Singhdurbar, derailing the democratic process in the country.
An important factor for good governance is ‘civil society’, which is yet to evolve in our country. The government can do nothing alone unless civil society develops. To develop the civil society and strengthen good governance, people must be well informed i.e. people should have access to information. Article-16 of the Constitution of the Kingdom of Nepal 1990, has granted ‘Right to Information’ to the people, but the exercise of the Article is yet to be fully realized. A bill guaranteeing the Right to Information has not been formulated even after 13 years of the promulgation of the Constitution. The bill is expected to ensure free flow of information and thus will play an important role in creating an informed civil society.
In absence of a right to information bill, transparency has suffered a major set back. Consequently, people are being deprived of decisions, decision making process and the implementation of the decisions, and even the whole decentralization process has been derailed. Above all, rule of law, which is the crux of democratic governance, has been badly jeopardized.
Role of Media in Good Governance
To begin with, good governance consists of three ingredients: the state, the civil society and the private sector. All three are critical for sustaining human development. Each has its own strength and weakness. And a major objective of good governance is to promote highest possible constructive interaction among these. In this context, the role of media can not be ignored. Media provides platform to the ingredients of good governance to interact to each other. Besides, media surfaces weakness and strength of each and binds them together.
Therefore, the role of media helps in bringing about participation, strategic vision, rule of law, transparency, responsiveness, consensus orientation, equity building and inclusiveness, effectiveness and efficiency and accountability, which are characteristics and objectives of good governance, in overall functioning of a government. So, our concern here is to see, how media as an important actor of good governance, plays role to ensure these ideals of good governance, especially in our own context.
Before we discuss the role of media in good governance, it is inevitable to talk on democracy, without which good governance becomes a matter of distant dream. To obtain the above-said objectives of good governance, democracy is a must. It is simply because without democracy, free press cannot be imagined. We did not have free press during the Panchayat system. The credit goes to democracy for the present fast development of media in our country. Without free press, good governance cannot even be thought of. Free press is fundamental to democracy and democracy is needed for existence of free press.
To encourage good governance and enhance democracy, the role of national and local level media is highly important. Freedom of expression and right to information are fundamentals of democracy. These rights can be safeguarded best by both national and local media.
Local media should concentrate on the local issues and emphasize on the problems of the locality whereas national media should play role on bringing out national issues, and thus should ensure that no national and local issues go uncovered. The more information provided to people, the easier it would be to make decisions. So, both the national media and local ones should perform their duties to promote well-informed civil society and help in overall development process of the country. It is because informed people will make informed decisions and thus media plays a crucial role in strengthening democracy.
Likewise, media also safeguards people’s right to information. People know whether decision making and their enforcement are done in a manner that follows rules and regulations or not, through media. Thus media is an important actor of good governance for maintaining transparency in decision making and their enforcement. Media ensure that information is freely available and directly accessible to those who will be affected by such decisions and their enforcement.
Good governance requires fair legal frameworks that are enforced impartially. It also requires full protection of human rights, particularly those of minorities. Impartial enforcement of laws requires an independent judiciary and an impartial and incorruptible police force. Media performs as a watchdog to maintain rule of law. In the recent years, Nepalese media have unearthed irregularities of judiciaries, and even raised voices for an independent judiciary. More interestingly, Nepalese media have been exposing unwanted interference of politicians to police institution, which shoulders major responsibility to maintain law and order in the country. But our media have not been able to ferret out corruption in the police administration, which is one of the most corrupt institutions, according to this year’s Transparency International Report. Likewise they have not been able to unearth corruption done by judges and irregularities in functioning of courts as well, which has affected good governance.
In the democratic system of governance, government, civil society and private sector are entitled to be accountable to the people. Not only governmental institutions but also the private sector and civil society organizations must be accountable to the public and to their institutional stakeholders. Who is accountable to whom varies depending on whether decisions or actions taken are internal or external to an organization or institution. In general, an organization or an institution is accountable to those who will be affected by its decisions or actions. Accountability cannot be enforced without transparency and the rule of law. It is the job of the media to unearth absence of accountability of stakeholders of national life, and to make them aware of their own responsibilities to the public.
In the same way, participation of people in decision making and implementation of the decisions is a key cornerstone of good governance. Participation could be either direct or through legitimate intermediate institutions or representatives. It is important to point out that representative democracy does not necessarily mean that the concerns of the most vulnerable in society would be taken into consideration in decision making. But, participation needs to be informed and organised. For this media has role of supplier of needed information. To some extent, our media has contributed to in this regard, but it is not up to the mark.
Different stakeholders of a community possess different interests. They exchange their interests through media. Thus, media plays the role of a mediator of these diverse interests to reach a broad consensus on what is in the best interest of the whole community and how this can be achieved. Good governance requires a broad and long-term perspective on what is needed for sustainable human development and how to achieve the goals of such development. This can only result from an understanding of the historical, cultural and social contexts of a given society or community on the basis of information supplied by media.
A society’s well being depends on ensuring that all its members feel that they have a stake in it and do not feel excluded from the mainstream. This requires all groups, but particularly the most vulnerable, have opportunities to improve or maintain their well being. Our media have been repeatedly raising cases of gender inequalities, racial and other type of discrimination and injustices in our society. Media ensures that voice of voiceless is also heard and that the views of minorities are taken into account and that the voices of the most vulnerable in society are heard in decision-making. In other words, media bears social responsibility as well.
Effectiveness and efficiency are important elements of good governance. Good governance means that processes and institutions produce results that meet the needs of society while making the best use of resources at their disposal. The concept of efficiency in the context of good governance also covers the sustainable use of natural resources and the protection of the environment. In the recent years, journalists are using their pens in favour of sustainable development, which is also an agenda of Millennium Goal set by the United Nations.
From the above discussion, we cab conclude that media is essential actor of good governance and without media; good governance cannot be achieved at any cost. Though the media is ranked after the executive, legislature and judiciary, its contribution to good governance is not less than that of the three estates of a state.
Challenges of Nepalese Media in Promoting Good Governance
Though Nepalese media are contributing their best to promote good governance, it is not sufficient. Media have their own limitations for not being effective to boost good governance. The reasons are as follows:
1. Lack of a Right to Information Bill
2. Absence of information culture
3. Media in the hands of bureaucrats, politicians and elite
4. Lack of communication infrastructure
5. Poor economic condition of most media and the people
6. Limited coverage of media
7. Lack of qualified hands in the profession of journalism
8. Absence of mission journalism (Journalism devoted to good governance)
9. Orthodox mentality of government bureaucrats
10. Ineffective government spokespersons
11. Internal Conflict (Maoist Conflict)
12. Low literacy rate
13. Absence of empirical media studies
Therefore, if good governance is to promote in Nepal, media should be enabled by addressing the above-mentioned bottlenecks of media sector.
Conclusion
In the modern era, each state strives for good governance. Though some detractors of good governance say that good governance is an ideal concept and cannot be attained, every country (should) strive for it. All the ideals envisioned by good governance may be hard to implement in practice, but the best way is to keep on trying.
Good governance can best prosper in democratic environment where free press exists. Similarly, without good governance, democracy cannot be consolidated. Democracy in our country is weakening. We can attribute bad governance to for it. We know that media is needed for a well-functioning of democracy and to ensure good governance. Thus, democracy, good governance and media are complementary to each other.
In our country, the situation of democracy and good governance is very pathetic. But, media are encouragingly developing. Thus, media has a greater part to play to strengthen democracy and good governance.
But, our media have not been able to promote democracy and good governance as they have their own limitations and weaknesses. It is high time to exert concerted efforts to bail out our media from a host of bottlenecks and thus ensure that they play role on promoting democracy and good governance in Nepal.
Bibliography
Pro-Public – 2058; Ashal Sashan
Millennium Goal, UNO
Rio Declaration of Earth Summit;1992
Kharel P (ed.) 2002; Media in Society
Kharel P (ed.) 2000; Media Nepal 2000
Yadav, Lal Babu; Role of Media in Promoting Good Governance
Rana, Shrish.S; Media and Governance in Nepal
Baral, Lok Raj; Good Governance, Means of Communication and Conservative Culture
Shah, Ram Babu; Media and Democracy
Khadka, Kedar; Interview
Transparency International Report, 2003
The End
Seminar paper on "Role of Media in Good Governance" prepared by Ujjyal prajapati and kiran chapagain .
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