speech and respect - College of Social Sciences and International ...

The Poverty of Civil Libertarianism
have liberated speech in the former eastern bloc. In fact, however,
the transition toward capitalism is replacing "Big Brother" with
market forces whose burden may be less visible but remains onerous.
Pravda, which boasted that it had been closed fourteen times—
nine by the Czar, four by the Provisional Government, and most
recently in August 1991 for supporting the coup—suspended publication
in March 1992 because circulation had fallen 99 per cent
from 1987, newsprint prices had increased twenty-fold, and annual
subscription fees defrayed the costs of only the first 20 issues.
Izvestia survived by carrying more advertising, renting or selling its
extensive real estate, and launching We-My, a Russian-English
paper published jointly with the virulently anti-communist Hearst
Corporation. 61 The 10,000 members of the Soviet Writers Union,
who had lived well under communism, now scrape by on state
pensions of 600 rubles a month and risible royalties of 400 rubles per
24 pages. Although private publishers pay more, they want only
detective stories, science fiction, and sex manuals. Even under
Gorbachev's glasnost the pornography market had grown to an
estimated 15 billion rubles by early 1991 (before the ruble collapsed).
The writers' group Aprel complained: "The market threatens
to become the grave of culture. Privatization of culture is above
all privatization of the soul." The most unlikely authors suddenly
earned big bucks. Col. Anatoly P. Privalov, vice-chairman of the
Foreign Intelligence Veterans Association and former KGB operative
in Turkey and Algeria, was negotiating with Hollywood to spill his
members' secrets. 62
C. The Ambiguous Value of Commodified Speech
If laissez-faire capitalism maximised freedom, then speech that bore
the largest price tag would command most respect. Instead we find
deep ambivalence toward commodified speech. 63 The claim to
truth can be fatally compromised by the acceptance of money.
Laypeople everywhere distrust and despise lawyers as hired guns,
mouthpieces for sale to the highest bidder. 64 Governments require
lobbyists to register and elected officials to declare their interests.
Eyebrows were raised when 47 MPs with investments in brewing
persuaded Lord Young, the Trade Secretary, to reverse his approval
of the Monopolies Commission recommendation that breweries sell
their pubs. That year the Brewers' Society contributed nearly
£250,000 to the Conservative Party. Large donations from business
sources can embarrass political parties, as the Tories discovered
during the run-up to the last general election when newspapers
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