September 13, 1994 CHAIRMAN HUNDT ADDRESSES ETHICS AND THE COMMUNICATIONS REVOLUTION In a speech delivered today to the United Church of Christ in New York City, FCC Chairman Reed E. Hundt said, "the communications revolution should not be a highway--it should be a bridge between the world of opportunity and the world of despair." Hundt elaborated that, "The great web of digital electronic communications that will extend across our country has vast power. It will transform our economy into one in which value is added...by generating and wielding information. It will change profoundly all the ways we teach, learn, and converse." In discussing ethics and the communications revolution he noted that defining ethics isn't that easy. "When it comes to ethical codes, we have a heck of a lot more choice than in local telephony or cable tv markets! But touchtone dialing and channel surfing through the these schools of thought is not an option." Chairman Hundt continued, "But in order to live successfully in our complex society, we need to create together what the legal philosopher John Rawls described as a 'well-ordered society.' In other words, in our Babel of ethics and languages we have to communicate well enough so that all 'free and equal' persons participate in the process. Through this communication, all of us together must come to a consensus about the way we should govern ourselves. This applies to discussions of value...to debates over who should pay for the information highway." Addressing the FCC's involvement in the communications revolution, the Chairman said "a task we can and should assign to government. I refer to the guarantee that the communications revolution will provide to all Americans the tools to participate in ethical consensus. All Americans must be able to share their views, to submit their different ethics to fair competition in a public reasoning process. Only then will all feel bound to understand and accept the common consensus. We need to make sure that with respect to ethics, as well as wealth, we do not divide into a society of haves and have-nots." -FCC- FCC CHAIRMAN REED E. HUNDT EVERETT C. PARKER ETHICS IN TELECOMMUNICATIONS LUNCHEON ETHICS AND THE COMMUNICATIONS REVOLUTION SEPTEMBER 13, 1994 NEW YORK, NEW YORK Thank you, Rev. Bailey, for that kind introduction. I particularly want to note how delighted and honored I am to be here with you and with John Seigenthaler. John is notable for many things, but he deserves more credit for his vision and judgment than you may know. In the early 1970s he gave what I think were the first full-time post-college jobs to a young newlywed couple from a small Tennessee town; one became a reporter and the other a photographer. This was the fine young couple we now recognize as Vice President Gore and his wife Tipper. Now that's excellent judgment and tremendous foresight. I am here to talk about ethics and the communications revolution. I'd like to begin by reading from the Biblical book of beginnings. From Genesis 11: "And it came to pass, as they journeyed East, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there.... "And they said 'Come, let us build us a city and a tower with its top in Heaven'... "And the Lord said 'Behold, they are one people and they have all one language; and this is what they begin to do; and now nothing will be withholden from them, which they propose to do. Come, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.' "So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth; and they left off to build the city. Therefore, was the name of it called Babel." Here we are then -- spread across the face of the earth, divided by barriers of different tongues, culture and distance. And in this condition we have to find ways to communicate in order to agree on how to exercise our responsibilities as stewards of this earth. Most scholars agree that the three most important periods in the history of communication have been the eras of the invention of writing, the printing press, and electronic communication. The last era started with Morse's telegraph but now, 150 years later, it is exploding in scope with the conversion to digital signals over wire, wireless, broadcast, satellite and cable networks -- the five lanes of the information highway. The great web of digital electronic communications that will extend across our country has vast power. It will transform our economy into one in which most value is added, not by refining iron or molding steel, but by generating and using information. It will change profoundly all the ways we teach, learn, and converse. To discuss in a learned manner both the dazzle of the communications revolution and its relationship to ethics requires a joint degree in philosophy and science. I have neither. I'm just a lawyer. Of course, as such I am certainly ready to offer remarks about these subjects anyway... Now I need to know that you're not expecting to hear literature today. After all, as Gertrude Stein once said to Ernest Hemingway, "Remarks, Hem, are not literature." So with expectations I hope sufficiently low to let me get by with what was called a gentlemen's C when I took Philosophy 10 in college, I'll proceed on. . . Ethics, as I was told in that class, is the study of how one ought to act in life. Others say it is the study of what one ought to believe. Others claim that it concerns how one can distinguish between good and bad, right or wrong. Still others suggest it is the study of what sort of character one should strive to develop. Defining ethics isn't that easy, is it -- even for a lawyer, who by training ought to be willing to say anything. But perhaps the difficulty we have even in defining the term ethics is similar to the trouble we have with defining values in this country today. Perhaps my difficulty in finding a way into these remarks and our difficulty in sorting out what has been called the chaos of values in our country are both related to the complexity of our culture. We live in the most exciting, diverse, complex society that has ever gathered together on this planet. We experience here the full impact of the scattering and confoundment of the people of Babel: in this country, our 250-plus ethnic groups speak more than 350 languages. The airwaves carry our Babel of tongues: over 450 radio stations have non-English formats. As we are multilingual, so we are multiethnic. And as we are multiethnic, so we are multiethic. This country has 80 different religious bodies, each with more than 60 thousand members. They agree on some things, but disagree on many things. In the academic world, or in the religious community, there has been a great burgeoning of interest in the question of defining ethics in our multi-cultural society. This development traces back to the work of philosophers Elizabeth Anscombe and Alasdair MacIntyre in the 1950's. Anscombe recognized that our historical notions of morality were becoming unintelligible in our complex, modern, polyglot culture. MacIntyre agreed that our modern world had inherited a crazyquilt of conflicting ethical traditions. But he said the search for meaning is more likely to be more successful if we can ascribe moral traditions that suggest orderly narratives for a successful life. Contemporary philosophy has taken on the search for moral tradition sparked by Anscombe and MacIntyre. But just as physics has not developed a grand unified theory that ties together the 20th century's many discoveries, so philosophers offer us not one settled doctrine but a welter of choices in our search for a code of ethics. We can choose to be realists or intuitionists, naturalists or subjectivists, relativists or metaethical relativists or universal prescriptivists. If we want to know how to live we can adopt the precepts of natural law or Kantian ethics, social contract or egoism, deontology or consequentialism, utilitarianism or virtue theory. And if all else fails we can rely on the bedrock injunction to respect the rights of others -- although few want to leave those rights for lawyers to define. When it comes to ethical codes, we have a heck of a lot more choice than in local telephony or cable tv markets! But touchtone dialing and channel surfing through these schools of thought is not an option. And to those who are waiting for remote controls to help you figure out what to believe, maybe you know something I don't. Nevertheless, the bookstores are stocked with the publications of would-be ethical guides, advisors, and savants. The top two hottest selling paperbacks this week are about the search for ethical guidelines and values. A former cabinet official creates a bestseller by writing a modern day version of Poor Richard's Almanac -- and it reads pretty well, too! We look for answers everywhere -- in schools, neighborhoods, exercise classes, self-improvement clubs, radio talk shows, and even the Internet. The search for values must be and can be an individual quest. But in order to live successfully in our complex society, we need to create together what the legal philosopher John Rawls described as a "well-ordered society". Rawls taught that a fair, just and well-ordered society depends upon two ideas. First, all citizens are free and equal persons. Second, society must be "regulated by a public political conception of justice". Rawls argued that this "conception of justice" must be shaped by the development of a "consensus" in the midst of a "diversity of conflicting. . . and reasonable . . . doctrines". In other words, in our Babel of ethics and languages we have to communicate well enough so that all "free and equal" persons can come to a consensus about the way we should govern ourselves. This applies to discussions of value and to debates on the crime bill, from discussions on the meaning of life to debates over who should pay for the information highway. Now this "consensus", Rawls said, is shaped by a public reasoning process. There are three pre- conditions for public reasoning to succeed. First, we have to adhere to the duty of civility. This is the duty to explain our views while being willing "to listen to what others have to say and being ready" to change our own views. Second, in shaping a consensus, we must seek true facts and accurate information. After all, when we agree on the true facts we are far more likely to agree on matters of opinion. Third, there must be universal access to the public reasoning process. Everyone in this country of "free and equal" citizens must be part of the public reasoning process. So now we see where modern communications comes into this discussion of ethics. How does the public reasoning process get conducted if it isn't over all the lanes of the information highway -- broadcast, wire, wireless, satellite, and cable? But do modern communications increase or decrease our willingness to listen to the views of others? Do talk radio and broadcast television help us learn the facts or do they spawn misinformation and enhance disagreement? And if modern communications only are available to the "haves", as opposed to the "have-nots" of our society, how can we hope to include all our citizens in the "overlapping consensus of reasonable doctrines"? These are critical questions. But we should start working on answers by recognizing, gratefully, that modern communications has the potential to enhance greatly the terms and methods for pursuit of the "consensus of reasonable comprehensive doctrines." First, the new communications techniques give almost infinite access to knowledge to those who know how to use them. Second, the communications revolution greatly expands access to communications. The first books were fabulously expensive. The first telegraph services were only for big business. But now we have the capability to talk to each other -- through voice, video, and data exchange -- more easily, more cheaply, more extensively than has ever before been possible. Those who like to know, to think, to talk, or just like to watch the world pass by should all feel about this revolution in communications the same way that Wordsworth felt about the French Revolution, as he wrote: "Bliss it was, in that dawn, to be alive." It will not surprise you to learn that at the FCC we're all in favor of promoting this communications revolution. Our means is a policy of competition with three guiding principles. First, we want to introduce choice for consumers in all communications markets. Second, we want open competitive markets because we want to create opportunity for all Americans to participate in the communications revolution, especially small business, women and minorities, for whom we are making special efforts. Third, we want to establish fair rules for the competition. The policy of competition under the guidelines of choice, opportunity and fairness will help our country see: -- more investment; -- more jobs; -- more participation by small business women and minorities; -- leadership by America in sustainable economic development all over the world; and -- a revolution in education, a reinvention of job training for adults, and the delivery of better health care services to all Americans. The policy of competition encourages fair competition among business plans to let the best plans win -- just as fair competition among ethical ideas should shape the consensus that governs our well-ordered society. And our competition policy stimulates the communications revolution to reach all parts of the private sector -- that will bring the greatest number of Americans into the public reasoning process. Yes, the communications revolution will give each of us access to more information than any one person can absorb. But if there are more books in the library than you have time to read, do you react by closing the library? We will need ways to filter information -- to sort out what is usable in the public's reasoning process. But we won't need censors and we won't need governmental control over the content of the ethical debate that I see thriving in the electronic Chautauqua of tomorrow. Now, as I suggested before, the FCC is in effect working to become the Federal Promotion of Competition in All Communications Markets and Protection of Consumer from Monopoly Commission. That would give us the initials FPCACMPCMC, which we're thinking of just shortening to The Commission. In that case I would just be called The Commish. What we don't want to be is the Federal Civility Enforcement Commission or, even worse, the Federal Censorship Commission. Living up to the duty of civility is up to people on their own. Just as we don't want the FCC enforcing civility, so we don't want it to decide who has spoken truly or falsely. But the public reasoning process that will define our consensual values also depends on the communication of truth. On this subject in Sunday's Washington Post, radio talk show host Diane Rehm asked hard questions, including these: "[s]hould there be as careful an examination of statements uttered on the air as there is of words printed? Is there any way in which talk programming can be monitored to ensure factual presentation and correction of error? How can we as citizens participate more fully in the process of questioning and demanding accuracy?" These are excellent questions. At the Emmy's Sunday night, Jeff Greenfield also asked the broadcasting industry hard questions about itself. I was glad to hear him. But we don't want to leave the answers to government bureaucrats. Nevertheless, without government intrusion, as a society we still need solutions to public disinformation and misinformation that don't involve governmental intrusion but that also don't leave us as a society callously indifferent to truth or falsity. Similarly there is a tremendous concern in this country about TV violence. The concern is justified. Violence on TV is one of many causes of violence in our society. And violence is totally unacceptable in any "well ordered society". It should not be necessary for government to step in to deal with violence on broadcasting. Look at what has happened because Congressional leaders such as Senators Hollings, Inouye, Dorgan, and Simon and Congressman Markey helped identify this issue: Both the cable and television industries announced comprehensive, industry-wide anti-violence initiatives. ABC this fall will introduce a new on-air logo to designate certain programs as "particularly enjoyable for family viewing." Television set manufacturers have approved a standard for blocking technology that will rely on the programmers sending their ratings electronically. A number of companies already have begun to sell devices that will enable parents to block programs. The third precondition to public reasoning is a task we can and should assign to government. I refer to the guarantee that the communications revolution will provide to all Americans the tools to participate in ethical consensus. All Americans must be able to share their views, to submit their different ethics to fair competition in a public reasoning process. Only then will all feel bound to understand and accept the common consensus. We need to make sure that with respect to ethics, as well as wealth, we do not divide into a society of haves and have-nots. Think about how you would develop the consensus ethic of a well-ordered society if we were divided into two groups: those who could read and write and those who could not? How could these two groups truly compare their beliefs, share their aspirations, agree on facts, or reason civilly together? The difference between those who can read and those who can't is similar to what will in the future be the difference between those who have the opportunity to take advantage of modern communications and those who do not. Now some say that by virtue of the inexorable logic of market economics the information highway will naturally reach to all Americans who need it. Is this true? Let's look at how we are doing with regard to the oldest lane on the information highway: the wire telephone network. In 13 states more than one in twelve households don't have telephones. In the African-American and Hispanic households representing the lowest one-quarter of income groups, from 10% to 36% lack active phone service. Overall, 15 million individuals are without phones. Nearly 10 percent of children under age 6 live in homes without phones. Among African-American and Native American children, the numbers are 20% and 36%. Is it important for these people to be connected? You bet. You need a phone to participate in the economy, to leave a phone number so that a potential employer can call you, to make arrangements for child care and transportation. These are obvious truths, but they add up. It is virtually impossible to participate in today's society if you didn't even have a telephone. And the capabilities of the humble telephone line are multiplying. The fact is that the common telephone line could bring every classroom in the country, all 45 million students, onto the information highway. That common line could connect the computers that are in half the classrooms in the country to a world of information. But only one out of twenty-four classrooms even have telephone lines. Why focus in particular on connecting our children to the potential of the communications revolution? Because any concept of a well-ordered society depends on raising our children to participate in public discourse and that discourse will increasingly be through electronic means. We can't affford to deny anyone the opportunity to enjoy the communications revolution. In this regard, your organization has been particularly important. The office of Communications of the Church of Christ, led by Everrett Parker and more recently by Beverly Chain, has provided the Commission with valuable input and information on critical issues of social justice ranging from cable television, equal employment opportunities and "electronic redlining". This input is vitally important. While we might not adopt every argument you make, every argument helps clarify our thinking and improve our decision. Soon after Harry Truman became President he met Churchill and Stalin at Potsdam. Truman confronted Stalin with the rumor that the Red Army had slaughtered a group of Polish officers in the forest of Katyn. Stalin brushed him off with the response that "the death of any one person is a tragedy. The death of many is just statistics". Here in the United States, we don't agree. Every life is important, statistics about all lives are also crucially important. We live according to John Donne's famous words, "Do not seek to ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee". When we read that not only are our children falling behind, we are all responsible. When we learn from the Department of Education that 90 million adults, 47 percent of the us adult population demonstrate low levels of literacy, in this country we accept that as a challenge for us all. The communications revolution could bring all these adults, and all our children, into the great public reasoning process that ultimately will sort out the chaos of values in this country, and bring Rawls' ethical consensus into being. I believe this from personal experience. In 1969, when all telephones were black and all dials were rotary, I spent a short time as a school teacher in a middle school. Only half the kids who started the 7th grade would graduate from 9th. On average, in 3 years at my school, a child would fall two years behind in reading skills. The best way out -- the only way out -- was physically to get out. And the way to get out was to be permitted to enroll in one of the city's magnet schools. The magnet school was the only ticket out of an ever deepening cycle of poverty and hopelessness. Three students out of my 150 who started 7th grade read well enough to qualify for a chance for admission to the magnet school. We met every Saturday for special study sessions on how to pass the entrance exam. After months, the day of the exam came. Maybe you've seen the movie "Lean on Me" about the New Jersey principal, Joe Clark -- or the movie "Stand and Deliver", about East Los Angeles math teacher Jaime Escalante. Both were true stories in which the efforts of dedicated teachers vastly improved the test scores of their students. Both movies included the key to all successful movies: A Happy Ending. But no movie was made about me and my three special students. No movies will be made. All my students failed the test. And I failed them. But I did make a promise to myself. I wouldn't settle for that ending. None of us should settle for that ending. The schoolchildren of today must have better ways to escape poverty, despair, and hopelessness. We must make sure that the teachers of today are better teachers than I was, have better tools than I did, and don't bring too little too late to their mission as I did. Now the communications revolution won't guarantee happy endings for all. It is not a cure for all society's ills. But when I think about what it could have meant to my students, I know it presents an opportunity that is far more important than simply getting more cable channels or movies on demand. The communications revolution should not be a highway -- it should be a bridge between the world of opportunity and the world of despair. In closing, I'd like to express the urgency I feel as we take on the many issues of the communications revolution. This moment reminds me of a hymn I used to sing in high school as part of our daily service. It said: "once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, in the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side." We are now at such a moment. This is a moment to decide if we want the communications revolution to be a dawn of opportunity for everyone, for kids in all schools, for adults with low literacy levels, for those who don't even have a simple wire phone line. This is the moment to decide whether the communications revolution will be like the tower on the plain of Sinar that brought down confoundment and scattering and division on the Sumerians. Or will it be the way to bring new understanding, tolerance, and learning to all of us? Will it give us, as it can give us, the ways to build an enduring, ethical, well-ordered society? I thank you for participating in this moment of decision and for listening to these remarks.