| Interview with Czech Radio-6
June 23, 2007
Jeffrey Gedmin, President, RFE/RL, Inc.
This is an edited transcript of an interview conducted by Jan Sedmidubsky, Czech Radio 6, and aired on "Opinions And Arguments" on June 23, 2007.
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Czech Radio 6: This year marks 56 years that the American broadcasting station Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, whose main goal is the free distribution of information to countries that don't have freedom, has been in operation. During its existence, RFE/RL has broadcast in many different languages. Broadcasting in Czech and Slovak started in 1951, overseen by famous Czech personalities from the journalistic world, including Ferdinand Peroutka and Pavel Tigrid. The radio station continued broadcasting in Czech until 2002, in cooperation with Cesky Rozhlas 6, which has continued the tradition of Czech broadcasting since 1995 -- although under different, democratic conditions -- as a station of the spoken word and democratic journalism. Broadcasting in Slovak ended two years later.
Since 1995, RFE/RL has resided in Prague and focuses its aim on countries in Eastern and Central Europe, as well as other countries that lack freedom and stability, including the former Yugoslavia, Belarus, Iraq, and Iran. Not long ago, Jeffrey Gedmin took over the post of president of RFE/RL, and now he speaks to our listeners.
It has been three months since you took up the leadership of RFE/RL. That is usually a time of critically analyzing key tasks and problems, a time when you need to adjust the vision with which you came to the post to the reality you find waiting for you. What has this time been like for you?
Jeffrey Gedmin: First, let me say that the first three months have been a pleasure. It has been wonderful to be in Prague, a city I have known a bit and I am getting to know better. I have gotten reacquainted with a number of people that I admire greatly -- including Sasha Vondra, the deputy prime minister; including President [Vaclav] Klaus; and former President [Vaclav] Havel -- in these first 90 days. And then Radio Liberty -- to be part of this great tradition is an honor. I have already had dinner with some 200 of our journalists over the last weeks, and I have now a pretty good idea of what's strong here and what our big challenges are.
No. 1, we want to do a better job of connecting to our host country -- the Czech Republic. We are trying to do more with students, with journalists, with politicians -- (a) to listen and learn from them and (b) to let them know that we appreciate their hospitality and that we care about good relations with our friends and partners here. I do not say that lightly, because Czechs understand liberty and what it means when liberty is absent. So do Slovaks, by the way.
And just to complete the thought -- the second great challenge we face with all these wonderful, talented journalists from Afghanistan, from Iran, from Russia, from Ukraine is to help them be more effective in supporting and encouraging democratic development and debate in their countries. Some of their countries are not free; some of them are partially free; they all need our support.
Czech Radio 6: Broadcasting has changed a lot since the Cold War, and this transformation continues now. During the Cold War, communism was the main enemy. Do we have an enemy today, or who is RFE/RL opposed to today? How would you define it?
Gedmin: I would define us positively, not negatively. So I do not think we have an enemy per se. What we have rather are a set of values and ideals that in many countries are under attack today. Take, for example, two countries we broadcast to -- Russia and Iran. They are quite different, but if you care about things like decent, accountable government; free and independent media; basic political rights; and civil liberties like freedom of speech and assembly, both countries are going through a very difficult period, and democrats in both countries want support.
Czech Radio 6: Public broadcasting -- and RFE/RL is definitely a public-broadcasting station -- is surrounded more and more by private media. So how do you see the future of a station like this in a world of commercial broadcasting?
Gedmin: I think that is a big challenge for us because the market in which we operate, or I should say "the markets," are far more porous, open, and competitive than in the Soviet Union or in Eastern Europe during the Cold War. So we have to do two things. We have to constantly think about audience size, because it is open-competition market, and about values and mission. It is a difficult balance.
Czech Radio 6: A mission is something that is transparent and known to everyone, but in what way can a radio station today support information channels between itself and its listeners? How can it technologically improve? What new ways can be found?
Gedmin: We have changed a lot since the Cold War. We have changed quite obviously in geography -- we moved east and we moved south -- from Russia, the Black Sea, Central Asia, to the Persian Gulf. But we have also had to transform ourselves quite obviously in terms of technology, too. We do radio today. We identify where we can work, where we can compete in radio. In some markets, we are doing television. But in many instances we rely more and more on the Internet. I mentioned Russia before. If you want to reach people generally and you grasp [Russian President] Vladimir Putin goals, you see his monopoly in television, there is not much space left. Where do we go? We go to the Internet. We go to urban areas. We go to young people.
Czech Radio 6: Of course, it is not just a matter of commercial competition, but also, let us say, opinion, or even ideological competition. How do you look at Islamic radio and television that broadcast alongside your broadcasts and air, in fact, exactly different opinions than you, and are often funded by European money. How can you be successful in an environment like that?
Gedmin: I do not know exactly what programs or stations you are referring to. Could you elaborate? When you move south, particularly -- and you raise the subject of Islam -- there is a struggle for hearts and minds. And I think it is important for us to understand that in the Muslim world there is a small group of people who are killers, who are murderers, and who support the killers and the murderers. There is a much larger group that, we believe -- I believe -- is open to Western liberal thought. However, they are not us. They come from different cultures; they have a different sense and relationship to history, to tradition, often to religion itself. I think that it is a great challenge of our time and a great challenge for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty -- to pursue dialogue with that mainstream Muslim world, which is neither terrorist nor often entirely modern, Western, and democratic. That's where the fight for the future of Islam is. I think it is mostly a fight between Muslims and Muslims, but I think it is something that the West urgently needs to participate in also.
Czech Radio 6: That is where there is continuity with the time of 20 years ago, because then it was also about persuading those who were not able to change things themselves, but who were able to change their opinions.
Gedmin: I think, in this respect, you are absolutely right to say that. We are about ideas. We are about democratic and liberal values, and we believe in "soft power" and in the art of persuasion. We believe that these ideas and values are universal in their application, and while each country, according to its own preferences, traditions, and culture, will choose its way, we do believe -- I believe -- that given a choice between dictatorship and freedom, most people on this planet will choose freedom.
Czech Radio 6: Let's go back to the history of the radios for a moment. Americans gave money voluntarily at the beginning to fund the broadcasting because of their convictions. Would this happen today? How do Americans view RFE/RL now? What does this station mean to them?
Gedmin: To be complete and accurate, at one point in our early history, the money for this institution came from the CIA. It was a good idea, implemented, I think, in a poor, ill-advised sort of way -- that is my opinion. But then that changed and for the past decades, and certainly today, our money comes from the U.S. Congress. I think the honest answer to your question is this: Americans have always been reluctant internationalists. Not isolationists but reluctant or hesitant internationalists. I think if you put it simply, on RFE/RL you would probably find two types of Americans. One type would be confident, idealistic, and missionary and would say: "God bless, what a great mission! We support you." That is one type. And the second type might say to you: "Good idea, but is that really our job as Americans? Are we doing it the right way? Do the people in these countries really want us to do this?"
Czech Radio 6: Do Americans have an opportunity to check this? What feedback do you have about this?
Gedmin: That is a big challenge for us because we do not broadcast to the United States. We broadcast to these countries, in the languages of these countries, so what we do is we market through an English-language website [www.rferl.org] and through our office in Washington. But the short answer to your question is -- many Americans do not exactly know what we're doing today. Not because of the lack of transparency, but the fact that we are broadcasting in foreign languages abroad makes it hard to market and be visible in the United States at times.
Czech Radio 6: RFE/RL is a little like a melting pot in this building in Prague. There are people of different nationalities, many mentalities, people who had to leave their homes. Is it difficult to pilot a boat where the sailors are not all the same?
Gedmin: Let me start by telling you a quick story. I had lunch recently with a Czech politician who told me that he has teenage children and he worries about making sure that his teenage children grow up understanding the value of freedom, because the chapter of communism already seems very distant to them and abstract. I said to him, "I have a simple solution to your problem -- bring your kids, and we'll meet with our young Afghans, our young Russians, our Iranians who only live in Prague because their countries are not fully free like the Czech Republic, like France, like America." So back to your question, what does it feel like being captain of this great multinational ship? First of all, just speaking culturally -- fascinating, endlessly fascinating. But second of all -- to work with people who are living and fighting for liberty in their countries, it's a daily inspiration.
Czech Radio 6: Journalism is one of the most dangerous professions in the world, and this counts double for RFE/RL. How do you, as the president of RFE/RL, come to terms with situations when one of your journalists becomes a victim because of his profession?
Gedmin: It is the hardest thing that I have faced since being here as president these three months. We have had two reporters killed in Iraq. We have one inside Iran who went to visit a sick mother and they would not let her leave. We had two colleagues in Turkmenistan who went missing and one killed there last year. It reminds you of the sanctity and fragility of human life and for those of us privileged to live in free societies -- never, never, never take anything for granted. It is a great gift to live in freedom.
Czech Radio 6: There is an old joke that through its hard work, RFE/RL is working on its own destruction. Do you feel that this idea is wishful thinking?
Gedmin: It is true that when we succeed, we close our business. And you have to be philosophical about this. What a great thing that we are not needed at all in the Czech Republic, Hungary, or Poland. So take something today like Radio Farda -- that is our Persian service and it means "Radio Tomorrow." Nothing would be better than for me to walk into their office -- we have 38 Iranians here -- and for me to say to those 38 colleagues, "Ladies and gentlemen, we are closing. You are free to go home to Iran. I'll meet you next week in Tehran for dinner." That's what happens when we accomplish our mission.
Czech Radio 6: Where do you see RFE/RL in 15 years? How do you see the future in relation to my previous question, too?
Gedmin: I hope that we will be increasingly less active in parts of Europe, like Russia. That is a wish; it is a hope. I do not know where Russia will be 15 years from now. Admittedly, things do not look good in Russia today, but I have more faith in the Russian people than I do in Vladimir Putin and the men surrounding him. And I would expect that we would enlarge our services to the greater Middle East, where I expect for the following years we will be talking about these issues in Saudi Arabia, in Egypt, in Libya, in Syria, and in other countries.
Czech Radio 6: A lighter question, what happened to the symbol of the bell in the logo of RFE/RL?
Gedmin: They made that decision before my time. I am told that this torch of freedom has greater universal application. But then, on a lighter note, some say it is beautiful -- it looks like an orange sorbet ice cream cone. Some people still disagree on the logo, but no one disagrees on the word "liberty." That is our heart and soul.
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