Media education needs popular participation – 06/15/2023 – Education

Although Brazil has an internationally recognized tradition in the field of educommunication and academic studies on media, media education has been gaining more space in the public debate in recent years, which is directly linked to the complex scenario of information pollution that we are experiencing.

Interest in the subject has grown, largely because of the action of the third sector to disseminate this very urgent agenda, but at least so far little has been seen in terms of public policies created and implemented by municipal, state and federal bodies. Media education finally became part of the projects of the new management of the Social Communication Secretariat of the Presidency of the Republic (Secom/PR) in a forceful way, with a perspective of solid action to combat violent speeches and mitigate the context of disinformation and attacks against the democracy.

In addition to the creation of a Secretariat for Digital Policies with a General Coordination for Media Education (CGEM), also in January, the Presidency of the Republic sanctioned the National Policy for Digital Education, whose text includes media education, a big step towards the development of skills for the connected world is not only instrumental, but considers critical thinking and digital fluency for the analysis of messages and media texts in any format (from printed to virtual).

In the open, awaiting popular participation, are two measures: a public consultation and the next Pluriannual Plan (PPA). In the case of the first, it is the construction of the text of the national media education policy that will be implemented by the CGEM. So far, more than 80 contributions have been received from society on the Brasil Participativo platform. The deadline for commenting on the document ends on June 30th. Anyone can participate.

On the same platform, it is possible to vote on proposals for this topic to be included in the new PPA, a document that provides the federal government’s budget guidelines for the next four years. Among the more than 2,400 suggestions sent by citizens on the most varied topics, only three mention media education. The final date for contributing —submitting and/or supporting priority initiatives for your territory— is July 14th.

Now that opportunities have finally arisen, it is necessary for the population to get involved, give their opinion and participate, which is a chronic problem in Brazil. According to the latest ranking by The Economist magazine, which ranks the 165 most democratic countries in the world taking into account concepts such as political participation, the Brazilian score dropped from 6.92 to 6.82 between 2020 and 2021. But there is good news: data released recently by Secom show that more than 200,000 users have used the Brasil Participativo platform, which is very positive.

In times of misinformation, hate speech and so many other negative phenomena in the digital environment, media education needs to be seen as a right of society. And it will only materialize as such if society itself participates in the discussions that will enable the construction of sustainable public policies on the subject.