Suchergebnisse

"Democracy provides an environment in which the protection of basic human rights is best guaranteed." (Our Global Neighborhood: The report of the Commission on Global Governance, New York 1998). A comparative analysis of available data on state security services of several European states and the US points to the fundamental theoretical tenets concerning the role and the functioning of these services in democratic environment. Since their beginnings, these agencies have been the chief instrument in national security protection. Historically, in various states and in different periods, the unique mission of security services - the protection of national security - has not included uniformity of content. Among other things, this is largely due to a lack of an unequivocal definition of the concept of national security and a miscellany of "perceptions" by the ruling structures of certain states. This is why security services in totalitarian regimes, in t name of protecting "national security", have violated human rights. Due to their specific role within national security systems, security services restri certain rights of certain individuals and organisations even in democratic societies. However, democratic societies are characterised by the fact that security services operate strictly within the law and that such violations are minimal. In other words, in democratic states, security services violate some civil rights in order to protect the key sections of national security, democratic society, and community rights. (SOI : SOEU: S. 150)

Democracy and constitutional state should understandably be reviewed in the context of a society's progression in curbing the state. In any community the central issue is the relationship between the people as individuals and as members of a collective, since it is desirable for a collective to be a synerg sum of individuals. Thus it is prudent to search for a corellation between democracy and constitutional state. Democracy is an emanation of freedom, constitutions always a limitation. A state hems in a civil society; within it there is a network of the processes of structuring government from "above", which is of particular interest in transitional countries that gave up on the ideologised inaugural effect in designing government and adopted "constitutional engineering": power-sharing, popular sovereignty, representative parliamentarism, promotion of freedoms and basic rights of individuals and citizens. In this, it is imperative to make note of the necessity of structuring societies from "below" by means of the principle of local self-rule. (SOI : PM: S. 147)

A few years after the collapse of communist regimes, it is evident that the confidence about the ultimate triumph of liberal democracy was premature. This waking up to the reality is not only the consequence of the hardships in the transformation of post-communist societies, but of the intellectual scepticism regarding the normative potential of liberal democracy in the developed western societies. The problem might in most general terms be formulated as the incapacity of liberal democracy to generate and reproduce the normative requirements for its own survival. The author thinks that the solution to this paradox can nevertheless be found within the institutional framework of liberal democracy: if the traditional moral concepts on which liberal democracy was founded in the past are worn out indeed, and no civil- religious substitute for that tradition has emerged as yet, then its only possibility is to create its own, modern or post-modern, morality by means of the public discourse mechanism and the political participation of citizens. The normative dimension of liberalism must not be reduced to the theory of private ownership, market and competition, but be envisaged as a constitutional theory of human rights and restricted government and the egalitarian distribution of goods and opportunities. (SOI : PM: S. 30)

What are today's mass media like? Are they objective enough or are consumers too fatidious? How topical the issues of the freedom of the media, truth, and objectivity are? The author has tried to provide the answers by looking into the norms and regulations in Croatia and abroad, beginning with the Code of Honour of the Croatian Association of Journalists, the documents of the Council of Europe and the famous First Amendment to the US Constitution. + A probe into the freedoms of American journalism shows that there are no all-inclusive recipes and that these freedoms must be fought for and won. The best way to secure the right to the freedom of speech is to consistently respect the standards of professional journalism. However, our experience and practice show that this aspect is most lacking. Particularly interesting is how these problems were noticed by Croatian journalists Frano Folnegovic and Bogoslav Sulek more than a century ago. Apart from the political restrictions and pressures, Croatian journalists do not pay enough attention to this respect for the standards of professional journalism, which can best be illustrated by the example of the catastrophe of that American plane near Dubrovnik, when some media reported not only that the plane had safely landed but published the late Secretary's statement. Only by strictly respecting professional standards, which may be achieved through constant improvement, study and research, the preconditions for objective and authentic reporting may be realised. (SOI : PM: S. 165) + Civil society has set up many commissions, councils and committees with the aim of controlling mass media so that they would not only be a profit-amassing industry but would also conform to the fundamental demands that are put on journalism