key: cord-0059817-x9inpjvb
authors: Hickling Gordon, Deborah
title: Introduction: Time Changes
date: 2020-11-26
journal: Cultural Economy and Television in Jamaica and Ghana
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-38065-6_1
sha: b54ffb252a67adb0628d80e1d87fb46c5d1a2753
doc_id: 59817
cord_uid: x9inpjvb

In this chapter the author, an audiovisual producer and lecturer of cultural and media studies, shares elements of the reflexive journey from Jamaica’s Public Service Broadcasting to Commercial Broadcasting eras, and on to the emergent Cultural Economy era. She argues that in the emerging cultural economies of the Global South, the production and trade of screen-based content are central to development positioning and geostrategic planning for nations like Jamaica and Ghana. The author presents #decolonization2point0 (d2k) as a cultural economy methodology for nations of the Global South that seeks to “personify” the cultural economy process through culturization rather than “disembody” it through marketization. Audiovisual production and trade in Jamaica and Ghana are presented as “metaphors of transformation” and as case studies to test the application of the South Star Policy Model she proposes for cultural economy policy development in the Global South. This model focuses on sustainable development objectives rather than exploitative and extractive intentions to guide planning for cultural and creative economy growth. It encourages a fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of the processes to integrate cultural economy thinking into development planning, in countries of the Global South with an emphasis on growing the audiovisual sector, particularly in Jamaica.

creative workers and consumer-participants, available at will. Now, devices never turn off. They are pre-programmed and digitally regulated, rendering master controllers an endangered species. Offspring of the 1980s sibling spend all day watching endless audiovisual content. They switch from program to program, format to format, platform to platform, activity to activity and device to device-from phone to watch to tablet and bigscreen television-watching content from countless sources available 24 hours per day. Personal amplifiers shaped around their heads or as buds in each ear satisfy the aural. Consumed content hails from every continent, places once only available through the reaches of imagination. From the safe-apathy of their middle-class vantage points they produce social media stories on the same gadgets through which they consume content. An available Wi-Fi signal is their most significant asset. Its absence is a challenge. Through this conduit the stream of content is constant. Between 1980 and 2020 things and times had changed. This is a story about a veritable zeitgeist, seen on and through the changing screens of time.

My fascination with the notion of creative zeitgeists began with my exploration of the impact of the liberalization of broadcast media and content production on the Jamaican society, where I was born. I propose that a creative zeitgeist is the change seen in the content, production processes and distribution of a creative sector at the end of a natural zeitgeist. This juncture is examined through the lens of philosophical, ideological, economic, governance and operational change within the sector and its sub sectors. I chronicled its occurrence in the audiovisual sector in Jamaica and my interest soon extended to countries of the Global South. My grounding in cultural studies and Pan-African orientation led me to a new understanding of the nuances, invisibilities and intangibles embedded in changes in the content creation process and in content products in former colonies, as compared with their Northern, predominantly colonial and imperial neighbors. The dialectics of "colonizer and colonized" met "spirit and matter" at the heart of a complex materialist debate about television's transition from public service broadcasting to commercial industry. Inherent contradictions in the creative and cultural industries concept in the Global South (Hickling Gordon) still remain unsettled but often unchecked in former colonies of the British Empire. These are central to understanding the changing audiovisual sectors in former colonies. Decolonization, or undoing the effects of colonialism and neocolonialism, remains at the core of the struggle by countries of the Global South to arrive at synthesis in these complex dialectics.

This volume traces the trajectory of transition of the audiovisual sectors of two former British colonies with a view to understanding the convergence and change that took place in their cultural economies-ecosystems of production, distribution and consumption of cultural goods and services in relation to their social, economic and political context (De Beukelaer and Spence 2018). The comparison of the trajectories in Jamaica and Ghana reveal cultural nuances that provide context for understanding the role of culture and creativity in economic planning, preparation and decision making for the uncertainties of the future.

This volume argues that the close of the second decade of the twentyfirst-century marks the end of a global zeitgeist, seen, in large part, as neoliberalism morphed into global populism. The end of the zeitgeist was marked dramatically and definitively with global insights brought by the harrowing COVID-19 pandemic. Within the context of a pandemic, the growing importance of the social, economic, political, and cultural roles of the audiovisual sub-sector of the global cultural economy became exceedingly clear. During the trajectory of transition of the audiovisual sub-sector from the twentieth century into the twenty-first, the ideological duality of public service and commercial media worldwide became more distinct. Widening global inequality, and changing patterns in public thinking and behavior reflected and represented wavering sustainable development imperatives and increasing commercial ones. To meet the development needs of the peoples of the Global South will require transformational thinking. To that end, and given the significance of the global cultural and creative sector, this volume encourages postcolonial developing nations to integrate Orange and Purple Economy in their development planning. Arguably, a global rebalance of power has begun to acknowledge, if not completely accept, the emergence of developing countries and to take their cultures and creativity into account. As this shift happens by natural selection, it is being televised. Programming and data is being produced in large volumes and transported between developed and developing countries at light speed through the Internet as conduit, curated by mainstream platforms and is consumed in copious quantities globally. It is for developing countries of the world to plan for and grasp the emergent opportunities and begin to plan clear geostrategies. This volume proposes that the twenty-first-century process of rethinking be considered the next phase of decolonization thinking. In this volume, decolonization 2.0 met the fourth industrial phase of global development and became a hashtag, #d2k. To embark on the #d2k journey, requires the acknowledgment that a series of cultural and creative zeitgeists occurred in the twentieth century into the twenty-first. This understanding arms decision makers in countries of the Global South with the insight required to make the best of the opportunity to "reset" the ways in which they approach development, through the design of their cultural and creative economies. The case studies of transition in the audiovisual sub-sectors of the cultural economies of Jamaica and Ghana, two former colonies of Britain, reveal a century of trauma that took place within what had become a new triangular trade route. The cargo has changed. The trade in black bodies for labour has become an exchange of products of the imagination and culture, processed into that valuable global commodity known as data. The balance of power must shift to favor the South if sustainable development is to be achieved. In this volume, the journey towards development begins with considering the impact of the changes over time and addressing the trauma of the transition starting with liberalization, out of which the cultural and creative economy concepts emerged on the eve of a new Millennium.

The media liberalization journey in Jamaica and my professional trajectory are reflective and representative of each other. Libertine zeitgeist occurred during the half century that is my life. Both my parents worked in the public service radio and television broadcaster, the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation (JBC). JBC was a veritable University. A training ground. An Institution grounded in the ideological push and pull between the democratic socialism through which it was formed and the capitalist conservatism that manifest as the Cold War. Before the JBC closed its doors, my parents' lives were steeped in the global activism and advocacy of the 1970s and the 1980s. My father was fired while on air, ostensibly because of political differences with Jamaica's Minister of Information of the day. As I researched the period I happened upon several anecdotes about my mother's activism in the labor movement at JBC. Awe and reverence characterize my childhood memories of time spent within the corridors of Jamaica's state-owned studios-its record library, editing stalls, floated television studio and control rooms. The Corporation's former employees continue to gather annually for retrospective celebration of the Corporation. Jamaica's National Dance Theatre Company, the National Pantomime Movement and other foundational national cultural institutions were agents of decolonization and continue to be instrumental in shaping the national consciousness of a politically independent Jamaica. Only the memory of the JBC remains as one of the cultural and artistic institutions charged with the identity formation of an independent Jamaica.

In the midst of Jamaica's media liberalization I responded to a newspaper advertisement from the JBC for producer/reporters, was accepted and joined the JBC family as a rookie in 1994. Television quickly became my first professional love. With the writing on the wall and looming closure I left the JBC just prior to the divestment exercise in 1997. I later learned two additional things about that year. In 1997 the coinage of the foundational DCMS "Creative Industries" concept and implementation of policy models took place in Britain. Liberalization exercises were also taking place in the West African City of Accra in Ghana in that year, a fact that would soon become significant. The year 1997 was one of those particular years in which there was a historical change in global economic systems, and marks the point at which a series of developments in different places align in ways that have lasting significance (Flew 2019: 1) . In postcolonial psychiatry, this phenomenon has been called "Psychic Centrality" (Hickling et al. (2010: 137) . The psychic centrality of 1997 was a marker in time for a new zeitgeist with significant impact on changes in cultural and creative production and trade. But I certainly did not understand this then. Now, I recognize that every detail of the story of transition is important for contextualizing decisions to be made for the future. The transitions and changes identified within the audiovisual subsectors of the Jamaican and Ghanaian cultural economies are "metaphors of transformation" that allow for an imagining of what could occur when prevailing cultural values are challenged and transformed (Hall 1996: 287) .

Having left the JBC, amid challenging national economic circumstances and the very low wages on offer to television content producers, I accepted a position as a television producer of the morning magazine program and special projects at CVM television. Before long, CVM began to buckle under the strain of Jamaica's 1990s financial crisis and became unsettled by the ensuing banking crisis (Duncan and Langrin 2004: 1). The financial downturn, changing technology, media practices and a dynamic political landscape impacted cultures of work, behaviors, ethics and standards (Hickling 2011) . Unable to make ends meet I tried my hand at independent television production. I had neither the sensibility nor the inclination for entrepreneurship, having been brought up in the ideological throes of democratic socialism.

The period of transition to liberalization was an unsettling time for Jamaica. The absence of an equitable model for the commercial trade in television programming and instability of the sector was another reason I gave up the instability of a changing media for the lesser instability of contracts in the public service for over 15 years that led me to policy and academia. It never compensated for the phantom limb of the broadcast media.

Postgraduate studies took me to my first International conference in the UK in 2004, a conference on broadcast histories. My presentation traced the trajectory of transition of the Jamaican television industry from inception to its recent divestment and liberalization. Its ideas converged mainly with the presentations by the African scholars. I found particular resonance in the presentation of a Ghanaian doctoral candidate, Margaret Amoakohene, who demonstrated changing television production values, content and philosophies in Ghana. The aesthetic similarities to productions in Jamaica were significant. The similarities seen in the news sets of these two developing nations are indicators of similarities in resource levels and aesthetic qualities. Technical production values and the traditions of storytelling were similar. A shared sense of "spirit" and sensibility was evident in the programming Amoakohene showed. The similarities between the Jamaican and Ghanaian television aesthetic, the trajectories of transition of Jamaican and Ghanaian societies and the ancestral linkages between the two nations provided a sound cultural "fit" for comparison and was chosen as a comparator, a secondary case study.

Ghana, too, had a colonial public sector and monopoly model of state television in the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC). Both television stations were initiated as part of the decolonization movements leading up to independence. Both Jamaica and Ghana were the first nations in their regions to gain political independence from Britain and both founding fathers Manley and Nkrumah approached broadcasting with the idealism of socialism education and empowerment at their inception (Hickling 2011 ). The Ghanaian government faced similar external pressures of Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) and privatized television in 1997, the same year the Jamaican government divested JBC and the Creative industries concept emerged. The Ghanaians, however, chose to maintain their public service broadcasting mandate, but added a commercial dimension to the operations of the GBC.

The liberalization of colonial media and ideological tensions within the nomenclature-battles surrounding the "terminological clutter" (Galloway and Dunlop 2008: 35 ) of cultural and/or creative industries and/or economy were fascinating. Using a dialectical and postcolonial theoretical frame, I examined the changes in broadcasting in the former British colonies and raised questions regarding the appropriateness of using dominant Western structures, processes and policies in the television sector in Jamaica and Ghana and by extension their cultural/creative industries and economies to address their challenges. The study sought to critically appraise cultural/creative industries and economy concepts for policy development, in light of the cultural specificities of Jamaica and Ghana; and consider how the television industry in both countries illustrated the contradictions and complexities of these concepts.

Amoakohene and others contextualized the changes in Ghanaian media when we met again at the University of Legon in 2009 as I sought to demonstrate the significance of examining the unique trajectories of transition of television in Jamaica and Ghana as they changed from public service institution to commercial industry. Both countries had shared colonial and progenitory customs and practices; but also very stark differences in approach to television based on their individual worldview. Several points of convergence and cleavage existed between Jamaica and Ghanaian cultures and television.

As ideas began to solidify around unique trajectories of cultural and creative industries (CCI) in my graduate work, I increasingly rejected "cookie cutter" approaches to CCI development in developing countries as developed for advanced industrial countries (Hickling 2011 ) based on the uniqueness of each sector. Countries of the Global South were ten years behind advanced industrial societies in their cultural economy approaches where expanded notions of cultural economy were seen in growing ecosystems of gestation, production, trade and distribution of ideas; identity and ideology; material and spirit; products and services; past and present. Many nations of the South were still shaping policies from early DCMS creative industries principles. During this period I was called to duty as a proximate aide to Jamaica's first female Prime Minister, Portia Simpson Miller, as her Special Assistant, and Coordinating Manager in 2006 and again in 2012 as her Director of Operations and finally Convenor of the National Cultural and Creative Industries Commission in 2014. That provided a high-level, fly-on-the-wall vantage point on global development processes, trends and politics. My deep-seated interest in culture, the arts and media converged with an emerging interest in policy formulation for the sustainable development of countries of the Global South. From one global High Level Summit to the next, political meeting and governance interface, I witnessed the existential duality facing national leaders of the Global South as they grappled with the changing fabric of societies and cultures that had been conditioned into cynicism over 40 years.

Neocolonial control, influence and pressures on former colonies were consistent geopolitical themes. Increasing inequity and contradictions of creeping positive economic indicators with alarming social, cultural and behavioral indicators loomed large in countries of the Global South. Where growth occurred, sustainable development did not always automatically follow. It was time to rethink "rethinking development" (Girvan 1991) . The question of whether neoliberalism as rebranded capitalism and its attendant freedoms of liberalization had failed developing nations continued to ring through. Had the "gifts of fortune themselves become elements of misfortune" (Adorno 1991: xv)?

By libertine design, societies of the South began to think diminutively about the sphere-of-influence of their governments, while , ironically, fervently relying on them for governance, guidance and growth. This was another contradiction amplified by the dreaded COVID-19 outbreak that peaked in 2020. I began to rethink the several points of cleavage and convergence that had emerged from the original study. These ideas, outlined here, provided contextual reminders of the cultural complexity of transnational media and formed the basis of the assumptions upon which this work is premised.

Understanding the story of change in twenty-first-century audiovisual sectors in countries of the Global South, like Jamaica and Ghana, requires an examination of the complex tale of a world in transition. The twentiethcentury trajectory of transition of cultural and creative industries and economy development in former colonies has a clear correlation with concepts and histories of abolition, emancipation, Pan-Africanism, political independence and the various steps toward sustainable development, including liberalization (Table 1 .1). Neocolonial liberalization has been the latest temporal "span of subordination" for the Global South (Hickling 2011) . In developing States like Jamaica and Ghana, this included variations on the theme of conquest, capture, enslavement and colonization. For nation states still working through issues of dependency, ideological grounding and development directions, the duality and dialectics of "creative economy" and "cultural economy" themselves require examination through the prism of decolonization. Across the spans of subordination variations of the creative economy concept became both a source of liberation with decolonizing intent and a contradictorily ambivalent, hegemonic form of economic repression in the stranglehold of capitalist commercialism in Jamaica and Ghana. This work spans the twentieth-into twenty-first-century libertine zeitgeist within which these cultural and creative Industries concepts evolved. It spans the first two decades of an expanded globalized vision of the new millennium. The libertine trajectory moved artistry and content production from public service and identity forming to the embrace of commercial models where culture, content and creativity are considered products and services. The underlying political and ideological contexts were fascinating.

The importance of considering political economy in the cultural economy equation was borne out by the polarizing geopolitics of the Cold War. Conflict was central to the emergence of virulent ideological polarity that defined Jamaican and Ghanaian politics and media. In Jamaica, a full-scale ideological battle emerged along party lines (Hickling 2011: 168) .

Responses to the tensions in both countries were in keeping with their cultural characteristics. While the Jamaican media and the nation raised their voices in defiant protest and criticism of government policy in keeping with its culture of confrontation; in the face of intense pressure the Ghanaian media and the nation at large were rendered silent. Asante's "language of conflict" manifests as a deep and prevailing "culture of silence" in Ghana (Hickling 2011: 197) . This is a perfect example of nuanced cultural cleavage that colors cultural economy development in countries of the Global South.

Ghana was found to be more grounded in the strength of influence of its history and prehistory with Africanism and "Africanness" as strong philosophical principles that undergird that society. Ghanaians have as "an adhesive quality -'Africanness' -"understood as coming from Africa" (Makumba 2007: 34) , but more importantly the "Africanity" that characterizes its philosophy. In the absence of an indigenous philosophy, the "youthful", creolized society of Jamaica has, instead, drawn its philosophies and theories of identity from the integration of cultures and philosophical constructs in order to formulate positions on contemporary national life, including decisions for cultural production (Hickling 2011: 321) . These identity challenges manifest in different ways. In Jamaica, the ambivalence of "cultural cringe" (389) and low "collective esteem"(344) were identified alongside demonstrable confidence in capabilities that manifest as a positive work ethic and solid content output, creativity and talent by audiovisual workers and teams. Socio-economic challenges and an absence of a clear market for audiovisual productions also negatively affected the consistency of production. In addition to material support, industry players' need for "smadification" (352) manifests in Jamaican television. Jamaicans have a deep-seated cultural quest to be respected, to be regarded as "smaddy". To be "less-counted" (352) is the antithesis of "smadification" (225), the Jamaican colloquial term used to describe the process of becoming or seeming "to become somebody", an indicator of poor collective esteem. Jamaica's consistent reliance on overseas programming and the marginalization of independent programming and production until late in the second decade of the new millennium are indicators of growing sector-confidence.

Comparatively, the bitter war to gain its independence in Ghana made the promotion of African content and aesthetics top priorities for the new independent government of freedom fighters. Nkrumah's dynamic African policy made the objective of television to protect the African personality and Africanized television to promote a Ghanaian culture and way of life "dress, language, head sculptors, gold and silversmiths, potters and weavers of old, all of that encompasses the African personality. Television was a part of the independence movement" (1998: 193) . In technical matters, however, identity was not a consideration. BBC broadcasting techniques and standards were stringently observed within both new media.

Tradition and modernity tensions also emerged in many areas of the original study, and caused heightened anxieties about the new commercial environment. Ghana engaged in an existential battle regarding concerns about commercialism, arguing that it is an affront to the emphasis on journalistic integrity (Hickling D, 276) . Conversely, in Jamaica, notions of modernity were embraced in the commercial era of television particularly by a new generation of producers as seen in later chapters of this volume. The embrace of competition; reduced reliance on the state; emphasis on individualism, individuation, rights and freedoms-be they freedom of trade, capital, expression or speech; and reliance on economic growth as the primary measure of human progress using primarily economic indicators took hold. Small and small island developing states became preoccupied with appeasing multilateral benefactors, warding off external threats and seeking to grow their economies. Many welcomed international free trade agreements and with them the concepts and language of commodified cultures with insufficient critical examination of the impact of its neoliberal form on their media and cultures. Three generations within developing nation-states sought to calibrate the experiment of liberalization. As cultures shifted, tradition and modernity fought a battle of ambivalence. Ideological tensions intensified even as political apathy and cynicism grew. The free market had liberated societies into vibrant economic centers of unstructured liminality and boundarylessness. Social decay and unwieldy governance existed alongside emergent economic growth possibilities as the formal and informal economies battled for primacy. Neither nation was fully prepared for the cultural realignment that liberalization brought.

This volume uses the audiovisual subsector of the cultural economy as a metaphor for transformation for national development in Jamaica and Ghana. Liberalization and many cultural and creative economy principles defied several traditional mores in nations of the Global South. Both Jamaica and Ghana struggled with adapting and adopting the cultural and creative industries concept. Neither could reconcile the ambivalence it presented and as a result were unable to articulate clear paths of synthesis, through policy up to the end of the second decade of the new millennium. Both sought to find a position that provided equity and synthesis in the dialectal constructs of economic growth and sustainable development. As we will see, Ghana took the concepts further than Jamaica. The volume later explains possible reasons for this.

Whether sufficient forecasting was done to adequately prepare for the economic, cultural and social changes that ensued from liberalization remains a foundational question asked and responded to in the original dissertation. This volume suggests, on the verge of post-COVID-19 zeitgeist change, that a deliberate, planned, data-driven process of preparation is required for the next phase of development to include a twentyfirst-century decolonization movement that utilizes modern tools to optimize growth. A counter-geostrategy by the Global South must involve a balanced economic independence and attainment of sustainable development objectives.

With a decade left to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), accelerating those processes is critical. This will occur where technology meets national identity, media diversity and productivity. Yet, emphasis is being placed on economic growth and technology in many countries of the Global South, resulting in great ambivalence. "Indeed, the approach cannot focus only on technical and commercial features" (LaTorre 2014: 17). Emphasis on intangible culture is of critical importance in the new round of development. Even as culture and creativity take centerstage, neoliberal ideals have rendered considerations of identity, diversity and other intangible, thematic consideration "soft". Yet the emphasis and reliance of the world's citizens on content production were amplified during 2020 global COVID-19. The reliance on citizen production and distribution of content during the lockdown demonstrated the deep connection between the audiovisual and cultural product and societal change. Strengthening the audiovisual sectors of developing nations is therefore a significant element of any geostrategy for development.

This volume presents the unique circumstances of change in two former colonies from television as institution to audiovisual subsector of the cultural economy-a trajectory of transition from TV to AV. Therein are largely unfiltered ethnographic descriptions of selective change-processes in liberalized television in Jamaica and Ghana. It proposes decolonization in a contemporary form, as a twenty-first-century methodology. I propose a model of cultural economy development for nations of the Global South that is applicable for structuring cultural and creative economies, sectors, subsectors and industries as part of contemporary decolonization movements.

The neoliberal world began to practice new waves of global populism in the second decade of the twenty-first century. A new zeitgeist had emerged with Brexit and Trumpism and exploded with the onset of the global pandemic of COVID-2020. This brought new implications for cultural and creative production, distribution and trade for countries of the Global South. The 2011 thesis had metamorphosed into new exploration and new questions discussed in the chapters of this volume. In response, the hashtag #decolonization2point0 or #d2k juxtaposes a groundswell of activist traditions centered around a decolonization movement grounded in twenty-first-century agency and advocacy. #decolonization2point0 means to encourage and inform thinking about emerging cultural economies in the Global South as an important element of global power dynamics. #decolonization2point0.

#d2k argues that the development of cultural sectors in the Global South goes well beyond structural, material and modernist changes. Development also requires intangible changes to the "spirit" of production. Where structural change meets intangible change and material change meets transitioning spirit is where the next phase of decolonization resides. Encapsulated in "decolonization" are meanings in Bob Marley's lines, "Every man have a right to decide him own destiny"; and "Emancipate yourself from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds"; from two of his anthems of defiant choice (Marley) .

The transition from public service to commercial broadcasting in Jamaica and Ghana 1997 caused accelerated change. The significance of that change is seen by exploring its history, and chronicling two decades of change in two countries. It is an ambitious task for an abridged volume. In television, we call this "highlights". The comparative circumstances of liberalization that led to variable media divestment are summarized in Chap. 2. Chapters 3, 4, 5 and 6 cover the changes that took place in the audiovisual subsectors in Jamaica and Ghana between 1997 and 2017 and up to the beginning of 2020. The construct of the 7Cs, proposed as the seven characteristics of the cultural and creative industries, are the organizing categories used to illustrate change, contradiction and choices made in those chapters. Chapters 7 and 8 explore the issues of sector "personality" in Jamaica and Ghana and apply those conclusions to a proposed plan for the development of the Jamaican audiovisual sector in Chap. 8. 

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Redemption Song