THE WORLD TONIGHT

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The World Tonight is the thoughtful, foreign-affairs-dominated mainstay of Radio 4's current affairs coverage. It's a kind of idealised version of The Guardian and, like The Guardian, has a pronounced left-liberal bias. Or is that just how it seems? Though I've had a busy working week (with overtime!) & haven't had much time to blog (only to count interruptions), I've recorded the contents of all of the last eight editions of the programme to see just exactly what it covers and just who the programme invites to speak. This is what I found.
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4/11 This edition began with Afghanistan and featured an interview by Robin Lustig with a sceptical Ed Davey of the Liberal Democrats (I.C. of 0.3). The following discussion of MPs expenses & spouses featured one of the few MPs willing to whinge about it in public, Charles Walker of the Conservative Party. The interview was somewhat challenging (I.C. of 0.8). The issue was then discussed with Allegra Stratton of The Guardian. After a discussion of opposition protests in Iran with BBC regular, Professor Ali Ansari of St Andrews University (a frequent contributor to The Guardian, Independent and Observer), the focus turned to the Tories and their European policy. The matter was discussed with a highly critical Sylvie Goulard. Robin introduced her as a 'French MEP and president of the French European Movement'. Though we can infer that she's an ardent Europhile, Robin forgot to tell us which party she belongs to. It turns out that she's a Liberal (as regulars could have guessed already from my colour-coding of her name!). So, all in all, a strong left-liberal bias on this edition.
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5/11 This edition was not so clear-cut. We had an interview with a female Afghan charity worker who wanted coalition troops to stay in her country and a report on the Fort Hood killings. Then the government's policy of Quantitative Easing (Q.E.) - i.e. printing money - was discussed with two people who were (with reservations) supportive of it (George Magnus and Jan Raldolph). Paul Moss then reported from Germany, where he chatted to former bosses of the communist GDR who are still proud and unrepentant about their dour old tyranny. The Trafigura story was then discussed with a lawyer called Martin Day and a Ivorian chap called Claude Gohourou, who claims to speak for the toxic poisoning victims. Finally came a hymn of praise to President Lula of Brazil, a centre-left president obviously, by the BBC's own centre-left economics correspondent Jonty Bloom. More hagiography than report, it would have brought a blush to Lula's bearded cheeks if he'd have heard it!
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6/11 Afghanistan again led this edition and Robin Lustig discussed the matter with (a) someone who advised President Obama during his election campaign, Marvin Weinbaum, and then (b) Patricia DeGennaro, a professor at NYU who regularly blogs for the left-liberal Huffington Post. A spot of left-liberal bias there for sure. More on the Fort Hood killings and a report on whether TV helped bring down the Berlin Wall (and a piece on Santa School - yes, about training santas) led to a bit of AGW chat with the head of the U.N.'s Climate Change Secretariat, Yvo de Boer. An interesting report on the U.N.'s conference on migration in Athens by the Beeb's Malcolm Brabant quarantined a couple of sage voices from the Third World (protesters) who opposed migration on the grounds that it harmed their countries (depriving them of skilled people) between two advocates for migration, William L. Swing of the International Organisation for Migration and the U.N.'s Peter Sutherland, who got the last word (hymning the glories of migration). (Note that no-one from, say, Migration Watch got a look-in here).
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9/11 Ritula Shah took over for this edition and the opening discussion of nuclear power centred on interviews with Lib Dem leftie Simon Hughes, an opponent of nuclear power, and a newly-converted Stephen Tindale (former head of Greenpeace) - who supports it to 'save the planet'. A balanced argument on nuclear power certainly, but a debate between people on the Left nonetheless. The BBC's Roger Harribin then added this thoughts. Next up came a discussion on the fall of the Berlin Wall between the Economist's liberal-minded Edward Lucas (formerly of the BBC and The Independent) and left-wing Neal Ascherson of The Observer. This was followed by a report on the Tories and poverty by Jonty Bloom - an ill-informed piece in which Jonty referred to "the Tory party of Wilberforce and Gladstone" . Now, does anyone with an interest in British history spot what's wrong with that statement? (Clue: check Wikipedia's entry for the famous Liberal Party prime-minister W.E. Gladstone!). A discussion about Yemen with Ginny Hill of Chatham House and The Guardian (naturally) and an interesting piece on China and Africa rounded off the programme. Left-liberal bias here? Yes, in spades.
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10/11 This was a remarkable edition of the programme. It opened by discussing Gordon Brown, a grieving mother and The Sun with Charlie Beckett of the L.S.E.'s journalism think-tank POLIS. Presenter David Eades might have been expecting a defence of Brown and an attack on The Sun from such a source. He didn't get either and the result was a satisfyingly testy encounter. A piece on those poor Palestinians followed from Bethany Bell (complete with obligatory side-sweeps at wicked Israel) and Mahmoud Abbas's declaration that he intends to cease being Palestinian president was discussed with one of his chums, Ziad Asali of the American Taskforce for Palestine. The bulk of the programme, however, was a debate at Chatham House, hosted by Robin Lustig, on the Copenhagen Climate Change conference. It was prefaced by a report from the BBC's enviromental(ist) correspondent Richard (Since Kyoto "the scientific case for man-made climate change has strengthened significantly") Black and featured the voices of various Green activists, as well as Joan Ruddick, Labour's climate change minister, a climate-scarer from Grenada and someone from the Union of Concerned Scientists. All four of Robin's guests fully bought into the AGW agenda too, and every single one of Robin Lustig's questions came from the same stance. The panel consisted of disgraced Labour ex-minister Elliot Morley (though his career-sinking expense claims were not brought up); Steve Rayner, professor of science and civilisation at Oxford University; Mike Hume, professor of climate change and founding director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia; and Cleo Paskal of the Energy, Environment & Development programme at Chatham House (and the liberal Toronto Star).
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11/11 With Robin Lustig back in charge, this edition looked at the economy and interviewed John Philpott of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development and John Cridland of the C.B.I., as well as featuring a report from Bishops Stortford by our old friend Jonty Bloom. Bishops Stortford has one of the lowest rates of unemployment, so that was obviously the place for the BBC to go on a day when the latest unemployment figures came out. Divided Cyprus, the Glasgow North East by-election (due the following day), and aliens and Christian theology were also discussed. Orla Guerin reported from Pakistan (a report that sounded exactly like every other report she's ever filed). Today's Afghanistan spot consisted of an interview with Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent, yet another voice from the liberal wing of American politics.
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12/11 At last, another centre-right voice (the first since Charles Walker)! Immigration was the hot topic and Robin Lustig conducted a joint interview between Labour's omnipresent Phil Woolas and Harriet Sergeant of the Centre for Policy Studies. Other pieces examined ivory trading in Zambia, Japan's relations with the U.S. and the thoughts of Russia's President Medvedev. Afghanistan today was discussed by (you guessed it!) two more voices from the left-liberal end of U.S. politics - former Clinton administration official Karl Inderfuth and long-term Bush-basher David Corn of liberal-progressive magazine Mother Jones. Any chance of hearing any American interviewee who isn't from that end of U.S. politics on The World Tonight some time soon?
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13/11 The Obama administration's decision to try the 9/11 Guantanamo inmates in civilian courts in New York was first up for discussion. Doing the discussing with Robin Lustig were (a) a lawyer for the Guantanamo crowd, Tara Murray of Reprieve and (b) Tony Ortega of the very-liberal Village Voice (described by the very-liberal Robin Lustig as a "venerable New York newspaper", who praised the current administration and bashed Bush. More voices from just one side of U.S. politics. The undoubtedly venerable Douglas H. Paal of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace was the sage consulted over Asia-U.S. relations. I don't know what his politics are (though he wrote this, which is suggestive: "Obama decided early on that among the many messes he inherited from George W. Bush, China policy was not one of them.") Also discussed were time-zones, local elections in Kosovo, China and its carbon emissions, the Glasgow North East by-election result (discussed with Hamish McDonnell, formerly of The Scotsman) and the government-owned rail company, East Coast, which has taken over the running of the mainline on the East Coast from National Express.
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I think all this conclusively proves that there really is a left-liberal bias at the BBCs The World Tonight.