An open letter from the Stellenbosch University Journalism honours Class of 2019
On Monday 26 August, Professor Johan Fourie from Stellenbosch University’s (SU) Department of Economics came to speak to the BAHons Journalism students of SU as a guest speaker on the topic “How does one write about capitalism?”.
On 15 September an opinion piece written by Fourie was published in Rapport in which Fourie states that the journalism students have a “distorted notion of capitalism”.
However, several statements and claims made in Fourie’s opinion piece have been taken out of context in order to fit his own narrative.
Since February, we have had regular guest speakers on a Monday afternoon, and these conversations, like any of our other classes, are seen by the class as a space for healthy debate where it is safe to voice your opinions without them being distorted.
Fourie mentions that with his first question as to what exactly capitalism is, “hands shot up”. Fourie portrays the class as responding to his question with zeal, which was not the case.
He also states that, after hearing the opinions of three students out of a class of 25, he realised that “there is work to be done”. This seemingly implies that the opinions expressed were not up to standard. Fourie’s talk was never understood as being a lecture in economics, as stated earlier he presented his talk as “How does one write about capitalism?”. From his opinion piece however it would seem that Fourie felt he needed to educate the class on a view of capitalism that, according to him, no one in the class had been taught.
The journalism qualifications at SU are offered only as postgraduate qualifications. The class obtained a variety of undergraduate qualifications, taking a variety of undergraduate modules, including economics in the very department from which Fourie hails. Fourie did not inquire about these details beforehand, and from his opinion piece it seems that he was under the impression that the class only took social science and humanities subjects.
The students who did study in the social sciences and humanities were taught various theories and were encouraged in undergraduate courses to question and critique theory, whether we agree or not. At no point did any student present in the journalism class on that afternoon voice their support for alternative theories to capitalism, nor did any one portray themselves as being anti-capitalist in the way Fourie paints the picture in his article.
Fourie quotes the comments of three students. Firstly, these three opinions are not representative of all 25 students in the class and, secondly, the comments were also cited out of context.
One student is quoted as saying in response to what is capitalism, “that’s when people are deprived of their freedoms”. Before the student responded, he stated clearly to Fourie that the statement he was about to make did not reflect his views, but rather that he was playing “devil’s advocate” by pointing out the negative sides of capitalism. Fourie makes no reference to this in the article.
Fourie turned the facts to fit into his own narrative. This is not only unethical, but dangerous. In the aftermath of Fourie’s opinion piece, two other pieces were written by individuals not present on the day of Fourie’s talk.
As prospective journalists, we place a high value on a diversity of opinions and voices as it is the foundation of the work we aim to do. We thus respect Fourie’s right to voice his opinion. We are however also encouraged to challenge existing societal norms and concepts. We cannot stay silent while a misconstrued image of us and our department is broadcast to the public.
BAHons (Journalism) Class of 2019,
Department of Journalism, Stellenbosch University