ABSTRACT
Our newspapers speak to us as much of public opinion as they do of the public whose opinion it supposedly is. And there seems no getting away from the fact that there is such a thing. It is easily outraged, sometimes upset, politicians appeal to it, try to influence it, we ourselves often side with it against our politicians. We, the public, were horrified by photographs of torture in the Abu Ghraib prison. Our horror might have some effect on the conduct of affairs. Documentaries on famine and other, nearer-to-home injustices may sometimes do more than just leave us alone with our feelings of impotence and loss of hope; they may also help to create climates of opinion that, if too late for many, have some effect on the future by forcing the hands of leaders sensitive to how ‘the public’ thinks.
