Tell Me No Lies: Investigative Journalism and its Triumphs

By Kenn Taylor

Veteran investigative journalist and filmmaker John Pilger has collected some of the world's most vital journalism -from the first witnessing of the death camp at Dachau to the present insurrection in Iraq. Journalism that exposed wrongdoing and power abusers, that revealed uncomfortable facts and bore witness to events most of the media wouldn't go near.

In introducing his book, Pilger bemoans the fact that the ever-increasing number of media outlets are controlled by an ever-decreasing number of corporations. The media is more and more just a system of dispensing information, rarely questioning official sources and only representing the concerns of its owners. He believes we are now fighting a new battle for freedom of the press, this time against big business rather than government.

Introducing each piece - from front-page articles to radio broadcasts and book extracts -Pilger writes a short explanation putting each work in context. Many risked life and limb to get their stories out -Wilfred Burchett exposed himself to radiation sickness to reveal the destruction at Hiroshima, and Anna Politkovskaya survived two assassination attempts whilst writing about Russia's war in Chechnya.

War is the most common theme of the collection, but there are many other examples of exposé. Phillip Knightley highlighted the pharmaceutical industry's cover-up over the Thalidomide scandal and Gunter Wallraff posed as a migrant Turkish worker in 1980s Germany to show up their exploitation.

What links these disparate writers across a span of decades and most of the globe is their integrity and determined pursuit of justice for all. Often they went far beyond the boundaries of common sense to give a voice to the voiceless.

The end of the collection brings us right up to date with Eric Schlosser's profile of the fast-food industry and a series of articles on the Iraqi situation, most notably Jo Wilding's reports from inside the besieged city of Fallujah. Wilding is one of a new breed of writers described by Pilger as 'citizen reporters' - unqualified journalists are doing their best to find the truth that so many professionals ignore. In the future, Pilger warns, this could possibly be the only type of media we'll be able to trust.

A powerful and interesting book, Tell Me No Lies sometimes reads like a secret history of the last fifty years, and shows the importance of true journalism.

Edited by John Pilger
Published by Jonathan Cape, £20