1,720,978 research outputs found
Media, communication and development: three approaches
No full textMedia, Communication and Development: Three Approaches critically investigates the three approaches that have characterised most debates in the field of Media, Communications and Development since its emergence in the 1950s, namely, media development, media for development and stakeholder and community engagement. The book thus addresses the extant gap in scholarship in the field and includes a chapter on impact evaluation, which current scholarship has either ignored or footnoted. In addition, the book uses case studies from both the global south and the global north to attend to complex and multidisciplinary concerns with participation, power and empowerment. The author brings in postcolonial perspectives to demonstrate that the use of MCD approaches emerged in response to the growing problems of underdevelopment, and not necessarily to western development theories. Using simple language that is at the same time theoretically engaged, he opens up the field to scholars across a large number of disciplines
People's radio: communicating change across Africa
No full textThis book is a critique of communication for development that examines radio-based methods and practices employed to engage people in the process of social change. Community engagement is a participatory and deliberative process aimed at fostering good governance, improved livelihoods, safer communities and a sustainable environment. The author discusses the challenges of using radio as a tool for community engagement in development. It examines specific case studies from the African continent. The book also considers the different ways governments, organizations, broadcasters and communities can use radio networks as instruments of participatory knowledge production, exchange and utilization so as to bring about social change and development. Thus, this book is relevant to global discourses on communication and development. It demonstrates how elusive participation can become if implemented without adequate consideration of power relationships within indigenous and local knowledge systems. It proposes that more effective radio for development initiatives should be built on participatory action research, local communication needs, and indigenous knowledge systems. Effective radio should rely on relevant broadcasting technology and infrastructure, and designed to operate independently of donor funds
Critical reflections on the theory versus practice debate in communication for development
No full textEven though the cliché ‘theory is practice’ registers in most communication for development debates, available evidence seems to suggest there is a growing chasm between the theory and practice of communication for development. This discussion argues that, with the increasing demand by governments and organisations for communication for development specialists, universities and training providers should rethink their graduate curricula. As course content, teaching methodologies and theoretical paradigms are revisited, trainers need to grill students on how the contestation of power is central to the application of communication in development. This paper advances two arguments. The first is that communication for development training has to begin listening to the innovative thinking that is shaping practice on the ground if the curriculum is to stay relevant. The second is that such programmes have forge strong linkages with development studies departments to ensure that students are well-grounded in development theory and practice
A tale of two community development projects: community engagement, local knowledge and power relations
No full text#Malawi sliding towards violent #anarchy
No full textAs unrest takes hold in Malawi, LSE’s Linje Manyozo urges his fellow citizens to realise that democracy is not just about speaking, but also listening
Method and practice in participatory radio: rural radio forums in Malawi
No full textParticipatory development entails the active engagement of the citizenry in the production, sharing and utilisation of relevant knowledge towards improving their livelihoods. For much of the developing nations, especially in Southern Africa, without access to electricity, telephones, internet and television, radio is the only reliable, affordable, pervasive and extensive avenue for information and knowledge exchange that the majority of poor citizens can afford. Sampling a participatory radio project from Malawi, this paper critiques the depth of radio as a strategy for promoting community participation in development policy formulation and implementation. The paper argues that radio is a reliable tool for strengthening democratic values when employed as a tool for engaging marginalised communities to frame out their development aspirations, as this creates a sense of pride and ownership in development interventions
Hegemony, ideology and political journalism in Democratic Malawi’s broadcasting media
No full textFor the first three decades following independence from Britain in 1964, the governance of Malawi was a political dictatorship under President Dr. Hastings Kamuzu Banda and his Malawi Congress Party (MCP). The country adopted a multiparty constitution in 1993 through a national referendum. Bakili Muluzi and his United Democratic Front (UDF) emerged winners of the 1994 general elections and formed a government. The UDF also won the 1999 and 2004 elections. In a multiparty democracy, the right to freedom of expression should ideally empower journalists to provide in-depth and balanced reporting on issues that affect the disadvantaged populace, the majority of which lives in abject poverty. The media’s attempts at providing accurate and balanced information have, however, intensified tensions with the ruling politburo. Building on the case of four journalists who were dismissed from the country’s public broadcaster, the Malawi Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) Radio, this paper draws from Gramscian concepts of ideology and hegemony to critique the practice of political journalism in Malawi’s broadcasting media. It seeks to explore how oppressive political regimes stifle media freedom and how all this leads to the emergence of popular culture as a form of alternative media
Mobilizing rural and community radio in Africa
No full textModern-day Africa, like the rest of the developing world, faces increasing social, economic, political, and cultural development challenges, addressing which relies on strategies that have included the use of media and communications toward actively engaging communities in policy formulation and implementation. Radio has borne a huge share of this responsibility, because the medium is pervasive, local, extensive, flexible, available, readily understood, personal, portable, speedy, and efficient. This article discusses the challenges of using radio as an instrument of mobilizing and engaging with communities on the African continen
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