Increasing female participation in municipal elections via the use of local radio in conflict-affected settings: The case of the West Bank municipal elections 2017

The 2017 West Bank Municipal elections were framed by locally-based non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and the Palestinian Authorities – albeit to a lesser extent – in terms of the desirability of increasing female participation in them in two particular ways: participation as representatives and participation as voters. Both aspects of participation were supported by extensive radio campaigns conducted by locally-based NGOs. The effectiveness of these campaigns and the approaches used form the basis of this article. Using a mixed methods approach consisting of both quantitative and qualitative data, it concludes that radio has endemic socio-technical advantages for reaching women, particularly in conflict-affected areas, and that broadcasting content aimed at women by women is essential in terms of increasing their representation and voting

The pedagogy of listening

A great deal of participatory development literature emphasises the bottom-up production of citizen's voices and their incorporation into policy formulation, implementation, and evaluation. Rarely do we hear of emphases on the question of listening, much as there exists a body of knowledge on integrating what experts consider to be the views and opinions of local people in the creation of socio-economic policies. This viewpoint outlines the kind of listening that builds on three key issues that emanate from Paulo Freire's idea of listening as both a virtue and practice of tolerance. The major contention is that as development practitioners, we need to build our abilities and capacities to practise all the three forms of listening if we are to work with others in designing and implementing policies that improve lives and communities

Communication for development in sub-saharan Africa: from orientalism to NGOification

The chapter provides a critical appraisal of the trends and phases that have characterised the growth of the theory and practice of communication for development on the African continent. The key argument is that communication for development has evolved with contradictions. Whereas its origins can be loosely traced to genuine bottom up efforts by indigenous Africans to educate themselves, the coming in of western development organizations have provided the funding and sustainability to design and implement such comdev interventions. The cosequence however is that such funding has come with its own ideological influence, espcially in the way dominant syntax conceptualse the field, from the perspective of western donor and development agencies. The overall objective of this chapter therefore is to rescue the field from this dominant syntax, by critically exploring the key approaches that characerise the field today

The Context is the Message: Theory of Indigenous Knowledge Communication Systems

How should media and communication studies approach the study of indigenous knowledge communication systems (IKCS)? In recent years, there has been a call to dewesternise and decolonise media and communication studies. Many of these debates have focused on rethinking the curriculum and the analytical frameworks and theories therein. This paper seeks to contribute to that debate by arguing for the need to pay attention to IKCS, which continue to shape socio-economic relations in much of the global south. Since the 1960s, there has been an increasing implication of the West and the East in providing development assistance to the global south, which is coincidentally experiencing a rapid exponential growth of the telecommunications and ICT sectors. In these places, however, the spoken word and its orality remain powerful articles and conventions for the generation, exchange and consumption of social meanings and their reference phaneroscopes. The discussion proposes a theoretical framework for studying IKCS. It rejects the location of such systems outside of modernity and contends that indigenous knowledge communications are co-existing with modernity. This critical analysis contributes to the meta-debate on de-centring the enlightenment in media and communications in two ways. First, it discusses an intellectual constitution that has oftentimes been footnoted by dominant media and communication teaching and scholarship. Second, this discussion is framed to undermine the modernistic approaches to media and communication that disregard the ways of speaking and communicating that lie at the periphery of modernity

Communicating Development with Communities

Development theory and practice are often taught in a manner that strips them of their historical context and obscures alternative intellectual assumptions and critical frameworks. This prevents students from acquiring a holistic understanding of the world and consequently, when it comes to development practice, most lack the skills to live and engage with people. It has become crucial to properly consider what it means to conceive and implement participatory development out in the field and not just in the boardroom. Building on the work of Robert Chambers and Arturo Escobar, Communicating Development with Communities is an empirically grounded critical reflection on how the development industry defines, imagines and constructs development at the implementation level. Unpacking the dominant syntax in the theory and practice of development, the book advocates a move towards relational and indigenous models of living that celebrate local ontologies, spirituality, economies of solidarity and community-ness. It investigates how subaltern voices are produced and appropriated, and how well-meaning experts can easily become oppressors. The book propounds a pedagogy of listening as a pathway that offers a space for interest groups to collaboratively curate meaningful development with and alongside communities. This is a valuable resource for academics and practitioners in the fields of Development Studies, Communication for Development, Communication for Social Change, Social Anthropology, Economic Development and Public Policy. With Foreword by Robin Mansell

People's radio: communicating change across Africa

This 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 in the theory versus practice debates in communication for development training

Even though the cliche '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. Th is 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

Models of and approaches to the station management of six African community radio broadcasters

This article is a political economy critique that contributes to current scholarship on community radio and development by examining the question of the management of six networks from Mali, Mozambique and Uganda. This discussion argues that understanding the models and functions of management committees will go a long way towards contributing to conversations on how community radios could achieve social, institutional, financial and ideological sustainability. The article also examines how management committees approach their work in the age of new Information Communication Technologies (especially mobile phones, computers and the Internet), and whether there is a gender digital divide within such committees. At the centre of the current discussion, therefore, is an attempt to understand the flow and contestation of power within community radio management committees