Different Global Journalisms: Cultures and Contexts 3031189914, 9783031189913

Table of contents :
Acknowledgements
Contents
Notes on Contributors
Chapter 1: Understanding Journalism Within Non-Western Contexts
Western Domination and the Role of Different Journalisms
Cultures of Journalism
Plan of the Book
References
Chapter 2: Harnessing Data and Digital Journalism in Latin America
Introduction
An Endless Source of Inspiration
Praxis
Journalism Shaped to Resist
Embracing New Practices
Business Models
A Never-Ending Search for Sustainability
From Basic to More Innovative Ideas
Two Main Sources of Funding
Data Journalism
Bringing Data Storytelling Principles to Latin American Newsrooms
A Range of Challenges to Overcome
Finding Solutions Through Cooperation
User-Generated Content
Punctual, But Promising: Engaging the Public to Make the News
In Time of Crisis, the Wise Build Bridges
Platforms
Finding a Balance Between Dependence and Strategic Use
The Future of Journalism in Latin America
References
Chapter 3: “Burmese Days” of Digitalization: From a Decade’s Dream of Myanmar’s Modern Journalistic Culture and Media System in the Making to a Press Freedom’s Nightmare of the Military Putsch in 2021
Introduction
Opening Up: Less Control, More Actors
Government Media Reforms
Transformation of the Broadcasting Sector
The Impact of Media Development Organizations and the Development of Journalists’ Associations
Coming Home: Exile Media
Ethnic Media
Coverage of Conflict: Rakhine—A Textbook Example for the Weaknesses of Journalistic Practice
Political Parallelism
Conclusion: Outlook
Discussion
References
Chapter 4: Recovered Media in Argentina: A Resilient Response to Instability and Precariousness
Introduction
Background
Methods and Materials
Recovered Media and the Organizational Evolution
Collective Actions
New Practices, New Identities
Adaptation for Transformation
Self-Management and Media Workers Trade Unions
Alliances for Growth and Pluralism
United and Represented
Resilient Action
A New Paradigm
Conclusion
References
Chapter 5: Uncovering the Power of Whistleblowing as a New Form of Citizen Journalism in Non-democratic Countries
Introduction
Background
Digital Technologies and Their Disruption of the Journalism Profession
Methodology
Theoretical Framing
The Subaltern Public Sphere
Agenda Setting and Whistle-Blower-Aided Citizen Journalism
Gatekeeping
Corpus: Baba Jukwa and Setting the Agenda
Discussion
Conclusion
References
Chapter 6: India: Mapping Journalism in the World’s Largest Democracy
Introduction
The Colonial Context and English Language Journalism
Post-Globalization Marketization and Expansion of Television News
Bollywoodization of Television News
Journalism in the Digital Age: Polarisation of Discourse and Fake News
Fake News
Indian Media in the Global News Space
References
Chapter 7: Social Media, Television News and Protest Participation: A Post-Soviet Media Culture
Introduction
Social Media and Protest Participation
Moldovan Anti-government Protests of 2015
Moldovan Media Culture and Links to Politics
Social Media Use in Moldova
Methodology
The New Vanguard: Facebook and the Young Post-Soviet Generation
Facebook, an Alternative Source
Facebook and the Post-Soviet Young Generation
Television and the Soviet Generation
Blending the New and Old?
Conclusion
References
Chapter 8: Investigative Journalism Is Global
Introduction
Context
Places
Chapter 9: Confessions of Two Well-Meaning ‘Mzungu’ Journalism Trainers
Ivor Gaber: Training Journalists in Africa
Values and Practices
From Theory to Practice
Are There Different Models of Journalism?
Naomi Goldsmith: The BBC Experience
An ‘African Way’ of Doing Journalism?
What Constitutes ‘Success’?
References
Chapter 10: Understanding Different Journalisms
Universalism in Journalism
Arab Culture of Journalism
Different Journalisms
References
Index

Citation preview

PALGRAVE STUDIES IN JOURNALISM AND THE GLOBAL SOUTH

Different Global Journalisms Cultures and Contexts Edited by Saba Bebawi · Oxana Onilov

Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South

Series Editors

Bruce Mutsvairo Auburn University Auburn, AL, USA Saba Bebawi University of Technology Sydney Ultimo, NSW, Australia Eddy Borges-Rey Northwestern University Qatar Ar-Rayyan, Qatar

This series focuses on cutting-edge developments in journalism in and from the Global South and illuminates how journalism cultures and practices have evolved from the era of colonization to contemporary globalization. Bringing previously underrepresented research from the Global South to the English speaking world, this series will focus on a broad range of topics within journalism including pedagogy, ethics, history of journalism, press freedom, theory, propaganda, gender, cross-border collaboration and methodological issues. Despite the geographical connotations of the term ‘Global South’ the series will not be defined by geographical boundaries, as Western countries are home to millions of immigrants and the contributions of immigrant journalists will be covered.

Saba Bebawi  •  Oxana Onilov Editors

Different Global Journalisms Cultures and Contexts

Editors Saba Bebawi Faculty of Arts School of Communication University of Technology Sydney Sydney, NSW, Australia

Oxana Onilov Faculty of Arts School of Communication Sydney, NSW, Australia

ISSN 2662-480X     ISSN 2662-4818 (electronic) Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South ISBN 978-3-031-18991-3    ISBN 978-3-031-18992-0 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: Paul Taylor/Getty Images This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

To all the journalists around the world who have to find different ways of doing journalism to stay true to their role.

Acknowledgements

This book was inspired by an international conference entitled International Cultures of Journalism which was to be held at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) and which had to be put on a halt due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However we decided to bring together, in this collection, the studies that attracted the authors to the theme of the conference and additionally invite other scholars who are interested in the topic to contribute. Hence, the editors of this book would like to acknowledge and thank the authors who contributed their insightful works towards this book. We would also like to acknowledge and thank the reviewers, editors and publisher. We would like to acknowledge the support of the Australian Research Council (ARC) who have funded this project through its Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) for the study entitled Developing an Arab culture of investigative journalism.

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Contents

1 Understanding  Journalism Within Non-­Western Contexts  1 Saba Bebawi and Oxana Onilov 2 Harnessing  Data and Digital Journalism in Latin America  9 Mathias-Felipe de-Lima-Santos, Lucia Mesquita, Gabriela Gruszynski Sanseverino, Giuliander Carpes, Kamila Fernandes Federal, and Ramón Salaverría 3 “Burmese  Days” of Digitalization: From a Decade’s Dream of Myanmar’s Modern Journalistic Culture and Media System in the Making to a Press Freedom’s Nightmare of the Military Putsch in 2021 35 Mandy Fox, Sascha Helbardt, Oliver Hahn, and Felix Krebs 4 Recovered  Media in Argentina: A Resilient Response to Instability and Precariousness 63 Carolina Escudero 5 Uncovering  the Power of Whistleblowing as a New Form of Citizen Journalism in Non-democratic Countries 85 Shepherd Mpofu, Bruce Mutsvairo, and Trust Matsilele

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6 India:  Mapping Journalism in the World’s Largest Democracy107 Daya Kishan Thussu and Anilesh Kumar 7 Social  Media, Television News and Protest Participation: A Post-Soviet Media Culture127 Oxana Onilov 8 Investigative  Journalism Is Global155 Hugo de Burgh 9 Confessions  of Two Well-Meaning ‘Mzungu’ Journalism Trainers173 Ivor Gaber and Naomi Goldsmith 10 Understanding Different Journalisms193 Saba Bebawi Index201

Notes on Contributors

Saba Bebawi  is a professor of journalism at the University of Technology Sydney, Australia. She has published on media power and the role of media in democracy-building, in addition to investigative journalism in conflict and post-conflict regions. She is author of Media Power and Global Television News: The role of Al Jazeera English (2016); Investigative Journalism in the Arab World: Issues and Challenges (2016); and co-author of The Future Foreign Correspondent (2019); in addition to co-editor of Social Media and the Politics of Reportage: The ‘Arab Spring’ (2014) and Data Journalism in the Global South (2020). She is also co-editor for the book series Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South. Giuliander  Carpes (PhD) is a research associate at the Laboratory of Studies and Applied Research in Social Sciences (Lerass) from the University of Toulouse III Paul Sabatier, where he recently completed his PhD within JOLT, a Marie Skłodowska-Curie European Training Network funded by the European Commission’s Horizon 2020 initiative. In recent years, he has been devoted to researching subjects at the intersection of platforms and journalism, such as the effects of social media and messaging applications on news production and distribution, the adaptation of newsrooms to these tools, and news organizations’ development of new revenue streams to keep their long-term sustainability as digital platforms increasingly hold dominance over digital advertising revenue. Hugo de Burgh  is Walt Disney Professor of Media and Communications at Schwarzman College, Tsinghua University. He is also Founder Chairman of Kensington Wade Dual Language Chinese English School (est 2017) xi

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and Director of the China Media Centre which he set up in London in 2005. In 2022 he is initiating, with business leaders, politicians and intellectuals, China Insight Foundation, to forge a deeper comprehension of China. De Burgh started professional life in Scotland, teaching history at Edinburgh University. His campaigning journalism, focussing on poverty, undereducation and employability, lead to full-time journalism and then TV. He worked for Scottish Television (politics and investigations), BBC (business and documentaries) and (the UK’s) Channel4 (C4 Dispatches, C4 News and Documentaries). In 1995 he returned to higher education, with academic posts at London, Nottingham Trent (where he co-­ established the first Centre for Broadcasting and Journalism) and Westminster universities. As a television producer he scripted many documentaries and some drama documentaries. As Director of China Media Centre he has overseen concept development for Chinese screen drama and entertainment programming (CCTV, Hunan, Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Shanghai, etc.). Among his publications are the 3rd edition of Investigative Journalism (2021), the 2nd edition of China’s Media in the Emerging World Order (2020) China’s Environment and Chinese Environment Journalists (2013); China and Britain: the potential impact of China’s development (2007) and (with Boris Johnson, Alison Wolf et al) Can the Prizes Still Glitter? The Future of British Universities in a Changing World (2007). He was a (national) Gresham Lecturer in 2020 and will again be a Gresham Lecturer in 2022. He will lecture on China’s media at Jesus College, Cambridge University in 2022. Mathias-Felipe  de-Lima-Santos, (PhD) is a postdoctoral researcher in the Human(e) AI project at the University of Amsterdam, Netherlands. He is also a research associate in the Digital Media and Society Observatory (DMSO) at the Federal University of São Paulo (Unifesp), Brazil. Previously, he was a researcher at the University of Navarra, Spain, under the JOLT project, a Marie Skłodowska-Curie European Training Network funded by the European Commission’s Horizon 2020. He was also a Visiting Researcher at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia. De-Lima-Santos is co-editor of the book “Journalism, Data and Technology in Latin America” published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2021. His research interests include the changing nature of communications driven by technological innovations, particularly in journalism, media, and online social networks.

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Kamila  Fernandes  holds a Ph.D. in Communication Studies from the University of Minho, Portugal. She serves as an Adjunct Professor and Coordinator of the Journalism Course at the Federal University of Ceará. She is also a researcher at the Center for Studies in Communication and Society (CECS), Institute of Social Sciences, University of Minho. Carolina  Escudero, PhD, joined the University of Missouri, USA, in 2006 bringing expertise in international journalism, gender perspective and health communication, particularly as it relates to emotions and human rights in the international context. She earned her doctorate degree at the Universidad Kennedy, Argentina; her Master’s degree in Gender Studies at the University of Barcelona, Spain, and her Bachelor’s degree at the University Robert Schuman, Strasbourg, France. Dr. Escudero has lived and taught in Argentina, pursued research and communication work as a Leonardo Da Vinci Fellow in Belgium, studied and worked in France, Netherlands and Spain; she also was a student/correspondent in Serbia. This broad range of international exposure has made her especially sensitive and interested to the ways that media portrays victims/survivors and how media can influence the recovery process, an awareness that she brings to her research and teaching. Her preferred approach is the action research (quantitative and enriched by qualitative insights). Her dissertation research tested how media can induce altruistic behaviors. In the academic and formative field, she obtained grants such as Leonardo Da Vinci, European Union (2001); Global Programs Research support for the TEB campaign USA (2016–2017); Women & Gender Studies Research and Creativity scholarship USA (2018); UJFK University from Argentina, Postdoctoral Research grant (2021–2022). She received the Solidarity, Communication and Resistance Award, Spain (2017). Mandy Fox, MA, is a Journalist and Research Associate to the Chair of Journalism at the University of Passau, Germany. Ivor  Gaber is Professor of Political Journalism at the University of Sussex. He has published more than 50 books, chapters and articles on various aspects of political communication. His journalistic career includes senior editorial positions at BBC TV and Radio, Independent Television

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News, Channel Four and Sky News. He has been training journalists at UK universities and in Sub-Saharan Africa for more than 20 years and has developed and led major media initiatives in Uganda, Nigeria and Malawi. He is the UK representative at UNESCO’s International Programme for the Development of Communication. Naomi  Goldsmith  is a media consultant and journalism trainer who travels to some of the most dangerous and demanding environments for journalists to operate in. She has been the editor-in-chief of a radio station in South Sudan and project directed in Afghanistan. Her journalistic career was predominantly with the BBC where she anchored “Asia Today” on their global TV channel. She has also reported on UK politics and the conflict in Northern Ireland for the BBC. She is an associate trainer for Dart Centre Europe, which educates and supports journalists covering traumatic stories. Oliver Hahn, PhD, is Professor of Journalism at the University of Passau, Germany. Sascha  Helbardt, PhD, is a former Research Assistant to the Chair of Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Passau, Germany. Felix  Krebs, MA, is a Copywriter and Editor in Munich and a former Research Assistant to the Chair of Journalism at the University of Passau, Germany. Anilesh  Kumar  is an award winning former senior journalist currently enrolled at Hong Kong Baptist University as a PhD candidate. He holds a master’s degree in TV Journalism from Goldsmiths, University of London and a master’s in International Relations and Democratic Politics from University of Westminster, London. He is also the host for Hong Kong Baptist University’s talk series—‘Global Ideas’. Trust  Matsilele, PhD, is a lecturer in the Media and Communication Studies Department of the Cape Peninsula University of Technology. He is also a research fellow of the CPUT’s Centre for Communication Studies. Matsilele holds a DLitt et Phil Communication Studies from the University of Johannesburg. Matsilele is an interdisciplinary researcher with an interest in digital humanities, the intersection of artificial intelligence and journalism, cyber-protest cultures, and the intersection of culture and technology. His monograph on social media and digital dissidence in Zimbabwe is set to be published in 2023.

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Lucia  Mesquita  (PhD) is a research associate at the DMSO research group at the Federal University of São Paulo (Unifesp)—Campus São José dos Campos. Mesquita recently completed her PhD at Dublin City University. At DCU, she was also an Early Stage Researcher within the JOLT–Harnessing Digital and Data Technology for Journalism project, a Marie-Skłodowska-Curie European Training Network. Before joining DCU, she was a Master’s student at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences (ISCSP) at the University of Lisbon in Portugal. She is also a journalist, having graduated from the Methodist University of Sao Paulo in Brazil. Shepherd Mpofu  is Associate Professor of Media and Communication at the University of Limpopo in South Africa. He has published several articles on communication, media and journalism in Africa. His body of work covers social media and politics; social media and identity; social media and protests. He is the editor of The politics of laughter in the social media age: Perspectives from the Global South (Palgrave Macmillan 2021) and Digital humour in the COVID-19 pandemic: Perspectives from the Global South (Palgrave Macmillan 2021) and co-editor of Mediating xenophobia in Africa (Palgrave 2020). Bruce  Mutsvairo  is the UNESCO Chair in Data, Disinformation and Democracy at Utrecht University in the Netherlands, where he became a Full Professor and Chair in Media, Politics and the Global South in April 2022. Oxana  Onilov, PhD, is an early career researcher with a doctorate in media and communication from the University of Technology Sydney. Oxana has worked as a researcher on various projects, including investigative and constructive journalism as well as measurement and evaluation of health communication. Ramón  Salaverría, (PhD) is a full professor at the School of Communication, University of Navarra (Pamplona, Spain), where he heads the Digital News Media Research Group. As the author of over 200 scholarly publications, his research focuses on digital journalism and media convergence in national and international comparative studies. Gabriela Gruszynski Sanseverino  is a PhD researcher on ‘Politics and Ethics of User-Generated Content’ at the University of Toulouse III Paul Sabatier, within the Laboratory of Studies and Applied Research in Social

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Sciences (LERASS). Sanseverino is a Former Marie Skłodowska-Curie Early Stage Researcher for the JOLT Project with a Bachelor’s degree in Social Communication—Journalism and a Master’s degree in Communication and Information from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil). Daya  Kishan  Thussu  is Professor of International Communication at Hong Kong Baptist University. In 2018–2019, he was a visiting Distinguished Professor and inaugural Disney Chair in Global Media at Schwarzman College, Tsinghua University, Beijing. For many years he was Professor of International Communication at the University of Westminster in London, where he was also founder and Co-Director of India Media Centre and research advisor to the China Media Centre. Author or editor of 20 books, among them International Communication: Continuity and Change (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2019). His latest publication is BRICS Media: Reshaping the Global Communication Order? (London: Routledge, 2021). He is the founder and Managing Editor of the Sage journal Global Media and Communication.

CHAPTER 1

Understanding Journalism Within Non-­Western Contexts Saba Bebawi and Oxana Onilov

This book was inspired by an international conference entitled International Cultures of Journalism. Although it was scheduled to take place in Sydney in 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic put a halt to that. However, we decided to bring together, in this collection, the studies that attracted the authors to the theme of the conference from around the world. We wanted to gather and learn about journalism in different countries. It was on purpose that we did not want to pinpoint a theme for researchers to abide to as we knew that every part of the world has its own issues and intricacies when it comes to journalism practice. For the same reason, we didn’t structure the book in sections, geographically, thematically or even in format, as there are chapters that are theoretical, empirical, in addition to reflective practice. Although the chapters together provide an overview of how culture shapes a multitude of journalism practices, each chapter stands on its own.

S. Bebawi (*) Faculty of Arts, School of Communication, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_1

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Journalists in the non-Western world are trained, generally speaking, within Western models of reporting and are taught to do so as a practice these reporters need to aspire and aim for. Yet what such training is short of achieving is teaching these reporters how ‘to do’ journalism within their own environments. In turn, what is required is a method of journalistic training, and in turn practice, that is reflective of the actual practice these reporters will encounter on the ground. Although local trainers could help to address this, one way of assisting with this is better understanding how journalism is practiced in different parts of the world, the contexts surrounding such practices, the issues and challenges associated, in addition to the positive practices that Western journalism can offer. This book is an attempt to do just that—to better understand how journalism in non-­ Western contexts is different and learn more about these practices.

Western Domination and the Role of Different Journalisms In his book entitled The Media Were American (Tunstall, 2007), as a follow up to a previous book called The Media Are American (Tunstall, 1977), Jeremy Tunstall revisits the global media scene as a result of a changing media environment. In it, he argues that Western domination of the global scene, specifically American-based media, ‘have been in decline on the world scene for several decades’ (Tunstall, 2007: 321). He, therefore, suggests that there is an exaggeration in Western dominance and believes that this is, in fact, changing. Nonetheless, the question that rises here is to what extent can this emerging global news space be considered to represent a ‘global public sphere’ that does not exclude any members of the global community? Historically, there have been many factors that have prevented the emergence of a global public sphere, as outlined in the NWICO debates. Such factors are slowly being addressed and facilitated as a result of developments at various levels, such as technology. In support of an emerging global space, Ingrid Volkmer views the public sphere as a ‘representative public zone’ where it is characterised as having ‘cross-cultural, cross-­societal, and cross-national implications’, in other words, ‘the global space […] can be considered as a O. Onilov Faculty of Arts, School of Communication, Sydney, NSW, Australia e-mail: [email protected]

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multi-discursive political space’ (Volkmer, 1999: 122–123). According to Volkmer, the process of globalisation marks a change to the meaning of ‘public’ as understood in previous debates, where the public sphere has expanded beyond the limits of the national onto a global context (Volkmer, 1999: 122). Volkmer argues that ‘the global communication sphere, involving fragmented satellite television targeting specific audiences worldwide and the Internet, provides not so much ‘global’ communication but particular globalized communication’ (Volkmer, 2007: 58). Here Volkmer refers to ‘new discourse spheres’ within the global public sphere, and introduces the concept of ‘negotiated sovereignty’ (Volkmer, 2007: 62): ‘[t]he study ofe political ‘information flows’ within the globalized sphere reveals new notions of ‘sovereignty’ not so much in view of a universal but an increasingly particular framework. Therefore, Volkmer considers the global public sphere to consist of smaller ‘spheres of influence’ where dominance is practiced within these smaller spheres which can be captured in different practices of journalisms around the world that eventually make up the wider discourses of the global public sphere, as we showcase in this edited collection.

Cultures of Journalism It has taken many decades, on the parts of both Western journalists and journalists from the Global South, to acknowledge that journalism is not universal and nor should it be. Reporters from the Global South have always looked up to the ‘Western’ way of doing journalism and relied heavily on coaches and trainers from the Global North who were seen as the key to ‘fixing’ their journalism. Yet when these reporters return to their local newsrooms, the cultural, political, economic and ideological realities prevent them from applying what they learnt in relation to doing journalism the Western way. It has taken them a while to realise that what works in one part of the world simply cannot work in another. Worlds of Journalism: Journalistic Cultures Around the Globe, edited by Thomas Hanitzsch, Folker Hanusch, Jyotika Ramaprasad, and Arnold S. de Beer (2019), is based on the largest, comparative study of journalism cultures around the world, The Worlds of Journalism Study (WJS) (http:// worldsofjournalism.org/) which was founded in 2010. This edited collection offers an account of the study including the findings which provides an understanding of the complexity and multifaceted nature of journalism within a global context. According to the editors, there has been a general assumption on the part of Western journalism researchers that their work is applicable to those outside the Western world, yet at the same time,

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researchers from the Global South face criticism for relying on scholarly work that stems from their parts of the world (Hanitzsch et al., 2019: 5). The tension, therefore, is evident, not just from a journalism training and practice standpoint, but also within a scholarly perspective. There has been a recent wave of efforts to make for a more inclusive global journalism scholarly representation from both the Global North and South with the aim of addressing the Western domination of journalism conceptualisations of training and practice, yet journalism academics from the non-­ Western world remain disadvantaged both financially and linguistically. Hanitzsch argues that journalism cultures differ and are dependent on the various influences that affect the practice, namely political, economic, organizational, procedural, and personal networks influences (Hanitzsch et al., 2019: 107). Although these influences play different roles in different journalistic cultures, journalists’ perceptions of these influences also differ. So, in some cultures, the ‘political and economic pressures appear to be less important in journalists’ perceptions because these influences are further removed from their daily practice than, for example, the influence of norms and routines’ (Hanitzsch et al., 2019: 113). Furthermore, editorial autonomy is another variant since in countries where journalism is closely monitored and state controlled, ‘there is no editorial autonomy in any recognizable Western form’. This edited collection does not seek to conduct a comparative analysis between different journalisms from around the world as this presents its own set of challenges. Such challenges, at first instance, include the difficulty in finding common points of comparison which lies at the heart of what this study set out to address. This includes a ‘workable definition’ of who is a journalist, for example. Definitions and boundaries in relation to this, therefore, needed to be articulated to provide a comparative platform across all journalistic practices for the countries studied. Additionally, the need for finding some form of common ‘theoretical universalism’ could ‘lead to measurement that is insensitive to context and formulates key concepts at such a high level of abstraction’ that doesn’t reflect the reality of practices at a local level (Hanitzsch et al., 2019: 23). Despite this, this collection of studies has taken details of difference into account to provide a comprehensive articulation of different journalistic practices around the globe. In turn, this book provides an important basis for researchers working on international cultures of journalism to build on. By acknowledging the need for an inclusive, representative global public sphere consisting of as many journalism models, this book is an attempt to learn about diverse

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journalistic cultures through a collection of case studies, reflective writings, empirical studies and theoretical papers. The book seeks to cover factors that influence the development of journalism in non-Western contexts; challenges and opportunities for its training and practice; the ways technologies impact the development of distinctive cultures of journalism; and the emergence of particular models of journalism in different cultural journalism contexts.

Plan of the Book Following the editors’ opening chapter, the contributing authors of this book explore how different practices, routines and conventions allow different cultures of journalism to become distinctly visible in non-Western countries. Together, these chapters provide an overview of how culture shapes, renegotiates, and redefines journalism practices. The book centres on journalists and their practices in different media environments and accentuates how journalists find their own ways to adjust, adapt, innovate, deal with challenges—successfully or not—in their social, cultural and political contexts embedded in non-Western environments. Through different snapshots of journalists operating and navigating multifaceted contexts, we aim to learn about Different Journalisms in this edited book. Chapter 2, entitled Harnessing Data and Digital Journalism in Latin America by Mathias Felipe de-Lima-Santos, Lucia Mesquita, Gabriela Gruszynski Sanseverino, Giuliander Carpes, Kamila Fernandes and Ramón Salaverría explores how the Latin American news ecosystem is evolving and reshaping the relationship between newsrooms and audiences through technology and digitalisation. Through a combination of content analysis and interviews with news organisations and practitioners in the region, the authors reveal that despite the lack of technological and research resources abundant in Western democracies, Latin American countries find their own ways to innovate and embrace novel technologies. To understand how digital journalism and data journalism have evolved in Latin American newsrooms, the authors discuss change in terms of praxis, business models, audience participation, and platforms. Chapter 3, entitled “Burmese Days” of Digitalization: From a Decade’s Dream of Myanmar‘s Modern Journalistic Culture and Media System in the Making to a Press Freedom‘s Nightmare of the Military Putsch in 2021 by Mandy Fox, Sascha Helbardt, Oliver Hahn and Felix Krebs describe the Myanmar media changes within the decade of transition from the end of

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the military rule in 2011 to the military coup of 2021. Based on interviews with Burmese journalists, editors, media owners, academics, key activists, and key actors in the media field, the authors shed a light on the impact of this decade of transition on journalists’ practice, private media companies, ethnic and exile media. The authors reflect on the emergence of a modern journalistic culture whose development was abruptly interrupted by the military coup. Chapter 4, Recovered Media in Argentina: A Resilient Response to Instability and Precariousness by Carolina Escudero, examines the phenomenon of workers co-ops, abandoned or closed media outlets recovered by their workers. Based on a combination of interviews with journalists and content analysis of materials on professional and self-management experiences published by recovered media, the author investigates the phenomenon of recovered media in Argentina. The chapter delves into recovery processes and challenges, and analyses the resilience of media workers who by responding to unstable economic situations assume new roles, in addition to exercising their profession. Chapter 5, Uncovering the Power of Whistle-Blowing as a New Form of Citizen Journalism in Non-Democratic Countries  by Shepherd Mpofu, Bruce Mutsvairo and Trust Matsilele explore whistleblowing as an emerging form of citizen journalism in non-democratic environments. Through the case of a celebrated Zimbabwean blogger turned activist, who exposed corrupt practices among the country’s political elite, the authors illustrate the intervention of digital technologies in aiding whistle-blowing styled citizen journalism. The chapter, ultimately shows how such practices have helped deepen democratic participation in Zimbabwe. Chapter 6, India: Mapping Journalism in the World’s Largest Democracy by Daya Thussu and Anilesh Kumar assesses the interplay between democracy and journalism in India. The authors describe the transformation of the Indian news media from state-controlled media to marketization, expansion of television news and bollywoodization. The multi-channel hyper-commercial media context is increasingly resulting in news content that takes the form of infotainment, and acts as an important element in shaping public discourse. This undermines the informational role of news in India, where millions of people still cannot read or write. Chapter 7, Social Media Use, Television News and Protest Participation: A Post-Soviet Media Culture by Oxana Onilov focuses on the impact of social media on protest participation in the context of a post-Soviet Moldovan media context. Based on interviews with protesters and

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activists, the author reveals how distrust in media and simultaneous tolerance towards it—as well as an emerging trend and strive for Western values—mediated the use of social media for participation. The author describes how social media usage is endogenous to community characteristics, contextual factors, an intergenerational divide, and the interplay of different online and offline media shape its importance for participation. In Chap. 8, in his essay entitled Investigative Journalism Is Global, Hugo de Burgh introduces the work of colleagues around the world whose operations illustrate current developments in investigative journalism. Each of these works contributed a chapter to the third edition of Investigative Journalism, which Hugo de Burgh edited with Paul Lashmar. The author first introduces the context in which investigative journalism operates currently around the world. Then, the author focuses on the places where investigative journalism is conducted. In Chap. 9, entitled Confessions of Two Well-Meaning ‘Mzungu’ Journalism Trainers, Ivor Gaber and Naomi Goldsmith discuss the role of the Anglo-American model of journalism in media development in the Global South. First, reflecting on their own wide experiences as media trainers and consultants, each of the authors shares insights gained from leading journalism training in more than 40 countries, many of them in the sub-Saharan Africa. Then, the authors jointly suggest seven universal journalistic principles that should form the bedrock of any international journalistic interventions. Chapter 10, Understanding Different Journalisms by Saba Bebawi, explores trends in journalistic training and newsroom practices of Arab journalists and investigative reporters. The author reflects on how journalists operate in negotiating a balance between the way they are trained on Western models and the way they practice journalism according to their own local models. The final chapter aims to reinforce and conclude the main message of the book. Bebawi emphasises the need to move beyond universalistic ways and claims of practicing journalism, towards nuanced models that embrace contextual peculiarities of different countries in the Global South.

References Hanitzsch, T., Hanusch, F., Ramaprasad, J., & De Beer, A.  S. (Eds.). (2019). Worlds of journalism: Journalistic cultures around the globe. Columbia University Press.

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Tunstall, J. (1977). The media are American. Columbia University Press. Tunstall, J. (2007). The media were American: U.S. mass media in decline. Oxford University Press. Volkmer, I. (1999). News in the global sphere: A study of CNN and its impact on global communications. University of Luton Press. Volkmer, I. (2007). Governing the “spatial reach”? Spheres of influence and challenges to global media policy. International Journal of Communication, 1(1), 18.

CHAPTER 2

Harnessing Data and Digital Journalism in Latin America Mathias-Felipe de-Lima-Santos, Lucia Mesquita, Gabriela Gruszynski Sanseverino, Giuliander Carpes, Kamila Fernandes Federal, and Ramón Salaverría

Introduction An Endless Source of Inspiration Latin America is composed of a diverse group of countries, all with particular landscapes, peoples, and cultures. It is generally understood that the region consists of the entire continent of South America besides Central America, and the islands of the Caribbean and Mexico. Despite this diversity, the context of the region is marked by a news ecosystem

M.-F. de-Lima-Santos (*) Digital Media and Society Observatory (DMSO), Federal University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil Faculty of Humanities, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_2

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often criticized for the concentration of political clientelism, ownership, and a consistent failure to represent its pluralism (Porto, 2016). This scenario has begun to change with the emergence of Latin American digital media, which provided new ways to communicate and consume information. A prior study analyzed the survey results conducted by the nonprofit organization SembraMedia (2017), which has been dedicated to mapping the digital media ecosystem in Latin America. It has identified five critical elements for the development of these initiatives: the active participation of women; the search for financial sustainability; a need for training, including the use of technologies;  market-oriented production; and the reliance on collaboration, including with traditional media outlets (Salaverría et al., 2019). Similarly, Latin American journalists face precarious circumstances not well understood in the Western world, as precarity is perceived in wealthy nations as job insecurity. However, in the Global South, particularly in Latin America, insecurity is translated into the risks and fears that typically accompany each phase of news reporting. Therefore, Latin American journalists live under censorship, political oppression, and other forms of repression, requiring them to unleash their creativity to produce content that positively impacts their society (Matthews & Onyemaobi, 2020). These characteristics have been exacerbated with the advent of the information age and the changes brought about by digitalization. Thus,

L. Mesquita Institute for Future Media and Journalism (FuJo), Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland e-mail: [email protected] G. G. Sanseverino • G. Carpes Lerass (Laboratoire d’études et recherches appliquées en Sciences Sociales), University of Toulouse III Paul Sabatier, Toulouse, France e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] K. F. Federal Arts and Culture Institute (ICA), Federal University of Ceará, Fortaleza, Brazil R. Salaverría School of Communication, University of Navarra, Pamplona, Spain e-mail: [email protected]

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news outlets across the region embraced news norms, routines, and practices (Boczkowski, 2005). Latin American news organizations are finding new avenues of growth, optimizing operations, and paying attention to topics that other latitudes were not focused on, which has opened new opportunities and diversified the news media ecosystem. In other cases, these challenges have also contributed to adjustments in the professional values that guide journalistic work. In this chapter, we will explore several compelling examples of Latin American journalistic practices that have been shaped and redefined by advances in technology and data. Through a combination of content analysis and interviews conducted between 2019 and 2020, we discuss that Latin American news organizations are finding their own way to innovate and harness data and digital journalism in their newsrooms despite the lack of technological and research resources available in Western democracies. By merging, contrasting, and adapting from Western “ideals” and non-Western “realities,” journalism in Latin America builds onto a journalism culture that is not in opposition, but instead in confluence and convergence with international trends, but with a strong appeal of innovation, collaboration, and participation. To demonstrate this, we look at five topics to shed light on the future of journalism in the region, namely praxis, business models, data journalism, audience participation, and platforms.

Praxis Journalism Shaped to Resist The evolving digital landscape serves as a response to the over-­concentrated and politicized regional media systems. Looking at Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico, Hallin and Papathanassopoulos (2002) characterized the Latin American media system by its ‘low level of newspaper circulation, a tradition of advocacy reporting, instrumentalization of privately-owned media, the politicization of public broadcasting and broadcast regulation, and limited development of the overall media industry’ (177). Further research studies have identified that civil society has more fragile ties in the region (Waisbord, 2009). In contrast, the media system of different Latin American countries have been highly influenced by both the State and the market (Fox & Waisbord, 2009). These influences are mainly due to the economic investment that the State provides to the media industry, such

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as official propaganda. Thus, governments have consolidated themselves as the region’s leading financier of the media, which persists until today. Previous studies have identified that the so-called mainstream media in Latin America dominates over 80% of the region’s production, access, and distribution of content and news across the region (Becerra & Mastrini, 2010; Gutiérrez & Ocampo, 2019). Scholars have emphasized that the Latin American mainstream media presents common traits, such as large audiences, commercial orientation, and proximity to official sources. Even among the most ideologically progressive outlets, these characteristics tend to reproduce certain discourses that reinforce the status quo (Carvalho, 2017). Thus, private media preponderance directly affects the content disseminated, as the media in the region does not necessarily search for the public interest but rather to expand its audience. In this context, incorporating the new deployments of information and communication technologies into the media environment resulted in changes in journalistic practices to overcome the media system’s dominant structures. It allowed the emergence of countless new actors as active editorial content producers, disconnected from the mainstream media. To combat the disruption of its social role, journalism as a profession engages in new models and formats that bring communities and other social actors together. Journalism has suffered a disruption by new information and communication technologies that deranged and reorganized the circuitry of practices in different ways. To analyze the praxis in Latin America, we circulated a questionnaire with around a hundred news organizations. Data were collected in three phases between late 2018 and the beginning of 2020. First, an initial questionnaire was designed and then submitted to  the feedback of Brazilian practitioners. A second phase was sent to other Latin American countries. Lastly, some of these practitioners were invited for interviews in the first half of 2020. Our data brought two main findings: Latin American digital media organizations see the need for innovation in journalistic practices and the widespread adoption of technologies will result in new norms and routines in newsrooms. Embracing New Practices As an example of new practices, collaboration has been one of the most common strategies to deal with the complexity of the local context. The Brazilian media organization #Colabora defends the idea that

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collaboration should feature intrinsically in the journalists’ work, that is, this should be employed not only when there are working ties, but in their daily activities. The organization’s members believe that collaboration should spread across different parts of the world, providing information needed in real-­time and forming a worldwide “network of collaborators.” The initiative also considers collaboration between independent media outlets, which can share resources helping to overcome their limitations to reduce costs, such as sharing physical space and legal support. Other news organizations have relied on alliances to expand access to information in more distant locations, such as the Peruvian Wayka. The outlet mainly uses community radio stations to bring information from remote areas in Peru. However, collaborating does not mean working for free. Among the initiatives heard in the interviews, employees’ paid work prevails, either as duly registered employees, such as in the case of Wayka, or through recurring scholarships (for example, the Brazilian news outlet Amazônia Real dedicated to covering the Amazon region). In other cases, the payments are made for production, such as the case of #Colabora. On the other hand, #Colabora admits the volunteers’ participation, that is, people who like the project and want to collaborate for free. However, the remuneration paid by the digital media in Latin America is insufficient. According to the respondents, only 18.3% said employees could keep working exclusively in these media organizations. Among the others, 34.4% said that they could not maintain themselves in any way only with the work carried out in these journalistic groups. In comparison, another 43% claimed they could partially support themselves, having to perform other services to supplement their income. The low or even the lack of remuneration often hampers the exclusive dedication of journalists in digital media organizations, which could potentially impact their content’s quality and frequency. Even with the rough and precarious conditions, Latin American journalists are looking for ways to engage with the public and work with professionals from different backgrounds. For this, sharing content, workforce, and financial strategies became essential features in the region. However, journalism’s central core values remain unchanged. The search to bring diversity, a plurality of voices, hold power accountable, and deliver quality information to the public remains the primary purpose and commitment of these organizations.

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Consequently, this is set to become another means of distinguishing between digital and traditional media. While the mainstream media is associated with the stigma of the defense of the interests of the most influential players, the digital media seeks to focus its practices on truth-­seeking work. Thus, the reaffirmation of traditional journalistic mission and values combined with a position that emphasizes journalism’s social role in the fight against injustices and inequalities to build social transformations become the primary justification for the existence and survival of the digital journalistic groups in Latin America.

Business Models A Never-Ending Search for Sustainability As we discussed, change is constant in the media landscape. With the digital revolution, the legacy media business model based on ads revenue had its success limited in an online and networked environment where platforms hold power (Sirkkunen & Cook, 2012). In the search for a sustainable model, Latin American media organizations have explored different revenue streams that could turn journalism into a viable product. From Basic to More Innovative Ideas While target advertising continues to be an essential revenue source with programmatic ads, native advertising, and sponsored content, many news outlets worldwide are also adopting subscription models based on audiences’ funding (Arrese, 2016; Chyi, 2012; Pickard & Williams, 2014). Historically, Latin American news organizations have increasingly relied on funding from government advertising and subsidies differently from their Western counterparts, which translated into a state interventionism culture (Waisbord, 2014). In contrast, Latin American digital news media has relied their business model mostly on philanthropic funding (Requejo-­ Alemán & Lugo-Ocando, 2014; Rashidian et al., 2018). To circumvent this dependency, some organizations have focused on niche markets to sustain their business models, such as the case of Nexo Jornal and JOTA (both from Brazil). Other news media are relying on funding journalism through more innovative ideas, such as training, workshops, and consulting, such as Ojo con mi pisto (Guatemala).

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In another vein, news outlets in the region adopt affinity clubs as a strategy to make their subscription model more competitive and robust for audiences (García-Santamaría et  al., 2016), such as La Nación and Clarín (both from Argentina). In it, any reader can have discounts on a myriad of products and services, reducing the costs of the subscription plan to almost zero. Thus, audiences can see a return on their investment through these offered discounts. Another interesting source of income comes from the sales of goods (merchandising products) on news websites, such as t-shirts and cups, working as an “alternative means of financing news” (Harlow, 2020, p. 1), such as GK (Ecuador). Latin American news outlets are also embracing an audience-centric model (Carpes & Sanseverino Gruszynski, 2020). In it, the public is invited to become a member and help news outlets in part of their news production process. This model was adopted by Red/Acción (Argentina) and La Diária (Uruguay), for instance. In interviews with 18 Latin American news outlets, our respondents bemoaned that it is hard to make the audience pay for news in the region, even though crowdfunding has become popular in Western countries. In fact, only some news outlets, such as The Intercept (Brazil) and Rutas del Conflicto (Colombia), could raise a significant sum of money from the audience. Two Main Sources of Funding To deploy potential innovation and transform newsrooms into more tech-­ savvy spaces, media organizations need a substantial amount of funds. In the region, two main revenue streams are overcoming these structural limitations and driving innovation in these outlets. Philanthropic funding and temporary grant-giving became essential resources for many organizations in Latin America. Most philanthropic grants are provided by Western family businesses using corporate (family-owned) capital, posing risks to bottom-feeding and shaping news agendas with specific interests of these institutions (Lancaster, 2008; Salar & Lugo-Ocando, 2018). Conversely, foreign aid can be essential for media plurality by introducing new voices and viewpoints into the media ecosystem. However, this soft intervention through policy-making has impacted vital areas, such as education, health, and the economy (Salar & Lugo-Ocando, 2018). By relying on “large grants from foundations” (Konieczna, 2020, p.  135), media outlets can sustain their business and support several

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projects. Despite some hope that foundations could be a potential solution to the failure of conventional business models in the news media industry (Benson, 2018), critical voices have pointed out the level of independence of these publishers (Schwab, 2020; Scott et al., 2019; Wright et  al., 2019). Furthermore, philanthropic funding cannot be sustained long-term, as it cannot be renewed after the first round (Harlow, 2020). Thus, news media always look for novel ways to sustain their business strategies. Many partnerships with technology companies, such as Facebook and Google, have emerged recently. In these projects, news outlets deploy cutting-edge solutions in their newsrooms, such as AI technology or data-driven projects (de-Lima-Santos et  al., 2021). Similar to foundations’ funds, news outlets also depend on these grants with an expiration date to hire temporary project managers, journalists, and technologists to deploy projects (Smith, 2020). An example is Aos Fatos (Brazi), which developed bots with big tech grants. However, most of these projects are one-time monetary awards with their funds ending with the projects’ life cycle. After that, these projects, which require updates, tend to vanish due to the low income of these news outlets. For this reason, some Latin American news organizations decided to rely on a multi-revenue stream along with new practices, norms, and routines that can bring strategic value to their business models.

Data Journalism Bringing Data Storytelling Principles to Latin American Newsrooms The need for creativity and innovation, along with the deployment of information communication technologies, have motivated news media to rethink how they work and incorporate these technologies into newsrooms (Koivula et  al., 2020). Data journalism was popularized by The Guardian’s Datablog in 2009. However, the concepts behind this practice have been around for a long time. Its roots lie in the broader use of social science methods and data analysis to generate and test journalistic hypotheses, which was known as computer-assisted reporting (CAR) (de-Lima-­ Santos et al., 2021). In the Global South, especially in Latin America, two events are critical milestones in using data journalism software tools and mobile collaboration: the offshore bank investigations of Panama and the Paradise Papers

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(Baack, 2016; Obermayer & Obermaier, 2016). Led by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), this investigative series on offshore banks joined journalists from the five continents to analyze a leaked set of 11.5 million documents from a secret source. These projects helped journalists change their mindset from the lonely wolf to the radical sharing model by creating a culture of collaboration (Mesquita & de-Lima-­ Santos, 2021; de-Lima-Santos 2022). Data journalism in Latin America has its unique set of hurdles that could be overcome using distributed innovation and a coordinated collaboration effort to accelerate the deployment of the practice (de-Lima-­ Santos & Mesquita, 2021). Since its introduction in the region, several organizations have collaborated to disseminate knowledge and support data reporting. In Central America, Internews organized several courses and training programs in data storytelling for journalists in the Northern Triangle of Central America, which includes Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Similarly, Escuela de Datos (School of Data) has also contributed to the development of the practice with courses, seminars, and published works for the Spanish-speaking community in Latin America. Brazil has also played a prominent role in developing data-driven storytelling in newsrooms in South America. In the country, an independent chapter of the Escola de Dados (School of Data) was founded in 2013. Almost at the same time, a Hacks/Hackers chapter was launched in São Paulo (Brazil) (de-Lima-Santos & Mesquita, 2021). These international grassroots communities that bring journalists and technologists paved the way for regional data reporting, leading to successful cases. In Argentina, La Nación became a data journalism powerhouse in the region, becoming internationally recognized for its excellence (Palomo et al., 2019). Recently, new organizations in other countries of South America have evolved to focus exclusively on data and investigative reporting and becoming recognized for their outstanding work, such as Convoca (Peru), Ojo Público (Peru), Postdata.club (Cuba), Rutas del Conflicto (Colombia), among others. A Range of Challenges to Overcome Behind this flourishing industry in Latin America, there are a considerable number of practical hurdles that need to be overcome. These limitations demand time and resources that newsrooms are, in most cases, unable to provide. These constraints take many shapes and forms. An example is the

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freedom of information (FOI) and open data cultures that remain a persistent issue in the region. According to the UN, only 19 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean have national FOI laws (Borges-Rey, 2019). In many countries, these laws do not echo in easy access or even the quality and integrity of the data. Latin American nations did not adopt digital and structured formats that enable organizations to grasp the knowledge quickly from these data. Some data journalists interviewed bemoaned that they spent much of their time in two tasks: negotiations to have access to the data or transformation of non-machine readable documents to digital formats. Another challenge faced by the Latin American data journalism community is the lack of resources and staff that may explain the absence of attractiveness for certain news products. Many data journalists mentioned that they do not have a data team or have to work with technologists that work for the whole newsroom. It mirrors the approach taken in other newsrooms around the world, which do not “immediately afford specialized staffers, so single members as a ‘one-man-band’ (Hollifield et al., 2001) are in charge of various tasks” (Stalph, 2020, p. 2). This limits data journalists’ ability to work on more extensive and complex stories. Finding Solutions Through Cooperation The expansion of the traditional definition of journalism (Carlson & Lewis, 2015) and the significant rise of peripheral actors (Schapals, 2022) and interlopers (Eldridge, 2017), which support the work of data journalism, have impacted the way journalists do their job. These changes allowed newsrooms to embrace innovative and cooperative mindsets in order to overcome economic hurdles and staff shortages (de-Lima-Santos & Mesquita, 2021). In fact, collaborations have had a greater return on an organization’s productivity and performance, such as the Lava Jato scandal (also known as Operation Car Wash) that unfolded in Brazil in March 2014, after a police investigation. This event is considered Latin America’s largest known corruption scheme in living memory (Lagunes & Svejnar, 2020). In Peru, this investigation was primarily undertaken by news outlets that identified the relationship between the government and the Brazilian conglomerate Odebrecht. IDL-Reporteros (Peru) led an alliance between journalists in the region to become more powerful across the region and “win the game.” Joining forces with journalists from La Prensa (Panama),

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La Nación (Argentina), Armando.info (Venezuela), and Sudestada (Uruguay), the alliance called the Latin American Network of Structured Investigation helped, despite the lack of resources and workforce that these outlets face, unveil the case of corruption. These practitioners relied on data journalism skills to analyze “26 years of contract of Odebrecht and other companies that belong to this club of corruption,” said Romina Mella, an investigative journalist from IDL-­ Reporteros (November 2020). Similarly, other smaller data projects have also relied on data and collaboration to produce cross-country stories. “Pequeñas Inocentes” (Little Innocents), led by Ginna Morelo from El Tiempo (Colombia) with the collaboration of El Universal (Mexico), El Comercial (El Salvador), La Nación (from Argentina and Costa Rica), El Comercio (Peru), El País (Uruguay), showed the numbers of gender-­ based violence in those countries. Another critical aspect that boosted their efficiency and effectiveness was using third-party tools to support data-driven storytelling (de-Lima-­ Santos et al., 2021). For newsrooms struggling to develop data units due to the lack of institutional backing, these tools come in handy to assist journalists that do not have the technical skills required to produce data stories. In particular, newsrooms with small teams or single data journalists use these tools more often than those with data units composed of journalists, technologists, and professionals with other backgrounds, such as La Nación (Argentina). For instance, the Chilean public-service media, 24 Horas, has a two-person data team, which makes it excessively difficult to produce data stories. Thus, they rely on a range of third-party tools to build data stories in their newsroom, such as Infogram. In summary, we can describe a threefold approach chosen by the Latin American data journalism community: (1) a collaborative effort among the different institutions, such as media organizations and civil society entities, to enhance and facilitate the practice and promote open data, (2) the expansion of boundaries of skill sets found in newsrooms, and (3) leveraging existing out-of-the-box solutions to overcome the barriers that exist. Although some of these practices are found in Western countries, the Latin American data journalism community brings specially-designed characteristics to its work to support the lack of funding and staffing.

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User-Generated Content Punctual, But Promising: Engaging the Public to Make the News As newspapers are thrust into the dynamics of the internet, where everyone with an opinion can be heard, User-Generated Content (UGC) has become an essential part of journalism. However, journalists, media companies, and researchers still have plenty to learn. These professionals should consider the regionalities and particularities of UGC when adopting its use. For example, limited local resources and complexities and context specificities can be particularly complex to benefit the public content. Additionally, they can change how journalism is produced. In Latin America, the appropriations of UGC by news sites vary just like the organizations, whose practices change according to their origin, structure, and publishing platforms. Latin American news organizations must continuously adapt to their audience’s demands and new technological advancements. At the same time, they also need to respond to a change in social (economic, political, and cultural) contexts (Salaverría et al., 2019). Having a big picture of the current development in Latin American news sites, the authors could identify the limited appropriations of users’ content, especially for storytelling. User participation is still met with moderation and limited to specific spaces and activities. Comment boxes and buttons that ask the user to share the content via email or social media are now nearly rudimentary tools for news sites. Still, they remain popular resources to provide an interactive feature for users across the region, even providing a minimal form of engagement with the reader and limited participation in the news process (Peters & Witschge, 2015). In the end, news outlets in the region produce quality journalism, thorough collaborative investigations, innovative multimedia resources, and creative presentations of data storytelling reporting but without public engagement. Consequently, this reflects how resources and tools have arisen with the advent of the internet and new technologies, as they expanded the interactivity via multiple channels. However, the innovative uses of UGC, which go further than the simple use of these tools, are still punctual in Latin American news sites. Unfortunately, they do not automatically correspond to an expansion of the adoption of UGC in journalism and the willingness of news organizations to make room for unfettered participation by the public.

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In Time of Crisis, the Wise Build Bridges While UGC is still limited, recent events might help to change it. The COVID-19 health crisis has called for creativity from news outlets worldwide. While the health crisis has brought many challenges, exciting initiatives that use audiences’ content also emerged. GK (Ecuador) launched a few special projects because of the spread of COVID-19 in the country, such as “Los que no aparecen,” a series of stories that delivers first-person reports of those who are looking for the bodies of missing relatives during the height of the emergency in Ecuador. Red/Acción (Argentina) is another prominent example. The newsroom puts user participation at the forefront of its journalistic model. The news outlet has created a channel for collaboration on stories between its journalists and the most active members. Similarly, Red/Acción always has an open call for partnerships with its members, continuously creating stories that mix content from readers and journalists. During the pandemic, the news outlet launched a series of stories, combining personal testimonials about the changes in routines from users and narratives from its journalists to bring different perspectives of a new reality, such as love, caring, and human connection. This was a way to stimulate people as life went from ‘real’ to digital environments (Sinay, 2020a, 2020b). Similarly, The Intercept Brasil (TIB), the Brazilian edition of the American The Intercept, brings an exciting approach to the use of UGC. TIB has engaged the audience to enhance its journalism. The organization adapted to the circumstances imposed by the pandemic, maximizing and optimizing the use of social media platforms. For example, Instagram was used as a space for audience consumption and participation (Vázquez-Herrero et al., 2019). In covering the pandemic, TIB has made a consistent and systematic effort to make room for testimonials from people who came from people outside the newsroom that were rarely heard, even in times of crisis. TIB published a series of testimonials of users affected by the coronavirus pandemic in a dedicated section called “Voices” on its website (Carvalho & Sousa, 2020; Fernandes, 2020), relaying stories such as the loss of loved ones and the lack of resources and support by different institutions. All of these stories come from users whose voices gained for the first time space in media outlets brought to life the different aspects of the human side during the COVID-19 pandemic. These examples illustrate how Latin American news outlets are overcoming their limitations to

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create an environment for public participation in the creation of narratives, using their content to help tell the story and incorporate their point of view into the news (Gruszynski Sanseverino & de-Lima-Santos, 2021). This does not preclude mediation or diminishes the journalist’s work, but opens different possibilities for storytelling in news reporting. This demonstrates that the public can help journalism make the news if organizations are willing to encourage participation, making a proper space for UGC that fits the audience into their idea of the profession and exceeding the traditional transactional relationship with the public. By placing the crowd at the, Latin American newsrooms have also made progress for active public participation. However, considering the technological advances, this is still insufficient.

Platforms Finding a Balance Between Dependence and Strategic Use The relationship between news organizations and platforms, in general, has evolved in contradictory ways over the years. During most of the 2000s, concerned with copyrights of their content, publishers were cautious and even refractory to have a presence on Google News, Facebook, and Twitter (Smyrnaios, 2018). The game changed during most of the 2010s when these structures became the most influential players in the digital economy and helped news organizations constantly reach bigger audiences through their algorithmic selection tools. During this stage, news media began to adopt more features and increasingly comply with distribution guidelines proposed by the technology giants. This scenario led the Tow Center for Digital Journalism, for example, to assume the term platform press to refer to the mainstream legacy and digital native media, which seemed already resigned to having most of its content distribution intermediated by these structures (Bell & Owen, 2017; Rashidian et al., 2018). The tide started to change again from the end of 2016, when Facebook made a series of modifications in its algorithms, whose effect was to limit the distribution of news at the expense of content published by family and friends—in theory, the type of material that achieves greater engagement within the platform (The Infinite Dial, 2019). Thus, publishers realized that the search for larger audiences through social media to convince

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advertisers to drive revenue to their digital properties was over (Rashidian et al., 2019). Most scholars have almost exclusively focused on the U.S. or European media markets. However, the scenario in Latin America is not radically different. It seems more complex because news companies usually have fewer resources and audiences are among the heaviest users of the Internet and social media platforms (Clement, 2019, 2020a, 2020b). At the same time, the public is the least inclined to spend their limited purchasing power on subscriptions and memberships to news media services (Newman et al., 2020). Hence, Latin American news publishers are less reliant on these tech companies and are hoping to develop strategies that drive more subscriptions or memberships instead of simply getting page views. Sometimes, it means adopting a more significant number and variety of platforms in different ways and depending less on a single one (Bell & Owen, 2017; Cornia et  al., 2018; Nielsen & Ganter, 2018; Rashidian et al., 2018, 2019). Conversely, Folha de S. Paulo, the leading legacy media in Brazil, took a radical and unusual approach to the world’s most popular social network: it simply quit sharing its content on Facebook and stopped its chatbot on Messenger1. On the other hand, the newspaper decided to enhance its presence on Instagram by sharing not only posts of pictures and short videos but also stories and longer videos on IGTV, including live streams with journalists. The news outlet also produced a series of short video documentaries that complement its print and digital news pieces for YouTube. Similarly, the news organization is partnering with Spotify Studios to create “Café da Manhã,” one of the most listened to podcasts in the country. During the elections, Folha de S. Paulo also opened channels on WhatsApp, the top messaging application in Brazil and Latin America (Campos Mello, 2018, 2019a, 2019b; Dias, 2018; Tardáguila et al., 2018). Unsurprisingly, this increasing proximity to the readers has already resulted in rising audience numbers and, consecutively, subscribers2. Several Latin American news organizations are following similar strategies for platforms with some variations. For example, La Nacion (Argentina) received the 2020 World Digital Media Award from the WAN-IFRA on Social Media Engagement for its relaxed and entertaining approach to stories on the platform without losing sight of the informative side of their content. Interestingly, the company developed filters for audiences to use on their pictures and videos, as well as a series of ‘good

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stories’ to improve people’s spirits during the difficult period of confinement because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Diario El Vistazo (Venezuela) even managed to monetize its stories on Instagram and the statuses of WhatsApp. The local daily uses a format similar to its well-known public service announcements to enable individuals and companies in the El Tigre community (about six hours Southeast from Caracas with a population of around 240,000 inhabitants) to run their ads and classifieds for more than 70,000 followers on both platforms. According to the general manager Nilsa Varela Vargas, the organization had its best financial year in 2019 due to this investment (April 2020). Telefe Notícias (Argentina) took advantage of a Google News Initiative program to accelerate the development of news channels on YouTube. The organization made its local teams produce national programs on the platform. This was a challenge for traditional journalists who were used to the old-fashioned TV formats. Furthermore, most of these professionals were not so tech-savvy and lived in less developed areas far away from the capital Buenos Aires limiting their exposition to innovative formats, as explained by the company’s digital news manager Leandro Camino (May 2020). Some digital natives are focusing their efforts almost solely on platform distribution these days to reach sustainability. It is the case of companies like Posta (Argentina) and Rádio Novelo (Brazil), which are using their expertise in radio and podcast production to news organizations to provide content with distinctive formats in partnership with Spotify Studios. The Argentine producer focuses primarily on explanatory journalism. In the same vein, the Brazilian does in-depth narrative experiments like Retrato Narrado (Narrated Portrait), where each season draws a profile of a prominent personality, seeking to explain its origins, motivations, successes, defeats, and contradictions. The YouTube-based channel MyNews (Brazil) also took a grant from Google to build a larger team, experimenting with new formats and developing new partnerships to scale the business and launch a new membership program with exclusive content. Focused on memberships, Correio Sabiá and Seu Panorama (both from Brazil) are betting their chips on providing a daily curation of the leading news topics only on WhatsApp. Robot LaBot (Chile) developed a chatbot on Telegram to deliver a weekly conversation on a single subject and focused on more in-house investigations after receiving grants from international foundations, as explained by the founder Francisca Skoknic (May 2020).

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The path to avoiding platform dependency seems to be more complicated for these emerging companies dedicated almost exclusively to a single application—such as YouTube, Spotify, WhatsApp, or Telegram—to grow than those diversifying their presence on them to explore their benefits strategically. On the other hand, if these “platform natives” have fewer resources, they also have less to lose with experimentation and are already born more accustomed to a digital environment where constant adaptation is necessary (Nieborg & Poell, 2018).

The Future of Journalism in Latin America The Latin American news media industry has undergone profound and structural changes. While most technologically developed and economically powerful countries have seen a rapid expansion of digital technologies in newsrooms, the region has been trying to overcome its structural limitations, such as economic hurdles and staff shortages, to innovate (de-Lima-Santos & Mesquita, 2021; Salaverría et al., 2019). Despite these challenges, our findings indicate that newsrooms are taking the opportunities that are presented to themselves to embrace novel technologies to create more developed ways to engage with the audience, such as the use of UGC and platforms. Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic has given impetus to the development of innovative uses of UGC in newsrooms. The isolation gave space for creativity, bringing audiences to the storytelling. Furthermore, newsrooms saw the opportunity for user content as various lockdowns and quarantines in different parts of the world restricted these professionals from reaching their sources. Even to a limited extent, empowering a portion of these newsrooms to adopt novel technologies helps advancing their journalistic formats. Our findings show that the increased processing capabilities and the proliferation of pervasive devices allowed new forms of journalistic content to emerge in the region, such as automated journalism, artificial intelligence, audience analytics, and data journalism. Remarkably, the latter has become more routine and integrated into the ever-complex business models of Latin American news organizations. While new forms of content bring better opportunities that can contribute to generating revenue and growth, Latin American news outlets are still seeking a sustainable solution for their business models that allow

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them to adopt technological innovations in their newsrooms (de-Lima-­ Santos et al., 2022). In the future, ubiquitous journalism can become more evident and organizations will need to keep pace with technological changes to produce something that engages their audiences (Salaverría & de-Lima-­ Santos, 2020). We are seeing an ever-growing trend toward the ubiquity of technology in our life brought by the Internet of Things (IoT), 5G, and the further deployment of AI systems. This promises a new revolution that combines advanced production techniques with intelligent technologies (de-Lima-Santos et al., 2022). However, without financial support, these projects will simply cease to exist. One of the paths found by publishers in Latin America to develop these new forms was having big tech companies and philanthropic backing to prop up a model and create an appearance of viability. Through these grants, they can introduce technological evolutions causing the transformation of norms and routines in newsrooms (de-Lima-Santos & Mesquita, 2021). Similarly, the dependence on platforms is evident for emerging companies dedicated almost exclusively to a single application to build their business. In contrast, more prominent news outlets are diversifying their presence on different platforms to explore their benefits strategically without creating a strong path dependence—even though it still exists. This chapter shows that the Latin American journalism industry has a bright future by bringing different ways to produce and consume journalism, despite facing multiple challenges that organizations and professionals face. Still, to become more prevalent in the news ecosystem, it needs to continue on a path of innovation to create business models that do not rely on funds that have an end date. By using their own practices and models of reporting, Latin American practitioners overcome their limitations to equip themselves with the necessary knowledge and tools that could assist them in their daily tasks. This chapter contributes to further delineate the actual practice these journalists encounter in non-Western countries and helps to foster an understanding how journalism is practiced in different parts of the world. Notes 1. Folha stops publishing on Facebook (Folha deixa de publicar conteúdo no Facebook). (2018, February 8). Folha de S.Paulo. Retrieved from

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https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/poder/2018/02/folha-­deixa-­de-­ publicar-­conteudo-­no-­facebook.shtml. Accessed 4 Mar 2020. 2. Folha achieves an audience record in two months in a row after political and coronavirus crisis. (Folha tem recorde de audiência pelo segundo mês seguido com crise política e coronavírus). (2020, May 1). Folha de S.  Paulo. Retrieved from https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/ poder/2020/05/folha-­bate-­recorde-­de-­audiencia-­pelo-­segundo-­mes-­ seguido-­com-­coronavirus.shtml?origin=folha. Accessed 3 June 2020. Leading newspaper in Brazil, Folha consolidates its digital growth. (Maior Jornal do Brasil, Folha consolida crescimento digital). (2020, June 26). Folha de S. Paulo. Retrieved from https://www1.folha.uol. com.br/poder/2020/06/maior-­j ornal-­d o-­b rasil-­f olha-­c onsolida-­ crescimento-­digital.shtml?origin=folha. Accessed 30 October 2020. . Two La Nación’s editorial projects are awarded. (Dos proyectos edito3 riales de La Nacion, premiados a nivel mundial). (2020, October 22). La Nacion. Retrieved from https://www.lanacion.com.ar/sociedad/ dos-­proyectos-­editoriales-­la-­nacion-­ganadores-­world-­nid2485558. October 22, 2020. Acknowledgments  This project was funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 765140.

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CHAPTER 3

“Burmese Days” of Digitalization: From a Decade’s Dream of Myanmar’s Modern Journalistic Culture and Media System in the Making to a Press Freedom’s Nightmare of the Military Putsch in 2021 Mandy Fox, Sascha Helbardt, Oliver Hahn, and Felix Krebs

Introduction With the elections in November 2010, the military initiated the top down process of Myanmar opening up, following its roadmap to a “Discipline-­flourishing Democracy” and thereby put an end to nearly The authors thank their research assistant Vera Rosinger for her support in formatting this chapter.

M. Fox (*) • S. Helbardt • O. Hahn • F. Krebs University of Passau, Passau, Germany e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_3

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half a century of military rule. The elections, in which the military-built Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) won a majority, were described by international observers as neither free nor fair. Nevertheless, President Thein Sein, an ex-military, drove the reforms forward in his five years in office, like the release of political prisoners, the start of the Union Peace Conference series that was supposed to initiate a peace process between the Myanmar military and the Ethnic Armed Organizations (EAOs), as well as the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA) as a preliminary stage to the peace conferences, such as the abolition of media censorship in August 2012 and the official closure of the censorship authority in January 2013, as well as the distribution of licenses especially in the print media sector, which led to more diversity in the daily newspaper market. Since then, young journalists have been testing the new freedoms, while experienced journalists are more cautious and tend to self-censure when it comes to criticizing the government or the military (Fox, 2013). In 2015, the National League for Democracy (NLD), Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi’s party, won the elections by a huge margin. The civil government had to rule and co-exist with the military in a political hybrid system. Interestingly, the reforms under the new and young civilian NLD-led government stalled and exacerbated by the deteriorating free expression and media freedom environment (UNESCO, 2018: III). In the elections in November 2020, the NLD was able to further consolidate its position and achieved outstanding election results. The military coup on February 1, 2021 interrupted the democratization process in the country and thus a decade of relative opening of the country. This article will shed a light on this decade of transition, the country’s media and political system as well as the country’s modern journalistic culture whose development got so abruptly interrupted by the military coup. As early as in his 2011 inauguration speech, President Thein Sein promised to respect Myanmar’s media as the “fourth pillar” of the country’s democracy (May, 2012). The Thein Sein-government needed the media as a partner for credibility and popularity. Although the reins were drawn again in 2014 were arrests and sentencing of journalists, mostly under the notorious Section 66(d) of the Telecommunications Act, as well as the restrictive new draft media law further muted the welcoming cheers for the young press freedom and strengthened mistrust in the government’s

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will for „real change“, or at least to its degree.1 Self-censorship with regard to certain topics such as the role of the military, the long-time ruler of the country, is still one of the consequences of these arrests. While journalists hope for a system in which they will be able to say what they want, many assume that the government, especially the powerful Ministry of Information, will continue to exert strong control over some fields of the media. While voices from Myanmar’s growing private press are the strongest to demand freedom, broadcasting, which is still the most important source of information outside the big cities, is still tightly controlled by state broadcasting or government crony pay-tv channels. The NLD-­ government as the successor of the Thein Sein-government, used the Section 66(d) of the Telecommunications Act to silence journalists extensively. They didn’t need the media as a partner because they had a huge voter base support and popularity from the Myanmar people. According to Brooten et al. (2019) the Telecommunications Law is one of the NLD’s weapons. She states that a revised version of the law passed by the Union Parliament in August 2017 did not abolish 66(d) or decriminalize defamation. Myanmar is falling steadily again in the World Press Freedom Index and is only 139th in 2020 out of 180 countries and territories (Reporters Without Borders,  2020), down from 131st in 2017. Before the USDP government abolished pre-publication censorship in 2012, Myanmar was ranked 174th in the 2010 World Press Freedom Index out of 178 countries (Reporters Without Borders, 2010: 18). This chapter describes the changes within the decade of transition from 2011 to 2021 and draws a contemporary image of a Myanmar media that is involved in a conflictual process coined by a constellation of mistrusting actors, who struggle over control. These include journalists, who as a strategic group follow a harsh aim of freedom of speech, private media companies struggling for licenses and an even playing field against subsidized state media on the market. In addition, there is the sector of ethnic media, which struggle to find their position inside or outside the nation’s media system. Furthermore, the chapter raises the question in how far journalistic practice has changed during the decade of transition. The findings are based on literature and background discussions with journalists, editors, 1  In April 2014 DVB video journalist Zaw Pe was sentenced for one year for “trespassing” and disturbing a civil servant on duty while doing a report on a Japanese funded scholarship programme. Https://dvb.no/news/journalists-slam-public-service-media-law-burmamyanmar/41193. Accessed 6.10.2014.

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media owners, university lecturers, media activists and key actors in the media field. Given the problematic and dangerous situation after the coup, we protect our interlocutors and anonymize by name and profession.

Opening Up: Less Control, More Actors With the establishment of Myanmar’s long-lasting military dictatorship in the early 1960s formerly independent media in postcolonial had been nationalized, media outlets of Myanmar’s ethnic groups were forbidden and the remaining independent media houses put under strong state control, first and foremost by the censorship board. Although this censorship was only abolished in 2012, the media market was partly liberalized already in the 1990s and during the following decade, when more and more private media companies emerged. In the 1990s private printing houses were allowed and import restrictions on paper and printing machines were relaxed, censorship measures were partly eased as well (Hudson-Rodd, 2008). Later in the early 2000s there was more room for explicit criticism, though the censorship board would not allow direct mentioning of the then military government.2 During 2008 and 2009 private journals still had to air the government position on issues like election and constitutional referendum, criticizing opposition members for boycotting planned elections. It was still mostly in blogs where opposition could voice their views (Pe Myint, 2012). Only in 2010 when the opposition was finally allowed to register and form parties as well as to campaign for elections, journalists finally came to cover opposition candidates. The president’s inauguration speech has been another cornerstone on the path towards liberalization of Myanmar’s media. Since then various actors have emerged with new media companies and a generation of enthusiast young journalists at the forefront. Yet despite its potential market of around 51 million customers, Myanmar’s media market is still relatively weak, even when compared to its Southeast Asian neighbours. Although the official literacy rate is high with over 90 percent (UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2020) and a young population with 50 percent under the age of 24, 2  Also in the 1990s the spread of satellite television enabled more some media practices that undermined the strong state control. Well-off people to purchase satellite dishes from China and Thailand or even subscribe pay TV from neighbouring Thailand (e.g. True) and therefore had access to international news channels.

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underdeveloped consumer markets, especially a small educated middle class as well as a lack of infrastructure (especially roads to the periphery of the countries) restrict the newspaper market to urban centers like Yangon or Mandalay (Myanmar Marketing Research & Development, 2013; Myanmar Advertisement Directory, 2013).

Government Media Reforms Transformation of the Broadcasting Sector Although always a stronghold of the state control, even the broadcasting sector witnessed some change—though to a lesser degree. The four most important TV Broadcasters are MRTV (Myanmar Radio & Television), Myawaddy Television (MWD), MRTV-4 and Sky Net TV Lines. MRTV is the National Broadcaster under the Ministry of Information (MOI) broadcasting nationwide with the 233-retransmitting stations. According to an official announcement in 2014, MRTV can reach 92.3% of the population. According to Radue ‘the transformation of the state-owned broadcaster MRTV into a public-service medium preserves a strong intertwinement of the government and the Tatmadaw3 with the media sector and does not balance the government’s monopolistic advantages’ (Radue, 2022). The legal aspects of this transition have been put on hold with the withdrawal of the Public Service Media bill, as being reported by UNESCO in 2016. One such reform was that MRTV provides news content in a variety of ethnic languages, so a large majority of citizens have access to state-­ produced news in a language they can understand. MWD on the other hand is under control of the Ministry of Defence. MRTV 4 is jointly operated by MRTV and a private company, Forever Group. MRTV-4 can only be received using a Pay-TV system. MRTV4 has around 50 channels broadcasting in Yangon and 10 channels are available in the peripheral areas of the country. Sky Net TV Channel is jointly operated by MRTV and Shwe Than Lwin Co., another private company. Both companies went into the joint venture with MRTV before Myanmar’s political transformation. As the military government (as elsewhere in Southeast Asia) considered broadcasting crucial for its control of public opinion, the people behind these stations were handpicked government cronies, which had to 3

 Myanmar Army.

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guarantee that the political content of the stations followed the official party line, although most of the stations stressed entertainment content anyway.4 On crucial political topics the Ministry of Information sends Sky Net information letters, in which the official government position is clarified. In the wake of the political transformation broadcasters, for example, had to reduce the political attacks on the NLD and opposition media, which were a standard political repertoire of broadcasters in pre-reform times. For the private sector, it took years until the granting of licenses was completed by the then NLD government. According to Radue ‘Only in April 2017 five companies were awarded a license after a long-lasting process, namely DVB Multi Media, Fortune International, Kuang Myanmar Aung, Mizzima Media, and Young Investment Group.’ (Radue, 2022). BBC Burmese Service, Voice of America, and Radio Free Asia as foreign news agencies are broadcasting via shortwave (UNESCO, 2016: xviii).

The Impact of Media Development Organizations and the Development of Journalists’ Associations The situation of media freedom and freedom of expression has improved firstly since the opening of Myanmar, being the northernmost country in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) located between India and China. Ironically, Myanmar’s Ministry of Information (MoI)— that had banned, for decades, George Orwell’s (1934) first novel Burmese Days in which its British author criticizes “imperious attitudes of both” the colonialists and the Burmese under the former British Raj—announced in 2013 that the unabridged and new Myanma translation (by Maung Myint Kywe) of the book “was the winner of the 2012 National Literary Award’s informative literature (translation) category”, “the highest literary award in the country” (Tha, 2013). Free expression and media freedom started to deteriorate again in 2014/15. The government in summer 2012 has stopped censorship of private media, the notorious Printer and Publisher Law was replaced in March 2014 with promulgation of new media laws by parliament. These were 4  There was a lot of public pressure on the Myanmar government to reveal the terms and conditions of the contracts between the MOI and the two private companies. In October 2013 the MOI held a press conference in Nay Pyi Daw and explained to the media that public and broadcasting contracts including two television networks and six private FM radio stations are granted license in accordance with the existing domestic investment law.

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crucial steps towards the reform of the media. Media experts and journalists express serious doubts about the new law, especially the question of influence of the government on the governing boards of the new public media organizations. Another concern that was expressed against the media ownership law was that no major cross-ownership is allowed, apparently in order to reduce market concentration. Yet critics argue that it is an attempt to maintain a strong degree of government power against private actors. Initially the government aimed to involve private media actors in the law drafting process itself and therefore the Ministry of Information established the so-called Core Press Council (CPC) in 2011. The original task of the Core Press Council was manifold. Firstly, it should monitor and sanction controversial media content that might infringe media ethics. Secondly, it should gather a media ethic catalogue itself. Thirdly, the media council was asked by the Minister of Information to draft the print media law, which would replace the 1962 Printer and Publishers registration law. Initially, the Ministry of Information appointed 20 Press Council Members without consultation of journalist’s organizations. Immediately, there was strong criticism against this top-down attempt to include journalists into the press-governance from all corners of the private media—the attempt to coordinate media regulation between state and journalists was ridden with mistrust and failed coordination. Some officials assumed that journalists would only be keen to push through their agenda of media freedom, whereas officials themselves saw the need for some form of regulation (e.g. registration of media companies). Journalists, on the other hand, considered registration of media companies as an attempt of officials to continue their control over media with other means than direct censorship. Indeed, the Interim Press Council, Myanmar journalist associations as well as international media NGOs like “Article 19” criticize the draft Press Law Bill on several accounts. One point of contention is, for example, the draft’s prohibition of “provocative expression or “false propaganda”. Both are unclear restrictions, which are not up to international standards like the International Convent on Civil and Political Rights. Also, the draft violates international standards by allowing the government to decide who can publish a press product or run a website and by restricting the access to information, when it comes to “matters of public and national security”. Still the draft law is praised for replacing the draconian Printers and Publishers Registration Law (1962) which requires prior censorship in all forms of media to examine in the first instance complaints against the press. This suspicion can be

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understood also because the ministerial officials are still the same people, who censored media before 2010 and since the law would give the Ministry of Information the right to revoke a license of print and online media. On the other hand, then President Thein Sein demanded a responsible media. In July 2014, for example, Thein Sein cautioned the media against publishing content that could further stir up religious violence between Buddhists and Muslims. In a radio speech he implied that social media reports on the rape of a Buddhist woman had sparked anti-Muslim riots in Mandalay: “We now have attained freedom of speech because of political reform which is crucial in the [democratic] transition process and we have now become a nation with one of the highest levels of press freedom in Southeast Asia”, the state-owned Mirror newspaper quoted him as saying. Indeed, Islamophobic propaganda, especially by the infamous monk Wirathu, a vanguard of Buddhist ultranationalism in Myanmar (Fuller, 2015), is widely shared via Facebook and other social media. Another issue of content was how to hold the press accountable in case their reports would, for example, be complaints against hate speech and false facts . Due to this mistrust and the different agenda of both actors the meetings between the MIPC and the Ministry of Information, a common understanding was hardly achieved. Eventually, mistrust was so high that despite the fact that U Aung Kyi, the Ministry of Information assigned MIPC to draft News Media Bill, five months later, the Ministry submitted its own draft of another media law which is called Printing and Publishing Enterprise Law. Since the government’s drafting process was not known to the members of MIPC nor other media associations, journalists protested strongly when the new bill was suddenly unveiled in a State-owned newspaper in late February 2013. As a result, the relationship between the Press Council and the Ministry was seriously damaged. As the motives and power constellations behind Myanmar’s transformation are still matter to speculation, so are the motives for the relaxation of the state’s grip on the media. It is still hard to access information on the internal workings of the Ministry of Information. Whereas some observers attribute the governments during this decade of transition with a sincere will to change, others, including many journalists, still have a deep mistrust when it comes to the government’s motives, including its efforts to reform Myanmar’s media system, although there have been significant changes caused by both government policies as well as by parliament.

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The collective influence of journalists’ associations on government policies is still limited, although some individual members were involved in the drafting of the media law. After the dissolution of the Myanmar Writers and Journalists Association, which was set up under the military in 1993 journalists rushed to establish several independent associations (Reporters Without Borders, 2012: 11). There are three notable associations representing journalists in Myanmar: the biggest one is the Myanmar Journalists Association (MJA) with over 1000 journalists. Founded in 2011 it is also probably the most influential professional group association not only by numbers, but also because many media company owners, chief editors and senior journalists are among its members. The Myanmar Journalist Association seems to be in a difficult position within the Press Council and has a problem of trust because it used to have very good relations with the Ministry of Information during the times of the military regime (Fox, 2013). The Myanmar Journalists Network (MJN) has less and younger members, which are, however, very active.5 Its activities comprise journalism training, but also setting up a media library (together with the MJA). Before the coup in 2021, there was a certain amount of fragmentation or fractionalization among journalists. The degree of horizontal organization (professional associations) is generally low in Southeast Asia. Media development organizations entered Myanmar, when the country opened up in 2011, bringing with them not only a package of norms, values and concepts, offering journalistic training and advisory expertise for organizational management and law drafting processes but also offered financial support for journalists’ associations, that they reduced gradually over the years, leaving the associations in a difficult position to sustain themselves after such a short time. Given, that the journalists or media practitioners involved are mostly volunteering, that there is a lack of human and financial resources in general as well as a lack of member fees to sustain the organization. The salaries for journalists are low and therefore paying a fee for the association is not a priority. The concept of member fees is, according to our interviewees, still not a common practice to the journalists in Myanmar. The journalists’ associations will care for members and non-members, if a journalist is being sued or beaten up,

5  In August 2012 MJN members were, for example, responsible for organising demonstrations calling for the lifting of the suspension of two weeklies ordered by the state (Reporters Without Borders, 2012: 11).

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they stand for them. This means, that they try, within their capacity, to negotiate or intermediate with the parties involved. There are personal animosities and economical conflicts. A prominent actor in the field of ethnic media is the Burma News International (BNI), a network of 16 ethnic news agencies, which was founded in 2003. BNI’s aim is to represent the country “as a nation of diverse peoples” and creating “knowledge and understanding about the different ethnic nationalities and regions of Burma” (Brooten, 2011). There is little cooperation between BNI and the other journalist associations. However, as with many associations in Myanmar, the political influence of these journalists’ associations is rather weak and the commitment of its member organizations in terms of finance, time and political backing remains limited. In the drafting process of the new media laws, they did not play a major role. With regard to BNI its demands towards the Myanmar government hardly moves beyond the demand for easier access to government licenses for ethnic media and more financial support, although these issues, it must be admitted are crucial for ethnic media. In terms of access to the state, most ethnic as well as national media would usually approach the Ministry of Information on an individual level bypassing the journalist associations. What has, however, become clear, is the vulnerability of the Myanmar mediascape in light of exogenous shocks. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has, again, fundamentally altered media law in Myanmar. Between March 19th and 31st 2020, the Myanmar government issued three directives under section 77 of the Telecommunication Law that saw over 2100 websites blocked. The government justifies its bans by having to prevent the spread of false reports about the corona pandemic, according to a Deutsche Welle reporter (Bärthlein, 2020). Especially ethnic minorities in rural Myanmar are heavily dependent on these alternative information sources and in “a time when access to information [is key, these drastic measures of censorship] could literally be the difference between life and death. Regarding the political and economic situation for the media in Myanmar Khine states: ‘As media practitioners predicted, the neglect to reform has been weakening the sustainability of independent media. While more resources have been channelled to the state-owned media sector over the past ten years, the private media outlets, including print and digital outlets, were already very weak when COVID-19 hit. The independent media outlets even accused the MOI [Ministry of Information] of monopolizing the advertising market, instead of encouraging the expansion of the media’s financial resilience. Since such policies have weakened the

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profitability of private media, the number of private newspapers in the market has shrunk from 16 to only five within the last eight years.’ (Khine, 2021: 8). Thus, further shrinking the plurality and diversity of media in Myanmar. ‘An insufficient willingness for media reform under the two previous governments,’ as Khine argues, ‘has led to the institutional defect that undermines media resilience in the post-coup political crisis.’ (Khine, 2021: 3).

Coming Home: Exile Media Another crucial feature of Myanmar’s media market is its fragmentation along ethnic, geographical and language lines. A strong exile media sector emerged in the aftermath of the crackdown of demonstrators in the early 1990s. This sector is represented by print, broadcasting and online media organization like Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), Mizzima or Irrawaddy. Often these were established by former student leaders of the 1988-generation, who had to leave the country in order to avoid government repression. The change in communication technology as well as international donors enabled some of these media to play an important role from abroad. Homepages, blogs, radio reports and even television (DVB aired its program with the support of the Norwegian government) provided a significant news-stream from Myanmar to the outside world and vice versa in an era of Myanmar’s international isolation. Local and exile journalists, for example, played a crucial role during the “Saffron Revolution” in 2007, when monks led mass demonstrations against the government after unannounced cuts in state fuel subsidies. Unlike the 1988 protests, which were hardly covered in the international news, Myanmar journalists, citizen reporters and bloggers were able to upload images of excessive military violence against protesters in 2007. These images put Myanmar on the international agenda and highlighted the potential role of media not only for documenting, but also driving political change of both protesters and journalists (Brooten, 2011). These exile media were facing major challenges during the transition period. In the past donor organizations funded Myanmar exile groups, because with most Western countries boycotting Myanmar’s military dictatorship development organization could not be active inside the country. After the end of sanctions and the new “change from within”-approach most donor organizations have been active within the country, indeed Myanmar was developing to a hotspot of international development aid in

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Asia, leaving the exile media in need of new sources for income. Political opportunities allow many former exile media, except the “insurgent” ones, at best to fully move back to the country or to at least have offices in Yangon. Media organizations now have to compete. The market for development aid has become more competitive and the media market was booming during the first years of the transition period. The organizational change demanded by these organizations can be exemplified by Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB). DVB’s director Ain Chan Naing returned to Myanmar for the first time in February 2012 to meet U Kyaw Sein, Director General at the Ministry of Information, who later became the presidential spokesman. This was the first time a leading member of DVB officially met a high-ranking Myanmar government representative in the country. Later in March 2012 Toe Zaw Latt, the Myanmar Bureau chief, was officially invited by the Myanmar government to join the first UN Media Development Conference in Yangon. For Toe it was the first visit to Myanmar after 24 years in exile. Many other exile media organizations criticized DVB for engaging too early with the new government and therefore granting it legitimacy (although many followed DVB soon after). In addition, in January 2012, the Myanmar government freed a number of imprisoned journalists, who had worked together with DVB. However, for DVB (and other organizations) these steps were crucial in building up trust with parts of the government and assessing the possibilities to return to Myanmar. During some earlier 2012 informal meetings in Norway, Myanmar government representatives had already signaled to DVB that it would be welcomed back in Myanmar. So in April 2013 DVB opened an office in Yangon. In early 2014 it had around 50 staff, who produce broadcasting and online content. The DVB leadership also discussed the possibilities of cooperating with local broadcasting companies such as Sky Net and others, because these had the journalistic and technical resources, which would ease DVB to go on air from Myanmar. This step, however, was considered inappropriate because many of these companies were known to be government cronies under the old military government. Yet DVB accepted Air Bagan and other “crony companies” as advertisers for its program. Besides the fact that DVB and other former exile media communicated regularly with the higher echelons of the Myanmar government through the mid 2010s, especially the Ministry of Information, and besides the fact that they have received permission to be active in Myanmar, the Ministry

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of Information also ordered the Myanmar state media to cease its rhetorical attacks on the exile media, which used to be part of the old propaganda machinery. DVB tries to balance its need to generate a commercial income, which is necessary to maintain a TV-channel and remain a certain degree of independence from Myanmar companies. In an economy trying to wrench itself from half a century of mismanagement this transformation is a difficult task. For exile ethnic media such a move towards a commercialized form of media organization is even more problematic. As the economies of Myanmar’s periphery are even more underdeveloped and its infrastructure often wretched from civil war, establishing a sound economic basis for commercial media outlets is more difficult, income from advertisement is scarce.

Ethnic Media Until April 2013 ethnic language media were forbidden, so most of them were located abroad (e.g. in Thailand, India) or in ethnic areas of Myanmar themselves, which were not under government control. In comparison to the above-mentioned nationally-focused exile media, the ethnic media are smaller, less professional and internationally less known.6 However, in the ethnic media in Myanmar is not only a significant feature of Myanmar’s media market, but they have a significant effect on the integration of ethnic groups in the nation-state and for example, the acceptance of the Nation-wide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA) talks.7 However, this process including the peace conferences, a fourth round was scheduled for July 2020, has largely come to a standstill in recent years and especially so since the Coup d’État on February 1st, 2021. Ethnic media might be distinguished between integrated and insurgent media. The first category of ethnic media are those media organizations that received licenses from the Ministry of Information. According to the Deputy Minister of Information nine “national races” are publishing

 Brooten (2011: 233).  Before the Coup d’État Myanmar’s governments aimed to achieve a first-time ever nationwide ceasefire agreement. The Thein Sein government’s Union Peace Working Committee negotiated the NCA with the National Ceasefire Coordination Team (NCCT), which is representing 16 ethnic armes organizations (EAOs) including the Kachin Independence Organization, the Arakan Liberation Party, the Wa National Organization and other organizations. See www.mmmpeacemonitor.org 6 7

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regularly with license of the Ministry.8 These include, for example, monthly and bi-weekly ethnic news journals in Mon, Chin and Karenni states.9 These “legalised ethnic media” have only been allowed to go into print since the recent liberalization of the press. Mon and Chin, for example, have better relationships with the political center in Yangon and Nay Pyi Daw, when compared, for example, with the Kachin or the Wa, which are still in a state of war with the nation-state. Although they have a critical attitude towards the national government, Chin or Mon media generally tend not to publicly question the integration of the minority into the nation state. On the other hand, there are ethnic media that might be called “insurgent media” as well, which means that they are under the direct or indirect control of ethnic insurgent movements and serve the purpose of the ethnic movement (e.g. independence, federalism, autonomy) and its mobilization, national and international, through media. In other words, these media are highly embedded in their political, economic and geographical environment. A case in point are the Kachin, an ethnic minority in the North of Myanmar. With its estimated 10,000-strong force, the Kachin Independence Army (KIA)/Kachin Independence Organization (KIO), has been rejecting government control of what is called “Kachinland”, since 1961 (Farrelly, 2012). In its effort to control and mobilise the local population, the KIO/KIA runs a radio station, Laiza FM, which illegally airs in parts of Kachinland. Its staff and funds are provided by the KIA. Contents of Kachin FM range from (patriotic) Kachin songs, over local news (such as reports on village festivals or local schools and human rights violations by the Myanmar army) to the airing of long political statements by the KIO/KIA leadership. However, there are other Kachin media like the Kachin News Group,10 which was initially established by a group of Kachin students to deliver an independent news source, also struggle to express criticism against the Kachin leadership. Hence the group depends on international donors. Although this group and other 8  Speech by the Deputy Minister of Information at the Burma News International (BNI), Ethnic Media Media Conference in Taunggyi, 4.3.2014. 9  San Yaming Aung (2013), After Reforms Ethnic Media Emerge in Burma, But Challenges Remain. The Irrawaddy. 31st October. http://www.irrawaddy.org/media/reforms-ethnicmedia-emerge-burma-challenges-remain.html. Accessed 21.9.2014. 10  The Kachin News Group runs a Kachin news homepage (http://www.kachinnews. com), but also produces a radio show for Radio Free Asia. Interview Kachin News Group journalist, Chiang Mai, 9.12.2014.

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more independent media groups are very aware of, for example, the involvement of the KIO/KIA leadership in illegal logging, these issues are not deemed suitable for publication. Especially in times of war there is still a certain loyalty towards the leadership to which there currently not apparent alternative. Most criticism against Kachin leaders can be found on Facebook and in smaller blogs. Here for example, the legacy of Saboi Jum, who was crucial for the achievement of the 1994 peace agreement, is critically discussed. Here younger Kachin also dare to argue that the KIO leadership got out of touch with the normal population. It is argued, for example, that most of the Kachin population actually want independence and not a federal system. Some ethnic media like the Laiza FM, but also some Shan media are rather means of ethnic armed groups than independent information platforms. The independence of ethnic media from armed groups and political organizations is always a matter of degree. Chin media, for example, are located in a different context. Chin World Weekly, for example, a bi-weekly newspaper produced by and for the Chin, which are a (majority) Christian ethnic group, whose population is estimated to be over one million in Myanmar, runs with a license by the Ministry of Information. Produced and printed in Yangon this newspaper is using Burmese language11 and was intended by its founders to be rather independent from Chin political leadership. In contrast to insurgent media like Laiza FM, which is dependent on the KIA/KIO, Chin World Weekly attempts to be more critical of its own ethnic political leadership, criticizing, for example, their policies as much as it attempts to be critical of Myanmar’s government policy towards the Chin. Since the media reforms then several independent news publications have been set up that intend to serve populations in ethnic regions. Yet despite the lifting of media restrictions the number of legal publications in ethnic regions remains limited. By October 2013, four monthly and bi-weekly ethnic-language journals have been founded in Chin, Mon, Karen and Karenni states. In 2017 an article states that three Chin language daily newspapers, 40 ethnic language journals and seven ethnic language magazines had been approved by the government (Htwe, 2017). Ethnic media face a number of political, economic and infrastructure difficulties. The Karen News journal, provider for information of one of 11  This is due to the fact there is no common language among the six Chin language groups, so they only language all Chin read is Burmese.

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the country’s largest minorities, can only publish once a month due to a lack of funding (Sam Yaming Aung, 2013). Since the peripheries of Myanmar have been coined by decades of civil war and underdevelopment, no infrastructure for the distribution of newspapers and journals exist. Especially during the rainy season it is hardly possible. Distributions of newspapers in the isolated and underdeveloped ethnic areas is a challenge, she said, adding that security for ethnic reporters is also a concern as tensions between the government and ethnic rebels continue, despite recent ceasefires. Another structural difficulty concerns the fact that due to the suppression of ethnic education the ability to read in ethnic languages is rather low among the population. As Brooten rightly stresses, there remain gaps of perception between national exile media, which are moving back to media, and ethnic media in exile. It remains to be seen what the impact of both is on the national reconciliation. Brooten argues that the limitations by international discourses on media freedom, which concentrates on the question of freedom and protection of individual journalists at the expense of more collective (media) interests/more complex picture. Although DVB, for example, has ethnic news and although it generally supports the national reconciliation process, ethnic issues remain rather side-lined within DVB, whose leadership is mostly ethnic Burmese.12

Coverage of Conflict: Rakhine—A Textbook Example for the Weaknesses of Journalistic Practice The conflict in Rakhine State is a textbook example to show the weaknesses of journalistic practice and the limitations of the media system in Myanmar during the ten years of transition. Three areas can be identified for the external factors that influence the work of media actors in Myanmar who are covering the Rakhine State conflict: The socio-cultural sphere, political-state sphere and economic sphere. A UN Human Rights Council mission concluded in September 2018 that crimes against humanity had been committed in the states of Kachin, Rakhine and Shan, mainly by the Myanmar military, which has denied the allegations (Fox, 2020). As Fox states, the situation in Rakhine State has 12  What appears to be common to both ethnic and national media is a certain amount of disinterest in the political interests of the Rohingya, although the violence in the region is regularly covered, whenever it flares up.

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reached a new level of escalation since January 2019. With the Arakan Army (AA), which is fighting for more autonomy of the Rakhine State, another actor has entered the scene. The AA, which has between 5000 and 10,000 fighters, mostly Buddhist Rakhine, was classified by the government as a terrorist group in March 2020. The ongoing fighting has now spread to the southern part of Chin State. Between 60,000 and 160,000 internally displaced people fled the fighting (as of May, 2020) (Fox, 2020). Myanmar is now at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), based in The Hague, after the Gambia filed a lawsuit on behalf of the 57-member Organization for Islamic Cooperation in November 2019 accusing Myanmar of violating the UN Genocide Convention (Horsey, 2021). A UN fact-finding mission on-site investigations in Rakhine State has been denied by the Myanmar government. At most, it offered some “guided” tours to conflict areas for diplomats and journalists. Investigative journalists try to report from Rakhine State under dangerous conditions. Aung Marm Oo, editor-in-chief of Development Media Group (DMG), for example, has gone into hiding since May 2019. The journalist is wanted because he conducted an interview with insurgents and is said to have violated “The Unlawful Associations Act”. Anyone who is in contact with a member of an Ethnic Armed Organization (EAO) is considered a supporter of that organization and can face prison terms of several years (Fox, 2020).13 The case of Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, the two Reuters journalists, got worldwide coverage as they were jailed for more than a year being accused of breaching the Officials Secrets Act. They investigated the killing of 10 Rohingya men in Rakhine state and the involvement of the Myanmar Army during their crackdown in North Rakhine State in August 2017 that finally led to the flight of 700,000 people to Bangladesh, among them people from the Muslim Rohingya minority. The signal was well received by journalists in the country: Don’t mess with the military. The journalists were only released on May 7th, 2019 as part of an amnesty of 6520 prisoners by the then President Win Myint. Since June 2019, a government shutdown of “mobile Internet traffic” in parts of Rakhine and Chin states has made it difficult to exchange information. The shutdown was partially lifted in September 2019 and 13  See also: https://burmacampaign.org.uk/aung-marm-oo-development-media-group150-days-in-hiding/ or: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-myanmar-media/refusing-tobe-silenced-some-myanmar-journalists-work-from-shadows-idUSKBN23J13O

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reinforced and expanded again in February 2020 (Fox, 2020). The government cites “disturbances of peace and the use of internet services to coordinate illegal activities” as justification (Amnesty International, 2019). Human Rights Watch (HRW) speaks of an “information blackout” which affects around one million people (Robertson, 2020). Important information, e.g. about fighting and COVID-19, cannot be obtained from the affected population. In addition, transport and supply routes are interrupted as a result of the fighting. Aspects introduced here for the political-state sphere show, that the civilian government led by the then NLD and the military, trying to control the access to conflict areas and making reporting on site, news gathering and news production extremely difficult. They try to control the flow of information and the communication technologies. As well as using notorious laws to intimidate, arrest and sentence journalists and editors. Journalists criticize that state authorities are not available for statements and hardly respond to requests. Instead, they are pointing out, that the journalists should read the two state-newspapers, if they are looking for official statements or check the Facebook-Channels. Ethnic armed organisations are more eager to provide information, but the information- and communication policy of the government and military is unsatisfying for media practitioners who are eager to do a balanced reporting. The afore mentioned conditions and challenges contributed to a biased and one-­ sided reporting about the conflict in Rakhine State. The question could be raised in how far the media coverage further instigated the conflict. The failure to act if it comes to hate speech in the Rakhine State Conflict, an accusation that also Facebook became infamous for, further instigated the conflict (Mozur, 2018). Facebook is widely used by state authorities, the military and Ethnic Armed Organisations (EAOs). Facebook also plays a role in the economic sphere. Companies would boost a Facebook page more than putting an advertisement in the newspapers. There is a constant fight about clients and a lot of displeasure that the state-owned media can publish the advertisement with half the price than the private media. The trend is towards commercialisation, a lot of media houses change to entertainment business and avoid to report on critical issues, like the conflict between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine State, because there is a fear of loss of advertising revenue and readers, according to our interviewees. There is a lack of financial and material resources and the Covid-19 crisis just uncovered what the market was already suffering and struggling from. There was also a lack of credibility

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of the media. Publishers or CEOs have their own business interests or are intertwined with the government, military or receive funding from the private sector, which is also intertwined with the military. The readers are aware of their background and it contributes to a lack of credibility. Regarding the Socio-Cultural Sphere four aspects should be mentioned here. There is a bad media image in the country were people keep talking about “medinya” (a combination of media and liar), the news content is perceived as one sided and biased, accompanied by a lack of access to information, especially in remote areas, but also by a long history of nationalised propaganda media and therefore an understandable mistrust a society in which rumour-news has been a way of receiving information for many decades and considering it to be valid due to “trustworthy” networks. Which leads to the aspect of education meaning the development during the last ten years about journalistic standards, media literacy, professionalisation, institutional structures for media education. That only exists in the “Yangon Bubble”, the biggest city in the country. There is only one private school founded by international media donors and one local University, as well as decentralised training programs about conflict sensitive reporting and reporting for peace in Yangon and other parts of the country. Existing taboos, for example ‘do not criticize the military, do not criticize the monks’, because it will backfire in different ways, like state actors might sue the journalist or worse, being confronted with an outraged public, religious or nationalist groups threatening the journalists and discussions or worse in their own communities and families. The aspect of ‘local traditions’ and identity politics that is a huge challenge in Myanmar. People connect the reporter with his or her personal religious and ethnic identity. That always matters when trying to approach people from different communities for interviews and it either opens or closes doors. There are questions of belonging and worries of social isolation that are influencing the decision-making and everyday life of a journalist and his or her reporting. Social Isolation refers here to colleagues, family members and friends who might accuse the journalist of being a traitor to ones own community or the country, whose national image they do not adequately “protect”. The journalist who actually just would like to do the job, could be side lined and excluded by the community, colleagues, relatives and friends. Especially when it comes to the conflict in Rakhine State, the journalist faces criticism from both sides, the Buddhist Rakhine and the Muslim Rohingya. Accusing them of favouring one community over the other, accusing them of receiving bribe money from international

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media organizations or ‘the community in competition’ to publish biased and one-sided news. Facing the afore mentioned obstacles, the journalist perceives the job as a thankless one and there are journalists changing their profession and moving to the PR-sector which is also financially more attractive. There are different strategies to cope with the challenges and obstacles, described for the three spheres and the attempt of some journalists to contribute to a balanced reporting about the conflict in Rakhine State. Self-censorship could be one decision of a media actor, to minimize the risk of being sued and imprisoned by state authorities or to face an outraged public and Facebook posts with life threatening content, and being able to report within a given and accepted frame. To sneak in is another strategy to access conflict areas secretly, without informing authorities and to sneak out in the early mornings to escape the surveillance from authorities and try to reach also villages from the Rohingya Community in Rakhine State to conduct interviews there. To cover up is a strategy to gain access to conflict areas by “pretending that you are interested in the Rakhine-side of a story” and while the reporter is there, he or she tries to also speak to the Muslim community. “Doing like a local” also helps and was being described as exchanging the trouser for a longyi, speaking Arakanese language and chewing betel nut. The people in Rakhine state reacting hostile toward media people, no matter if international or local. When the reporter is being uncovered, especially while being surrounded by an angry mob, the reporter avoids to tell his or her real name and tries to avoid showing the ID card. Revealing your identity and thus that you are a reporter means for “the angry mob” to be a traitor and the situation could easily become violent or worse. Doing a balanced reporting in “getting the voices from both sides”, that means Rakhine and Rohingya communities, is vital for the journalists to uphold journalistic standards. That also includes travelling to conflict areas “to see with your own eyes”, even though it might be a dangerous task that is all too often not funded by the media outlet the journalists are working for, because there is no budget available, so they are using their private money. Further on it means to include information from the international media into the articles and to re-check the official statements from authorities with different sources. Not to forget the aspect of education, like attending workshops for conflict sensitive reporting and reporting for peace. By doing so, it contributes to the enhancement of the media image. Even though all this is in an embryonic state and put to question again regarding the Coup on February 1st, 2021.

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Political Parallelism Myanmar’s media system has always been highly politicized, whether it was during the colonial times, during the fight for independence or during the military dictatorship. This affects the media system as well as journalistic practices in various ways. Among journalists there is a strong distrust against the government, which also impacts political processes as has been shown above. Another result is an appetite to criticize the government. Corruption, misuse of power, stories about rich sons of ex-generals, on-­ going conflicts with ethnic groups and big dam projects are popular among readers. Another problem for journalists who take their profession seriously and would like to do a balanced reporting is, that ministers, MPs et cetera are often not available for questioning, statements or interviews and hardly answer requests from journalists. D-Wave and other newspapers are especially close to the NLD and therefore tend to quote Aung San Suu Kyi more often than other papers. Beyond a form of political affiliation especially among the printed press, they cannot be categorized as liberal, conservative, left-wing or right-wing or socialist as in the European context. Independent social movements (e.g. labour unions), which could serve as a basis for these kinds of ideological currents, have long been suppressed in Myanmar. Political parallelism cannot only be seen concerning domestic issues. A study published in 2020 by the International Federation of Journalists takes note of China’s extensive efforts to increase its global influence through global journalism unions and individual journalism training. The survey displays China’s media outreach in 31 developed and 27 developing countries all over the world, ranging content-wise from journalist exchanges and training schemes to union corporations as well as MoUs on media content sharing agreements. In a case study on Myanmar, each of the nine interviewed journalists has been to China at least twice. China, a major supporter of the Myanmar economy and military as well as counsellor on diplomatic issues, has expanded its media activities during Myanmars decade long transition. However, concrete topics of China that they think require “positive publicity” are the conflict in the South China Sea as well as the expanding Belt and Road Initiative. Additionally, China directly funds various media organizations ranging from magazine outlets and radio stations and activism on social media platforms such as Facebook. The Anglo-­ American region as well as north-west Europe have been involved in the international media development assistance in Myanmar during the country’s transition period. The Coup represents a turning point and leads to

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a reorganization and reorientation of the commitment. How Myanmar, its media system and its journalistic culture sit in a Global South context and positioning is at the present time while the country is in turmoil neither possible to comment nor to predict.

Conclusion: Outlook “The situation for press freedom is only going to get worse as they cut off the internet,” says political analyst Sithu Aung Myint, before adding: “The country no longer has democracy or an ounce of freedom.” (Quote taken from: Myanmar Now, 2021). Since the military coup on February 1st 2021, 74 journalists, 12 of them women, have been arrested (as of April 22nd 2021). The data collection from reporting asean states that 19 of the journalists were charged with violating Section 505(a) from the Penal Code, a post-coup amendment to the Penal Code by the State Administrative Council, which criminalizes comments that “cause fear”, spread “false news, (or) agitates directly or indirectly a criminal offence against a Government employee” (Reporting ASEAN, 2021). A conviction carries a punishment of up to three years in prison. Within this two and a half months after the Coup the military’s State Administration Council suspended all five privately owned free-to-­air stations and the licenses of all private FM radio stations - some allowed to broadcast only if they stick to music and entertainment programmes, according to Frontier Myanmar reporter.14 The military also seized the state broadcaster MRTV and according to Frontier Myanmar they moved against the satellite-based pay TV operator and market leader SkyNet whose broadcasting studios have been occupied by the navy, whereas police and soldiers raided newsrooms from other media outlets in Yangon. “Myanmar ebecomes a nation without newspapers” was a headline published by Myanmar Now on March 18, reporting that all five privately owned daily newspapers stopped publishing15 either because they were banned or because of other reasons. “The crackdown on the media harms not only press freedom and the public’s right to know. It undercuts the livelihoods 14  The Tatmadaw can’t turn back the clock on Myanmar’s news industry, April 11, 2021 by Khine, Frontier Myanmar. 15  Myanmar becomes a nation without newspapers—The closure of Myanmar’s last independent newspaper marks a new milestone in the country’s political descent: Myanmar Now, Published on Mar 18, 2021.

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of journalists and the larger news profession, which were already reeling under the economic crisis brought by COVID-19.” (Paing & Son, 2021). It has a bitter-sweet taste that the coup-leader Min Aung Hlaing speaks of the media as the fourth pillar and continued that the media plays a crucial role in the enhancement of freedom of expression for democracy, improving transparency of government by distributing knowledge to people (Global New Light of Myanmar, 2021). While at the same time more and more outspoken journalists who are critical of the military and the coup are on the military’s warrant lists, publicly announced via MRTV. Some fled the big cities and went into hiding in the countryside or sleep every night in another place to avoid being caught by security forces or the police. However, the nightly internet shutdowns, the cut off of mobile data services and the military’s attempts to block access to their media sites do not stop them (yet) to push out news, also via and Facebook, to document the military’s actions against its own population.

Discussion One could say that the modern media system in Myanmar is still in the making. Significant changes in media laws and media infrastructure are still to be expected. Regional and local media in the periphery have to be strengthened. Journalism and media education has to be intensified. The degree of journalistic professionalization has to be heightened. (New) media literacy has to be strengthened and more media self-regulation, accountability and transparency as well as more journalistic self-­ organization are advised. But, as true as all this is, it seems to be obsolete, in the wake of the Coup on February 1st, 2021 with the military taking over and an uncertain future that the whole country is facing in the post-­ coup era. As Khine states ‘even before the coup, Myanmar had seen a dramatic media decline in terms of circulation, capacity, and quality of media content‘(Khine, 2021: 12). With journalists in hiding, imprisoned or driven out of the country there arises the question in how far this affects journalistic practice, with media organizations operating under difficult conditions in the country or being in exile now facing new challenges to uphold and restructure their engagement and their work. In how far is it possible for the private media to operate and present quality news content, and at the same time relying heavily on the internet, facing regular shut downs and harassment by the military? What effects does the militaries

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state propaganda have in the country? Those are questions to be discussed in the near future. However, what lessons can be learned about journalism from the fate of Myanmar? The country’s young journalism culture and media system in the making became a textbook example for the fact of how fragile and volatile the development of media can be in a very short period of time, in just a decade of political opening between approximately half a century of a military rule and a new military putsch in early 2021. Myanmar’s journalists, again, find themselves in a precarious situation of high conflict. Democracy and its important pillar of free media seem somehow ‘unattractive’, given the throwback towards authoritarianism, or even to barbarous tyranny, and its corresponding mind-set—not only in Myanmar, but currently also in several other countries worldwide. The military in Myanmar tries to control the media, raiding newsrooms, shuts down the Internet regularly and uses itself digital and social media to communicate and to propagate. The military also intimidates large parts of the population in Myanmar, among them many arrested and imprisoned journalists, protesting and resisting peacefully under the label of the so-called Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM). Four aspects seem important for journalists and especially media agencies in times of crisis: 1. Preparation is key. Always be prepared to move your offices, equipment and your data quickly to safe places. Peaceful times are no resting time. 2. Technology. Work with minimal equipment like mobile reporting sets, use satellite broadcasting and internet from neighbouring countries to be able to get your message out. 3. Banking system. Build up an infrastructure in neighbouring countries to be able to pay your bills, employees and receive money, f. ex. from donor organizations, when the banking system in the country fails. 4. Skills: Enhance your network to exchange expertise and building up mobile journalistic training stations in areas not affected by the conflict. Moreover, since the Russian invasion of Ukraine many Myanmar democracy activists have voiced concern that the conflict in Ukraine has diverted media attention away from the ongoing fight in their country. Indeed, for a sustainable political change in Myanmar local and international journalism is essential, even more so that there is at least a chance that the Myanmar military fails defeat civilian resistance. Although other voices from Myanmar state that the military seems to be quite successful in creating an atmosphere of protest and resistant ‘fatigue’. Yet, not only has media attention shifted away from Myanmar in this crucial historical moment, but also the caravan of most of the actors of international media

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development assistance, NGOs as well as state agencies, has left Myanmar mainly for security reasons, mostly without a continued support for the precarious situation of Myanmar journalists in the country and in neighbouring countries. Since the support of media-related local NGOs or media institutions is extremely difficult under the current military regime, there are new ways of a reduced but continuing support, mostly on an individual basis in neighbouring countries. Yet, there has to be stronger support to find long term solutions for journalists who struggle with visa issues or illegality in the respective countries. The situation in Myanmar also shows how much support and solidarity the country’s journalism and media landscape do need—also from abroad. Many of them as well as Myanmar exile media and (international) media development assistance are operating in neighbouring countries, for example in Thailand’s borderland area. Chiang Mai, a city in Northern Thailand, has been already nicknamed ‘the new Yangon’, referring to Myanmar’s biggest city.

References Amnesty International. (2019, June 15). Myanmar: End Internet shutdown in Rakhine, Chin States [Press release]. https://www.amnesty.de/sites/default/ files/2020-­0 7/Amnesty-­B ericht-­M yanmar-­I nternet-­S hutdown-­R akhine-­ April-­2019.PDF. Accessed 29.04.2021. Aung, S. Y. (2013, October 31). After reforms ethnic media emerge in Burma, but challenges remain. The Irrawaddy. https://www.irrawaddy.com/news/ burma/reforms-­e thnic-­m edia-­e merge-­b urma-­c hallenges-­r emain.html. Accessed 29.04.2021. Bärthlein, T. (2020, May 3). Pressefreiheit in Myanmar: Unter Druck in der CoronaKrise. Deutsche Welle. https://www.dw.com/de/pressefreiheit-­in-­myanmar-­ unter-­druck-­in-­der-­corona-­krise/a-­53295370. Accessed 29.04.2021. Brooten, L. (2011). Media, militarization, and human rights: Comparing media reform in the Philippines and Burma. Communication, Culture & Critique, 4(3), 229–249. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1753-­9137.2011.01107.x. Accessed: 29.04.2021. Brooten, L., McElhone, J. M., & Venkiteswaran, G. (2019). Myanmar media in transition: Legacies, challenges and change. ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute. Farrelly, N. (2012). Ceasing ceasefire? Kachin Politics beyond the stalemates. In N.  Cheesman, M.  Skidmore, & T.  Wilson (Eds.), Myanmar’s transition: Openings, obstacles, and opportunities (pp. 52–71). ISEAS. Fox, M. (2013, June 20). Myanmar: Medienfreiheit mit Hindernissen. Heinrich-­ Böll-­Stiftung. https://www.boell.de/de/2013/06/20/myanmar-­medienfreiheit-­ mit-­hindernissen. Accessed 29.04.2021.

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Fox, M. (2020, November 4). Konfilktportrait Myanmar. bpb.de. https://www. bpb.de/internationales/weltweit/innerstaatliche-­konflikte/54586/birma-­ myanmar. Accessed 29.04.2021. Fuller, P. (2015, April 5). Ethnocentric Buddhism: A new theme in Burmese Buddhism. DVB  – Multimedia Group. https://www.dvb.no/news/ ethnocentric-­b uddhism-­a -­n ew-­t heme-­i n-­b urmese-­b uddhism-­b urma-­ myanmar/39275. Accessed 29.04.2021. Global New Light of Myanmar. (2021). Media plays a crucial role in the enhancement of freedom of expression for democracy, improving transparency of government by distributing knowledge to people: Senior General. https://www.gnlm. com.mm/media-­p lays-­a -­c rucial-­r ole-­i n-­t he-­e nhancement-­o f-­f reedom-­o f-­ expression-­f or-­d emocracy-­i mproving-­t ransparency-­o f-­g overnment-­b y-­ distributing-­knowledge-­to-­people-­senior-­general/#article-­title. Accessed 04.05.2021. Horsey, R. (2021, January 24). Myanmar at the International Court of Justice. Crisis Group. https://www.crisisgroup.org/asia/south-­east-­asia/myanmar/ myanmar-­international-­court-­justice. Accessed 29.04.2021. Htwe, K. (2017, June 10). Ethnic media in Burma. Irrawaddy Magazine. https:// www.irrawaddy.com/opinion/guest-­column/ethnic-­media-­in-­burma.html Hudson-Rodd, N. (2008). “Not a rice-eating robot”: Freedom of speech in Myanmar. In S. Krishna & L. Terence (Eds.), Political regimes and the media in Asia, London and New York (pp. 85–105). Routledge. International Federation of Journalists (IFJ). (2020, June). Telling China’s story: Reshaping the World’s Media. https://www.ifj.org/fileadmin/user_upload/ IFJ_Report_2020_-­_The_China_Story.pdf. Accessed 29.04.2021. Khine, N. K. (2021). The Repression and Erosion of Independent Media in Myanmar Since the Military Coup, https://www.rosalux.de/fileadmin/rls_ uploads/pdfs/sonst_publikationen/14-21_Onl-Publ_Repression_and_ Erosion.pdf. Accessed: 10.07.2022. May, S. (2012, May 7). Govt pledges more press freedom. The Myanmar Times. https://www.mmtimes.com/national-­news/712-­govt-­pledges-­more-­press-­ freedom.html. Accessed 29.04.2021. Mozur, P. (2018, October 15). A genocide incited on Facebook, with posts from Myanmar’s military. The New  York Times. https://www.nytimes. com/2018/10/15/technology/myanmar-­facebook-­genocide.html. Accessed 20.10.2018. Myanmar Marketing Research & Development. (2013). Myanmar Advertisement Directory 2013, p. ii. Myanmar Now. (2021, March 18). Myanmar becomes a nation without newspapers - The closure of Myanmar’s last independent newspaper marks a new milestone in the country’s political descent. https://www.myanmarnow.org/en/ news/myanmar-becomes-a-nation-without-newspapers. Accessed 20.03.2021. Orwell, G. (1934). Burmese days. Harper & Brothers.

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Paing, K.  T., & Son, J. (2021, March 31). No-Safety Zone: 5 Realities About Journalism in Post-coup Myanmar. Reporting ASEAN – Voices and Views from within Southeast Asia. https://www.reportingasean.net/no-­safety-­zone-­5-­ realities-­about-­journalism-­in-­post-­coup-­myanmar/. Accessed 29.04.2021. Pe Myint, T. (2012). The emergence of Myanmar weekly journals and their development in recent years. In N. Cheesman, M. Skidmore, & T. Wilson (Eds.), Myanmar’s transition: Openings, obstacles and opportunities (pp.  204–213). Singapore. Radue, M. (2022) (accepted for publication). Comparing impacts on media freedom in Southeast Asia – Connotative context factors in Malaysia, Myanmar, and Thailand. Global Media and Communication. Reporters Without Borders. (2010, October). World Press Freedom Index. https://reliefweb.int/report/world/press-freedom-index-2010. Accessed 08.11.2020. Reporters Without Borders. (2012, December). Burmese media spring. https:// www.refworld.org/docid/51dc0bc84.html. Accessed 29.04.2021. Reporters Without Borders. (2020). World Press Freedom Index. https://rsf. org/en/myanmar. Accessed 04.11.2020. Reporting ASEAN. In numbers: Arrests of journalists and media staff in Myanmar. Reporting ASEAN – Voices and Views from within Southeast Asia. https:// www.reportingasean.net/in-­numbers-­arrests-­of-­myanmar-­journalists/?fbclid= IwAR2uU5znt41DlVac_iBd0y1vhxUeO4HjFGqCmv8UX1JyeZLAttCL%2 D%2D7sSB4. Accessed 29.04.2021. Robertson, P. (2020, February 5). Myanmar again cuts Rakhine State’s Internet. Human Rights Watch. https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/02/05/myanmar-­ again-­cuts-­rakhine-­states-­internet. Accessed 29.04.2021. Tha, K. P. (2013, November 19). Orwell’s ‘Burmese Days’ Wins Govt Literary Award. The Irrawaddy. https://www.irrawaddy.com/news/burma/orwells-­ burmese-­days-­wins-­govt-­literary-­award.html UNESCO. (2016). Mapping media development in Myanmar. https://unesdoc. unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000244760. Accessed 29.04.2021. UNESCO. (2018). Mapping media development in Myanmar. https://unesdoc. unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000373111. Accessed 29.04.2021. UNESCO Institute for Statistics. (2020, September). Literacy rate, adult total (% of people ages 15 and above) [Dataset]. The World Bank. http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SE.ADT.LITR.ZS. Accessed 29.04.2021.

CHAPTER 4

Recovered Media in Argentina: A Resilient Response to Instability and Precariousness Carolina Escudero

Introduction The economic situation for journalism in Argentina, as in other countries, demonstrates how an unstable political and economic context can lead to the worker’s precariousness. However, there is a phenomenon that has grown over recent years called “recovered media”, also known as “workers’ co-ops”. Between 2016 and 2017, at least six media outlets were recovered by their workers after they were closed or abandoned by their owners. These include La Nueva Mañana in Cordoba; El Ciudadano of Rosario; La Portada, of Esquel; plus, the newspaper Tiempo Argentino, the magazine Cítrica and online news site Infonews, amongst others. In 2018, the National Meeting of Recovered Newspapers was created and Argentina’s National Network of Recovered Newspapers (RNDR) founded, which today is comprised of eleven members (Media Ownership Argentina, 2019). With these experiences in such a challenging context

C. Escudero (*) University of Missouri, Columbia, MO, USA e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_4

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for journalism, it can be understood that the Western practices exported to the South do not adapt to countries with fluctuating economies like Argentina where inflation of 50.9% was recorded (INDEC, 2021). In this particular economic context, new collective actions emerge allowing journalists to survive and still work in changing contexts. This explorative study intends to analyze the phenomenon of recovered media in Argentina and aims to examine whether this movement responds to a journalistic work and social commitment, observable in the Global South, through which their workers assume new roles in addition to exercising their profession (Dávolos & Perelman, 2003). According to the Social Observatory on Recuperated and Self-Managed Companies (Osera, 2015), workers’ co-ops have offered job protection to older, salaried workers, who found it practically impossible to reinsert themselves in the labor market. At the end of 2001, Argentina’s political and economic crisis was headline news around the world. At this time, and in response to the economic crisis, workers seized control of many abandoned factories. The rise of these “recovered businesses” were profiled in the documentary The Take (Klein & Lewis, 2011). Today the co-ops sector continues to grow, representing a new way to empower workers and foster citizen commitment and creativity. Hence, I believe that this country, like others in the region, opens a new paradigm for the labor market of journalists by incorporating new practices that respond to an unstable local economic situation to which even the legal system itself has adapted. More precisely, the Argentine Bankruptcy Law (1995, 2011) enabled workers to take over bankrupt companies with the Argentine Bankruptcy Law (1995, 2011). Over the last few decades, the world of media has been financially transformed, with a negative and direct impact on journalists’ incomes. In Argentina, the most local journalists work in precarious conditions and find themselves forced to deal with high levels of instability (Fopea, 2021). Editorial departments have been reduced, offices transformed and journalists’ tasks increased as it is no longer a question of writing or investigating a given subject but rather of taking on new responsibilities such as editing the news into an online format, uploading versions onto social media, editing photographs, videos and audio content, amongst others. As a result of news media models, in many cases, journalists work under continuous and fluctuating pressure which creates a climate of unease, uncertainty and often frustration. Faced with this panorama, for many distressing and inescapable, for others it has been an opening through

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which to find a new way of doing journalism in times of crisis. This re-­ connotation of the crisis is carried out by the workers of recovered media, which is a growing movement in Argentina based on the experiences of the workers of recovered factories and companies. To better understand the context in which journalists undertake these actions, it is necessary to contextualize the country’s economic situation. According to the National Institute of Statistics and Census, in 2019 inflation in Argentina was at 53.8%, the highest since 1991 when the country introduced parity with the dollar, and one of the highest rates of inflation in the world. This was reached after the cost of living had risen to 3.7% in December (INDEC, 2020 in Escudero, 2020: 1237). In addition, in various studies carried out by the Buenos Aires Press Union (SiPreBA, its Spanish acronym), between 2018 and 2019 over 3100 journalists lost their jobs in the City of Buenos Aires and over 4500 in the entire country. The most recent survey from 2020, shows that ‘most women are amongst those paid the lowest wages […] 49.3% of all women and breakaway groups were paid under the poverty line of $41,994, while the percentage of men was 37.5%. This implies a feminization of precarity’ (Sipreba. org, 2020). Various studies have been carried out based on the experiences of media startups as new forms of entrepreneurial journalism (for US cases see Coates Nee, 2014; Cagé, 2016. For Europe see Bruno & Nielsen, 2012; Borelli, 2019 in Escudero, 2020: 1237). There are currently nine newspapers which are cooperatives that are self-managed by their employees, and publications such as La Vaca.org and La Masa are also part of the cooperative movement. In turn, ‘[a]ll these media come together every year at the National Meeting of Recovered Media, where experiences are exchanged, the unity of this new sector is promoted and joint challenges are shared’ (Escudero, 2020: 1237). This chapter will provide an explanation of findings related to strategies of collective action which favor self-management and their implications in the work environment which have led to a change in the statutes of the media workers trade union in Argentina. First, the historical background and the actions to recover workspaces and rights will be presented. Next, the organizational evolution of the movement in Argentina will be described, examining the collective actions and their progress. The chapter will conclude with the different experiences of recovered media and their various impacts such as changes in the statutes of journalists, the creation of different workspaces, new and free voices and challenges.

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Background The phenomenon of the occupation of factories and companies, as well as workers’ self-management, denote a long global tradition in the international workers’ movement. This tendency, along with joint actions, can be seen throughout history, such as the case of workers taking control in 1871 in Paris, France, at the abandoning of factories during the great economic crisis. The Paris Commune issued a decree, in which it was stated that ‘a great number of factories have been abandoned by their directors, who have fled their responsibilities as citizens with no concern for their workers’ (Mandel, 1973  in Magnani, 2009: 39). In that decree, the Commune asked workers’ organizations to create an investigatory commission whose task was: 1. To establish count of the abandoned factories, as well as an exact inventory of the state of the factories and any equipment that may be in them; 2. To draw up a report on the conditions so that the factories can return to production immediately, not under the deserters who abandoned them but under cooperative association of the workers of these factories. 3. To create a plan for the formation of these cooperative workers associations. (Mandel, 1973 in Magnani, 2009: 40).

What happened in Paris was preceded by the Russian revolution (March and July 1917) and the launch of the factory committees. Another similar experience was seen in the occupation of factories in Turin and Bavaria in 1920, followed by the unexpected general occupation of companies in France in 1936 and later in 1968, as well as the experiences in workers’ self-management in Catalonia between 1936–37. In Japan these worker occupation movements also took place between 1946–47, under the American military occupation (Altamira, 2004). As for South America, it was in the tin mines in Bolivia in 1952 where the workers put forward the need for expropriation (Lavaud, 1998); and in Argentina, the Lisandro de la Torre meat processing plant was occupied in 1959 (Llanpart Gobbi & Molinari, 2005). In Argentina, the impact of recovered factories, a movement which began again at the end of the 1990s, goes far beyond their actual dimensions. Their real power lies in in their capacity of creating recovered spaces for media productions also encompassed with social commitment, making possible changes in statutes and provoking a reflection on the part of

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institutions as to new means of communication from self-managed workspaces. According to Briner and Cusmano, 2003 ‘was a record year for presentations of bankruptcy and court proceedings, compared with previous years during the economic recession, with 10,109 presentations and a total of 3,359 declared bankruptcies’ (2003: 26). Faced with this unstable situation, workers from different sectors organized themselves, transforming their actions to face the economic crisis into new labor practices. As stated by Rapoport (2005), to understand the dynamic of these movements, it is necessary to take into account their economic and social environment: between 1998 and 2002, there was a 19% fall in GDP, and of 60% in investments. At the same time, 10% of the population was below the line of poverty in 2001 and 24% in 2002. More specifically, recovered companies are a product of the socioeconomic and political crisis that hit Argentina at the end of 2001. This crisis gave a group of workers the social incentives to recover their closed/bankrupt companies and self-manage them, as a strategy for tackling the threat of social disaffiliation (Castel, 2000). In that sense, Magnani observes the proliferation of self-­ management experiences indicates a silent change ‘[w]ith almost no recourse, these workers shattered the logic of the system on which their economy was built’ (Magnani, 2009: 14). And it is in this joint action that journalists seek to recover a workspace. The particularity of this movement of journalists is the move to joint and risky action in the process of “recovering” a news media. That is why the interviews with journalists from these recovered spaces are of interest and make part of the data collection for this study, as presented below.

Methods and Materials This study contains examples of some recovered media actions in Argentina which occurred in the last two decades. Examples of the media transitions and processes of recovery, occupation of the places were collected through unstructured interviews conducted in 2020 and 2021, among five journalists-­introduced as J-1, J-2, J-3. J-4. J-5—as well as from media publications. It is in the story narrated in the first person by the journalists that the joint action, organized and agreed by the whole group in which new roles are distributed—taking care of the space occupied, seeking social support—necessary to advance towards self-management, is resignified.

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The method of the unstructured interview was chosen because of its compatibility with the research topic. The use of open-ended questions allows the interviews to resemble a natural conversation, while the interviewer retains his guiding function (McLeod, 2014). In this way qualitative information is generated. Respondents can, therefore, speak more deeply and descriptively, which allows the interviewer to better understand their views on the topic. The interviewer may ask for clarification by going into the depth of the topic, which gives increased validity to the results. This explorative study also adopts the content analysis method, established as a tool for the study of mass communication in the mid-twentieth century by Lasswell (1948) and Berelson (1952). According to them, the main features of the analysis are its objective and systematic approach, conditioned by the quantitative description of the content of the recovered media introducing themselves and promoting their actions. It is for this reason that we used for this study material published in the recovered media where they publish about their professional and self-management experience, they specify the commitment assumed and, in some cases, they share the objectives they want to achieve. To learn about these recovery processes and challenges it is proposed to delve into how these media have evolved.

Recovered Media and the Organizational Evolution In Argentina, while large media groups and their owners have been getting ever stronger, their employees find themselves on the losing end, in part due to the lack of state action and the current economic crisis. In many cases, salaries have been dropping by 30% or more, and in many cases delayed, as happened with the workers of the newspaper Tiempo Argentino who spent 59  days without receiving their salaries (Anred, 2016). More than 20 media outlets have been closed down across the country since 2016, and at least 3500 media employees have lost their jobs (more than 2700 in the city of Buenos Aires alone) over a period of only two years (MOM, 2019). In addition, around eight of those 20 media outlets have been recovered by their staff and continue to operate as workers’ cooperatives like in the case of Cítrica; ‘[i]n Argentina the media sector is leading the ranking of successfully recovered businesses across all industries’ (MOM, 2019). This success of independent, non-profit media could be explained by the fact that it is not something new in Argentina, but that it has a try and

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error experience of several decades. Although very diverse in background and form, what unites these print and online outlets, TV and radio stations is to consider journalists rights as a right to be respected. In early 2019, Argentina had over 400 alternative printed and online media outlets, and the number is growing, within a variety of scenarios. Between 2016 and 2018, eight of these self-owned and self-managed companies were founded. In the knowledge of this context, we should aim to define these companies as not just cooperatives, but companies having gone through a process of occupation and recovery. Briner and Cusmano (2003) define recovered companies as ‘all those companies which, having stopped production and undertaken a cessation of payments to their creditors […] were reopened on the initiative of the workers in order to sustain the source of work, restarting production activities with the direct intervention of the workers in the administration’ (2003: 31). Both authors point out that joint actions are part of a necessary process for the recovery of the workspace. From these actions, group and consensual, the recovery of the space is achieved or not, which leads us to develop the meaning of the collective actions.

Collective Actions The analysis of self-managed media is based on considering them a social movement with specific collective actions in response to a precarious work context that is under strain (MOM, 2019). For this reason, in such a context, joining forces with other workers to find new ways to work corresponds with that put forward by Klandermas: ‘Participation in a social movement is considered […] the result of processes of rational decision-­ making in which people calculate the costs and benefits of their participation’ (1984: 583). This need to analyze the costs and benefits relates to a rationalization as explained by Cohen ‘the ‘rational actor’ (individual and group), employing strategic and instrumental reasoning, replaces the crowd as the central referent for the analysis of collective action’ (Cohen, 1985: 674). Given that the transition to self-management is infinitely linked to collective actions, as stipulated by Tilly (1978), mobilization is defined as the process by which a group obtains collective control over the various types of resources needed for its action, rather than the mere growth of these resources. This process outlines what is known as the Theory of the Mobilization of Resources (Jenkins, 1994). This confirms

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that the recovery of a media outlet in Argentina is not done with two workers or under the leadership of a single person, the recovery action is a collective action where all voices are validated and necessary since it is a process that can be long, challenging and exhausting. The strength and diversity of the group keeps them united to transcend difficulties and benefit from the various resources that each worker will contribute in the process of taking over, occupying and creating the new space. In the recovered newspaper, Tiempo Argentino, it can be observed how the mobilization of various resources was put into practice. In this particular case, when three journalists were injured during the occupation process and the rest of the media reacted by publishing the facts and showing support to the journalists (see El Mundo, Spanish newspaper, 7 July 2016). This is a clear example of how journalists obtained collective control of resources by occupying physical spaces, producing news and informing their audiences and colleagues about the changes in the editorial team and the new management. To do so, they did not have to increase resources but rather manage each action in a coordinated way, both inside the self-­ managed media and with the audience witnessing these changes (Tilly, 2002), giving rise in one way or another to cycles of protests which, in some instances, would take the form of the occupation, seizing or the repossession of workspaces (Tarrow, 1997). These actions—occupy, resist and produce—place them in a unique space as journalists since they are not presented as possibilities of action in journalism manuals designed for Western cultures. In the case of journalists who decide to recover a medium, they transcend the formalism of journalistic work as news production and coverage of events, they take a risky action that leads them to physically occupy a news production space. This space, on many occasions earned, gives it a unique sense of belonging and is very difficult to extrapolate to other nations where the idea of occupying a media outlet is considered illegal. As for Touraine (1985), he would take a critical viewpoint of the notion of resource mobilization, stating that: this notion is used to eliminate enquiries about the meaning of collective action as if resource mobilization could be defined independently from the nature of the goals and the social relations of the actor, as if all actors were finally led by a logic of economic rationality. (p. 769)

Nonetheless, from the collective action of recovered companies it can be seen that there are goals which could not be achieved without social

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relations (Magnani, 2009). For this reason, this study is based on the following concepts of collective actions presented by Rebón et al. (2015): (a) it is in response to a sudden closure/asset stripping that the workers’ decisions are focused, initially, in the distribution of roles and participation within the organization; (b) a new economic logic for distribution of income is created; (c) the work organization adapts to a new reality. As for the distribution of roles (considered by authors as the distribution of power), workers’ self-management is characterized by new methods of production control, a new use of the workspace and a new distribution of knowledge. The results of the collective actions can be seen in how each recovered media begins the process of creating new practices and identities, as developed below.

New Practices, New Identities While the workers of recovered media have made progress in the occupation and repossession of workspaces, they have also created, alongside collective actions new spaces for communication. With a new identity, they inform people of their freedom of action, such as in the case of Tiempo Argentino with their phrase “Dueños de nuestras palabras” (Masters of our words) or as that stated in the web of the magazine Cítrica: Cítrica is staying alive without negotiating our independence and with the support of organizations, municipalities and associations that trust our work, and that of our subscribers who doubt the truth and rigor of news produced by the mass media and rather choose projects of self-management. (revistacitrica.com/info-­quienes-­somos.html)

Another case of trade union struggle and collective action is embodied by the newspaper El Ciudadano de Rosario (the Province of Santa Fe), as explained by one of its editors-in-chief, J-1: We come from a long struggle that lasted 22 years. There were many closures but we always managed to carry on. We were pioneers in the press workers’ struggle, in the sense of having an awareness as workers. In 2000, we occupied the secretary’s office, we blocked streets, went to see politicians, hung out banners in football fields. In 2016, when (the business owner) left the newspaper and paid us compensation, we decided to continue as a cooperative. (Interview, 2020)

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Here again we observe the concrete actions in a local context, difficult to extrapolate to Western culture. One of the reasons is because in the Western culture, the reaction of a journalist to his possible job loss is to look for another employment in another media. In Argentina, this way of acting, depending on the environment and its geographical occupation in the country, would not be realistic. It will be easier to be able to continue working as a journalist if you join the rest of your colleagues who are going through the same precarious situation and assume a specific role— and actions—to receive the attention of society, obtain diverse and concrete social support. The success of a recovered media it is also based on the social support obtained during the occupation and resistance process. The newspaper La Nueva Mañana from the Province of Cordoba, also recovered by its workers, explains in the ‘Institutional’ section of its website: ‘We are here for our dignity and to go back to being the option for pluralist journalism that our province must never lose’ (Lmdiario). Meanwhile, the newspaper La Portada de Esquel, in the south of the country, presents itself as “La Portada. The workers’ newspaper” (diariolaportada.com.ar/quienes-­somos/). Although Dávolos and Perelman (2003) observe that the first cases of recovered companies facilitated those that came after them with experience, as is the case with the publication: El Diario de la Región. On December 22nd 2002, the workers of this newspaper, in the Province of Chaco, decided to recover their jobs by founding a cooperative which they called La Prensa Ltda. They stated: a new inclusive journalistic project, mindful of the community and without bosses. Following the first years of crisis and uncertainty, the cooperative began to show considerable signs of growth. It began with 22 founding members, and today consists of 36 workers (eldiariodelaregion.com.ar/ quienes-­somos).

The journalists of the newspaper La Portada de Esquel (Province of Chubut) sum up what they went through before becoming a cooperative: ‘Work is food for the soul is not just an expression’, going on to explain how the journalists from two newspapers (El Oeste and Páginas del Sur) joined forces, both newspapers members of the Trade Union of Press Journalists of West Chubut (affiliated to FATPREN—the Argentinean Federation of Press Workers), to defend ‘our dignity and our jobs, the rallying cry in 2016’ and to set up the United Press Workers’ Cooperative

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Ltd. that prints La Portada. At the same time, the workers, conscious of the challenges facing them, amongst them technological challenges, informed: ‘We believe Esquel deserves and needs a newspaper that reflects its daily life, adapted to new technologies through a presence in social media’ and they make a commitment: We will never lose our spirit as press workers and we will do our jobs according to the professional ethics which have always characterized us, honoring the support of the community that has accompanied us in this fight for the defense of our DIGNITY (diariolaportada.com.ar/quienes-­somos).

Although the collective actions carried out by journalists represent periods of uncertainty and stress, once the objective of recovering the media has been achieved, messages expressing thanks and acknowledgments of the social support obtained arise—as we see with the newspaper La Portada— and also the commitments are reconfirmed and resignified in pursuit of the dignity of workers, in this case journalists.

Adaptation for Transformation What can be seen in self-managed media is their capacity for the transformation and adaptation of formats. In one way or another, they have succeeded in managing the workspaces, knowledge and time for their teams to adapt to digital formats and acquire new technology skills. Cagé states that ‘over the past few years, not only the size of the editorial teams of each communication media have tended to become smaller, but also a growing percentage of the staff is currently dedicated to feeding their websites […]’ (Cagé, 2016: 36). In addition, according to The International Federation of Journalists the arrival and the concentration of new technologies facilitates the polyvalence of the press worker, as the platforms for which content must be generated are diversified. It can be argued that these workers carry out multiple tasks for very low wages and upholds that put forward by Van Cuilenburg and McQuail when specifying that convergence is not, per se, the deciding factor of a change in paradigm but, if anything, the opportunity for media and governments to benefit from economic opportunities made available by communicational new technologies (Van Cuilenburg & McQuail, 2003).

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As for self-managed communication media, they foster a new operational and production modality in which the roles of boss and employee are blurred, and from this new space, propose a new form of journalism. J-2, a journalist from Tiempo Argentino, recalls: We were not even sacked, we had no redundancy pay or anything. Ours was an act of union resistance, to defend our jobs and our workers’ rights, after which the building of the cooperative was a way to create our jobs; to keep our profession, which is to be journalists and be masters of our words, literally speaking. This is quite rare and exciting within the world of journalism. (Interview, 2020)

For the journalists of El Ciudadano, their experience also led them to rethink how they would exercise their profession from this new cooperative space. As J-3 explained: We asked ourselves what we were going to talk about, from which perspective, what our themes were, the newspaper’s stance on each subject, and we changed, we got trained and we increased our visits… above all, we established the foundations of what we believe as workers. (Interview, 2020).

This new method, these new roles for journalists and novel forms of journalism were included in the new statutes of the Sipreba trade union, giving a place to different voices, workspaces and publications. As explained by J-4, journalist and secretary for self-managed media at Media Workers Trade Union, SIPREBA (its acronym in Spanish): We believe that the workers of communitarian, alternative and grass-roots communication media are essential because they build a plurality of voices and opinions that strengthen the debate in the territories, and are strategic to giving visibility to the social issues of community sectors and their organizations, generally invisible within the hegemonic media agenda. (Interview, 2020).

As can be seen, an union as SIPREBA has recognized the importance of having recovered media workers, pointing out the importance of maintaining the plurality of voices. This is another space created and gained by the recovered media journalists.

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Self-Management and Media Workers Trade Unions It should be specified that the repossession and self-management of a media represents, both within the media and for a broad cross-section of society, the repossession of a critical voice, in some cases a dissident voice. Various recovered media not only embodied an attitude of defiance at the time of repossession, but also led their journalists to take new initiatives providing them with the necessary innovation to reach the greatest number of people and diversify their formats. The term self-management refers to workers with the authority and power of decision over production and operations within such spaces. Focusing on the experience of recovered media in Argentina, it must be stressed that this sector continues to build spaces and identities which take shape in response to the crises and precarity. For Klein, ‘in Argentina and around the world, original, creative, effective direct action is way ahead of intellectual leftist theory’ (in Magnani, 2009: 31). In November 2017, during an assembly of the Buenos Aires SIPREBA, the reform of the statutes was passed unanimously, in which all forms of journalistic work were recognized. More specifically, those carried out in self-managed, alternative, cooperative and community media. This updating of the statutes corresponded to a working reality which transcended that which was statutory. SIPREBA was founded in 2015, in response to and driven by the closure of media and mass redundancies across the country. Additionally, the need arose for a trade union as respect for the rights of media workers and the democratization of communication was in regression. As argued by Becerra and Mastrini, the concentration of communication and information increased during the first 15  years of the twenty-first century in Latin America. However, in many countries in the region, laws were drawn up aiming to limit this tendency, to bring up-to-­ date the role of an active state and, at the same time, to democratize the radioelectric spectrum. That explained by both authors makes it possible to understand and visualize the challenges faced by the new union, SIPREBA, as recalled by Gaudensi J-5, currently Secretary General of Fatpren: We had wanted to incorporate self-managed media since the foundation of SIPREBA. While there is a debate about whether trade unions should only represent waged employees in any given company or all employees, in Sipreba the majority always agreed that these media should be incorporated.

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The only reason they did not figure in the initial statutes was that, for the trade union’s foundation, the Ministry of Labor demanded that we present common statutes, but we did so in the knowledge that once they were approved we would change them. (Interview, 2020).

In Argentina, the profession of journalist is regulated by a law passed in 1942. These regulations specify that a journalist is dependent on a media for their work as journalist, although they also allow for atypical cases within journalism, such as the freelance worker or reporter. Self-managed media and their teams of journalists did not fit this set-up. With the closure of Grupo 23, three of its media became self-managed: Tiempo Argentino, Infonews and El Argentino Zona Norte. A new format opened up within journalists’ workspaces—occupied spaces that had been appropriated—and to not include them meant expelling those who until now had been recognized as leaders in the union dispute. Incorporating the workers of self-managed media into Sipreba created certain tensions and differences; J-4, journalist and secretary for self-managed media at Sipreba explains: Certain tensions can be seen, based on the concrete differences of the problems affecting them. For example, waged workers often see the members of self-managed media as militants. At the same time, there is a resistance to feeling and seeing themselves as “workers” by the members of these media, often because there is no (or little) monetary retribution in exchange, and/ or they do other conventional work at the same time. (Interview, 2020).

Hence, Article 4 of the new statutes states that for the purposes of the affiliation, ‘an activity of journalistic work would be taken as that of natural persons regularly carrying out acts or providing services belonging to the profession,’ (Sipreba.org, 2019). In this way, this union brings together communication workers who previously did not have union support and representation, emphasizing the need to pluralize the various ways of carrying out a journalistic activity, which allows the founding of new alliances and objectives, as we will see below.

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Alliances for Growth and Pluralism In certain self-managed media, the means of income distribution is equitable, in which solidarity and equality between workers are central to its legitimization (Magnani, 2009). Nonetheless, an alternative system implies the differentiation of income between workers, but in many cases, wage differences are not significant but rather have a symbolic value with which to express the organization’s internal social differentiation. For example, at the El Ciudadano newspaper, during the pandemic and economic crisis, J2 stated: “we happened to get together to share the money out. There are sixty of us. At other moments we use a scale, but right now, no” (Interview, 2020).

United and Represented One of the first alliances of self-management and media was the Associative Federation of Newspapers and Cooperative Communicators of Argentina (Fadiccra), founded in February 2009. Fadiccra’s mission is to give visibility to and promote a new form of journalism and to manage a journalistic company made up of diverse stories and experiences. In addition, and in response to this movement, various spaces for dialogue have been created, including the National Meeting of Recovered Newspapers which is held every year, attended by media also part of Argentina’s National Network of Recovered Newspapers (RNDR), which today is comprised of 11 members (MOM, 2019). During the meeting held in 2018, journalists of the various recovered newspapers agreed that ‘to occupy editorial departments, to resist asset stripping and to work in freedom: this is the formula of recovered journalism (Zuberman and Borelli, 2018). For the second meeting, fifteen self-­ managed media took part, ranging between newspapers and magazines from Argentina’s different regions, although there were also representatives of self-managed media from other countries such as La Diaria from Uruguay and Taz from Germany. The representatives reasserted commitments and positions: ‘We are convinced that journalism free of conditioning is better for all and that self-management has a key role to play in guaranteeing it’ (Tiempo Argentino, 2019).These meetings have not only made it possible to make visible the number of active recovered media, but also to know the type of alliances that they have been able to establish to transcend difficulties jointly and resiliently as presented below.

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Resilient Action As outlined above, the capacity for action of these groups is not only conditioned by management and the amount of income but also by individual and group factors which denote community resilience, allowing them to transcend situations which elude their knowledge and fall outside their agendas and joint strategies. A clear example of this was that which took place on the night of July 4th 2016, when a group of people entered and destroyed much of the office, intimidating three representatives of the newspaper TA. The journalists decided ‘to do what we do best, write about and report on what happened’ and hence the next day 30,000 copies were printed of a publication explaining what had happened in the offices that were still occupied as a ‘pay protest’. They sold all the copies. From this stance of resistance, the journalists moved on towards the organization of the cooperative (Escudero, 2020, P. 1239). J-2 from TA recalls: I remember the night when the mob came into the newspaper, and there were three colleagues inside guarding it. When the rest of the team found out, we went to the paper. And this mob, sent by the owners, was still inside the offices, breaking everything. The police wouldn’t let us in. It was cold, raining. We couldn’t do anything, they kept us there. A comrade said: “if we don’t go back in now…we won’t ever go back in.” And we went in. We opened the gate and pulled down a drywall. And we recovered our workspace. I will never forget that day (Interview, 2020).

In this precise stage of resistance, we see resilience within the media, beginning with its meaning: from the Latin resilio, to jump back, jump again, bounce (Puig & Rubio, 2012: 36). A recurring action carried out by various workers who find themselves forced to transcend the physical and psychological barriers in order to recover a workspace, launch a new project and bring forth a new voice. In addition, in this action it can be seen what is considered ‘community resilience’ based on a heuristic model created as a result of social research, whose pillars are: solidarity practices; sense of belonging; cultural identity; social humor; state honesty. As explained by Twigg (2007), community resilience corresponds to the capacity of the community to detect and foresee setbacks, the capacity to absorb a serious setback and the capacity to recover after suffering damage (in Escudero, 2020: 1240).

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A New Paradigm While it is common knowledge that journalists should not mix their personal lives with their work and the production of news, should maintain clear objectivity and create an invisible barrier between themselves and their interviewees in order to not show emotions that could magnify and influence their work; everything seems to indicate that we are heading towards a change in paradigm that transcends the well-known recommendations and ethical norms of journalism exported from the Western culture. Despite this, several factors show that the learned knowledge of journalistic practices provided by the Western find its own limitations since how the unstable economic/political contexts affects the journalistic labor and, in many occasions, place them in situations of precariousness are not contemplated. Knowing the precarious situation in which journalists currently find themselves, to listen to their demands and be aware of the space they occupy as part of their wage claims illustrates on the one hand the workers’ vulnerability but also their resilience and action in pursuit of change/transformation. Understanding these paths of action can bring an audience closer to a media or a journalist, or drive it away, but above all it means the audience knows what happens in workspaces in which news and reports are produced that greatly influence society and nations’ political/ economic arena. The occupation, seizing and self-management of workspaces producing news and reports read by a small, medium or increasing percentage of society raises questions about the roles of the journalists writing from workspaces either still waging battle, or already appropriated. This new paradigm should be studied in greater depth from a multidisciplinary perspective, as it could have an impact on a new way of experiencing and producing news.

Conclusion In this chapter, various experiences of recovered media from Argentina have been presented, in which it can be seen that all share a common interest: to continue being journalists producing news while also recognizing the need for unity and compromise to succeed in taking a stance and defending their rights and demands. As stated by Bruno and Nielsen: They all pursue different forms of excellence, aiming to break news, curate content, host conversations, change formats, and invent new genres. In

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­ ursuit of their various goals, they all face a shared and more basic challenge: p finding a sustainable model for whatever kind of journalism they aspire to provide (2012: 2).

By studying recovered media in Argentina, it is observed how a fluctuating economic context leads its workers, in this case journalists, to launch collective actions—sometimes risky—that allow them to advance towards common good objectives. This allows us to argue that the great difference between the journalistic practices carried out in Western culture countries and countries like Argentina lies in how their workers face job insecurity. In the South American country, many of its journalists face it by forming a grassroots movement whose collective actions of occupation and resistance leads them to create a self-managed workspace. Also, the fact of belonging to a managed media gives them the possibility of being represented in unions and institutions that represent journalists and media interests. In other words, in Argentina, the institutions and even the laws were adapted to the needs raised by their workers, while in the Western culture it would seem to be rather the reverse: their workers continue to adapt to market norms and institutions. For all the above, future research should further investigate similar experiences (Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay) and explore how the changes in the roles of these journalists, working in recovered media, can affect the production of news and their relationship with the audience.

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Klandermans, B. (1991). New social movements and resource mobilization: The European and the American approach revisited. In D. Rucht (Ed.), Research on Social Movements. The State of the Art in Western Europe and the USA (pp. 122–144). Campus Verlag. Klein, N., & Lewis, A. (2011, December 20). The Take [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwwivk5LV1o Lasswell, H. D. (1948). Power and Personality. New York, NY. Lavaud, J. P. (1998). Segunda parte. Los agentes de la inestabilidad Capítulo uno: Los Mineros [Part Two. Agents of instability. Chapter one: The Miners]. El Embrollo Boliviano. Turbulencias sociales y desplazamientos políticos, 1952–1982 [The Bolivian Confusion. Social turmoil and political movements, 1952–1982]. Institut français d’études andines, HISBOL, Centro de estudios superiores CESU-UMSS de Bolivia [French Institute of Andine Studies, CESU-UMSS Centre for Higher Education of Bolivia]. https://doi.org/10.4000/ books.ifea.3429 Llanpart Gobbi, F., & Molinari, L.  I. (2005, November 23–25). La toma del Frigorífico Lisandro de la Torre (enero de 1959) [The occupation of the Lisandro Processing Plant (January 1959)] [Conference presentation]. IV Jornadas de Sociología de la UNLP [IV Sociology Days of the UNLP], La Plata, Argentina. http://www.memoria.fahce.unlp.edu.ar/trab_eventos/ev.6706/ev.6706.pdf Magnani, E. (2009). The silent change. Recovered businesses in Argentina. Editorial teseo. McLeod, S. (2014). The Interview Research Method. SimplyPsichology. Retrieved October 20, 2021 from: https://www.simplypsychology.org/. Media Ownership Monitor (MOM) ArgentinaTiempo Argentino & Reporteros Sin Fronteras. (2019). https://argentina.mom-­rsf.org/es/ OSERA, Social Observatory on Recuperated and Self-Managed Companies. (2015). Noticias de recuperadas [News of recovered companies]. http://www. empresasrecuperadas.org/noticias-­recuperadas.php. Puig, G., & Rubio, J. L. (2012). Manual de resiliencia aplicada. Prólogo de Stefan Vanistendael. Barcelona: Editorial. Gedisa S.A. 287  pp. ISBN: 978- 84- 9784- 659-2 Rapoport, M. (2005). Historia económica, política y social de la Argentina (1880–2003) [The economic, political and social history of Argentina (1880–2003)]. Editorial Emecé. Rebón, J., Kasparian, D., & Hernández, C. (2015). La economía moral del trabajo. La legitimidad social de las empresas recuperadas [The moral economy of work. The social legitimacy of recovered companies]. Trabajo y Sociedad [Work and Society], 25, 173–194. Sipreba [Buenos Aires Press Union]. (2019a). Estatuto del Periodista Profesional [Statute of Professional Journalists]. Estatutos y Convenios [Statutes and Conventions]. https://www.sipreba.org/estatutos-­y-­convenios/estatutodel-­periodista-­profesional-­ley-­12-­908/

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Sipreba [Buenos Aires Press Union]. (2019b). Relevamiento de situación laboral en los medios de CABA durante 2018–2019 [Survey of the work situation in the media of the CABA in 2018–2019]. https://www.sipreba.org/ sindicato/relevamiento-­de-­situacion-­laboral-­en-­los-­medios-­de-­caba-­durante-­ 2018-­2019-­sipreba/ Sipreba [Buenos Aires Press Union]. (2020). Encuesta sobre salarios, teletrabajo y condiciones laborales 2020: dos de cada tres trabajadores/as de prensa cobró un salario por debajo de la Canasta (CT) [Survey on wages, remote work and work conditions 2020: two out of three press workers were paid under the basic market basket]. https://www.sipreba.org/sindicato/encuesta-­sobresalarios-­teletrabajo-­y-­condiciones-­laborales-­2020/ Tarrow, S. (1997). El poder en movimiento. Movimientos sociales, acción colectiva y política [Power in movement. Social movements, collective and political action]. Alianza. Tiempo Argentino. (2019, September 15). Periodismo autogestionado: indispensable para fortalecer la democracia [Self-managed journalism: essential to strengthening democracy]. https://www.tiempoar.com.ar/nota/ periodismo-­autogestionado-­indispensable-­para-­fortalecer-­la-­democracia Tilly, C. (1978). From mobilization to revolution. Addison-Wesley. Tilly, C. (2002). Repertorios de acción contestataria en Gran Bretaña [Indexes of protest action in Great Britain]. In M. Traugott (Ed.), Protesta social. Repertorios y ciclos de acción colectiva [Social protest. Indexes and cycles of collective action] (pp. 15–69). Hacer Editorial. Touraine, A. (1985). An introduction to the study of social movements. Social Research, 52(4), 769. Twigg, J. (2007). “Characteristics of a resilient community faced with disaster”, Disaster Risk Reduction Interagency Coordination Group, Department for International Development, Government of the United Kingdom. Retrieved October 18th, 2021 from https://www.preventionweb.net/files/2310_ Characteristicsdisasterhighres.pdf Van Cuilenburg, J., & McQuail, D. (2003). Media policy paradigm shifts: Towards a new communications policy paradigm. European Journal of Communication, 18(2), 181–207. https://doi.org/10.1177/0267323103018002002 Zuberman, N., & Borelli, J. (2018, December 2). Ocupar redacciones, resistir vaciamientos y producir en libertad [To occupy editorial offices, resist asset stripping and produce in freedom]. Tiempo Argentino.

CHAPTER 5

Uncovering the Power of Whistleblowing as a New Form of Citizen Journalism in Non-democratic Countries Shepherd Mpofu, Bruce Mutsvairo, and Trust Matsilele

Introduction The growing influence of digital media has promoted the impact of whistle-­blowers. In this chapter, we argue that there is an emerging trend of citizen journalism that is aided by the growing influence of whistle-­ blowers. With the aid of digital media, they have broadened the role previously occupied only by professional journalists particularly in societies known for their longstanding attacks, threats, harassment and violence against journalists especially those that expose wrongdoing, corruption and abuse of power. We argue that digital technologies have helped change

S. Mpofu (*) University of South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa B. Mutsvairo Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands T. Matsilele Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Cape Town, South Africa © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_5

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the roles of investigative journalists as sole media producers to being part of audiences. The role of previously ‘passive audiences’—has also shifted from just being recipients to being active content producers as well as what other scholars have characterised as prosumers (Carrosio, 2007). Our aim in this paper therefore is to use the example of celebrated Zimbabwean blogger ‘Baba Jukwa’ to illustrate the intervention of social media platforms in popularizing whistle-blowing-styled citizen journalism and show how this approach and practice has predominantly set the agenda for mainstream media and society. We also look at the extent to which this variant deepened democracy in Zimbabwe. Fearless and confrontational, sometimes appearing like a shrewd but star-crossed undercover agent, ‘Baba Jukwa’ made a series of allegations against leading Zimbabwean politicians including murders, abductions and assaults. The blogger has been likened to more famous digital dissidents such as Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden, Frances Haugen and Julien Assange. There is growing scholarship suggesting that social media could be liberative in contexts of repression (Editorial, 2011; Mortensen, 2011). In line with such claims, we investigate the potential of whistleblowing as a new form of citizen journalism using the case study of Zimbabwe’s Facebook character that exposed the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) secrets just before the 2013 elections. At the core of the exposés was how ZANU-PF planned to rig the 2013 election, tensions and intra-party factions and plans for opposing factions to eliminate each other, elite political meeting ‘minutes’ and state secrets some of which could have easily compromised state security. Others have looked at the use of Facebook by Baba Jukwa to settle personal scores in politics (Chitanana, 2020; Wasserman, 2019; Chibuwe & Ureke, 2016; Matsilele, 2019; Karekwaivanane, 2019; Sabao & Chingwaramusee, 2019; Mutsvairo, 2016; Mutsvairo & Sirks, 2015). In the current study, we attempt to add to this debate by taking an angle that seeks to advance the potential and importance of social media especially in setting the agenda in societies, where official media are seen to be legitimate authorities. Further, using a variant of whistle-blower-aided citizen journalism, we explore the potential of social media in supporting democratic forces. We argue against techno-determinism and advocate for a balanced view of how technological disruptions have affected the profession of journalism. Whistleblower-aided citizen journalism is simply a form of reporting, in which a whistle-blower, under pressure to act as a responsible citizen, turns to social media to expose excesses of those in power. Usually these

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are insiders or technologically savvy individuals who manage to access and leak certain information ‘illegally’. It is through the use digital technologies that the role of traditional and professional journalism in society has been altered (Goyanes et al., 2021; Hermida & Mellado, 2020; Neuberger et al., 2019). These digital technologies have helped modify the role of journalists as sole media producers to being part of audiences. The posture of audiences as passive audiences has also shifted from being recipients to being active content producers as well, what has been labelled prosumers (Bruns, 2008). In this vein, it can be argued that a digital platform can also be seen as a double-edged sword that can both build and destroy. This is because they have brought new challenges to the practice of local journalism including upholding and enforcing of journalistic ethical values. In the same vein they make information that could conceivably be not available to journalists and the public easily accessible sometimes without any negative ramifications to the whistle-blower journalists operate in anonymity.

Background From the time of Johann Gutenberg in 1456, journalists have dominated the process of news gathering and dissemination as professionals and acting as watchdogs and gatekeepers (Barkin, 1984). Journalists cannot keep claiming to play these roles today due to interference and disruption of their profession by digital technologies of the past two decades. These technologies have seen the media landscape moving towards more openness from being a closed space where production and consumption of news were clearly demarcated in a news ‘food chain’. This evolution has also been enabled by accessibility and use of advanced devices that can both videotape and record audio and sometimes act as surveillance tools. The terrain of digital technologies is however uneven as some societies are advanced while others still lag far behind. For example, in most developing countries such as Zimbabwe, internet connectivity is low and expensive making the use of digital technologies a challenge while the case is totally different in countries like Sweden. Together with journalists, citizens now participate in the process of information gathering, packaging, dissemination and consumption (Alejandro, 2010) what is characterised by scholars as citizen journalism (Banda, 2010; Allan, 2013; Allan & Thorsen, 2009; Kolbitsch & Maurer, 2006; Mpofu, 2015, Mutsvairo & Salgado, 2020, Mutsvairo & Sirks, 2015, Mutsvairo, 2016). Citizen

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journalism has brought radical changes to traditional journalism practice further complicating the definition of journalism already under ‘very much critical debate’ (Deuze, 2005, 443) with its unsettled boundaries. Deuze therefore argues that journalism is an ‘occupational ideology’ characterised by certain tenets and practices as understood by journalists. Of course, there is a risk of ‘protectionist’ definitions where those in the profession set the parameters of the practice (2005, 444). This protectionist approach is what has led to delimiting of what can and cannot be defined as journalism, one perceived or regarded as real journalism, one that is professionalised, and another viewed and regarded as pseudo-­journalism in the form of citizen journalism. While real journalism is ethical and observes a litany of other ‘codes’ like gate keeping, objectivity, balance etc. so as to professionalise the field, it is important to open up to the fact that there are other alternative and innovative forms that could as well qualify as journalism. The proliferation of new media technologies and particularly the evolving “architecture of the internet has, over the years, promised greater freedom of assembly and expression to different communities” (Mpofu, 2015:116) where people have created and entered platforms that allow them to gather, disseminate and debate issues without immediate hindrances. These readers who have strayed onto the journalists’ path are called citizen journalists (Mpofu, 2013, 115). Even though citizen journalism is a slippery and contested concept, we use it here as Gillmor (2006) in his definition which encapsulates such activities as gathering information or formulating ideas and sharing them through social media, blogs, listservs, websites and commenting under news articles (Mpofu, 2016). ‘Baba Jukwa,’ the focus of this article, through his Facebook page practiced what we visualise as a variant of citizen journalism that is supported by whistleblowing. The social media blogger posted previously unknown ruling party insider information to the public. The activities of ‘Baba Jukwa’ on Facebook pushed the state to issue a reward of 300,000 U.S dollars to anyone who could help them unmask the secretive blogger’s identity. Other famous examples of journalism aided by whistleblowing include Watergate, WikiLeaks, Panama Papers and Paradise Papers. This form of journalism complements other whistle blower activities that still rely on traditional journalism. Three cases are illustrative of this argument: the US’s Watergate scandal, Zimbabwe’s Willowvale motor scandal and South Africa’s Guptagate scandal. During Richard Nixon’s last term as President of the United States, the Watergate scandal saw under-cover informants divulging information on the dark secrets of the Nixon presidency. The

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leading informant was later known as ‘Deep Throat’ due to the explicit nature of his whistleblowing. ‘Deep Throat’ would define the character of whistle-blowing especially in keeping the person being informed focused on a goal, which is to bring down the corrupt government. ‘Baba Jukwa’ controlled, i.e. set the agenda, not only in terms of what people were informed via mainstream media but also what people talked about. Unlike ‘Deep Throat,’ who shared secrets with Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward, ‘Baba Jukwa’ did not need the help of a professional journalist to tell stories. The blogger simply turned to social media to dish out explosive political secrets. In non-democratic environments, whistle-blowing activists in the form of ghost social media characters such as ‘Baba Jukwa’ have helped professional journalists and the public to tell stories that under normal situations would not see the light of day. Due to these technologies, some of the sacrosanct tenets of journalism such as agenda setting and gatekeeping are no longer the preserve of trained professionals as they share this with their former audiences who have encroached into the profession (Banda, 2010). It is these digital technologies that enablers moles and whistle-blowers to expose secrets without fear of arrest, torture, harassment or even death. Dictatorships often curtail free flow of information to conceal intra-­ state and intra-party corruption, tensions and this is even clearer where there is party-state conflation like in Zimbabwe. Moreover, mainstream media are incapacitated because some are controlled by the state and therefore cannot expose its excesses while independent media operate under restrictive regulations whereby the government of the day uses legal and extra-legal tactics to silence them. Such an environment has bred whistle-blowers who volunteer information to journalists in a rather clandestine manner (Rønning, 2003). The advent of social media and ICTs has seen the emergence of whistle-blower citizen journalists, a move away from reliance on traditional journalists whereby information relating to some malpractices is dumped on social media platforms and websites and therefore accessed to ordinary citizenry.

Digital Technologies and Their Disruption of the Journalism Profession The upsurge in digital technologies has forced traditional media institutions to migrate from the linear and old style news gathering, production and dissemination structure to mobile and digital platforms so as to remain

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competitive and relevant. Some media houses have embraced digital technologies using them to advertise what to expect in the mainstream news platforms. Examples include Zimbabwe’s The Herald, The Chronicle, NewsDay and in South Africa where newspapers such as Mail & Guardian, Sunday Times, Sowetan and Daily Sun employ social media such as Twitter and Facebook to advertise their content carried in their respective publications. Other publications in Africa such as Forbes Africa magazine and Africa Confidential use digital media to market their print content by offering snippets of what to expect in the print edition. Globally CNN, BBC, The Guardian, New  York Times among others have managed to extend readership to online audiences by having exclusive online editions accessible to subscribers or advertise their content on social media to direct customers to main pages and television channels. Alejandro (2010, 5) notes that a growing number of readers, viewers and listeners are going online for their news, posing a threat to traditional journalism practice “[T]elevision, newspapers and radio are still here but there is a growing competition from interactive online media. To remain relevant, most traditional media have created platforms or networks where audiences share news with each other and have been forced, in some cases, to de-regulate sections such as letters to the editor, which were previously censored by editors to conform to editorial bias. This, in a way, is meant to make audiences loyal to specific news media. Critics argue that digital technologies, though presenting a platform through which publics can now access and share information, the absence of traditional structures that enforced adherence to journalistic norms and ethics may give a partial, partisan or deliberately distorted view of the world (Price, 2015, 2). This is a threat, especially, when citizens can easily publish information and claim anonymity as it poses threats to how news and the practice of journalism is understood. Easy access to news production also threatens journalism as most countries, especially in Africa, have used abuses and excesses of digital media as an excuse to gag the media. Other than Zimbabwe, South Africa and Kenya have made overtures towards that direction (Mitullah et  al., 2015; Matsilele & Mutsvairo, Forthcoming). In Kenya, for example, the government in the past enacted laws such as the Telecommunications Act and used the same to prosecute journalist Yassin Juma who published content online as having transgressed the ‘misuse of a licensed telecommunication device (Einashe, 2016). Due to de-regulation and access to avenues where one may open any online platform, especially in many African countries, there has been a

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flurry of platforms that have been opened and are operating in blurred lines as to whether they are online news platforms or just social networks where news is disseminated. Twist writing on this phenomenon says, with this explosion of citizen reporting, the relationship between producer and consumer has to realign itself. He adds that, ‘as a result, the challenge to content industries and mainstream media has been to think about how to ensure everyone has access to quality and trusted sources of news and information.’ Erdal elucidating the challenge posed by blurred lines that exist between what and what is a not news states that ‘[N]ews content now also comes in a variety of forms, delivered by online technologies in addition to traditional print and broadcasting media with enhanced, 24-hour capabilities. The field of news production has become more complex and differentiated’. At the centre of the digital technologies is the empowerment of citizens and with it emerged a concept popularised as citizen journalism; demoralizing to some professionals but necessary to journalism. Bart writing on citizenship participation through digital technologies intimates that it ‘is a recent and relatively popular phenomenon which is deemed to have the potential to promote citizen participation in the media, and in particular in the production of (critical) media content by ‘netizens“. Banda (2010, 8), supporting the above concept, in an exploratory work, postulates that the emergence of alternative means of publication has brought a greater opportunity for citizens to own their own media and counter the effects of years of reportorial neglect occasioned by an unhealthy concentration of media ownership. The dictatorship of the mass media, to an extent, has been diluted by digital technologies and thereby helping bring media plurality and diversity. There are no longer exclusives, at least in digital media, as everyone with data and a device can also communicate to a certain public audience. Of course, citizen journalism clashes with real journalism in that ‘it is caught up in concerns around authenticity, credibility and controversy’ (Banda, 2010, 26). ‘Baba Jukwas’ case demonstrates to us that citizen journalism is also a dangerous minefield especially where sensitive information is involved. He made predictions about the ruling party’s plans some of which came to pass much to the chagrin of Zanu-PF, which hunted for him leading to the arrest of state-controlled newspaper, The Sunday Mail editor in 2014. The editor was accused of being ‘Baba Jukwa’ and charged with attempting to subvert a constitutionally elected government, insurgency, banditry and demeaning the office of the President. Besides, ‘Baba Jukwa’ had a large

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following and ended up setting the agenda for Zimbabweans and the mainstream media—both private and public with the former relishing the postings while the latter because of government control being dismissive of the fierce blogger revelations.

Methodology The paper employed a qualitative approach to understand the meaning or nature of the concept we call whistle-blower citizen journalism. The qualitative approach is used obtain the intricate details about phenomena difficult to extract or learn about through more conventional research methods (Strauss & Corbin, 1998, 11). The purposive sampling method was also used as it allows researchers to choose a selection from which the researcher can learn from. This purposeful approach comes with intentional bias which is its equal strength (Tongco, 2007). However, the danger with this approach is that it relies on the researcher’s judgment on the informant’s reliability and competency. In this study, the selected subject was a hyperactive social media user whose online activity has in one way or the other contributed to the national discourse. The researcher used posts that were considered relevant to this study. In gathering data for this investigation, the researchers started by harvesting all ‘Baba Jukwa’ posts that appeared between April of 2013 and August of 2013. This period was observed by researchers as having experienced Baba Jukwa’s hyperactive use, especially Fecebook, for his leaks and political activities. The posts selected were a mixture of ‘Baba Jukwa’ curated news, media curated, uncurated shared news and Baba Jukwa’s original generated leaks. Having selected this sample of posts to study and analyse, the researchers went on to streamline the same sample so as to remain with only original leaks from ‘Baba Jukwa’ that generated attention from select media houses within and outside the country. The researchers also focused on posts that generated more likes and shares, which had a relative degree of widespread reach. After this process of tabulation, the researchers remained with three posts employed for this study— the assassination of a prominent ruling party official, flamboyant businessman Philip Chiyangwa’s alleged HIV status and allegations over attempts to rig the 2013 elections.

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Theoretical Framing The Subaltern Public Sphere An unregulated digital public sphere is what this study regards as a subaltern public sphere as it allows those at the margins to speak back to power. At the centre of ‘Baba Jukwa’s social media activities was an attempt to undermine the ruling ZANU (PF) hegemony. Habermas’s imagination of the public sphere as an all-inclusive arena has been criticised Fraser as faulty since the ideal public sphere envisaged by Habermas was “meant for and frequented by the privileged elite to the exclusion of other groups in society” (Mpofu, 2014, 30). The subaltern public sphere as we understand it addresses limitations posed by Habermas’s public sphere especially its narrow focus on rational democracy leading to Mpofu (2015, 88) arguing that the exclusion of ‘irrational’ voices from the public sphere is problematic. Mpofu is supported by Papacharissi (2004, 259) who posits that, debate needs to be ‘robust and heated’, characterised by ‘anarchy, individuality and disagreement rather than rational accord lead[ing] to true democratic emancipation’. Despite these shortcomings, the public sphere remains an indispensable work especially in “critical theory and democratic political practice,”. It is this mediation that allows anarchy in journalism that we see in Baba Jukwa’s social media activism. This anarchy is a result of activism and dissidence that is promoted by whistle-blower-aided citizen journalism. It threatens the existence of an oppressive and violent state. Agenda Setting and Whistle-Blower-Aided Citizen Journalism Agenda setting, according to Scheufele and Tewksbury (2006) is the idea that there is a strong correlation between the emphasis that mass media place on certain issues and the importance attributed to the same issues by mass audiences. McCombs et al. notes that the role of journalists is to create a market for the ideas advanced by members of the field and to do this they lead society into worrying and concerning itself about things the media chooses to give prominence. McCombs and Shaw (2009) argue that media are perceived as powerful but not as predicted by the hypodermic needle, in shaping and manipulating people’s attitudes towards socio-­ political and economic matters. This can best be seen in how Zanu-PF through public media has attempted to manipulate public perceptions

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over the past two decades (Mare & Matsilele, 2020). Zanu-PF, especially during election cycle, bombards the masses with anti-opposition propaganda and information on Zanu-PF’s contribution to the liberation struggle. Shaw’s argument is challenged by Weaver (2007, 142) who argues that that the ‘first level’ of agenda setting focuses on the relative salience of issues regarded by journalists as important. Agenda setting in the context of this research therefore refers to the importance of issues highlighted and then transferred into the public domain by the mass media. It is important to note that what we seek to do here is to demonstrate that, in changing the ways we have known traditional journalism to be, digital media have made it possible, through Baba Jukwa, for whistle-blower citizen journalists to set the agenda for mainstream media and the public.

Gatekeeping Gatekeeping, just like agenda setting is important in a research like this one as it helps demonstrate how digital media have precipitated in the metamorphosis of traditional journalism. Lewin, the first to use the concept of gatekeepers, noted that the gates were governed either by impartial rules or by gatekeepers, who are individuals or groups charged with the responsibility of deciding what passes, and what is denied entry. This definition was expanded by Bittner (1989, 11) who elucidated that a gatekeeper is ‘any person or formally organized group (that is) directly involved in relaying or transferring information from one individual to another through a mass medium.’ Journalists have been regarded as gatekeepers due to their immense filtering powers. Adams predicted that, in the future, everyone will be a news reporter, prophetically, referring to citizen journalism . Williams and Delli Carpini (2010, 1208) contend ‘[I]f there are no gates, there can be no gatekeepers’. However, Shoemaker et al. (2009), argue that the rise of online media is to the contrary calling for journalists to be gatekeepers as they are bombarded with information from the internet, newspapers, television and radio news, news magazines, and their sources. They argue that ‘their job of selecting and shaping the small amount of information that becomes news would be impossible without gatekeeping’ (Reese et al., 2009, 73).

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Corpus: Baba Jukwa and Setting the Agenda An anonymous character calling himself Baba Jukwa (loosely, “Father Spirit Medium”) appeared on Facebook prior to Zimbabwe’s general elections in 2013 presenting himself as head of an invisible army of ‘vapanduki’ (rebels). Such an appropriation of the term was previously unheard of in post-independence Zimbabwe. ‘Baba Jukwa’ used Facebook to assert himself as a dissident who was in fact a proud and patriotic citizen. He argued that it was those who fought against dissidents like himself that were enemies of the state. ‘Baba Jukwa’ re-appropriated and repurposed the notion of dissident, using it to deconstruct Zanu-PF hegemony and its framing of “patriotic history” (Matsilele, 2019; Matsilele & Ruhanya, 2020) and what constituted Zimbabwean nationhood. Within months, Baba Jukwa had gathered a near-cult online following of hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans, and had caused widespread official panic, and was the subject of intense public interest. What follows below is an outline of data. We attempt to demonstrate how as a whistle-blower citizen journalist ‘Baba Jukwa’ supplemented, aided and even set the agenda while disregarding some ethical considerations usually exercised in traditional journalism such as balance, objectivity, fairness and gatekeeping so that harmful, untruthful and false information is not passed onto the public domain. In addition, we demonstrate how whistle-blower citizen journalists help deepen democracy through such exposes. In a bid to understand if ‘Baba Jukwa’ contributed in aiding or displacing traditional journalism practice, data analysis was carried out based on reports that featured the blogger’s name. The researchers sought to gather views on whether ‘Baba Jukwa’ played any role in determining mainstream journalism practice in Zimbabwe using the following three examples: elections, assassination of Edward Chindori-­ Chininga and HIV status of politicians. Example 1: Elections ‘Baba Jukwa’ wrote of attempts to rig elections a week before July 31, 2013 polls. The US’s Los Angeles Times journalist, Robyn Dixon taking a cue from ‘Baba Jukwa’ wrote an article on the 20th of July 2013, headlined: Mystery blogger exposing threats to fair election in Zimbabwe.

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Baba Jukwa wrote: Robert Mugabe is attempting to steal Zimbabwe’s most important election. In the past month alone, Mugabe manipulated the already shambled voters’ rolls, keeping hundreds of thousands of eligible people from registering; abused presidential powers to change election laws; and unilaterally declared an illegal election. These are actions of a party whose ideology has failed but whose thirst for the personal spoils of power remains.

The Los Angeles Times used and quoted ‘Baba Jukwa’s Facebook post in its story illustrating the nexus between the blogger’s posts representing a form of dissident digital journalism and traditional practice. One hallmark of professional journalism as a practice and ideology is reliance on ‘credible’, authoritative sources that have faces and not ‘mysterious bloggers as demonstrated by the Los Angeles Times story. Nehanda Radio, one of the diasporic news outlets for Zimbabweans also reported on the plan to steal elections with ‘Baba Jukwa’ cited as the main source. Under the headline: Baba Jukwa exposes threat to fair election, Nehanda reported on August 01, 2013, that Tsvangirai would win but that the ruling party, powerful security chiefs and the Electoral Commission would conspire to steal the election. The article quoted ‘Baba Jukwa’s predictions of electoral rigging. The difference between Nehanda Radio and Los Angeles Times reportage are the levels of trust and credibility attached to ‘Baba Jukwa.’ For the former, ‘Baba Jukwa’ is a credible character who lives amongst us, is authoritative and trusted voice. The description of Baba Jukwa as a mystery character throws into the whole story some caution; readers do not have to necessarily believe in the story as it can neither be confirmed nor denied. This leads into ethical dilemmas of citizen journalism. Responding to these claims and others made by opposition politicians, the state-­ controlled media such as The Herald (Herald Reporter, 02 August 2013), responded with headlines: Registrar General rubbishes rigging claims and Kuda Bwititi on August, 01, 2013 noting that, Tendai Biti (then vice president of the Movement for Democratic Alliance which recently morphed into Citizens Coalition for Change) fails to substantiate rigging claims. Example 2: The assassination of Edward Chindori-Chininga ‘Baba Jukwa’ reported in June of 2013 that Zimbabwe’s former Mines Minister, Edward Chindori-Chininga, was being targeted by some

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elements within his party for exposing dirty secrets that were taking place in the party and government. Baba Jukwa wrote: “The Mashonaland Central mafia is planning to sink Edward Chindori-Chininga and replace him with their puppet. They are accusing him of co-operating with Baba Jukwa to divulge information about some of the things that are taking place in the party and in the province.” Within few days, Chindori-Chininga was killed in a brutal car accident. This made both local and international headlines confirming predictions that had been made by Baba Jukwa. Soon after his death, media following Baba Jukwa’s posts covered the story with most except the state media crediting Baba Jukwa’s earlier warnings. Some of the newspapers that covered include Zimbabwe’s NewsDay, Southern Eye and Daily News, Nehanda Radio, South Africa’s Mail & Guardian and Politics Web, regional and international agencies that also covered the story crediting Baba Jukwa include; Africa Confidential, Global Voices, Scotsman and Christian Science Monitor. Some of the headlines by media organisations read: Secret insider warned Zanu-PF ‘rebel’ before his death; Baba Jukwa warnings come true; In Zimbabwe, an official’s death foretold—and Facebooked. The coverage of Chindori-Chininga helped bring some legitimacy to ‘Baba Jukwa’s posts and predictions and to an extent shaped how journalists covered political stories in relation to ‘Baba Jukwa’s posts. ‘Baba Jukwa’ managed, in the process to set the agenda. Another important issues relating to the second strand of our paper is that of gatekeeping. It would be considered unethical and even illegal to publish, in official media, with authority that some people are planning to assassinate someone. ‘Baba Jukwa’s use of citizen journalism helps demonstrate how some ethical and even legal considerations are circumvented through social media. The state-controlled media never gave attention to Baba Jukwa’s claims choosing to just give a historical background of Chindori-Chininga in its article headlined: Breaking News, Edward Chindori-Chininga dies (Herald Reporter, June 19, 2013). Example 3: Baba Jukwa and the HIV Infected Politicians HIV/Aids is still a stigma in Zimbabwe and when one is believed to be infected, the society—for the large part—ostracises that person. Stereotyping people living the HIV has been used by as a political tool by both state media and independent media in Zimbabwean politics. As Nyatsanza and Wood (2017) have argued that Zimbabwe remains trapped

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in stereotypes of othering certain groups in society through colonial and post-colonial prejudices of racism, sexuality, sexual orientation, religious conservatism, poverty, gender and social class. These stereotypes get amplified when someone is known to have contracted HIV virus. Zanu-PF has in the past, through state media, published the HIV status of people it considered to be enemies even though this is done without verification. An example is that of former Anglican Archbishop, Pius Ncube, an anti-­ government critic, whose ‘partner’ was alleged to have been positive as a way of labelling Pius Ncube due to his radical anti Zanu-PF stance. In the run up to 2013 elections, ‘Baba Jukwa,’ in his Facebook page named Zanu-PF ministers he alleged were infected with the HI-virus. It seems, the post was meant to ostracise Zanu-PF leadership from the populace and have an impact in the 2013 polls. The revelations also sought to help demonstrate that some of the people in Zanu-PF leadership has weak immune system and easier to defeat should a civil war break out. Though, most publications, shied away from publishing names of politicians implicated by Baba Jukwa, newspapers, both print and online, made the issue of HIV infection an agenda item after Baba Jukwa made the revelations. On 29 April 2013, Baba Jukwa, made claims that a top Zanu PF politician, Philip Chiwangwa was armed with fake HIV tests results. Baba Jukwa presented Philip Chiyangwa as a threat to the Zimbabwean society with claims on his sexual behaviour and HIV status. ‘Fellow Zimbabweans, especial women and young girls, please be extremely careful on Phillip Chiyangwa. The man is bad news now he has 30 children with 26 women what saddens me is that the man is HIV positive and moves around with a fake negative result luring young girls telling them that he his negative he even has medical doctors who are on his payroll to prove this to unsuspecting women.’

Chiyangwa is related to the late President Robert Mugabe and is one of the most influential politicians and businessmen in Zimbabwe who owns and sells large swathes of urban land for residential property construction. At the time, Chiyangwa was the leader of Zimbabwe Football Association. Chiyangwa is popular for creating short videos that circulate on social media networks, where he flauntes his wealth such as cars, money and his houses.

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The report on Chiyangwa came days after his initial expose’ on politicians who were infected on 20th of April, 2013. The story made news on mainstream media like NewsDay on the 30th of April, 2013, that wrote an article headlined: Baba Jukwa distresses Zanu PF, arguing that Baba Jukwa’s posts of infected politicians were distressing the liberation party. Even though the allegations were not proven or could not be proven, Baba Jukwa managed to capture the role of agenda setting such that mainstream media took a cue from his/her Facebook page to report on the story. The state media did not give attention to this story at the time when Baba Jukwa made the revelations.

Discussion The deliberate use of social media has seen the undercover characters setting the agenda from Occupy Movement, Wikileaks to Arab Spring and the Iranian Twitter revolution. In the context of Zimbabwe and specifically in Baba Jukwa’s unconventional ‘journalism practice’ that we this undercover character set the agenda for political parties, private conversations, funeral conversations, local news media, international news media and social media deliberations. At the time of revising this work (February 2022), a google search of ‘Baba Jukwa’ under the news icon pulled about 1910 results in 0.25 seconds. This demonstrates the level of prevalence of ‘Baba Jukwa’ in the mainstream news media nine years after this character came into the social and mainstream media sphere. In the lead up to the 2013 elections, ‘Baba Jukwa’ became the main driver of news, either as a news item or through the content he provided on his Facebook page as the whistle-blower journalist. The role played by ‘Baba Jukwa’ is also captured by Chibuwe and Ureke (2016) who observe the reference to blogger by leading political parties, MDC-T and ZANU (PF) when they launched their manifestos. The most prominent of cases that ‘Baba Jukwa’ exposed was the plot to assassinate Chindori-Chininga who later died in mysterious circumstances. This particular case of Chindori-Chininga helped lend credence to ‘Baba Jukwa’s credibility which saw him getting international coverage on CNN, Al Jazeera and BBC.  As this study has demonstrated, ‘Baba Jukwa’s posts became lead stories in local publications as it allowed newsrooms to republish Baba Jukwa’s claims without the risk of legal and extra-legal intervention by media watchdogs in the country. By republishing Baba Jukwa’s posts journalists were able to circumvent censorship laws and normative journalistic expectations which in

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most cases police media reportage. This coverage of ‘Baba Jukwa’ and his posts would see his social media posts setting the agenda for what mainstream media covered, the same would happen to other social media actors who would emerge in 2016. There has been an observable mass permeation of new digital technologies in shaping news production, distribution and consumption practices across Africa (Moyo et  al., 2019; Mavhungu & Mabweazara, 2014). Moyo et al. (2019) have studied the use of these digital analytics and social media metrics in determining the extent to which African journalists are using these tools for journalistic news gathering and dissemination. Both cases mentioned above demonstrate the growing proliferation of social media platforms as sources of information. However, little is known on the role social media plays in setting the agenda for what is eventually covered in the mainstream media. This study, in part, contributes to this missing link with bias on Zimbabwean newsrooms. A cursory look at cases in North America, the Middle East, Europe and some parts of Africa demonstrates a growing trend in how newsrooms and journalists are increasingly relying on social media for the content which in turn is demonstrating how social media is driving the mainstream media agenda. In her book, Anonymous, Coleman observes how hacktivist campaigner, Anonymous has tapped into social media to help drive the agenda. Anonymous drives the agenda through email bombing, listvers, Facebook and Twitter. News selection processes in most Zimbabwean mainstream media are affected by the choices made by media workers at various levels. It is a well-known fact that state-controlled but public owned media attempt to see the world through the lenses of the ruling party or dominant faction within the ruling party while the private media mostly see the world differently: in ways that oppose the ruling elite. For example, in a paper Gatekeeping in Nigerian Press Okigbo observes that “[T]he axiom in the government papers seems to be that news is: ‘[A]ll news that fit government’s expectations” (Okigbo, 1990, 8). This does not suggest that the privately owned media give the true representation of the world but there are different interests they are in service of, and this colours the final worldview. For instance, most private media are critical of the government and are pro-opposition. In a context where the opposition parties are characterised by disharmony the same media will seek to align with those who fund the media through advertising or could be ethnically aligned. In some cases, private newspaper proprietors inadvertently influence the slant of their

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publications towards issues. For example Mpofu (60) observes how Trevor Ncube, a private newspaper owner in Zimbabwe could have unduly influenced his media workers to cover news in an anti-Zanu-PF manner when he wrote ‘We are prisoners of fear’ (22/02/02) in the Publisher’s memo of The Zimbabwe Independent castigating Zimbabweans for being ‘generally a timid and docile lot who have suffered under Zanu-PF without doing anything to free themselves...” and the election in March provided the people with an opportunity “to get rid of this murderous regime and liberate themselves once again”. He urged people to do the ‘right thing’ on March 10 (Presidential elections) and said that the “election has been rigged already” and “if Zanu-PF wins we will perceive this one as a stolen ballot”. This had a telling effect on how The Zimbabwe Independent was to view the President and the ruling party in its stories regarding elections of that year as the paper adopted an anti-Zanu-Pf slant expressed by the owner. What the above suggests is the possibility that gatekeeping is sometimes enforced in the interest of those who control the media at the expense of the right of the public to know. In a way they influence the way their media houses set the agenda. Agenda setting in the world where citizen journalism and traditional media contend for space and prominence has been made more complex. As Cohen (1963) once said of the press and agenda setting that the even though the press may not be successful most of the times in telling audiences what to think, but it is stunningly successful in telling its readers what to think about. However, it is naïve, as Neuman et al. (2014) suggest, arguing that citizen journalism has totally usurped the agenda setting powers from the mainstream media and establishment organs. New media technologies have brought about what Neuman et  al. (2014) and Kiousis and McCombs (2004) call reverse agenda-setting whereby mainstream news media and professional journalists respond to what trends in the public domain giving an impression that media agenda setting has been overtaken by public agenda setting. There is an attempt by the elite structures of society, to state the agenda but the alternative views held by the public sometimes gain popularity leading to the latter setting the agenda suggesting the conditionality of the framing of agendas by the former (Gamson, 1992; Druckman & Nelson 2003). The advent of digital media has been lauded for its potential to interfere, positively and negatively, with the way we have known democracy. ‘Baba Jukwa’ introduced some important disruptions in the Zimbabwean adulterated democratic culture. The opposition parties allege that

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Zimbabwe’s democracy, as defined by Zanu-PF and Mugabe mainly hinged on the right to vote and nothing more. ‘Baba Jukwa’s entrance into the political discourses in Zimbabwe expanded the conversation and understandings of democracy (though not the practical and implementation aspects thereof). Politicians were called into account by Baba Jukwa who also exposed the plans to interfere with the elections. Besides, he did so through unconventional journalistic standards where he never sought comment from the people he sought to ‘scandalise’ while at the same time he had the benefit of having to say “I told you so” as things he wrote about happened. In some cases, his debate was rational and in some cases it was anarchic. Anarchy and heated debates are part of a democratic discourse that has been prevalent on social media. While crossing ethical lines, the case of Chiyangwa and reported HIV status presents an opportunity for citizens to demand accountability from politicians to account for their ethical conduct. The normative and the most popularised fourth estate role of the media is to hold public and private entities and public figures to account (Ettema, 2007: 144). This view is anchored in what Mwesige (2004), Waisbord (2000) and Wahl-Jorgensen and Hunt (2012) consider to be the “watchdog role”. Ettema (2007), concurring with the notion of watchdog, further posits that journalism is both a social institution in and of itself, and one that is charged with the oversight of other social institutions. It is no surprise that journalists like in such cases as the Guptagate state capture scandal in South Africa, Willowvale case of the 1980s Zimbabwe and Watergate scandal of the USA would rely on their exposé from undercover whistle-blowers from within organisations or insider knowledge.

Conclusion In this chapter we discussed the phenomenon whistle-blower-aided citizen journalism. The case of ‘Baba Jukwa’ proves its importance in countries where freedoms of expression and open governance are curtailed with whistle-blowers gaining celebrity status, credibility, and reputation and experiencing huge volumes of traffic (Meraz, 2009). ‘Baba Jukwa’ earned not only a celebrity status but also gained credibility and reputation by spilling ruling party secrets through the internet. He was believable and credible not only because what he said came to pass but also because the powers that be, evidently panicked and even hunted for this character. The

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major advantage with citizen journalism is that information spreads instantaneously arming recipients with alternatives to deal with issues that may arise. Unlike in the traditional media where issues of censorship, accuracy and verification are emphasised and enforced through laws, digital media activists publish without fetters of regulation or fear of legal action precisely because most of them are faceless. Digital media, while developing and reshaping the communicative landscape in ways that raise ethical and security concerns, are a tributary to democracy as they allow for the truth to be exposed while concealing the sources of the messages making them secure from legal or extra-legal ramifications. Therefore, to avoid detection and ultimate arrest activists prefer to use a pseudonym.

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CHAPTER 6

India: Mapping Journalism in the World’s Largest Democracy Daya Kishan Thussu and Anilesh Kumar

Introduction This chapter explores the interplay between democracy and journalism in India, the world’s largest democracy, with one of its most complex media systems. With a brief excursion into the historical context, the chapter focuses on the transformation of the Indian news media beginning in the late 1990s, particularly in broadcasting, which has grown from a state-­ controlled monopoly to a multiplicity of private television news channels. The expansion and consolidation of media corporations have transformed India’s media landscape and significantly affected broadcast journalism. The chapter argues that this marketized, multi-channel television environment is dominated by a scramble for ratings, resulting in news content increasingly taking the form of infotainment. The informational role of television in India, where millions of people still cannot read or write, has

D. K. Thussu (*) • A. Kumar Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_6

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been undermined by this market-led journalism and the privatization of television news is eroding the public sphere in a multi-lingual democracy.

The Colonial Context and English Language Journalism It is often said that an independent news media is essential for a democracy to function effectively and responsibly. It is not for nothing that the news media are perceived as the fourth estate, supplementing, and supporting the other three pillars in a democratic polity—the executive, the legislative and the judiciary. However, this very European conception of the media, dating back to the French Revolution of 1789, is not universally accepted. In most of the developing world the news media have, by and large, not acted as a watchdog on the powers that be. Rather, they have often followed the agenda set by the government or ruling parties or promoted the interests and ideologies of their private owners. In many ways India, with its diverse and activist media, has been an exception to this rule. Journalism in India has a long and distinguished history. The print news media played a key role in India’s transformation from a feudal to a modern nation-state, with a stable, mature, and multi-­ party democracy. The first printing press was set up in India in 1578 and the first newspaper, the Bengal Gazette, was founded in 1780 by James Augustus Hicky, a disgruntled employee of the East India Company, who described the journal as “a weekly political and commercial paper open to all parties, but influenced by none” (Rau, 1974, p. 10). A significant contribution to Indianizing journalism was that of Rammuhan Roy (1772–1833) proficient in Bengali, Persian, Sanskrit and English, who used the printed word to establish a nascent nationalism, launching three journals the Brahminical Magazine (in English), Sambad Kaumidi (a Bengali weekly) and the weekly magazine in Persian, Mirat-­ ul-­Akhbar (Mirror of News) to present the Indian case (Sonwalkar, 2019, p. 19). Roy started a trend which had its effect across the sub-continent as dozens of ‘nationalist’ newspapers and magazines sprung up. The Times of India—currently India’s largest selling English-language daily newspaper—came into existence in 1838 and, by the 1870s, more than 140 newspaper titles were in circulation in various Indian languages, in addition to many more in English (primarily aimed at the ruling colonial elite as well as aspirational and Anglicized Indians). In the twentieth century,

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Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869–1948), who led the world’s biggest anti-colonial movement against the most powerful empire of modern times, democratized journalism by editing four periodicals, notably Young India (later renamed as Harijan). His words were read very widely in South Asia and beyond, acting as rallying cry for anti-colonial sentiments. Gandhi “both made the news and was the news”, notes a new study of Gandhi and the media: often referring himself as a ‘newspaperman’ he wrote in English, in Gujarati (his mother tongue) and in Hindi (the most widely used language in India) (Kaul, 2020, p. 2). Many other nationalist leaders were also active in journalism—either editing or regularly contributing to the nationalist cause, a legacy which continued after India achieved independence from British colonial rule in 1947. Unlike in many other post-colonial countries, the Indian government did not own newspapers, but it exerted influence on print media indirectly, subsidizing news agencies and supporting newspapers and magazines by providing them with affordable newsprint and government advertising. Despite such state interference, the relative autonomy of the private print media contributed greatly to the evolution of a multi-party democracy in India. As democracy took root, various political parties and groupings, representing the ideological spectrum, started their own newspapers and magazines (Bhattacharjee, 1972). The diversity of the press, including the mainstream publications, reflected the wide variety of ideological, political and linguistic affiliations in a vast, multi-ethnic, multi-­ religious and geographically and culturally complex country with 18 official languages and more than 800 dialects. While print journalism by and large acted as a fourth estate in a fledgling democracy, it can be argued that it also supported the role of the state as an instrument of modernity. For most journalists, who came from an urban middle-class milieu, national development was a shared value framework within which the press generally worked, including belief in a multiparty democratic system with socialistic tendencies as well as an avowedly ‘non-aligned’ foreign policy, eschewing Cold War bipolar blocs as founder leader of the Non-aligned Movement. However, this did not necessarily mean that the press always followed the government line, it had enough autonomy to criticise the powers that be. This watchdog role of journalists, it has been argued, contributed to the evolution of an ‘early-warning system’ for serious food shortages, thus helping to prevent famine (Ram, 1990). Although during the first two decades of independence, a large proportion of Indians were chronically

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and severely under-nourished, no famine hit the country (in stark contrast to the colonial period when more than 20 million Indians died in various famines afflicting the sub-continent between 1890s and 1945). More broadly, the press helped create new spaces for a democratic discourse to emerge and evolve relating to socio-political and economic issues affecting millions and thus contributed to the formation of a public sphere in the Habermasian sense. However, the plural, discursive scene of print journalism was not applicable to television when it came on stream in 1959. The state television channel, Doordarshan, was part of the government’s All India Radio (AIR) until 1976, when it became a separate department under the Information and Broadcasting Ministry (Chatterjee, 1991). Ostensibly the aims of the national broadcasters were to educate, inform and create a feeling of national identity and help maintain national unity. Both AIR and Doordarshan were public-broadcasting monopolies and were perceived as little more than propaganda services for the government of the day. Like other government departments, the electronic media were over-­ bureaucratized, and their performance was dull and drab. How far they succeeded in serving any developmental purposes also remains a subject of debate.

Post-Globalization Marketization and Expansion of Television News The rapid liberalization, deregulation and privatization of the media and cultural industries during the second half of the 1990s transformed the media sector in India (Page & Crawley, 2001). As elsewhere in the world, the Indian media space was also reconfigured by what Hallin and Mancini have termed as the ‘triumph of the liberal model’ of media (Hallin & Mancini, 2004, p. 251), partly “because its global influence has been so great and because neo-liberalism and globalization continue to diffuse liberal media structures and ideas” (p.  305). Privatization epitomised the ‘structures and ideas’ of this liberal model. While an accelerated push for privatization at one level provided consumer choice for news, it also undermined public media in a country where television news on the state broadcaster was considered as little more than the mouthpiece of the government and its leadership. Unlike the privately owned print media, which enjoyed credibility both within the country and outside, television news

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was seen as a monotonous state monopoly, covering what was often described as ‘protocol news’. As India opened up its broadcasting space to transnational players towards the end of the last century, many Western media organizations entered what was seen as one of the world’s largest markets, bringing mostly Hollywood-originated entertainment to the living rooms of Indian middle class. In terms of news media, the role of such globalizing forces as Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation-owned STAR (Satellite Television Asian Region) which had a profound impact on Indian media, is worth mentioning. STAR—the first pan-Asian television network—brought the concept of rolling news to India in 1998 when it launched Star News, an English language news channel, to coincide with the national elections, in collaboration with New Delhi Television (NDTV), a relatively small but respected news organization set up by a former professor of economics at the University of Delhi (see essays in Kagal, 2016). As interest in news grew, other channels, including Zee Network (India’s largest multimedia corporation), launched a dedicated Hindi-­ language Zee News, aimed at a mass audience, the first of its kind (Thussu, 1998). Its main rival, Aaj Tak, part of the India Today group, publisher of arguably India’s best known news magazine, India Today, launched a 24-hour Hindi news channel in 2000 and within less than a year came to dominate the news space, a feat it has managed for over two decades now within an extremely crowded market. In this period, the television scene was transformed by globalizing forces—whether technological or economic, manifested in the exponential growth in television channels: from one channel, Doordarshan, to more than 900 channels in 2021 (TRAI, 2021). Out of these more than 400 were dedicated news networks, making India home to the world’s most competitive news arena, catering to a huge domestic audience as well as a 30 million strong diaspora—the second largest in the world after China’s—scattered around the globe and increasingly connected with their ancestral homeland. Inevitably, such competition forced news executives and journalists to prioritise popular and populist news content. The old state-centric notions of nation-­ building were gradually replaced by championing the private power, reflecting the neo-liberal ideology, with its primacy of profit motives over public-interest journalism.

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Bollywoodization of Television News In such a privatized media economy, the competition for audiences and, most importantly, advertising revenue, became increasingly intense as the audience was fragmented across many different broadcast channels. The growing commercialization of 24/7 news meant that broadcast journalists and television producers had to create news programmes that would attract ratings by borrowing and adapting ideas from the world of entertainment. This ‘infotainment’ formula for news has become globally popular and has fundamentally changed the nature of TV journalism. Journalists and news managers are prone to privilege sensationalist coverage, even employing dubious practices to gather and manipulate information to maximise the audience. The lowering of the threshold of taste and decorum and thus compromising of ethical and professional standards of journalism is a disturbing trend. Such ‘global infotainment’, defined as ‘the globalization of a US-style ratings-driven television journalism which privileges privatized soft news—about celebrities, crime, corruption and violence—and presents it as a form of spectacle, at the expense of news about political, civic and public affairs’ (Thussu, 2007, p. 8), is increasingly evident in other democracies too, especially in the global South. At the same time, many news networks are part of huge media conglomerates which also have investments in the entertainment industry, thus directly or indirectly influencing editorial content, such as greater coverage of sports and lifestyle stories about celebrities from the world of entertainment. In the Indian context entertainment revolves around Bollywood, India’s commercial film industry, which annually produces the largest number of features films in the world (Gehlawat, 2015). As more and more non-news companies acquired news channels, ‘Bollywoodized’ content grew exponentially, demonstrating the symbiotic relationship between the news and new genres such as reality TV and, now increasingly, social media. In an extraordinarily competitive and crowded market, such hybridized news programming fed into and sustained a 24/7 news cycle, founded on Bollywood-driven, compelling content. This improved or at least maintained ratings and also helped keep production costs under control. Not surprisingly, in such circumstances the rural poor were remarkably absent in news stories, as a socially relevant television agenda did not suit a broadcasting environment primarily interested in the

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demographically desirable, urban upper and middle class with the disposable income to purchase the goods advertised on these channels. Critics have described mainstream media in India as ‘celebratory media dominated by breathless gossip about cricketers, billionaires and Bollywood stars and point-scoring among the political elite’ (Drèze & Sen, 2013, p. 263). With the advent of the digital age, arguably this tendency to Bollywoodize television news has become even more pronounced, with an added element of sensationalism (Thussu, 2007). A prominent recent example is the coverage of the death of a young Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput (SSR). Sushant, a popular actor from a small town in the eastern state of Bihar, was found dead in his Mumbai apartment on 14 June 2020. The news of his death sent shockwaves across the country, as fans, who associate artists with their on-screen image, could not believe that the actor had taken his life. A series of protests broke out in the country with supporters demanding ‘justice’ for the actor (“Fans of Sushant”, 2020). Strong sentiments started pouring also in the online space with ‘justice for Sushant’ trending on various social media platforms including Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram (Ananth, 2020). Some ‘fans’ started identifying themselves as ‘Sushant warriors’ and ‘SSRians’ and the digital space became a volatile battlefield where other actors—supposed to be his rivals—were regularly attacked (Jaswal, 2021; ‘Boycott Bollywood”, 2021). More importantly, looking to ride the wave of popular sentiment, the television news took up the issue and started a voyeuristic witch-hunt in the guise of investigative journalism. The first victim of the 24/7 news channel was a fellow actor Rhea Chakraborty—the late actor’s partner at that time. Contrary to the concept of objective journalism, the news channels launched a campaign against Rhea, demanding her arrest, harassing her family members, security guards, neighbours, and assassinated her character on prime-time debates (Pandey, 2020). While the investigative agencies were trying to find the truth, news channels had already given their verdicts with hashtags like ‘SushantWasMurdered ‘SushantCoverUp’, ‘IndiaForRheaArrest,’ ‘ArrestRhea’, and conspiracy alluding headlines such as ‘Who wants investigation blocked?’, ‘State government baffling investigation?’, ‘Drug transcript exposes Rhea?’ and so on (Bajpai, 2020). In their attempts to secure viewership, news channels all over the world have been known to sensationalise events; however, the voyeuristic circus in the name of news was unprecedented during the coverage of Sushant’s death. For example, almost all the news channels circulated images of the

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actor’s dead body lying on the bed, violating the basic tenets of journalistic ethics. The ligature marks on the neck, the colour of the lips and position of the dead body lying on the bed were given wall-to-wall coverage for days, with endless speculation about sinister causes. The most vivid spectacle on news channels were the frequent ‘chase sequences’, not unlike a Bollywood film action sequence, where reporters were found chasing other actors presented as the ‘villains of the piece’ in cars for miles navigating the busy Mumbai traffic and shouting such questions as ‘do you take drugs’ and ‘who is your supplier?’ (“Caught on camera”, 2020). The reporters were also shouting incessantly on live TV such ‘exclusive details’ as the model and even the number of the cars of the actors they were following. This ‘real time entertainment’ was aimed to provide the audiences the thrill of ‘live’ coverage on a story, which had no basis whatsoever and was covered live without any real information. A consequence of this ‘news without information’ was a series of conspiracy theories floated on prime-time debates, blaming some film production houses for the death of the actor. Other Bollywood actors, activists and even journalists who appealed for restraint and to refrain from wild speculations were considered culpable by a large section of the media, who operated on the principle of guilty until proven innocent. In those few weeks of wall-to-wall coverage, more than two dozen film production houses were constantly maligned, forcing them to approach various high courts in the country seeking restriction over the media coverage by leading news channels like Aaj Tak, Zee News, Republic TV, and Times Now. The courts, on several occasions, reprimanded these news channels for this ‘trial by media’ and observed that some of their coverage was in contempt of court which could obstruct the ‘administration of justice’. (Press Trust of India, 2021). Unfortunately, the nature of media coverage during Sushant Singh Rajput’ death is not an exception but an example of the growing trend of an entertainment-driven, performance-oriented, haranguing journalism.

Journalism in the Digital Age: Polarisation of Discourse and Fake News One of the greatest challenges facing journalism in India in the digital age has been the polarisation of political discourse, which has developed alongside the structural changes in the nature of news discussed above. Perhaps the most significant and far-reaching change was the acquisition,

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just before the 2014 national election, of News 18 (the country’s biggest television network with 19 news channels including national ones in English and Hindi as well as broadcasting in all important regional-­ languages) by Reliance group, India’s largest conglomerate, with investments in vital sectors of the country’s economy, including energy and, crucially, telecommunication. This convergence between old and new media and communication can lead to monopolizing tendencies, as a recent study has noted: “Ownership concentration is likely to intensify as content media companies identify synergies with wireless telephony companies for distribution. The advent of vernacular, language-enabled smartphones is likely to play an important role in the convergence scenario and the ensuing concentration of ownership” (Bhattacharjee & Agrawal, 2018, p. 56). Reliance’s entry into the media arena, building on its ownership of Jio, India’s most prominent mobile and internet provider, raised concerns about the concentration of communication power within a small circle of hugely influential corporates with close connections to the political right, symbolised by the rise of Narendra Modi as the nationalist leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and elected Prime Minister riding the wave of his majoritarian agenda—twice in 2014 and again in 2019 with even bigger majority in the parliament (Yadav & Patnaik, 2022). Three years after Modi’s ascent to power, a major shift of the mainstream TV news towards the majoritarian project occurred with the launch in 2017 of Republic TV, a channel known for its explicit nationalist agenda. Arguably, this very popular network has contributed to redefining Indian identity—championing a majoritarian perspective, ostensibly representing 80% of India’s 1.4 billion people who are Hindus. Moreover, as discussed below, the network has emerged as a key voice for promoting a blatantly anti-minority agenda, specifically targeting India’s 200 million strong Muslim minority (the world’s largest minority population within a country). The network closely identified with its owner-anchor Arnab Goswami unabashedly adopted what has been termed as ‘campaigning frame’, which “declares the news outlet’s stance on a particular issue or cause and typically seeks to galvanize sympathies and support for its intervention, political or otherwise, beyond the world of journalism” (Cottle & Rai, 2008, p. 83). Such framing has been amplified by the growth of the social media which have played a crucial role in the growing polarization of politics in India, as one study noted, ‘social media have facilitated the expression of

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polarized views online’ (Neyazi, 2020, p. 49). It is vital to appreciate the scale of ‘technological churn’ (Mukherjee, 2019) of recent years to understand the impact of this. According to data from Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), by June 2021, there were 834 million internet users in India, making it the world’s second largest internet population after China. However, unlike the ‘closed’ Chinese internet, the Indian one is ‘open’ and therefore more vulnerable to media manipulation and production, circulation, and consumption of fake news, particularly in the rural areas. While the urban subscribers were nearly 497 million, rural Indians were also joining the cyber age—in June 2021 there were 337 million subscribers in the countryside, according to the official figures from TRAI (TRAI, 2021). The usage of social media too has shown extraordinary growth, cutting across rural-urban/rich-poor/male-female divides. By 2021, both Facebook and WhatsApp had their largest audiences in India, and continuously growing. However, despite noting an exponential digital growth, bridging the digital literacy gap remains a work in progress. For example, while urban digital literacy has been recorded at nearly 70%, rural figures have only reached 50%, highlighting one of the reasons behind the spread and consumption of fake news. This connectivity has contributed significantly to promoting the majoritarian agenda in the rural hinterlands too. One scholar sees this quest for what has been called ‘Hindutva 2.0,’ as a Hindu ‘political monotheism,’ an advertised and informational Indian experience of urban normativity. He notes that “in the recent decades with the ushering-in of an informational world and networks of electronic urbanization, the literary-cultural project of Hindu nationalism has undergone fundamental transformations” (Basu, 2020, p. 8). One of the key elements of this nationalist project is anti-Islamic rhetoric, particularly toxic on social media, for example, the notion of ‘love jihad,’ a narrative which accuses young Muslim men of luring Hindu women into fake marriages with the aim of forcefully converting them to Islam and discarding them afterwards (Biswas, 2020). Another relates to the Muslims violating the so-called ‘beef ban’ (“Muslims on India”, 2017). In the majoritarian discourses the claim is made that before Modi took office, previous governments had been ‘appeasing’ the Muslim population as a ‘vote bank’ and the mainstream liberal media was implicitly supporting this. Challenging the hitherto mainstream liberal media discourses, such pro-majoritarian on-line media platforms as Swarajamag.com and OpIndia.

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com (both launched in 2014, after Modi’s victory in the election held earlier in that year) have gained a steady following among the so-called ‘Internet Hindus’ (Chadha & Bhat, 2019, p. 119). A study termed such sites as crucial building blocks of ‘the effort to establish a right-wing ecosystem,’ where these sites, are “coming to constitute a parallel discursive arena where conservative activists are not only able to articulate their core principles, but can also define their own identity, highlight perceived misrepresentations, and develop oppositional discourses challenging what they consider to be a biased mainstream media narrative” (p. 132). Since then, many more digital spaces have emerged—especially on YouTube— where sympathetic journalists and commentators espouse the anti-Muslim agenda to supplement the majoritarian project of the mainstream news media. Such sites are regularly and systematically fed information formulating and disseminating a majoritarian agenda by the BJP’s so-called IT Cell, or the PR machinery which is highly active on social media, with a “vast army of internet operatives to colonise the space,” as one commentator noted (Muralidharan, 2018, p. 441). The BJP—which claims to be the world’s largest political party in terms of membership—has professionally managed campaigning for elections—both nationally and for the states (Yadav & Patnaik, 2022). Apart from the diasporic sympathisers of the majoritarian cause, the IT Cell is increasingly influencing news agendas by providing newsworthy tips and stories at a time when news networks have been facing financial strains. One indication of this is that many networks are drastically cutting news gathering costs and resorting to opinionated ‘news’ content that is cheap and easy to produce and whose aggressive presentation quality may even attract advertising. Many media houses have also resorted to sharp practices in order to squeeze revenue out of ‘news’, including broadcasting advertisements—whether political or corporate—as real news: This phenomenon of so-called ‘Paid News’—also inflicting print journalism and social media—has further undermined the credibility of news media. Fake News As argued above, in the intense, commercialised, ratings-driven 24/7 environment, news channels are facing tremendous pressure to ‘break’ the news instantaneously. With first-hand witnesses sharing information online and politicians circulating press releases on social media, the traditional

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mainstream media have lost their monopoly over ‘breaking news’. Even with the most sophisticated technology and fastest OB (Outside Broadcasting) vans, they no longer have control over being the first to reach the venue of an unfolding story somewhere or experience something. Television news networks are fighting a battle of remaining a relevant information source and because of their dwindling grip over information monopoly, they tend to share information without proper verification: truth is compromised for speed. In a society where people are struggling to keep up with the rise of fake, deep fake, AI, and other technology driven disinformation, it is incumbent upon the responsible media to separate fact from the fiction. Unfortunately, a large section of the media, too, have been found guilty of propagating disinformation and legitimising rumours. According to a report released by the National Crime Records Bureau, India witnessed a 214% rise in fake news cases in 2020 compared to 2019. These figures are based on 1527 registered cases/official complaints filed by people across the country (National Crime Records Bureau, 2021). While the actual numbers including unregistered cases could be manifold, the surge reflects a worrying trend and a far more complex problem than the numbers could encapsulate. For example, the leading Hindi language news channels Aaj Tak was accused of posting fake information during the Sushant Singh Rajput death coverage, described above. Based on a doctored tweet, which claimed that the actor had posted a cryptic message hinting about his mental health condition and intentions of ending his life, the news channel shared the information on its social media pages. Later, the channel retracted the post and took down the news article based on the fake tweet (Chowdhury, 2020). During the first wave of Covid 19 pandemic in India in 2020, online platforms were used to demonise minorities and hate campaigns were launched against them which had serious social and economic consequences (Menon, 2020). A popular Hindi language news channel— TV9 Bharatvarsh (owned by TV9 Network)—claimed that a mysterious virus found in tomatoes in the Indian state of Maharashtra was a more dangerous variant of Covid 19 triggering panic among people (Chowdhury, 2020). Another instance that exposes a lack of basic fact-checking and the rush to sensationalise information in a country whose religious fault lines are well-known, was the issue of an alleged ‘rate card’ shared on India’s leading English language news channel—Times Now (owned by The Times of

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India Group). On one of his debate shows, Rahul Shiv Shankar, the editor-­in-chief of the news channel, shared a fake ‘rate card’ that claimed to have different reward rates for converting Hindus to Islam. Later it was found that the photoshopped image had been doing rounds on WhatsApp and the news channel had fallen prey to conspiracy theories related to religious conversions (Jawed, 2018). These are just some of the examples that question the due diligence done by mainstream media organisations before publishing such stories. The consequences of such perfunctory journalistic practises have proven grave at times. As a result, large sections of mainstream journalism in India—especially televisual media—appear to be preoccupied with either infotainment or partisan political coverage legitimising a majoritarian project (Neyazi, 2018). This politically polarized, domestically-oriented and hyper-­ commercial media has not contributed to India’s voice being heard at international arena. Indeed, it has given the country a bad press, especially among the influential US-dominated global media.

Indian Media in the Global News Space As a major economic and cultural power, Indian voices are increasingly visible in the global communicative space, as more and more Indians are going online, producing, distributing, and consuming news, especially using their skills in the English language, the vehicle for global communication and commerce (Arora, 2019). However, unlike India’s commercial film industry—which has a global presence for many decades and arguably a soft power role, especially among many developing countries—Indian news and current affairs continue to be largely absent in the global news arena, in an era when news media are a key instrument of public diplomacy. Despite ambitions for a global role for India as a civilizational power, it is the only major country whose national broadcaster is not available in the important capitals of the world: the external service of Doordarshan, DD World, launched in 1995 and now called DD India, has very limited international viewership. A report about global Doordarshan noted, ‘Foreign policy is important, and the world wants to know what the Indian government has to say on a wide range of issues. So far, India’s foreign policy and its communication have been reticent’ (Lakshman, 2014: 5). This is unfortunate, given that India is one of the world’s largest English-language news markets and when English-language 24/7 news networks emanating from major non-English speaking countries such as

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China (CGTN), Russia (RT), Qatar (Al Jazeera English), Iran (Press TV), France (France 24), Germany (DW News) and Turkey (TRT-News), are widely distributed around the world. All these are state broadcasters and are perceived as such by international viewers, providing their own perspectives on and narratives of global affairs, while the Indian state broadcaster—the second largest in the world after CCTV in China—remains notably absent in global news space. Although such major private English-­ language news networks as NDTV 24x7, CNN-News 18 (A collaboration between Reliance-owned News 18 and CNN), India Today TV, Republic TV, Times Now and WION (World is One News—part of the Zee network) are available globally, their focus has remained on diasporic audiences, though their web presence is growing both nationally and internationally. As a result, the capacity to communicate Indian perspectives on international affairs to a globalized audience is extremely limited, despite having a vibrant media and a well-established tradition of English language media. The Times of India, one of the country’s oldest daily newspapers, was set up in 1838, indicating that generations of educated Indians have worked within an English-language and a democratic media environment. In the post-independence phase, India played a crucial role in articulating demands for a fairer and more balanced flow of information (championing what was then called the ‘Third World’), leading to the 1970s debates within UNESCO about the creation of a New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO), which brought the global South, albeit briefly, into the global communication discourse. Ethical issues were central to the NWICO debates which broadened the definition of media ethics within a larger framework of national development and demands for a fairer media representation of the developing world within a Western-­ dominated international media system (MacBride, 1980; Thussu, 2019). One area where India could make an important difference is in the field of development journalism. India was the first in the world to use satellite television for educational and developmental purposes, through its 1975 SITE (Satellite Instructional Television Experiment) programme (Thussu, 2019). Under its ambitious National Optical Fibre Network project, the world’s largest rural broadband project, India has connected most of its 250,000 village councils with high-speed internet ‘to deliver government services online’. The share of Indians with a digital financial account ‘has more than doubled since 2011, to 80 per cent, thanks in large part to the more than 332 million people who opened mobile phone-based accounts

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under the government’s mass financial-inclusion programme’ (McKinsey Global Institute, 2019: 1). These ‘internet-driven changes, especially for India’s poor will reshape not only India, but, eventually, the global order,’ notes one commentator (Agrawal, 2018: 8). India was one of the handful of countries which developed its own vaccine to combat Covid-19 pandemic, apart from being the world’s largest vaccine producer, making these and other life-saving medicines for global companies and earning the name of the world’s pharmacy. In information technology field too, India has a great deal to offer, especially to the global South. Domestically, it could be argued, that popularizing news and current affairs may have the potential to liberate and to introduce a more democratic character. But is the apparent media plurality contributing to a democratic deficit in the world’s largest democracy? Indians take justified pride in their democracy, arguing that it has helped India’s creative and cultural blossoming. It is no mean achievement that a deeply unequal and undemocratic society, with its pronounced caste and class distinctions, has emerged arguably as the world’s most ‘argumentative’ multi-party democracy (Sen, 2005). This multilingual and often noisy argumentation has been sustained by one of the freest and fiercest media systems in the global South. A federal democratic structure and a constitution that ensures freedom of expression and linguistic, religious, and cultural pluralism, has been crucial for the growth of media in India’s national languages. Though English remains the link language—of higher courts, bureaucracy, and higher education—Hindi, with its regional variations, is most widely spoken (Ninan, 2007). Unsurprisingly, Hindi-­ language media dominate; but as regional parties have gained ground at the national level, audience figures for media use in India’s regional languages have also soared. One reason for this impressive growth is that, in the past two decades, India’s literacy rate has grown steadily from 52 to 74%. In radio too, there has been a proliferation of programming and perspectives: the number of community radio stations in 2021 was at 333 while the number of private FM radio stations (excluding All India Radio) stood at 384 (TRAI, 2021). The resultant freedom has democratised public discourse as a multiplicity of media outlets has enabled citizens to access a wider range of information and analysis, curtailing the government’s capacity to control and manage information and thus influence the media agenda. The transformation of television news, especially, has widened the public sphere. From electoral politics to economy, to social and cultural issues, news media,

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especially televisual media could play a major role in shaping public opinion, in a country where nearly 25 per cent of the population remains illiterate. Beyond India, a development-oriented media discourse could also contribute to a more equitable and just world information order. Castells has argued that ‘power is primarily exercised by the construction of meaning in the human mind through processes of communication enacted in global/local multimedia networks of mass communication, including mass self-communication’ (Castells, 2009: 416). Will the communication power of the rising billions provide an alternative voice on issues affecting contemporary life—from fighting a global pandemic to environmental degradation to debt crisis and the threat of extremist politics? India could be an important voice in articulating Southern viewpoints in global forums like UNESCO, International Telecommunication Union and World Trade Organization on such contested issues as sustainable development, climate change, multiculturalism, safeguarding of media plurality and intellectual property rights in the digital environment. However, such lofty and ethical considerations are often in stark contradiction with the dominant tendencies of a media system increasingly hostage to excessive marketization, where infotainment rules, fake and false information sells, and polarization defines politics.

References Agrawal, R. (2018). India connected: How the smartphone is transforming the world's largest democracy. Oxford University Press. Ananth, V. (2020, October 14). The strange, sometimes sinister conspiracy theories on Sushant Singh Rajput’s death that flourished on social media. The Economic Times. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/internet/the-­ strange-­s ometimes-­s inister-­c onspiracy-­t heories-­o n-­s ushant-­s ingh-­r ajputs-­ death-­that-­flourished-­on-­social-­media/articleshow/78636570.cms?from=mdr Arora, P. (2019). The next billion users. Harvard University Press. Bajpai, S. (2020, August 6). Aatma, autopsy, jadu—After Ayodhya, TV news went right back to magnificent Sushant obsession. The Print. https://theprint.in/ o p i n i o n / t e l e s c o p e / a a t m a -­a u t o p s y -­j a d u -­a f t e r -­a y o d h y a -­t v news-­went-­back-­to-­sushant-­obsession/475858/ Basu, A. (2020). Hindutva as political monotheism. Duke University Press. Bhattacharjee, A. (1972). The Indian Press – Profession to industry. Vikas. Bhattacharjee, A., & Agrawal, A. (2018). Mapping the power of major media companies in India. Economic and Political Weekly, 53(29), 48–57.

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CHAPTER 7

Social Media, Television News and Protest Participation: A Post-Soviet Media Culture Oxana Onilov

Introduction Over the last decades, the growing use of social media for social movements and protest participation has generated intense academic debates about its potentially democratising effect (Bennett & Segerberg, 2013; Castells, 2015; Della Porta & Mosca, 2005; Langman, 2005). However, the mixed evidence, at the best, is moving the discourse of revolutionary or over pessimistic claims to more nuanced approaches. These acknowledge that social media usage is endogenous to an amalgam of political, social and economic factors (Fuchs, 2012, 2017) and these contextual factors determine who have access to, who can use, who uses, why, and who benefits from social media. It is not social media by itself but the context that will mediate the relationship between social media use and political participation.

O. Onilov (*) Faculty of Arts, School of Communication, Sydney, NSW, Australia e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_7

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Regardless of the findings related to the impact of social media on protest, it is important to note that most of these studies have been conducted in the context of consolidated Western democracies (Boulianne, 2017), with another large number concerned with recent uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa region. Valenzuela (2013) concurs that “most data on social media and protest behaviour have been collected in either mature democracies or authoritarian regimes, leaving aside the special case of third wave democracies” (921). The post-Soviet space, which is the focus of this chapter, is a representative of the third-wave democracies and remains one of the least-researched regions. To address this gap and accumulate more evidence on the actual impact of social media tools on protest participation, this study examines how a post-Soviet media culture influenced the use of social media for protest participation. So, what is the contribution of social media in contexts where the major share of socio-political sources of news still belongs to traditional media, which is trusted very little? What role can social media have when media displays state paternalism and clientelism features and the individual internet use, though relatively uncensored, is still characterised by an intergenerational digital divide? Answers to these questions is provided through the case of the 2015 anti-government protests that took place in the post-­ Soviet Moldova. The protests, the largest since Moldova’s independence, were triggered by a banking scandal that robbed the country of one eighth of its GDP, 1 billion US dollars. These protests make for an interesting case study of whether social media use may reveal its potential in the mobilisation of a protest movement in the context where most of the Moldovan mainstream media was owned by the politicians involved in the theft and protested against.

Social Media and Protest Participation A growing body of literature underlines how activists and protesters around the world use social media platforms to sustain their political movements (Bennett & Segerberg, 2011; Della Porta & Mosca, 2005; Garrett, 2006; Langman, 2005; McCaughey & Ayers, 2013; Van De Donk et al., 2004). The questions being asked over the years is whether social media can really facilitate protest participation and thus, enhance democratic development. On the one hand, scholars argue that the communicative autonomy afforded by the internet is the new form of power, and that social movements born, conveyed and based on the internet

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allow citizens to “watch the powerful” (Castells, 2009: 413) and create, distribute and receive content beyond the accredited knowledge. Some scholars go further and emphasise “media frenzy movements” (Sorkin, 2012) such as Twitter revolutions that can be synonymised with quests for more democracy and freedom (Shirky, 2011) that can even “result in regime change” (Breuer & Groshek, 2014: 32). On the other hand, there are scholars who focus mainly on the dystopian side of social media. The focus here is on the use of social media as a tool of control and repression (Christensen, 2011; Howard et  al., 2011; Morozov, 2012). Authorities use social media to block, distort and control the online flow of information (Christensen, 2011; Gainous et al., 2018) in an attempt to consolidate their power. A third camp is more moderate and highlight the reinforcing effect of social media on participation (Calenda & Mosca, 2007; Kim, 2006; Norris, 2002; Oates, 2013). Murthy (2013) for instance concluded that Twitter did not cause the Egyptian Arab Spring revolution nor was it irrelevant since it played several practical roles, such as access to real-time information, a means to reach the diaspora and international journalists and a practical tool for organisation. In the case of the Ukrainian Euromaidan, although social media played a crucial role in building the protest (Tucker et al., 2015) by connecting creative ideas and putting up posters and slogans, by facilitating the collection of financial support for the movement (Bohdanova, 2014), and by offering access to resources such as legal support, medical services and transportation (Tucker et al., 2015), it was not in itself mobilising. Onuch et al. (2021) showed that Ukrainians’ media consumption culture, that is heavily reliance on television was significantly associated with protest mobilisation while social media not noticeably. Hence, over the recent years, the debate has moved over hyperbolic claims to more ambivalent, and nuanced approaches. Participation at protests cannot be ascribed solely to technology, since this represents a contextualised phenomenon and claiming otherwise would mean having to explain complex social relations through “the fetishism of things”, as Fuchs (2012: 386) argues. Technology is embedded in society (Fuchs, 2012, 2017) and “those traditional social, political, and economic arrangements remain the meaningful catalyst for social movements and not the new tools of social media” by themselves (Morozov, 2012: 339). If claims of impact are to be made, these need to be situated within a serious and critical assessment of limitations (Kidd & McIntosh, 2016) and broader contexts.

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More specifically, factors such as digital divides, media systems, institutional settings (Anduiza et  al., 2012), political regimes (Gainous et  al., 2015; Kirkizh & Koltsova, 2021), personality traits (Kim et  al., 2013), interest in politics, ties built online (Valenzuela et al., 2018) or the nature of social media use (Boulianne, 2017; Casteltrione, 2015; Kim et  al., 2013) mediate the impact of social media on political engagement. The informational effect of social media might be more pronounced in countries without a free and independent press (Boulianne, 2017), while political debate may occur more in a context where this is not encouraged or allowed (Diamond, 2010; McGarty et  al., 2014; Shirky, 2011; Skoric et al., 2016). A look at the post-Soviet space shows that in Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan, internet and online media are considered alternatives to controlled and co-opted media systems (Oates, 2013; Oates & Lokot, 2013). During the protests against the disputed Russian Duma elections of 2011, online information “empowered citizens in specific ways that the Kremlin apparently finds hard to understand, much less to co-opt or control through its traditional way of dealing with Russian citizens” (Oates, 2013: 166). Nevertheless, the degree to which social media becomes an alternative also depends on the type of social media platform used. In the same Russian context, Western platforms like Twitter and Facebook increased awareness of electoral fraud while Russian platforms such as Vkontankte and Odnoklassniki did not (Reuter & Szakonyi, 2015). The digital divide is another crucial factor that will mediate the extent to which social media can influence protest participation. Not all people are likely to benefit equally from the affordances created by the internet and social media (DiMaggio et al., 2004; Hargittai, 2002, 2010; Hoffmann & Lutz, 2021; Van Dijk, 2006). Vitak et al. (2011) highlights the need to understand the scope and nature of digital divides in political participation to fully grasp whether internet and social media can create access to resources for the wider public. This chapter, therefore, explores how social, political and media factors mediate the potential of social media for participation. Moldovan media is a post-Soviet hybrid system that is determined by old state paternalistic traditions and a strive for Western values. The major share of socio-­political sources of news still belongs to television. When the protests started in 2015, the greatest part of media was politically monopolised and those who owned media companies were some of the corrupt politicians involved in the banking scam and protested against. Yet, this dominant position,

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has started to be challenged by digital and social media. The online environment is one of the few spaces relatively free and unregulated that could hold the most promise for a shift towards a more politically involved society, although its use is mainly characterising the young generations. Before delving into the question of how the Moldovan media culture shaped the use of social media for protest participation, the following sections explore the background of the anti-government protests of 2015 and the general media landscape.

Moldovan Anti-government Protests of 2015 The analysis of social media potential for protest participation was based on the case of the Moldovan anti-government protests of 2015. Moldova, a post-Soviet Eastern European country has been facing a rapid monopolisation of power in the hands of a few wealthy businessmen and politicians (Całus, 2015a, 2016; Cenușă, 2016; Konończuk et  al., 2017; Popșoi, 2016). These same people are associated with the orchestration of the bank fraud (Anticoruptie.md, 2016; Barbăroșie, 2015), the main event that triggered the protests in the country. During 2012–2014, three Moldovan banks gave loans to a number of companies and individuals connected to different politicians and businessmen (Kroll, 2015). The money was subsequently transferred out of Moldova into offshore bank accounts (Bird & Cotrut, 2016; Radu et  al., 2015). The state urgently bailed out the looted banks resulting in a one billion US-dollar hole in the public finances, the equivalent of an eighth of the country’s GDP (Sandut ̦a, 2017; Sandut ̦a & Preașca, 2016). The bank embezzlement scandal coincided with the worsening economic situation and the period of the corrupt ruling government and led to the largest protests since Moldova’s independence. A group of lawyers, journalists, analysts, and public figures created a grass-roots campaign and organised protests amid the corruption scandal. Various protests, flash mobs and sit-ins were organised during the year, attracting protesters of all ages, occupations, and political orientations from all over the country. After the protests, the country witnessed significant changes that brought the organisers and activists of the protests into politics and the parliament. However, even though many high-ranking officials were dismissed by the newly formed government or resigned themselves (Barbăroșie, 2019; Călugăreanu, 2019) and the central bank started to prepare legal actions to recover the stolen one billion dollars, as

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of the time of writing this chapter, the money hasn’t been recuperated yet. To better understand the potential of social media for protest participation, the following section situates this case study into the general media culture of the country.

Moldovan Media Culture and Links to Politics Moldovan media has a Soviet past, that is a past dominated by ideology and propaganda. Although after independence, Moldova enthusiastically tried to copy Western media values and liberate media from the top-down Soviet system, whatever media and advertising laws or press freedom was achieved was accompanied by old rituals of an intertwined relationship among politicians, new media owners, journalists, and audiences (McCormack, 1999). Transformations in media turned out to be more of a “democratic civic masquerade” (Gross, 2004: 113), “imitations” (Splichal, 2001) than sustainable changes. In these thirty years of Moldova’s independence, the relationship between the media and the state has been described as “incestuous” (Gonţa, 2021). The first years after the independence, the weak and fragmented party and state, weak civil society and the “traumatic economic downfall” (Tudoroiu, 2011) dampened the media freedom initiatives and led to a very chaotic development. Politicians continued to use media as a “resource for legitimacy and political influence, ignoring the real public interest” (Moraru, 2001). The chaos and disillusionment associated with the first independent rulers and Soviet nostalgia gave way to the installation of a communist government in 2001. For the next eight years, Moldova was governed by a “neo-communist” regime “representing an effort to mirror the totalitarian past”, as Tudoroiu (2011: 240) argued. The media mirrored the new government and became monopolised by the Party of Communists. After two terms and violent protests, the Communist party was removed from power in 2009 and replaced by loose coalitions of anti-communists calling themselves pro-Europeans. Although every new government emerged as a new hope for Moldova’s stability, the pro-European politicians (2009–2015) brought Moldova into the gravest political and economic instability. Oligarchs and businessmen-turned-politicians engaged in a fierce competition over the control of the state institutions, media, and the country faced a continuing increase in corruption and abuse of power, with all signs of state capture (Tudoroiu, 2015).

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Moldovan press had succumbed to a “strident oligarchization and politicization” (Litra, 2016: 7). The murky terrain surrounding media ownership cleared out only in 2015 when the law on media ownership transparency voted by the parliament revealed that the media was heavily concentrated in the hands of politicians and oligarchs with political connections (Cebotari, 2015). When the protests started, 70% of Moldova’s TV market was owned by just one politician, Vlad Plahotniuc, the oligarchic chairman of the Party of Democrats, and the remaining 30% was spread among other politicians (Gogu, 2016; Nani, 2015). Vlad Plahotniuc was considered the real decision-maker of the Moldovan political scene. Besides, he and the people from his entourage had been associated with the orchestration of the bank fraud (Anticoruptie.md, 2016; Całus, 2015b; Sandut ̦a, 2017; Sandut ̦a & Preașca, 2016). Therefore, the press became a strong political instrument that carried stories based on the orders of the political parties and oligarchs that funded it. It also prepared public opinion for disputable government actions; legitimised or distracted the public’s attention with irrelevant content; denigrated the opposition; and propagated the image of a prosperous Moldova with an efficient government that would fight corruption (Macovei et al., 2017). Such media systems are described as displaying “state paternalism” and “political clientelism” (Jakubowicz, 2007: 304). This ownership structure affected the pluralism of opinions in Moldova and led to “a near-monopoly on public opinion” (Vitalie Călugăreanu as cited in Gogu, 2016), especially when television was and continues to be the most popular medium in the country. In 2015, when the protests started, almost 70% of the Moldovan population were using television daily as their primary source of socio-political news (Cărăuş & Godarsky, 2015). Among the four most-watched TV channels, the state-owned public television channel Moldova 1 had 53% of the total viewership. The next two—Prime TV and Publika TV, with 52% and 42% of the viewership respectively—belonged to Vlad Plahotiuc. Jurnal TV, owned by a fugitive businessman, followed closely with 50%, and was the only TV channel that openly supported the protests. As of 2020, oligarchic control over prominent news outlets, politicised, unstable and underdeveloped regulation, cases of intimidation and harassment of journalists and hostile treatment for the independent press are still the norm in the country (Freedom House, 2020). Hence, Moldova, as many post-Soviet member states has “a number of features of a non-Western/non-European nature” (Vartanova, 2012).

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This includes “the existence of a state-market complex and its significant influence on media, formal and informal links between political or integrated political/economic elites and journalists, […] tolerance on the part of audiences to an instrumental use of media by the state and political clans, and a paternalistic culture of media management” (Vartanova, 2012: 140). Low trust in media and a simultaneous acceptance that media is an essential part of the power is the contradiction that governs the relationship between Moldovan people and the media.

Social Media Use in Moldova How did the context of corrupt political elites who control media market influence the use of social media use for protest participation? Could social media use bypass the near media monopoly and carry out its potential to engage people in offline protest participation? This question becomes relevant when online media is becoming the quickest source of information for Moldovan citizens and serve as an incentive for TV, newspapers and radio stations to create their online pages. Approximately 60% of the population had internet access by the end of 2015 and 51% used it daily (Gramatic, 2015). The internet added diversity in the news coverage and became the most important source of information for 20% of the population (Gramatic, 2015). Nevertheless, this group is made up of active young people (Cărăuş & Godarsky, 2015). One of the main reasons to go online has been the manipulative power of the mainstream media (Macovei et al., 2017). The online space is relatively open in terms of internet freedom and censorship (United States Department of State, 2015). Social media platforms are also widely used. In 2015, the platform most associated with protests and the second most used in country was Facebook, which as of 2022 is number one in terms of users. It is important to note that by the end of the first year of the protests there was a 33% growth of new Facebook accounts in Moldova (Gramatic, 2017). Although it cannot be argued that this growth is exclusively the result of Facebook being related with the protests, some of the interviewed participants mentioned that they created their Facebook accounts to learn more and keep updated with the progress of the events. Besides, Facebook became a frequently quoted source of information in mainstream news, usually in the few independent or protest-supportive channels. This occurred because Facebook figured prominently as a mobilising tool, a place to express dissent and build the protest organising team. It is also

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important to note that Facebook use is representative of the young cohort, with 64% of the total number of users situated in the age group of 18 to 34 years (Gramatic, 2015). Another reason why this study focuses on social media is that already in 2009 when Moldova had less than 100 Twitter users, its use became significant during the post-election anti-communist protests of 2009. The protests were dubbed “Moldovan Twitter Revolution” (Morozov, 2009a, 2009b, 2009c), which emphasises the fact that there is promising potential of social media influence on participation. Although this label seems exaggerated because at the time there were less than 100 Twitter users in Moldova, Lysenko and Desouza (2012) argue that social media use became significant because of its simultaneous use with other new media and mobile technologies.

Methodology This chapter is based on a larger study that employed both surveys and interviews with protest participants. First, data were collected through an online survey to identify the portrait of the typical protester, their general media use and the roles Facebook played for participation. Second, survey was used to provide a pool of potential contacts for qualitative interviews with protesters. The outcomes of these interviews are analysed and discussed in this chapter. A total of 20 semi-structured interviews were conducted with protesters, activists and organisers of the protest events. The interview questionnaire was divided into different but interrelated thematic sections and it revolved around participants’ reasons and motivations for protesting, protest-related use of different media channels, their assessment of the quality of protest related information on those channels, the use and potential impact of Facebook on offline participation. The textual data of interviews were analysed using a top-down thematic analysis (Boyatzis, 1998; Bulmer, 1979). This means that themes came from the characteristics of the topic, the researcher’s theoretical orientation and the established definitions of the main concepts mentioned in the literature review. The familiarisation with data started with the transcription of interviews and consequent repeated reading of them. The second step was the generation of initial codes that were sorted into potential themes. These comprised 35 broad categories that included types of online activities participants engaged in; ways and reasons for using Facebook; interaction

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with online ties; protest participation and protesters’ use of television and the quality of its news; offline relationships, etc. After the themes were identified, they were refined, defined and named. This helped to delineate what a theme was about and what aspect of the data each theme captured. It is important to note that the analysis implied a constant move throughout the phases, and so it was first coded manually; then, to facilitate organisation, the computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software NVivo was used. This allowed for a smoother process of looking for patterns of codes and links between codes across the data.

The New Vanguard: Facebook and the Young Post-Soviet Generation The analysis of the 20 interviews suggest that the effect of Facebook use on participation was in great part limited to a young post-Soviet cohort that also represented the smallest age group of protest participants. First, a combination of analysis and discussion explores why the young turned to social media and second, it describes why interviewees believe that Facebook use describes a post-Soviet cohort. Facebook, an Alternative Source According to the interviewed participants, the main contribution of Facebook consisted in being a source of mobilising, novel, and alternative information. Participants explained that the “bought, politically affiliated” (ID13), “captured” (ID9, ID11), “controlled” (ID4, ID16), “non-­ existent” and “not free” (ID1, ID20) traditional media created the need to look for a space with alternative information. And Facebook provided that space. The interviewed participants described their online interactions as giving them access to “objective” (ID7); “new”, “unknown to me”, “out of my circle of friends” (ID17), “depoliticized”, “alternative” (ID11), “unaltered information” (IID1) when compared to the main traditional media channels. One participant even claimed that: Facebook is theoretically the only free space we have so far. Ninety per cent of media is already in favour of power and they are not impartial at all (ID20).

Another participant described Facebook as a “solution to overcome propaganda” (ID20) because of the flow of alternative information. Although

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many claimed to follow different traditional media outlets through their Facebook pages to gain authorities’ perspectives, the amalgam of sources coming from various news portals, public figures and thousands of protest participants helped to challenge the truth of those in power. It also facilitated the creation and distribution of more nonconformist information that allowed protesters to enter a more pluralistic form of debate. These arguments are consistent with several research works that emphasise the pronounced effect of social media in relatively closed or authoritarian regimes, where the online public sphere creates opportunities otherwise lacking for dissenting voices to be heard (Diamond, 2010; McGarty et al., 2014; Shirky, 2011). If social media is important in Western democracies, in countries without a free and independent media it might be even more important, as argued by Boulianne (2018). However, this privileged access to alternative information as one participant put it, mainly characterised a young digitally literate cohort. All interviewed participants claimed that Facebook’s role in protest participation was limited to the young people since they are the heaviest users of social media. Facebook is used by active people, 12–40-year-old, tech-savvy, informed people and for them Facebook had definitely played an important role for mobilisation. The rest are watching TV (ID16) Look, I think we can divide people by age. For middle-aged people the main source was television; this is the reality. My mother, she is not even 50 but her main sources of information are television and me, and I do inform myself from Facebook (ID15).

The fact that social media use is concentrated among young people has influenced the direction of many studies that focused on the relationship of social media and political participation, with a specific emphasis on the young people (Bennett, 2008; Bode, 2012; Conroy et al., 2012; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012; Scherman & Rivera, 2021; Valenzuela et al., 2014; Xenos et al., 2014). The impact of social media on political participation is particularly accentuated in the younger generation since they are more likely to get exposed to deliberate and incidental political news and thus more likely to obtain the benefits from it (Shah et al., 2001; Skoric et al., 2009) and eventually increase their political engagement (Bode, 2017).

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Facebook and the Post-Soviet Young Generation Apart from the fact that Facebook users were characterised as representing the young layer of the Moldovan society, they were described as curious, the “most informed” and “knowledgeable” by some respondents (ID6, ID15, ID20). Having access to internet and being digitally literate was regarded as important conditions to get access to alternative, “less manipulated information” (ID6, ID15) as several participants described it. Two of the activists and several protesters described a “Facebook generation” that has a “strong civic spirit” (ID11) and understood “the importance of civic duty” (ID7, ID9, ID10, ID16). This cohort has also been described as belonging to a post-Soviet generation. These are people who had to deal with a Soviet legacy indirectly through their parents and grandparents. And although they inherited many attitudinal and behavioural patterns from their family, they have been exposed to a more democratic world than their parents. Two participants described this generation as follows: We live in a different regime now, different from the one our parents grew in … we know that we have the right to express our opinions and the right to many other freedoms … to bring change. People under 35 understand this; those over are not confident that change can happen. (ID4) We have visions on how Moldova should like in the future and [the young] want to affirm themselves. (ID11)

These conclusions are consistent with a study conducted by Cărăuş and Godarsky (2015), who argue that internet in Moldova is used by young “as an empowering tool” and for its “genuine news” (Cărăuş & Godarsky, 2015, p.  48). Large numbers of these young people aspire towards a Western model of democracy. The second theme that emerged in relation to the young Facebook users as belonging to the post-Soviet group is the fact that they seemed more open to trust and likely to rely on knowledge outside of their immediate circle of friends. This was put in comparison with their parents, the Soviet generation who were more likely to interact and trust their close friends and family members where the information was moving in a circuit of overlapping friends. This can be explained in terms of the social capital that each age cohort developed, or type of ties people interact mostly with.

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Moldova, as many post-Soviet countries is characterised by having a high level of bonding social capital which means that Moldovan people are still characterised by putting a strong emphasis on private ties and having a short radius of trust that spreads among close friends and families (Howard, 2003; Lasinska, 2013). Bridging social capital or trust in public forms of interactions and relationships with weak ties “friend-of-a-friend type of relationships” is still low in Moldova and explained by institutional mistrust, a persistent Soviet heritage. Therefore, the older generation was still described as having a strong bonding social capital, while the young, apart from the interaction with bonding ties were also more open to build bridging ties. Therefore, for the young, those tightly knit offline relationships “impeded the circulation of unconventional protest information” (ID12) and social media helped to bypass this hindrance as one participant underlined. I used Facebook to meet new people, people with whom I share many interests, fascinating people. I met them later at the protests, and we continue to meet even now to get to know each other better; we like to engage in debates. … By interacting with new people online, I have access to new and interesting information. As for the people I already know, there is not much to learn; we know each other very well already. (ID12)

Nevertheless, political apathy among the young is considered in decline in more established democracies (Henn et al., 2002; Zukin et al., 2006), not to mention the post-Soviet countries where political participation has always been considered low. Several interviewed participants confirmed that the young were the dominant users of Facebook but the smallest age group of protest participants. They described the young as passive, and some emphasised how ‘slacktivist’ they were. However, several of the interviewed activists, linked the small number of young protesters to emigration—the young being the largest group of Moldovans who are migrating—and not to political indifference. One activist stated that the protesters of 2015 were a representative sample of the actual demographic situation in the country: This is a very important thing I want to emphasise. I participated at all protests and television often subjectively was claiming that only old people participated. No, it is not like that. There were young people and old people,

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people who were 30 years old and 60 years old. People of all ages participated, participants reflected our society […] because we now have few young people in Moldova, and if it is to take proportionally who is in the country and who came to the protests, it shows the real situation of the country.

This argument is supported by official data, which emphasise the fact that in 2018, young people (18 to 35) represented 30% of the stable population in the country (Consiliul Nat ̦ional al Tineretului din Moldova, 2019). Another activist, ID11, perceived migration as also bringing benefits: “being exposed to different cultures helped the young understand what it means to be a responsible citizen” and “[those] who studied abroad, they returned home and want to share their experiences”. Although many research participants concurred that the young people were the smallest age group at protests, they acknowledged the importance of their participation. One of the activists claimed that those who participated were of an “exceptional quality with their own political visions” (ID11), other participants described the young as having a “strong civic spirit” (ID9, ID11) and “a lucid mind” (ID15). Credit was also given to the young for organising the first protests and setting the start and base of future events. Well, you cannot say that the young are very indifferent, it was the young who started the protests (ID5). The protests were born on Facebook (ID10).

All in all, the findings that emerge from this analysis indicate the significance of Facebook for protest participation almost exclusively describes a young cohort, therefore these findings cannot be generalised to the larger public. Nevertheless, though Facebook had a small impact on protest participation, in a country with a monopolised media culture, Facebook promised to become a favourable environment to help young people embrace democratic values and become more receptive to different opinions and non-orthodox knowledge. The literature emphasises how new forms of participation are taking form around the world, how the young are the most prone to changes and hopes are put out on new media to revitalise political and civic participation (Banaji & Buckingham, 2013; Sloam, 2014; Sveningsson, 2014). Bennett et  al. (2011) for example,

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acknowledge that young people’s political participation today is rather defined by peer content sharing and social media use, and not so much by the models of political and civic participation of earlier generations. Earlier generations and their protest-related media consumption patterns are analysed and discussed in the next section.

Television and the Soviet Generation The focus of this study was the impact of social media on protest participation, nevertheless, the significance of television journalism and offline ties was a continuous thematic thread throughout the interviews and two paramount factors that influenced participation. Although, there is very low trust in mainstream journalism in general and people talk of a captured media, its use and impact for protest remained significant, as protesters claimed. However, protesters referred to different media outlets when pointing out “low trust” and “significant”. On the one hand, there was the captured media and participants openly or indirectly referred to politicians and notorious businessmen as the ones who stayed behind their editorial policies. They affirmed that propaganda, misinformation and lies were common guests of their TV channel news. A recurring key theme related to protest representation that emerged from interviews was that of disparagement. First, news on the controlled media often minimised the number of protesters, trivialised protesters’ claims and goals, underestimated the leaders of the movement and framed the protests as “pretentious” (ID5), “provoking” (ID8, ID9, ID11, ID19), “a frozen conflict” (ID1), “coup” (ID12), “chaos” (ID12), “anarchy” (ID12), “populist movement” (ID14) or a movement that would bring “disintegration” (ID11), thus speculating on foreseen violence. One protester compared the denigration on television with “media lynching”. He added: They were throwing dirt on participants and their demands. Every authoritarian regime tries to denigrate the opposition and this happened with us too. If before regimes were trying to silence the opposition through terror, now they are doing it through manipulation in media, it is all about media lynching (ID16).

Research studies found that social movements that challenge the status quo are identified as deviant and their legitimacy undermined (Gitlin,

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1980; McLeod & Hertog, 1992; Shoemaker, 1984), exactly as it happened in the media coverage of the Moldovan protests. On the other hand, when protesters referred to the great significance of television for the movement, most of them referred to a particular television channel and mainly JurnalTV. However, JurnalTV was owned and financed by another controversial businessman and former politician who was described as leading an “anti-government policy” (ID7, ID14). Despite these allegations, because JurnalTV became the main supporter of the protest and its leaders, it came to be perceived as very significant for protest participation. Participants said that most of its TV shows and informational programs in 2015 revolved around protests and the corrupt politicians involved in the banking scam. JurnalTV’s shows and news were directed to promote the protest events and its participants, to reflect every activity of the protesters, to offer mobilisation information and to call for participation. The live broadcasting of protests and the involvement of some of JurnalTV’s journalists in the protesting events gave more integrity to this channel, according to some interviewed participants. The respondents regarded the information from JurnalTV as “credible” (ID19), “impartial” (ID1, ID4, ID6, ID11, ID15), “trustworthy” (ID1, ID3, ID7) and “motivational” (ID10, ID12, ID15). They claimed that JurnalTV was “promoting an anti-government policy” (ID4, ID7) in a “constructive manner” (ID7) and the framing of the movement as “honest citizens who have a common cause and resistance” (ID3) motivated participation. This finding also led participants to ascribe the impact of television to middle-aged and elderly people and therefore a Soviet generation. They included their parents, grandparents and friends born in the Soviet Union or those who spent most years of their lives during communist times. Protesters claimed: The impact? Of course television. Currently in Moldova, TV has a bigger impact than Facebook and other media. The grannies from the countryside, north, south—they do not all have internet. That’s the real situation for people with a more Soviet thinking (ID3). For middle-aged people, the main instrument was TV; that is incontestable. … many people watch JurnalTV now and they learned about the theft and who was involved from there. That motivated people. The first source

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for older people was TV definitely; polls show this too … people of third age, they do not use social media, they watch television (ID16).

Despite acknowledging that the media were partisan, even the one supportive of protests, many people kept using television as their primary source of political news. One participant explained it as follows “it is about habit, people watch what they have access to the most, many people are used to propaganda” (ID4). This was explained in terms of Moldovans’ tolerance to a subordination of media to the state. Although the growing political use of new media fuelled a plethora of research that exclusively focus on social media, television continues to be related to the political mobilisation of “ordinary” citizens as several studies showed (Beissinger et al., 2015; Boyle & Schmierbach, 2009; Onuch et al., 2021).

Blending the New and Old? Although the Soviet generation is characterised as the heaviest users of television and non-users of social media, they could still learn what was happening on social media. A great number of interviewees argued that protest supportive television news would constantly cover what was happening online, what “people talked on the internet about” (ID7), quote activists and organisers’ messages on Facebook and share mobilising information of future protests. On the other side, active Facebook users would follow television news through their counterpart Facebook pages. This speaks of a circular flow of information that connects the old and the new media. This interrelationship between the new and the old allows us to treat media from an integrative point of view and as moving. It amalgamates the logics of traditional and social media that operated simultaneously (Chadwick, 2013): two “interpenetrating communication flows” (Cottle, 2011: 652). These two modes of information dissemination collaborated and thus the young, active users of social media would learn how traditional media covered the protesting events through Facebook, and the older people—the main audience of mainstream media—would learn how protests were depicted online, since television often would integrate and rely on social media in the coverage of the protests. Besides and most significantly, the main reason for the young to connect to Facebook was to get access to the resources that circulated among their online friends and were less common offline or different from what

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was provided by traditional media. Such resources acquired online were eventually shared with the participants’ offline ties. A great majority of participants described how those with access to internet became the first seeds of an informational chain that was spread offline. ID15 claimed: We, the young and the most active on Facebook had the information and then we were sharing it with the others offline. … Everything was beginning on Facebook, and the personal relations took care to send the information further. … as soon as I would learn something new, I would pass the information to my mother (ID15).

ID7 reiterated this idea by emphasising how the young used Facebook and were passing the knowledge further to non-users: “Those over 40 do not use Facebook. … I think, kids, the young started to talk with the adults, as I did with my grandfather.” ID9 said, “If someone did not have Facebook, I would inform them”, and suggested that by circulating mobilising information from online to offline and vice-versa, there was no way the majority would not react. The young Facebook users served as connecting bridges between the online and offline, which, in great part, represented the Soviet generation or those people who did not use social media, and were relying mainly on their offline relationships and television in terms of protest information and participation. In this way, social media became significant for those who did not have a Facebook account or were not using the internet, since they were connected in person with those who were. This indicates a spill over effect (Kobayashi et  al., 2006) which supports the argument that online and offline can no longer be treated as separate entities since online permeates and augments offline (Carty, 2010; Harlow & Harp, 2012). At the same time, this emphasises an online and offline divide which reinforces other social cleavages in a country with very distinctive Soviet and post-Soviet divide as argued by Oates (2013) in a similar case study.

Conclusion This chapter aimed at understanding how the Moldovan media culture and an intergenerational gap in the use of social media could influence the extent to which social media can contribute to protest participation. A majority of state-run, partisan and business affiliated media motivated the young to connect to Facebook to accrue and trust alternative protest

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related information and knowledge. The young looked for diverse information in the space where they are the most present. This age group has been also described as a generation that matches advanced Western countries in its digital skills and democratic aspirations and called by many participants as post-Soviet. Although the young were not the most active protest participants in this case study, Facebook holds the promise to become a resource for the young that can mitigate a politically monopolised traditional media and create a favourable environment for diverse information. Nevertheless, this same context didn’t impact the media consumption among the older age cohort. The Soviet generation—young social media users’ parents or older friends who although claim to understand traditional media’s partisan affiliation, still represented its main audience. One of the TV channels anti-government policy was handy in promoting the anti-government sentiment and mobilise the Soviet generation. Most of the interviewed participants emphasised the crucial role this TV channel played for non-users of social media who also represented the largest age group of protesters. As Anduiza et  al. (2012) argue factors such as digital divides, media systems and institutional settings mediate the impact of social media on political engagement. This argument is supported in this study because the findings demonstrated not only an intergenerational divide in terms of media use, but also how the partially free, politically controlled mainstream media in a hybrid institutional regime affected how social media were used for protest participation. This is a context where Soviet media consumption habits—distrust in media and simultaneous tolerance towards it—are still persistent and merge with emerging trends parallel to those in Western media systems.

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Hoffmann, C. P., & Lutz, C. (2021). Digital divides in political participation: The mediating role of social media self-efficacy and privacy concerns. Policy & Internet, 13(1), 6–29. https://doi.org/10.1002/poi3.225 Howard, M.  M. (2003). The weakness of civil society in post-communist Europe. Cambridge University Press. Howard, P.  N., Duffy, A., Freelon, D., Hussain, M.  M., Mari, W., & Maziad, M. (2011). Opening closed regimes: What was the role of social media during the Arab Spring? The Project on Information Technology and Political Islam. Retrieved 17 July, 2021, from https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/ handle/2027.42/117568/2011_Howard-Duffy-Freelon-Hussain-Mari-­­ Mazaid_PITPI.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y Jakubowicz, K. (2007). The Eastern European/post communist media model countries. In G.  Terzis (Ed.), European media governance. National and Regional Dimensions (pp. 303–314). Kidd, D., & McIntosh, K. (2016). Social media and social movements. Sociology Compass, 10(9), 785–794. https://doi.org/10.1111/soc4.12399 Kim, J. Y. (2006). The impact of Internet use patterns on political engagement: A focus on online deliberation and virtual social capital. Information Polity, 11(1), 35–49. Kim, Y., Hsu, S.-H., & Gil de Zúñiga, H. (2013). Influence of social media use on discussion network heterogeneity and civic engagement: The moderating role of personality traits. Journal of Communication, 63(3), 498–516. https://doi. org/10.1111/jcom.12034 Kirkizh, N., & Koltsova, O. (2021). Online news and protest participation in a political context: Evidence from self-reported cross-sectional data. Social Media+ Society, 7(1), https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305120984456 Kobayashi, T., Ikeda, K. I., & Miyata, K. (2006). Social capital online: Collective use of the Internet and reciprocity as lubricants of democracy. Information, Communication & Society, 9(5), 582–611. https://doi. org/10.1080/13691180600965575 Konończuk, W., Cenușa, D., & Kakachia, K. (2017). Oligarchs in Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia as key obstacles to reforms. Swedish International Development Agency. Retrieved 26 April, 2021, from http://www.3dcftas.eu/system/tdf/ Oligarchs_14%20June_FINAL_0.pdf?file=1&type=node&id=358%20 Kroll. (2015). Kroll final report prepared for the National Bank of Moldova Kroll Inc. https://candu.md/opinii/raportul-­kroll/ Langman, L. (2005). From virtual public spheres to global justice: A critical theory of internetworked social movements. Sociological Theory, 23(1), 42–74. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0735-­2751.2005.00242.x Lasinska, K. (2013). Social capital in Eastern Europe. Poland an exception? Springer.

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Litra, L. (2016). Moldova. Nations in Transit 2016 Freedom House. Retrieved 19 December, 2021, from https://freedomhouse.org/report/nations-­ transit/2016/moldova Lysenko, V.  V., & Desouza, K.  C. (2012). Moldova's internet revolution: Analyzing the role of technologies in various phases of the confrontation. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 79(2), 341–361. https://doi. org/10.1016/j.techfore.2011.05.009 Macovei, P., Bunduchi, I., Zaharia, V., Gonta, A., Nani, A., Rata, M., & Dodon, V. (2017). Capturarea mass-mediei şi a altor mijloace de comunicare publică în Republica Moldova. http://www.api.md/upload/files/Capturarea_mass-­ media_rom.pdf. McCaughey, M., & Ayers, M. D. (2013). Cyberactivism: Online activism in theory and practice. Routledge. McCormack, G. (1999). Mass media in CIS: Analysis of political. Legislative and the Socio-Economic Framework. McGarty, C., Thomas, E. F., Lala, G., Smith, L. G. E., & Bliuc, A.-M. (2014). New technologies, new identities, and the growth of mass opposition in the Arab Spring. Political Psychology, 35(6), 725–740. https://doi.org/10.1111/ pops.12060 McLeod, D. M., & Hertog, J. K. (1992). The manufacture of ‘public opinion’ by reporters: Informal cues for public perceptions of protest groups. Discourse & Society, 3(3), 259–275. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926592003003001 Moraru, V. (2001). Mass media vs politica.Universitatea de Stat din Moldova, Chișinău Morozov, E. (2009a). Moldova’s Twitter revolution. Foreign Policy. Retrieved 23 December, 2021, from http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~beki/cs4001/ Morozov.pdf Morozov, E. (2009b). Moldova’s Twitter revolution is NOT a myth. Retrieved 23 December, 2021, from http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~beki/cs4001/ Morozov.pdf Morozov, E. (2009c). More analysis of Twitter’s role in Moldova. Foreign Policy. Retrieved 23 December, 2021, from http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~beki/ cs4001/Morozov.pdf Morozov, E. (2012). The net delusion. How not to liberate the world. Penguin. http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/uts/detail.action?docID=868978 Murthy, D. (2013). Twitter: Social communication in the Twitter age. Polity Press. Nani, A. (2015). Vlad Plahotniuc, proprietar a patru televiziuni şi trei posturi de radio. Anticoruptie.md. Retrieved 19 December, 2021, from https://anticoruptie.md/ro/stiri/oficial-­vlad-­plahotniuc-­proprietar-­a-­patru-­televiziunisi-­trei-­posturi-­de-­radio Norris, P. (2002). Democratic Phoenix: Reinventing political activism. Cambridge University Press.

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Oates, S. (2013). Revolution stalled: The political limits of the internet in the post-­ Soviet sphere. Oxford University Press. Oates, S., & Lokot, T. (2013). Twilight of the gods?: How the internet challenged Russian television news frames in the Winter Protests of 2011–12. SSRN. Retrieved 20 May, 2020, from https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers. cfm?abstract_id=2286727 Onuch, O., Mateo, E., & Waller, J. G. (2021). Mobilization, Mass Perceptions, and (Dis) information: “New” and “Old” Media Consumption Patterns and Protest. Social Media+ Society, 7(2), https://doi. org/10.1177/2056305121999656 Popșoi, M. (2016). Moldova’s Great Disillusionment. Moldovan Politics. Retrieved 17 December, 2021, from https://moldovanpolitics.com/2016/01/07/ moldovas-­great-­disillusionment/#comments Radu, P., Munteanu, M., & Ostan, I. (2015). Grand theft Moldova. Organized crime and corruption reporting project. Retrieved 26 April, 2020, from https://www.occrp.org/en/investigations/4203-­grand-­theft-­moldova Reuter, O. J., & Szakonyi, D. (2015). Online social media and political awareness in authoritarian regimes. British Journal of Political Science, 45(1), 29–51. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123413000203 Sandut ̦a, I. (2017). Two huge scams, one Moldovan businessman. Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project Retrieved 25 March, 2020, from https:// www.occrp.org/en/laundromat/two-­huge-­scams-­intersect-­at-­one-moldovanbusinessman/ Sandut ̦a, I., & Preașca, I. (2016). The Moldovan banking wars. Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project. Retrieved 26 April, 2020, from https:// www.occrp.org/en/thebankingwars/the-­moldovan-­banking-­wars/ Scherman, A., & Rivera, S. (2021). Social media use and pathways to protest participation: Evidence from the 2019 Chilean Social Outburst. Social Media+ Society, 7(4), https://doi.org/10.1177/20563051211059704 Shah, D. V., Nojin, K., Lance Holbert, R., & Dhavan. (2001). “Connecting” and “disconnecting” with civic life: Patterns of internet use and the production of social capital. Political Communication, 18(2), 141–162. https://doi. org/10.1080/105846001750322952 Shirky, C. (2011). The political power of social media: Technology, the public sphere, and political change. Foreign Affairs, 90(1), 28-I. Shoemaker, P. J. (1984). Media treatment of deviant political groups. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 61(1), 66-75, 82. https://doi. org/10.1177/107769908406100109 Skoric, M.  M., Ying, D., & Ng, Y. (2009). Bowling online, not alone: Online social capital and political participation in Singapore. Journal of Computer-­ Mediated Communication, 14(2), 414–433. https://doi.org/10.1111/ j.1083-­6101.2009.01447.x

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Skoric, M., Zhu, Q., & Pang, N. (2016). Social media, political expression, and participation in Confucian Asia. Chinese Journal of Communication, 9(4), 331–347. https://doi.org/10.1080/17544750.2016.1143378 Sloam, J. (2014). ‘The outraged young’: Young Europeans, civic engagement and the new media in a time of crisis. Information, Communication & Society, 17(2), 217–231. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2013.868019 Sorkin, A.  R. (2012). Occupy Wall Street: A frenzy that fizzled. The New  York Times. Retrieved 12 June, 2019, from https://dealbook.nytimes. com/2012/09/17/occupy-­wall-­street-­a-­frenzy-­that-­fizzled/ Splichal, S. (2001). Imitative revolutions changes in the media and journalism in East-Central Europe. Javnost-The Public, 8(4), 31–58. https://doi.org/1 0.1080/13183222.2001.11008785 Sveningsson, M. (2014). “I don’t like it and I think it’s useless, people discussing politics on Facebook”: Young Swedes’ understandings of social media use for political discussion. Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 8(3), 106–120. https://doi.org/10.5817/CP2014-3-8 Tucker, J. A., Metzger, M., Penfold-Brown, D., Bonneau, R., Jost, J., & Nagler, J. (2015). Protest in the age of social media. Medium. Retrieved 20 December, 2020, from https://medium.com/carnegie-­corporation-­international-­peace-­ and/protest-­in-­the-­age-­of-­social-­media-­7ae9fd940b06#.8qi1imbtg Tudoroiu, T. (2011). Structural factors vs. regime change: Moldova’s difficult quest for democracy. Democratization, 18(1), 236–264. https://doi.org/1 0.1080/13510347.2011.532628 Tudoroiu, T. (2015). Democracy and state capture in Moldova. Democratization, 22(4), 655–678. https://doi.org/10.1080/13510347.2013.868438 United States Department of State. (2015). 2015 Country reports on human rights practices – Moldova. https://www.refworld.org/docid/571612379.html Valenzuela, S. (2013). Unpacking the use of social media for protest behavior. American Behavioral Scientist, 57(7), 920–942. https://doi. org/10.1177/0002764213479375 Valenzuela, S., Arriagada, A., & Scherman, A. (2014). Facebook, twitter, and youth engagement: A quasi-experimental study of social media use and protest behavior using propensity score matching. International Journal of Communication, 8, 2046–2070. http://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/ view/2022/1189 Valenzuela, S., Correa, T., & Gil de Zúñiga, H. (2018). Ties, likes, and tweets: Using strong and weak ties to explain differences in protest participation across Facebook and Twitter use. Political Communication, 35(1), 117–34. https:// doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2017.1334726 Van De Donk, W., Loader, B. D., Nixon, P. G., & Rucht, D. (2004). Cyberprotest: New media, citizens and social movements. Routledge.

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Van Dijk, J. A. (2006). Digital divide research, achievements and shortcomings. Poetics, 34(4–5), 221–235. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.poetic.2006.05.004 Vartanova, E. (2012). The Russian media model in the context of post-Soviet dynamics. Comparing Media Systems Beyond the Western World, 119–142. Vitak, J., Zube, P., Smock, A., Carr, C. T., Ellison, N., & Lampe, C. (2011). It’s complicated: Facebook users’ political participation in the 2008 election. CyberPsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 14(3), 107–114. https:// doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2009.0226 Xenos, M., Vromen, A., & Loader, B. D. (2014). The great equalizer? Patterns of social media use and youth political engagement in three advanced democracies. Information, Communication & Society, 17(2), 151–167. https://doi. org/10.1080/1369118X.2013.871318 Zukin, C., Keeter, S., Andolina, M., Jenkins, K., & Delli-Carpini, M. X. (2006). A new engagement? Political participation, civic life, and the changing American citizen. Oxford University Press.

CHAPTER 8

Investigative Journalism Is Global Hugo de Burgh

Introduction Journalism was an Anglo-American invention,1 and it could be reasonable to expect that, as Asia starts to eclipse Anglo-America in economic development, social dynamism and political influence, so many of the institutions and values of Anglo-America, including journalism, will become less respected. Already, those media which were dominant up to the end of the twentieth century have been weakened by changes both technological and This essay is based on Hugo de Burgh’s ‘Introduction’ to de Burgh, H and Lashmar, P (ed) (2021) Investigative Journalism, 3rd edition, Abingdon: Routledge, used with kind permission of the publishers. 1  Chalaby, Jean (1998) The Invention of Journalism London: MacMillan. More accurately, it was an English invention, coming out of our Civil War. See also de Burgh, Hugo (2008) ‘The Emergence of Investigative Journalism’, in Investigative Journalism, 2nd edition, chapter 2.

H. de Burgh (*) Schwarzman College, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_8

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commercial, putting journalism under pressure and its most troublesome form, investigative journalism, often under the axe. Nevertheless, the story we tell here, is, in many ways, one of rejuvenation. While the platforms and personnel have changed, the profession, if that is what we can call it, is renewed. Exposure and revelation have never been monopolies of professional journalists. The whistle-blower existed long before the investigative journalist. The patron saint of Anglophone investigative journalists, William Cobbett, was not a scribbler but a soldier when he first exposed peculation in the British army of North America in the 1780s–90s. Hai Rui, whom Chairman Mao Zedong could not bear to see eulogised even 500  years after the heroic whistle-blower’s death, unearthed maladministration as an official in 1565. In today’s England, some of the most inspiring investigations are being carried out through organisations which make no claim to journalism. Ida Tarbell and WT Stead, to mention just two of the best-known nineteenth-­century investigative journalists of the Anglosphere, would not recognise how their successors do things, but they would warm to the motivations and the individuals. The Internet and tools of digitalisation and minimisation have given opportunities to investigators undreamed of even as recently as ten years ago, and globalisation has connected the canaries, newshounds, moralists, harbingers and muckrakers of every continent. I shall first introduce how investigative journalism now operates; later, where. Investigative journalism may be global, but it is not universal: different cultures produce different ways of telling stories and select different stories to tell. From Ibero-America to Nigeria, from India to Poland, courageous men and women are contributing to their countries’ evolution by holding the powerful to account in their own ways. Far from dying out with the decline of the legacy press and television, investigative journalism is an actor almost everywhere. There are new complexities. While the enthusiasm and idealism of the citizen journalists and the NGOs and charitable foundations that fund investigations are to be welcomed, they do not necessarily subscribe to the norms of impartiality and detachment to which legacy media subscribed, nor are their operatives always trained in the profession’s disciplines. We all know that the tools that investigative journalists deploy can as easily be deployed by unscrupulous businesses, oppressive governments and ideological fanatics; we are increasingly aware of the dark side of New Media:

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The old media, whatever its faults, had institutional checks, including editing, fact checking and verifying pundits. If someone appeared as an expert, viewers could expect that he or she was in fact an expert, not just a random guy with an opinion. Even if channels were biased, they were obliged to have some semblance of balance. Today, however, people can spend their entire days in media ghettos where their views are not seriously challenged, and indeed become hardened. Analysis becomes propaganda and people are increasingly only exposed to the most crazed and extreme members of the opposing tribe.2

In this atmosphere, it is not only terrorists, fanatics and paedophiles that we have to fear. Otherwise admirable Anglo-American journalists can see their roles as a form of activism, promoting Anglo-American liberalism as a universal ideology. This is curious, since the WikiLeaks and Snowden revelations have probably ensured that few people outside the White House or the Blair Foundation now believe that the United States is an unalloyed force for good in the world. It is a matter of concern, though, that the successful condemnation of China as, in effect, a new ‘Yellow Peril’ in the European and Anglo-American worlds, has exacerbated polarisation such that any claim that we should try to set aside our Western perspectives is treated as apostasy. We find it difficult to imagine that other societies may have different views of what constitute human rights, of the role of the media or of the relative significance of issues revealed in the investigated country’s affairs. The media of most countries claim to be impartial; only the BBC actually believes it is.3 In this chapter I introduce the work of colleagues around the world whose operations illustrate current developments in investigative journalism. All of them contributed a chapter to the third edition of Investigative Journalism, which I edited with Paul Lashmar. Our survey had limitations: we did not mention work in Russia and Italy, to mention just two countries in which it requires abnormal courage to be an investigative journalist. In the Anglophone world alone, we should at least mention John Pilger’s The Coming War with China, Seymour Hersh’s controversial exposure of fake news on chemical warfare in Syria and revelations of callousness and cruelty in Britain’s National Health Service revealed not

 West, Ed (2020) Small Men on the Wrong Side of History London: Constable p311.  Many books in recent years have explored the failings of Anglophone media, but perhaps the most influential has been Davies, Nick (2008) Flat Earth News London: Vintage. 2 3

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by journalists but the relatives of victims.4 There is a great deal of investigation going on all over the world of which we are still ignorant.

Context Hamish Boland-Rudder and Will FitzGibbon’s, ‘Data Journalism in a Time of Epic Data Leaks’, details the huge changes that have taken place in investigative journalism because of the rapid development of computing. They also emphasise that journalists have to treat data like any other source of information. They have to establish credibility and reliability. Data need to be verified. Each piece of data requires assessment before it can be relied upon for a story; it must be treated with the same level of scepticism and corroborated with the same level of care as any other source. If the identity of the source is known, this makes it easier. Can the existence of this data be proven? Is it likely that that person has access to this type of data? Can they be trusted? What are their motivations? The Panama Papers was a collection of 11.5 million diverse files, mostly containing unstructured information that was not easily categorised or sorted. Even rendering it searchable was a challenge because processing this much data required more power than any individual computer could muster. At its peak, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) was running more than 30 servers simultaneously to index the information contained in each file in the dataset. But change is not just in the techniques; the very anthropology of investigative journalism has had to change. For the Panama Papers, the ICIJ put together a team of more than 370 reporters from 80 countries working across 25 different languages, plus coding languages. This was collaboration on a scale never previously seen. Traditionally, investigative journalists have been lone wolves, or at least small teams competing against other small teams. In the case of the Panama Papers, the size and complexity of the project enticed many of the best reporters in the world. There were plenty of stories to go around, and there were clear benefits to teamwork compared to working alone. Unprecedented access to secret documents made it worthwhile to renounce independence. The technical methods used in the Panama Papers cannot be replicated because, as the writers put it, the pace of change in data management is rapid and relentless. ‘Much of the 4

 www.curethenhs.co.uk/from-ward-to-whitehall/ accessed 070720.

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technology employed to produce the Panama Papers is already obsolete’. But the behavioural lessons are still valid. Collaboration works. In many democracies today, Paul Lashmar argues in ‘National Security’, systems of surveillance that ‘make the Communist East Germany’s Stasi look like a tiny cottage industry’ have secretly been installed in democratic nations. Too often, the target of these surveillance monoliths are journalists. There is probing fourth-estate work yet to be done as, with few exceptions, oversight agencies have proved ineffective. What has proven more effective is investigative journalism. With this chilling rejoinder, Lashmar shows us how the formal institutions of oversight have failed to reveal rendition, torture, mass surveillance and covert operations and that we must be grateful to whistle-blowers such as Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. Snowden’s revelations about the mass acquisition of telecommunications data and bulk interception of internet traffic by the US National Security Agency showed the world how technological change has developed. We saw a global surveillance apparatus, jointly run by the Five Eyes Network in close cooperation with their commercial and international partners, which ignored laws or accountability. We saw that the agencies have secretly negotiated for ‘backdoors’ in the security of computer programmes, social networking sites, websites and smartphones, giving an ‘extraordinary capability to hoover up and store personal emails, voice contact, social networking activity and even internet searches’. Snowden’s revelations have had impact on the practice of investigative journalism. Realising that the Five Eyes had the technology to snoop on journalists and their sources, a major revaluation of journalism tradecraft has begun. In ‘New Models of Funding and Executing’, Glenda Cooper notes how the difficulties caused to investigative journalism by transformations in legacy media are being assuaged through the involvement of new actors. Investigative journalism is frequently time consuming and expensive, requiring the two commodities that mainstream media have in short supply. For this reason, there has been a growing understanding that other actors may play a role in providing newsworthy investigations for public consumption. In one sense this is nothing new; NGOs such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have been investigating human rights abuses for decades. However, the ability to self-publish and the increased opportunities of open-source material mean that NGOs themselves have been examining different ways to bring their investigations to light. New technologies that could be used for verification have been

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taken up with enthusiasm by those working in human rights, and some have seen the possibility of collaboration with journalists. One of the most successful has been the Amnesty International Digital Verification Corps, which now operates in six universities around the world. One of the founding partners was the Digital Verification Unit at the University of Essex. Once upon a time, as many children know, there was a group of mice which planned to neutralise the threat of a stalking cat by placing a bell around its neck. Today, according to Félim McMahon in ‘Digital Sleuthing’, we have the neo-journalistic organisation Bellingcat. In a series of substantive and painstaking investigations, it has broken some of the most remarkable and consequential stories of recent years, finding innovative solutions to seemingly insurmountable problems of volume and verification of data to reveal facts that were hiding in plain sight. All of the examples they cite have in some way re-imagined open-source journalism as an all-source activity. While logic indicates that these types of skills belong at the heart of the newsroom, it is hard to imagine them delivering the kind of impact they have had elsewhere from there. The skills learned during a stint in one of these investigative units or even on a busy verification hub, however, would serve a journalist well on any beat. As Artificial Intelligence continues to transform our world and make every aspect of life more quarriable, digital investigative journalists will need new knowledge, skills and partnerships to succeed. Stephen Grey, famous for Ghost Plane, in which he revealed the Bush-­ Blair policy of rendition,5 in ‘Kill One and a Dozen Return’, tells the story of how journalists have come together to render the murder of their colleagues ineffective as a deterrent by ensuring that their work is shared and continued. Probably the first extensive such collaboration was the Arizona Project, the first salvo of the Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE). Grey details this and other early collaborations for the same purpose. Reporters from the Brazilian Association of Investigative Journalism (ABRAJI), a non-profit, kept alive the work of Tim Lopes, a reporter burned to death by drug traffickers in 2002. With the Khadija Project, set up in 2015, the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) continued the work of Azeri journalist Khadija Ismayilova in exposing political corruption while she was in jail. Inspired by these, 5  See Lashmar, Paul (2008) ‘From Shadow Boxing to Ghost Plane’ in de Burgh, Hugo (ed) (2008) Investigative Journalism London: Routledge, pp191–214.

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French journalist Laurent Richard developed Forbidden Stories systematically to continue the work of murdered and imprisoned journalists and to provide a technical system for reporters in dangerous situations to upload their secrets as a kind of insurance. In the event of their death or imprisonment, the secrets could be released. ‘Cooperation is without a doubt the best protection’ says Richard. Although journalists in the United Kingdom are very rarely faced with the violence, torture and death that can be the too-frequent reward for their services in many parts of the world, some journalists are concerned at the new laws and police activities that hamper what they regard as their legitimate work, in particular the menacing of sources. According to Sarah Kavanagh in ‘Legal Threats in the United Kingdom’, 82 journalists had their data seized by British police in 2015. A total of 34 police investigations concerned themselves with relationships between 105 journalists and 242 sources. That same year, the Conservative Party Manifesto pledged that there would be explicit statutory protection for journalists and a commitment to ban the police from accessing their phone records. The party won the election and a new Investigatory Powers Bill was published. As Kavanagh explains, ‘this Bill has been a disappointment. It has even made life more difficult for journalists’. That this happens in England, the birthplace of relatively free journalism, where the idea of a free press is common ground among all except the far left and far right, is indicative of a worldwide trend. Rachel Oldroyd summarises for us the crisis of journalism in the digital, globalised world. Her purpose, in ‘Mission-driven Journalism’, is not merely to repeat the litany of austerity, advertising collapse and audience flight but to show us how new platforms are coming about. The ‘non-profit, mission-driven’ sector is burgeoning, giving new hope to watchdogs and victims everywhere. At the last count, the international grouping of such entities, the Global Investigative Journalism Network, has 182 members in 77 countries. Oldroyd herself runs the UK’s Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Philanthropic support has allowed non-profit organisations to equal the legacy media’s efforts. Campaign groups such as Greenpeace employ investigative journalists. To get attention for their otherwise tranquil websites, new methods and approaches are being inaugurated. Operations such as Bellingcat have emerged. The challenges are obvious, especially that of living up to the levels of impartiality, evidence and fact checking of the best journalists of the pre-digital past. Oldroyd tells us that practitioners have recognised the risks and that their professionalism is second to

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none. They are, she holds, an inspiration to the coming generations of investigators who see themselves operating on platforms other than those of the past. The crisis of local newspapers in the United Kingdom has been met by local initiatives very typical of English society, immemorially, but also of relevance elsewhere. Until the twentieth century, political power and social innovation were very localised in England; as far back as the historians can be sure, well over 1000 years, the detached family system of the English has driven them to set up social and business enterprises to stand in for the family solidarity familiar in other parts of Europe. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, foreign visitors identified a rich working-­ class culture of associations, mutual societies and businesses quite unlike other European countries. The default position of the English, it seems, is to set up an association, as British Labour politician Ernest Bevin is supposed to have said, ‘as hens lay eggs’.6 Rachel Hamada, writing in ‘Grassroots Operations’, is squarely in that tradition, as Community Organiser of the Bureau Local Project, ‘a network of over 1000 people across the United Kingdom—journalists, bloggers, coders, academics, lawyers, community leaders and activists—who all come together to work on investigations and commit “acts of journalism”, beyond straight reporting’. This model has proved effective and has inspired others—for example, Correctiv in Germany, which took on the same model to set up Correctiv Lokal, and The Correspondent, the global news features platform headquartered in Amsterdam, which has used the Bureau Local’s collaboration model for its latest investigation into surveillance during the coronavirus crisis. The Bureau Local Project operates on an open-source basis wherever possible and shares open resources online, including a blueprint for its own model. Projects are emerging all over, from Greece to India. Local news is seeing a host of imaginative versions emerging, with people willingly sharing resources, technology and success stories, super-powering this movement.

6  Irene Noel Baker, granddaughter of Labour politician Lord Noel Baker, personal communication.

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Places Globalisation does not bundle universalism. While journalists in Asia or Africa are happy to study the techniques of their Anglo-American counterparts, they often upset their mentors when they refuse to imbibe their assumptions. Anglophone academics may, like Davos devotees, judge every country’s institutions by their proximity to the Anglosphere’s, but journalists in the Maghreb or Korea or Iceland, for that matter, will point to their own traditions, media history and social values as justifications for particularities. Investigative journalism performs a set of similar functions in any polity, but the exercise of these functions varies according to the culture of that polity. This is an important point to assert, because Anglo-Americans have become inured to the idea that there are now different habits of journalism and like to claim that theirs are of universal validity. In a world dominated by Anglo-America, the 80% of the world not descended from Europeans kept quiet when they disagreed. No longer. Now that we are coming to grasp that ‘The Future is Asian’,7 difference should be respected. The harbinger is China, if only because it has the largest population combined with the most dynamic and, on many counts, already greatest, economy. Our chapter on China is by journalists turned academics who have experience of working in China’s media and studying in Europe. Because of the widespread ignorance of China outside Asia and the rapid changes in society and polity that have taken place over the recent decades, in ‘China and the Digital Era’, Wang and Fan have to start by reassuring us that there is an indigenous tradition of investigative journalism in their country. As elsewhere, digitalisation and the Internet have profoundly affected journalists since the millennium and, indeed, so has politics. China is going through one of its periods of ideological intensification, though, to the benefit of ordinary Chinese people as to the benefit of the rest of humankind, the ideology in question is less Marxist-Leninist and more a neo-Confucianism of the kind that underpins other East Asian societies.8

7  The title of a book by Parag Khanna (New York: Simon and Schuster 2019) but also a theme running through many books and articles on international affairs and economic development. See also Mahbubani, Kishore (2020): Has China Won? (New York: Public Affair). 8  I discuss this at much greater length, and offer recommended reading on the phenomenon, in de Burgh, Hugo China’s Media in the Emerging World Order (UBP: 2020), chapter 7.

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Nevertheless, this means that investigative journalism in legacy media has been more constrained out of fear of upsetting the authorities, accelerating the shift to social media and the burgeoning influence of ‘we media’. Wang and Fan give examples of stories that originated with netizens, were picked up by sites both legacy and New Media and have put pressure on the authorities. They are too polite to say that revelations in China can be more influential than their counterparts in electoral democracies because the authorities, bereft of the checks provided by national elections, take social media complaints so very seriously. It is not only the mode of reporting that has changed but the topics. Until recently, investigative journalism particularly targeted the ‘hard’ topics of abuses of power and the wrongdoings of government departments and officials. Today it tends to deal with ‘softer’ topics such as health, environment and ordinary people’s livelihoods. Wang and Fan give examples. There are two major developments revealed in their work. Underlying them is another which, though not a necessary aspect, is nevertheless deserving of mention: the emergence of the philosophy of constructive journalism. Asian journalists have long regarded Anglophone media as irresponsible, subversive (of their own societies) and naive in claiming themselves to be impartial when they are, in other eyes, carriers of propaganda. Chinese journalists are working to theorise what they consider a fairer approach to subjects and events, one which recoils from stimulating hatred or violence.9 Culture-specific approaches to journalism are also reflected upon in Bebawi’s work: ‘Syria: The War and Before’, where training was provided to Syrian journalists by outside organisations, the trainers, being from non-Arab backgrounds, were ignorant of the specifics of Arab society and governance, let alone current issues, making clear the redundancy of the idea of ‘universal journalism’. While the scientific method of reasoning and evidence-seeking may be universally applicable, as well as the skills of data collection and evaluation, the ways in which you deploy it and the choice of topics must be relevant to the culture. Bebawi, like her Chinese 9  Africa’s Media Image in the twenty-first Century: From Heart of Darkness to Africa Rising, edited by Melanie Bunce, Suzanne Franks and Chris Paterson (Routledge, 2016), contains an article by James Wan, ‘Propaganda or Proper Journalism: China’s Media Expansion in Africa’, on CCTV’s challenge of ‘constructive journalism’. Zhang Yanqiu (2014) ‘Understand China’s Media in Africa from the Perspective of Constructive Journalism’, paper presented at the international conference China and Africa Media, Communications and Public Diplomacy on 10 September 2014. Available from: www.cmi. no/ file/2922-.pdf accessed: 030716.

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colleagues, wants to dispel Anglo illusions about their societies. She is at pains to point out that ‘the emergence of investigative journalism was not a result of the Arab Spring’ but, in fact, that ‘the development of investigative reporting in some Arab countries was more prominent prior to the Arab Spring’. The Arab world is varied and, in Jordan, for example, investigative journalists moved on from social and environmental issues to addressing political matters in this period. In Syria, where journalists before the war were relatively free, the war constrained them, for all the reasons we can imagine. In Turkey there is not, thank God, a civil war, but there is certainly a violent battle of ideas. Journalists in Turkey have long been pragmatic and generally secular and sceptical. This puts them, as a profession, at odds with the revival of traditional religion promoted by the current political leadership. President Erdoğan rejects the Ataturk settlement by which modern Turkey was carved out of the Ottoman Empire to be a secular republic, eschewing not only its inheritance of the Islamic Caliphate but also leadership of the mystical Turkic world from Ulan Batur to Edirne. It has never been easy to be a journalist in Turkey, for Ataturk secularism was authoritarian, and Bucak’s lucid history profiles courageous individuals as well as explaining the political economy of media to tell us the story. Today, the revival of religious sentiment makes it all but impossible for Turks to practise journalism. Bucak quotes a colleague as saying that ‘the better a journalist is in Turkey, the more likely he or she will be fired’. The exercise of journalism as previously understood—reporting facts and supplying evidence—is likely to send the reporter to prison. As Bucak writes, though, even getting published is remarkable, but finding sources and discovering wrongdoing are equally difficult. Even daring to consider investigating corruption can incur a charge of treason. The President describes journalists as ‘gardeners of terrorism’. Turkey is an important culture and Turkic civilisation, with around 170 million people, the foundation of many geopolitically significant countries. Bucak’s study also acts as a warning and gives food for thought even as we celebrate the globalisation of journalism. Once totalitarianism of the Marxist-Leninist variety had been overthrown in 1989, Poland’s journalists began to revive the civil society which had flourished before the Soviet-Nazi invasion of 1939. Poland is a European country, sharing with the supposed Anglophone ‘inventors of journalism’ those principles of human equality and accountability which underlie modern secularism and are the moral basis of investigative

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journalism. In ‘Poland since 1989’, Palczewski describes the enthusiastic deployment of investigation techniques such as undercover sting operations during the 1990s, used in revelations of corruption, paedophilia and terrorism. In the early 2000s, the trend continued, with many revelations having major political repercussions, although suspicion hung over some of the stories as to whether they were politically or commercially motivated, resulting in a period of scepticism and stagnation. Palczewski reports an impressive revival over the last 4 years, however, in which property scams, paedophilia in the church, police brutality and neo-Nazis were among the momentous exposures. Traditional investigative journalism, all in all, is in rude health in Poland. In India, Sonwalkar reminds us, there is a ‘glorious tradition’ of investigative journalism. ‘India’s Paradox’ shows that journalism in any one country does not exist in isolation but is part of a complex matrix of laws, core values and practices. The Indian cases Sonwalkar adumbrates make us wonder to what extent investigative journalism can function ‘when powerful political and corporate forces steer it to one partisan extreme’. Despite the improvement of the hardware of journalism and therefore improved techniques, Sonwalkar considers that investigative journalism in India is in serious decline because of the changes in its political environment. From the 1970s through the 1990s, many exposures by investigative journalists ‘rocked’ India, testifying to the robustness of the media and the zealousness of journalists. Since then, it is the ‘Murdochization’, as Sonwalkar has it, of the media that has crippled journalism, elevating moneymaking far over holding power to account as the purpose of media, offline or online. ‘Paid news’, often as political as commercial, squeezes out honest reportage. Media organisations and personnel critical of the party in power have suffered calamity to the extent that India’s leading investigative journalist has likened India’s media to that of North Korea. From the journalist’s point of view, that is a terrible deterioration since India inherited its liberal press laws from the British Raj. Sonwalkar shows us the heights of which Indian investigative journalism is capable and the struggles which it has fought since Independence. He also tells us about the investigation of the news organisations themselves, in which they were discovered to be being paid to defame politicians, promote a particular religion and subvert the democratic processes. Leading members of the current government have attacked the media, vilifying and disparaging journalism. The story of how defenceless Malaysians were being robbed of their rights, their livelihoods and their identity is told in an extraordinary tale by

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Clare Rewcastle Brown, ‘A Malaysian Odyssey’. She gives us the whole sorry saga as she reveals how she penetrated the politics, business, criminality and downright irresponsibility of many in the Malaysian elite. Aside from the exploitation and deception of human beings, that which she investigated has disastrous environmental impacts. Yet the perpetrators used every legal and illegal technique to stop her. The lessons to be learnt are not only of the indefatigability of a lone sleuth but the way in which social media can be mobilised on the side of the victims, whether individual poor communities or society at large. Without Sarawak Report, the shameless behaviour of the Taib family would never have been exposed to the world and revealed to their victims, no matter how clever Rewcastle Brown might have been in tracing their millions and their deal-making or how brave the whistle-blowers she handled. The results included a political overturn. This tale is to be read for its lessons in craft but also for its vindication of the mission. In ‘Ten Years in Nigeria’, Umejei and Suleiman tell us that the Nigerian press has been vigorous since its inception in 1849. Espousing liberal ideas of a free press and watchdog journalism, it often challenged the British authorities (c. 1849–1960) under whose auspices it emerged. Today, it is the most politically vibrant in Africa, and ‘through watchdog journalism and investigative reporting, Nigerian newspapers have been at the forefront of democratic development in the country’. There have been ups and downs, however, and the authors discuss those, as well as particular aspects of investigative reporting in Nigeria. One consequence of digitalisation has been the increased dependence of all media on advertisers and sponsors, with concomitant conditioning of subject matter. Since 1999, the move online has accelerated. Another issue which puts in question the trustworthiness of digital investigation is anonymity and pseudonymity. All in all, Umejei and Suleiman’s rather downbeat conclusion is that legacy media’s proud tradition of investigative journalism is unlikely to continue and that online media have yet to provide adequate alternative spaces. In 2003, London’s Financial Times headlines revealed ‘A vast enterprise for looting community funds’ in the European commission, and subsequently Stern reporter Hans-Martin Tillack was arrested at the instigation of the European Union on trumped-up charges eventually dismissed by the courts. His documents and other seized items were not returned to him until 2008. Tillack’s experience was typical of that suffered by others who have dared to enquire into the opaque activities of the European Union’s governing institutions. Known or suspected corruption, financial

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or political, has been a principal motivator of the revulsion against the EU, manifested time and time again by demonstrators and voters in Western European countries. It is not that journalists have not tried to get to grips with this, but they have been hamstrung not only by the complexity of the institutions but by the great differences in attitudes and approaches of journalists from different countries of the Union. This is the subject of Brigitte Alfter’s chapter, ‘The EU and the Cheallenges of Collaboration’. Twenty-seven of the 44 European countries are in the EU. Even without the recalcitrant 17, that makes for a great deal of variety. Journalists from Belgium or Hungary or Portugal, say, will be familiar with the institutions of their own countries but seldom equipped to cross borders, lacking language and knowledge. Their skills, too, are rarely transferable, because what is acceptable in Slovenia may not be in Ireland, and so on. Expectations vary. ‘Scandinavian and British journalists kept pushing for more transparency and Nordic style access to documents for example and even the perception of what constituted a breach of norms varied according to country’, according to Alfter, discussing some of the collaborative projects. Consequently, while co-operation is difficult, it is also the only solution if investigations are to penetrate the multilingual, multicultural cabals. Alfter nevertheless describes attempts to ‘follow the money’ and identify nepotism in appointments. Although cultural differences make life as complicated for journalists as for politicians, we should celebrate rather than denigrate them, because it is the very diversity of Europe that has been the secret of its successful intellectual, artistic, scientific and social advancement over the centuries. Nationalism has often wrongly been blamed for wars which were ideological and religious in motivation. It is patriotism, attachment to cultural particularities, that has been a bulwark of resistance to despotism over many centuries, so that we should rejoice in the distinctiveness of the European countries, no matter how frustrating. Investigative journalism can only benefit from it, too. In ‘Latin America Today’, Saldaña and Waisbord focus on the shared concerns which have stimulated cross-continental alliances. In the 1990s, in most of the constituent countries, investigative journalism was vigorous, complementing the re-emergence of democratic politics. It was not necessarily detached; journalists were often hamstrung by vested interests, or their editors were threatened by politicians. In such circumstances, sharing responsibility can be a way out. Brazilian, Argentinean, Mexican and Colombian media participated in global exposures such as the Panama

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Papers and Paradise Papers. As with other nationalities’ journalists, Saldaña and Waisbord remind us, such collaboration ‘demonstrates a paradigm shift where exclusivity and immediacy are replaced by a culture of information sharing and “slow” journalism’. Another major development in Latin American journalism over the past decade has been the emergence of digital sites which feature investigations. Some of these and their achievements are introduced, as are the distinctive funding models, with combinations of subscription, consulting, service provision, advertising, crowdfunding, sales to news organisations and philanthropic sources. Of the latter, how much is supplied from foreign countries and therefore might cause alarm is not clear; perhaps this needs investigation. Saldaña and Waisbord report that data journalism has taken off in elite media and that fact-checking operations have begun to emerge in response to the spread of unverified information, rumours and conspiracies that have been a concern raised during several elections across the region. Although they are enthusiastic about progress, they warn that when political conditions change, as in Nicaragua and Venezuela, repression is not far behind, and journalists are vulnerable to violence and online harassment. Despite this, the successes of Latin I American investigative journalists in influencing public affairs and shedding light on social problems have been remarkable and are documented here. In England, the progenitor of modern journalism, Roy Greenslade reviews how the popular papers are continuing to undertake investigations despite the changes to the industry wrought by digitalisation. ‘How the United Kingdom’s Tabloids Go about It’ starts by reminding us of the obloquy which shook the UK industry, destroyed one of its oldest newspapers and attracted widespread condemnation for investigative journalism, due to the exposure of the phone-hacking scandal. That which the newspapers were lambasted for was not what serious journalists would consider investigative journalism, but the British public was confused and cursed all journalists equally. The infamy and the public enquiry that followed were reported, often with delight, around the world as evidence of the malfeasance of the notoriously rude English media. It seemed for a time that tabloid investigative journalism would never again lift up its collective head, yet, as Greenslade reassures us, business would soon be as usual because, though shocking, investigations are an important part of the marketing mix for the tabloids and a way to claim the public service accolade for all British newspapers. Revelations about the peculiar sexual proclivities of assorted politicians, stings of vain or

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greedy bosses by a chap who dressed up like Lawrence of Arabia were too good to pass by, but, fortunately, stories with better claims to social value were also commissioned and published: exposures of fraudsters, violence in refugee hostels, predatory landlords, unsafe tumble dryers and suicides among army recruits did, indeed, constitute a public service. This is not investigative journalism of the scale and depth of tabloid celebrities of a generation ago—Paul Foot and Jon Pilger—nor of the ambition and expectation of many of the other stories told in this book. But they show that, despite the odds, the flame of investigation is still fluttering in the popular press. There are several nasty causes in British public life, nasty because they eschew democracy or at most see it as a means to power because of their predilection for violence and because of their hatred of other groups. Since the defeat of the terrorist IRA, these characteristics are shared today by three ‘causes’: far right, extreme left and Islamist fanatics. The far right has traditionally attracted most attention because its adherents initially were pleased to associate themselves with the Nazi movement and because its anti-Semitism is so repulsive to most British people, particularly since the Second World War, which came to be seen in retrospect not only as a struggle to save English freedoms, threatened by a totalitarian ideology, but also as a war against persecution of the Jews. Paul Jackson, in ‘United Kingdom: Reporting of the Far-Right’, shows us how the grass-roots platform Searchlight has been investigating and supplying material to the mainstream media for half a century. It has inspired other organisations and publications, notably BBC Panorama and More4 True Stories, which over several documentary reports have exposed the actual views of members of the ostensibly moderate British National Party (BNP) and revealed weaknesses that its opponents might exploit. A similar process is evident in the relationship between a Searchlight subsidiary, Hope not Hate, and the Mirror and Mail on Sunday newspapers. The message of this study is that coordination between specialist research bodies and journalists can make for long-term and meticulous investigation. In exposing a vicious and violent cause, party or group, subject expertise is as important as investigatory skills. Private Eye sells 40% more copies than the internationally famous Economist and is the best-selling current affairs magazine in the United Kingdom. As Patrick Ward tells us in ‘The United Kingdom’s Private Eye: The “Club” the Powerful Fear’, it seems laughable to the uninitiated and redolent of schoolboy humour, yet its bite is worse than its bark. It has

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carried out, and continues to carry out, very serious investigations as well as modest revelations which can nevertheless result in great alarm. It does so with sceptical humour, lightness of touch and exemplary professionalism. Unlike its French cousin, Charlie Hebdo, Private Eye is of no evident political persuasion; bad people are bad, for Private Eye, whether they are left or right or nothing but bad. Ward gives us thumbnails of some of the Eye’s most effective investigations, detail on a very major long-term one, ‘Shady Arabia and the Desert Fix’, and introduces the regular sections which probe areas of British life such as health, local government or media. Oh, and, of course, the jokes. In doing so, he illustrates the extraordinary workstyle of Private Eye and what makes it unique. Every country should have one. Finally, not a report but an assertion: In his ‘Manifesto for Investigative Journalism in the twenty-first Century’, Paul Lashmar calls upon all nations to recognise the value of revelatory journalism. It remains ‘the most effective and consistent counter to corruption and complacency’ and should be protected and encouraged by all political leaders who acknowledge that they are accountable for their power. Our enthusiasm for investigative journalism has been fired up while working with the colleagues above, who are, every one, inspiring. As they show us, notwithstanding the powers of darkness which beset them and the changes in political economy and technology which challenge them, brave men and women all over the world are seeking to use their journalistic skills to expose chicanery and better the lives of their fellows.

CHAPTER 9

Confessions of Two Well-Meaning ‘Mzungu’ Journalism Trainers Ivor Gaber and Naomi Goldsmith

Is it helpful, and appropriate, for experts from the North to fly into countries of the Global South to deliver journalism training courses, usually as part of a wider programme of ‘democratisation’? It’s an issue that has long been highly contested both in development and academic circles. The Indian economist and political philosopher Amartya Sen, famously wrote: “No famine has ever taken place in the history of the world in a functioning democracy” (Sen 1999). It’s more of a robust statement of principle than a strictly accurate historical fact but it has been the starting point for much of the impetus for aid programmes (mainly from Western agencies)

‘Mzungu’ is the Bantu (or Mzungu in Swahili) word used in East and Southern Africa to refer to someone of European descent—not generally used as a term of abuse.

I. Gaber (*) • N. Goldsmith University of Sussex, Brighton, UK e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_9

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that have been targeted at helping to create free and independent media as part of wider ‘good governance and democratisation’ programmes. This has been seen as a critical aspect of functioning Western liberal democracies and has been deemed (mainly by the West) as a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for economic and social development. Behind this thinking lies the implicit notion that free and independent media help produce and sustain the conditions necessary for a Western-style democratic polity. The United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office website justifies its work promoting and defending independent media as part of its aid programme thus: Promoting democracy and defending democratic freedoms are fundamental to the UK’s foreign policy. We believe that strong democratic institutions and accountable governments, which uphold universal rights and the rule of law, are key building blocks for secure and prosperous states […]. (FCDO, 2021)

Its American counterpart—the US Department of State echoes this view: Resilient democracies depend on a political culture that values citizen engagement, tolerance, and respect for human rights. USAID plays a lead role in advancing knowledge about fortifying democratic political cultures. (USAID, n.d.)

But what is the reality behind the rhetoric? The authors of this chapter, who work together on G&G Media—a media development consultancy—have wide experience of training journalists and leading media projects in the Global South. Over the past twenty years we have undertaken media development work in more than 40 countries, many of them in Sub-Saharan Africa. All of the projects have been organised by international NGO’s on behalf of Northern donors— either private, national or international. Both of us have long recognised that our professional experience is based on, what has long been seen as, the ‘universal’ form of journalism i.e. the Anglo-American model. Much of the formal journalism training in the Global South still uses this model as its ‘ideal type’ but this has been in conflict with the ongoing challenge of the development journalism model. This tension is continuously played out both in the professional and academic spheres. So, in this context, we

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reflect on our experiences, some similar, some different, and address the arguments about the role of Western journalists in media development in the Global South.

Ivor Gaber: Training Journalists in Africa In recent years there has been much discussion about the apparent differences between what is termed ‘African Journalism’ (Shaw, 2009; Skjerdal, 2009; Jimada, 1992) and the Anglo-American or ‘liberal democratic’ (Hallin & Mancini, 2004) journalism model. Shaw sums up the position thus: […] while the African model of journalism lays emphasis on the community (civil society), or communities (civil societies), the western liberal model emphasizes the individual. And what is even more interesting {…}the public in Cameroon preferred partisanship to level-headed analysis. This meant that the middle-ground position, or objectivity, that is unique to the western liberal democracy model, was, and still remains, an unpopular option. (Shaw, 2009: 501).

Such a statement poses real issues not just for Western journalism trainers but for all journalism trainers. Putting aside the issue of ‘objectivity’ as a central tenet of journalism practice, the quotation begs the question: how does one ‘train’ journalists to be ‘partisan’, indeed should one be training journalists to be partisan? Indeed, in many sub-Saharan societies one sees that the partisanship, and particularly ethnic partisanship, has been problematic in the extreme. The example of Radio Mille Collines’ role in encouraging the genocide on Rwanda, should give any trainer pause for thought before seeking to train journalists in ‘partisan journalism’. On the other hand a more nuanced approach is taken by Nyamnjoh (2005) who argues: African journalists are called upon ‘to operate in a world where everything has been pre-defined for them by others, where they are meant to implement and hardly ever to think or rethink, where what is expected of them is respect for canons, not to question how or why canons are forged, or the extent to which canons are forged, or the extent to which canons are inclusive of the creative diversity of the universe that is purportedly of interest to the journalism of the One-Best-Way (Nyamnjoh, 2005: 3).

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In other words, there are no absolutes in journalism training. The adage of Carl Bernstein, of Watergate fame, that his guiding principle of journalism—the seeking of ‘the best obtainable version of the truth at the time’ (Bernstein, 2022)—seems a reasonable all-purpose guiding principle.

Values and Practices When, as a trainer, one begins a new foreign training assignment one undertakes (or one ought to) as much research as possible. This can include a preliminary trip to the country, probably involving meeting with local partners to plan the most appropriate content, teaching methods, materials, speakers, locations etc. In this process I am always conscious of the imperative of ensuring that the training is as culturally appropriate as possible but equally aware that I have been recruited in order to bring to the training the perspective and knowhow of an international journalist. As a trainer, I have always sought to inculcate into my training a sound knowledge of, and insight into, how journalism, or at least critical and reflective journalism, is practised by responsible journalists in the West. The aim being not to say: “This is how you should do it” but rather “This is how we do it; draw from it what seems relevant and useful to your own practice and implement it in your own environment in the most appropriate way.” With these provisos in mind let me set out how I approach the task of imparting the journalistic values that I have sought to practise in my own work. These values do not represent a dogmatic view of a right and wrong way to ‘do journalism’. Instead I talk, in broad terms, about the most and least effective ways of gathering and communicating news stories, recognising that effective is very much a contextual term. My primary message is that there has to be an absolute commitment to accuracy—are there observable facts? What are they, what source is relating them and what is the source’s motivation (if any) in telling you? Then there is the obligation of fairness—not the same as objectivity—it is an obligation to try and treat all informants, and subjects, in as fair a way as possible, as determined by the individual journalist’s sense of ethical integrity. There is also a commitment to impartiality—we all have opinions but when working as a journalist we should seek to put those to one side, and that involves making sure that one is sufficiently aware of one’s own biases so that one can take them into account. The BBC’s Editorial Guidelines

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provides a useful working definition, noteworthy for including the word ‘due’ as an essential prerequisite: Due impartiality usually involves more than a simple matter of ‘balance’ between opposing viewpoints. We must be inclusive, considering the broad perspective and ensuring that the existence of a range of views is appropriately reflected. It does not require absolute neutrality on every issue or detachment from fundamental democratic principles, such as the right to vote, freedom of expression and the rule of law. (BBC, n.d.)

Transparency of method is another prerequisite, so that anyone, colleagues, readers or whomever, can see where the information has come from. And it involves a sense of accountability to the audience, and to the profession of journalism, which should take precedence over accountability to editors or proprietors. (for a more detailed discussion of these issues see (Gaber, 2020)).

From Theory to Practice Setting out these principles in theory is easy, putting them into practice in the training room is far more difficult. Perhaps the single biggest set of issues to be overcome are those that arise from cultural differences. These can include gender differences (men and women sitting separately for example), differences around levels of informality, acknowledging hierarchies, suitability of accommodation, timekeeping (always problematic), a lack of equipment and/or time available to complete ‘homework’ and, always, ‘expenses’. A particular set of issues arise when teaching Muslim journalists which include allowing time for daily prayers and recognising the exigencies of fasting during Ramadan. Levels of informality need not be a major problem but can become such if sensitivities around local custom and practice are not recognised. For example, addressing older journalists by their first name can cause tensions and suggest a lack of respect; and treating older and younger journalists equally can also be problematic. Not deferring to editors or proprietors might be welcomed by the journalists whilst in the classroom but can also store up trouble for the participants when they return to the newsroom. One of the major practical issues facing journalism trainers is that of timekeeping. To run the risk of over-generalisation, Western trainers often

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encounter what feels like a different understanding of the importance of timekeeping when working with journalists in many Sub-Saharan countries (for an interesting discussion about how concepts of time can differ between countries of the North and South see Babalola & Alokan, 2013). Notwithstanding, there is a real practical dilemma for the trainer when, at the designated starting time for the training session, there are just two or three trainees present. What to do? Begin the class regardless (and also out of respect to those who have turned up on time), or wait until a significant number have arrived thus encouraging latecomers to continue to turn up late and discourage those few who were on time not to bother in the future? But what might appear to the trainer to be a justified complaint about the importance of timekeeping can sometimes be seen as a failure to recognise the many valid reasons why participants are unable to arrive on time, including transport difficulties, family obligations or the need to go into the office first to ‘earn their keep’. Another of the complications facing trainers revolves around discussions as to whether journalists should accept ‘expenses’ for attending press conferences. In many African countries, because journalists are poorly paid and their media houses do not provide them with transport, press conference organisers are often expected to pay for journalists’ travel and, usually, to provide a meal as well. This arrangement can easily lapse into what is colloquially known as ‘brown envelope’ journalism in which the press release for the event is handed out to journalists in an envelope which contains both the release and the money for ‘transport’ (usually a relatively generous amount). If the envelope contains only a press release, then the story is rarely covered. This issue is often seen by Western journalists as akin to corruption and can make for difficult ethical discussions. But for a very poorly paid journalist such payments can be an essential part of their salary, a fact often exploited by avaricious proprietors. Hence, although it is easy for well-­ paid Western journalism trainers to suggest that accepting payments in return for stories is corrupt and should be resisted, such strictures, coming from apparently wealthy ‘muzongos’, can sound alienating and inappropriate.

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Are There Different Models of Journalism? All these matters bear on the larger issue, raised in the literature, that of there being different models of journalism. The starting point for most such discussions is Siebert et al.’s, 1956 study ‘Four Theories of the Press’ which whilst very much dated by its cold war stance did seek to analyse how the press functioned in both the developed and developing world (Siebert et  al., 1956). Hallin and Mancini (2004) building on Siebert et al’s assertion “that the press always takes on the form and coloration of the social and political structures within which it operates” (pp. 1–2) came up with three models—the Polarized Pluralist model, the Democratic Corporatist model and the Liberal model which they differentiated by the differing relationship in the three systems between the media and the polity. Christians et  al. (2009) sought to modify these two approaches by identifying four distinct yet overlapping roles for the media: “monitorial,” “facilitative,” “radical,” and “collaborative.” But whilst it moved the debate forward, like its counterparts, it did not effectively work across the Global North/South divide—the research and theorising being almost exclusively confined to media systems on Europe and North America. In the Global South, both the colonial and post-colonial eras, the have been largely dominated by the extent to which national media systems either did, or did not, compare with the Anglo-American model of journalism, as compared with the various modes of developmental journalism which originated in the movements for national liberation in the former colonies (Downing, 1996). The notion of developmental journalism was most prominently articulated by the liberation leaders who argued that the role of journalism was to support the process of development. This meant that, in essence, positive news about society should be emphasised and negative news minimised, or supressed. Needless to say this conflicted with the Anglo-American model whose practitioners saw it as challenging basic concepts of the fourth estate model of ‘watchdog’ journalism, including the importance of scrutinising governments and robustly defending freedom of expression. Supporters of the developmental journalism perspective argued that these Anglo-American notions were in fact a cloak for the continued domination of the Global South by the North and that ‘freedom of the press’ was in fact the freedom of the wealthy and a licence for powerful nations to exploit the countries of the South. This argument was articulated powerfully in the landmark McBride Report (McBride, 1980). This UNESCO

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study characterised the drive for developmental journalism as part of the creation of a ‘New World Information and Communication Order’ in which governments in the Global South had the right to protect their nation’s development by controlling foreign and domestic reporting in the wider interests of society. In my own experience as a media trainer, recognising the essential impermanence of one-off training workshops, I have sought to combine such programmes with longer term media development projects. This, I believe, represents a significant improvement to the model of media development assistance in which the ‘muzungu’ trainer flies in, delivers a series of workshops and then flies out again. These longer-term projects are intended to provide both journalism training and the opportunity of putting into practice aspects of the training programme, as well as providing some income for poorly paid local journalists. In Uganda, for example, a nationwide training programme was used to both train and recruit contributors to a new national news agency (the Uganda Radio Network, n.d.) that provided, and still provides, local community and commercial radio stations with a daily supply of news stories, clips and packages which could be accessed from a password protected website. The project had a central newsroom in Kampala but relied for its stories from journalists across Uganda who had attended our workshops.1 I was involved in setting up a similar project in Nigeria that was aimed at providing an alternative source of national news during the 2014 presidential election.2 One of the successes of this initiative was that it enabled political journalists, many of whom were based in the office of their State Governors, to file stories to the network which they were constrained from publishing locally. Both the Nigerian and Ugandan projects involved providing an alternative source of news to the state-run (former) monopoly news agencies. Whilst the Uganda project—funded by a number of European Union governments—which was established back in 2006 continues to this day, the Nigerian project, which was funded jointly by the US and UK governments, did not receive continuing funding and ceased at the close of polls. Such projects deliver ongoing and long-term benefits but, to state the obvious, require long-term and stable funding. A third and final project I was responsible for was in Malawi where the training workshops were followed by an intensive media monitoring 1 2

 Uganda Radio Network at https://ugandaradionetwork.net/a/  Nigeria Election News Report at https://iwpr.net/focus/nigeria-election-news-report

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operation during the 2015 general election. The monitoring sought to measure the extent to which the Malawian media was covering the campaign to internationally accepted standards of fairness.3 This project was part of a larger initiative aimed at making the election campaign more ‘issue-focussed’ as opposed to being focussed—as elections in the past have been—on personality, region, religion or tribe. To this end journalists in the programme were invited to take part in a competition aimed at encouraging issue-based election reporting. The competition was regarded as a success but many of the journalists complained of the difficulty of covering a campaign in which the leading politicians did not engage with any of the substantive issues but preferred to stay on their usual tack of attacking opponents and appealing to traditional loyalties. In summary, whether one builds on journalism training programmes by establishing longer term projects or they are left to stand alone, the political environment of the country remains the ultimate determinant of the extent to which the journalistic values—good, bad or indifferent—that the trainer has sought to impart, can be implemented by local journalists. However, I very much recognise that the notion of international journalism trainers flying into post-conflict situations in the Global South and offering to ‘help’, is riven with potential conflicts and tensions that make such interventions potentially problematic. Nonetheless, I would argue that such interventions can be, and for the most part, are beneficial both for the local journalists but also for the trainers who are able to garner valuable insights into the nature of journalism from those they are ostensibly training but who are also able to provide the trainers with the opportunity of reflecting on their own practice. To conclude, I do not believe that there is a ‘standard’ way of doing journalism which is equally valid for journalists in the South and North. But I do believe that there are values or aspirations that are, or should be, held in common. Reflecting on my work in the North as a journalist, and my work in the South as a trainer, I have developed what I am calling my ‘Seven Pillars of Journalistic Wisdom’. They based on the notion that in the pursuit of independent journalism there are certain fundamental values, or aspirations, that transcend temporal and geographic contexts. These are (in no particular order):

3   Monitoring Malawi Election malawi-election-coverage-broadly-neutral

Coverage

https://iwpr.net/global-voices/

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1. The centrality of factual accuracy—the cornerstone of all news reportage. 2. A personal integrity that commits the journalist to include all information they deem relevant and not to exclude any information they could also be considered relevant. 3. Non-interference in the editorial work of the journalist by proprietors or governments. 4. Robust legal and police protection for journalists in the course of their work. 5. The non-acceptance of payments for stories 6. Adequate renumeration to ensure that journalists are not obliged to accept payments for stories and finally 7. The right to organise in independent trade unions (with their own robust code of ethics) to ensure that all the above conditions are met. Reflecting on the pillars I am struck by the fact that they are just as relevant for journalism practice in the North as in the South. We do not live in a perfect world but the extent to which these values can be seen as realities on the ground, then one can be assured that the independent journalism is alive and well irrespective of place.

Naomi Goldsmith: The BBC Experience Those early trainers who began working in the late nineties of the last century would not have recognised much of the language of international development of today. They were often middle-to-late career journalists seeking an alternative challenge to the grind of the daily commute and incessant deadlines. I was not in the first wave who trained journalists in former Warsaw Pact countries. They were told that these countries were keen to embrace Western European style democracy and values and would need a media fit to match these aspirations. This training was run by BBC World Service Trust, the international development arm of the BBC. I began my international training career in September 2001. Little did I know how much the terrible events of that month—9/11—would shape my future working life. My first assignment was at the BBC School of Journalism in Sarajevo. I was to supervise the work of trainers from former Yugoslavia who were themselves to be training young media professionals from Bosnia and Herzegovina. It was just six years after the Dayton Peace Accords and the aim was to bring young radio journalists, who were a mix

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of Bosniak (Muslim Bosnian) Bosnian Serb and Croatian, together in the spirit of learning. Having never undertaken any formal training before—I was somewhat surprised that my first job was supervising other trainers. I soon realised that this was unlike the sort of informal mentoring of new recruits I’d done in the BBC nor even similar to the training the Somali volunteers I had undertaken at BBC Radio Sheffield. I knew the challenges were unique when, shortly after Christmas, my manager at BBC World Service Trust rang to tell me that one of our students at the BBC School had shot and killed himself. This was somewhat beyond my own very limited experience which, until that point, did not extend much beyond introducing a new arrival to the software system and BBC house style. This involved working with people who had experienced very different lives and challenges to my own. The BBC World Service Trust which was set up in 1999 grew out of earlier BBC initiatives, including one called, “Marshall Plan of the Mind” with the aim of encouraging high standards journalism in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. The BBC World Service Trust was then located on the same floor as the Training Unit of BBC World Service which organised training for new recruits working for the language services at the BBC to ensure high editorial and technical standards. Naively, at the start, I saw this as what I was supposed to do in Bosnia. I had attended a five-day ‘training of trainers’ course, which taught me how training for adults should be dynamic and interactive. There was little in the way of discussing how to adapt to different cultural norms. The emphasis was more on, “Don’t be like an old-fashioned talk and chalk schoolteacher but recognise you’re dealing with adults who can think for themselves and already know a great deal”. But the after-effects of 9/11 could not be ignored, shaping Western foreign policy as it did. It was no coincidence that Afghanistan, Somaliland, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria and Yemen all became stamps in my passport. I soon realised that the job wasn’t so much about imparting the technical skills to produce a professional TV or radio package, but more about being a small cog in a much bigger complex political package. There were times when I, and my fellow trainers, felt like patsies for both the so-called beneficiaries and funders. Often the local station managers just wanted the equipment which came with the training. Or, the next level up, the ministers or governors wanted recognition from the European Union, or international community, that they were making an effort in the right direction and would therefore be in line for trade deals and partnerships.

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On one occasion in Azerbaijan, my training wasn’t being taken at all seriously. I was offered a small room where I would sit with my interpreter waiting for people to train. The TV staff would wander in and out, just to see what was going on. They might stay for five or ten minutes and then leave. When I complained to the organisers, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Director General of the channel was called to a meeting and told that if he and his staff co-operated with the training he could expect further partnerships, together with fact-­ finding trips to Europe. The next day I arrived to find a room full of journalists and programme makers notebooks to hand.

An ‘African Way’ of Doing Journalism? Skjerdal (2009) talks about a “distinct African way” of doing journalism. Based on my own experience I am puzzled as to what is a distinct ‘African way’ or, for that matter, a ‘distinct European way’? Many of the radio stations in South Sudan are managed by the Catholic Radio Network, which in turn is financially supported by various international organisations such as UNICEF and CAFOD. Christianity arrived in Sudan (South Sudan was part of Sudan until independence in 2011) in the sixth century. Nubia, later Sudan, was mainly Coptic Christian before the arrival of Islam in the seventh and eighth century. Catholic missionaries arrived in the nineteenth century. Catholics are now the majority Christian denomination. South Sudanese thinking is strongly informed by their faith. I taught various journalism training courses for reporters and producers who were employed by the Catholic Radio Network. A reporter once complained to me that his editor had vetoed a story he had written in which, he said, the local bishop was made to look foolish. I asked him what he expected when he worked for the Catholic Radio Network. Hoping to catch me out, knowing I was a former BBC journalist and indeed training on behalf of BBC Media Action, he asked me whether this wasn’t censorship and suppression of the truth? I widened the debate with him to consider how, if there had been a serious case of abuse or fraud at the radio station, how would the story be handled, or would it perhaps be offered to another media outlet outside their network? In the end we agreed that by clearly labelling their station as a Catholic one, people would know what limitations they should expect in terms of content. The point I am making, with reference to Skjerdal’s assertion about an ‘African journalism’, is that parts of Africa have

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incorporated many influences from the West in the form of Christianity, and from the Arab world which brought Islam to the continent, and these influences have been there for centuries and are as much ‘African’ as influences emanating from traditional non-Christian, non-Muslim sources. I am more familiar with training in South Sudan than any other country in Africa but I have also worked in Somaliland and Puntland. Here, some of the older local experts in agriculture (I was helping Somalis to make radio programmes on good husbandry, especially with goats) had gone to Russia for further education and training. Having worked in Russia myself, we would, over a glass or two of vodka, reminisce about the joys and frustrations of living there and amuse ourselves with the few Russian words we remembered. I recall that the Somali agriculture experts had an enduring respect for Russian education and culture. I have met with a similar attitude in Afghanistan with Afghans of a certain age. Here, their admiration for Russian culture went as far as enjoying drinking alcohol, which they claimed they had learnt abroad. Hachten (1968) asserts “…it is highly desirable that Africans train Africans” because they have the best knowledge of local conditions, and journalists are more likely to stay in the media if they are trained locally; all of which might be true but begs the question which Africans should do the training? In those countries which have been torn apart by civil war or genocide, are the best trainers going to be those that people remember as forming part of the oppressing elite? On the other hand, it can be argued that a successful partnership between trainer and trainee is part of the process of healing the rift. When in early 2009 the then Sudanese President Al-Bashir revoked the rights of several non-governmental organisations to operate in Khartoum, many. Including the BBC World Service Trust, de-­ camped to the southern Sudanese city of Juba. The office moved together with a few of its northern Sudanese staff. These were Arabic-speaking men, the majority of whom were Muslim. They became trainers for their compatriots in the south. I was the lead international trainer and they were the national trainers. Our trainees were young southern Sudanese men and women, the vast majority of whom were Christian and spoke a local language, English and sometimes simple Arabic. Perhaps I was blind but I noticed little tension or animosity, despite the fact our staff came from the wealthier and more developed north of the country. They did, however, have to prove their worth in order to avoid potential conflict, and they did this by pointing out how they had contributed to humanitarian broadcasting in the Darfur region of Sudan. Had

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they been members of the Misseriya tribe, blamed for much of the violence in Darfur—they might not have had such an easy time. My response would therefore be which part of Africa should the trainer come from so that their experience of local conditions means they are not feared or mistrusted? As it was, when conflict broke out a few years later, it was unsafe for them to stay and they returned to Khartoum. Similarly, when I was the training supervisor in a class of Bosniaks and Bosnian Serbs in Sarajevo in 2001 and 2002, my best trainer was a young Serb from Belgrade. Despite coming from Serbia, he was liked, not only for his charisma but because he had been a member of Radio B92, the radio station which had stood up to the former authoritarian leader of Serbia, Slobodan Milosevic. Journalists in Africa are frequently seen as part of the elite because of their education level and access to other elites (Chuma et al., 2017; Berger, 2005). Reporters, in order, to practice their craft need to have completed secondary school at a minimum. They routinely converse with politicians, officials and professionals through their work. As such, they often do not have a great deal of understanding of what it means to be poor (relative to their country) or to be ignored and invisible. I recall conducting diversity training in Khartoum. When I asked the participants if they had ever experienced prejudice my question drew blank looks. Eventually, one male journalist told how he had gone to a conference for Muslims in an Arab country and was looking forward to companionship with fellow Muslims, instead he was disappointed to discover they looked down on him as an African. In other words, here was a Sudanese journalist who had to go abroad to experience prejudice. Journalism trainers from the West may be privileged by virtue of coming from a developed nation but they themselves often come from a wide variety of backgrounds. Having said that though, the growing need to complete an unpaid internship is leading to journalism becoming a profession for those with families who can support them at the start of their careers. A further objection to ‘internationals’ training African or Asian journalists is their lack of understanding of how to operate in those countries where media independence is under constant threat. Ironically, in ‘fragile states’ which are not properly functioning democracies, and when their instability poses a threat to western interests, the international community has, on occasion, undertaken comprehensive programmes of intervention, including funding, managing and supporting precarious democratic governments or even civil society organisations, with greater or lesser success. Programmes such as this have been undertaken in a number of countries

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including Afghanistan, South Sudan and Libya. I’ve worked in media outlets in Afghanistan and South Sudan which only survive because they receive substantial aid from Western donors. In these outlets the journalists are paid properly and are expected to maintain international standards of journalistic ethics. In these cases, I’ve not just been an international trainer but their manager—recruiting, managing and, in collaboration with senior national staff, overseeing their output. According to Myers and Juma (2018) international media development has, since the Cold War, been “shown to play a role in strengthening democracy, economic development, political discourse and good governance”. Myers and Juma’s argument that the main point of international media development is to help strengthen Western-style democracy comes to the crux of the issue. If we accept that robust democratic systems, economic development, healthy political discourse and good governance are all things to be wished for—the question is: does media development have a positive impact, does it justify the expense and is the effect long-term— in the language of international development—is it sustainable?

What Constitutes ‘Success’? Every, or most, workshops end with the ritual of course evaluation. When I first started working on media development projects I would read the results of the feedback forms avidly—like an actor reading reviews of the first night. I then went through a phase of thinking all they proved was that, for the participants, the training was preferable to their normal work and the ‘per diems’ (daily paid ‘expenses’) and free lunches were very much appreciated. Now, as methods of evaluation have become more sophisticated, depending on how well they are written and how seriously the participants fill them in, they can indicate a genuine level of satisfaction or reveal shortcomings in the training. This in turn might indicate the likelihood, or otherwise, that they will follow the advice and use the skills obtained. Twenty years ago monitoring and evaluation was in its infancy. Now, many of the larger non-governmental organisations have whole departments devoted to it. The pre and post tests are proficient at testing knowledge where there are precise answers, but they are inadequate at assessing skill levels or problem-solving abilities. However, the funders expect to see evidence of improvement and project managers are required to demonstrate that it has been achieved.

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Journalism training programmes can be particularly effective when there is among the , a grass-roots desire for social change. In this case, it’s not just the skills the journalists need in readiness for any new dispensation, but the confidence gained from the awareness that the international community is supporting this change. When I trained in former Yugoslavia (2003 to 2005) the young journalists wanted a Western-style democratic political system and an end to the civil war but were frustrated by the slow the pace of change. I would point out that I had come on a business visa— with the authorities knowing I was working for the BBC World Service Trust—the implication being that whatever they might say in public, they were willing to countenance change. Sometimes I would rather theatrically hold-up my business visa for them to see. The presence of an overseas trainer was evidence that the international community was supporting change and the local authorities were, if not supporting it, at least were prepared to turn a blind eye. In some cases, the presence of international trainers gave the journalists the confidence to flex their muscles and push for a faster pace of change. This was the case in the Maldives where I trained between 2006 and 2011. Many of the journalists were frustrated with the 30-years of rule by President Gayoom and supportive of the opposition led by Mohammed Nasheed, regardless of whether they worked for the private or state media. One journalist told me that following my training he couldn’t stomach working for the state media any longer and had resigned. I was somewhat horrified, until he reassured me he had secured a job with a private media outlet. In 2006 the Maldives was planning to hold its first multi-party elections since independence but there was reluctance from the ruling party to permit greater media freedom during the course of the campaign. I received a phone call from the Ministry of Information—aware of the election training programme I was leading—telling me it was not my place to ‘interfere’ in Maldivian politics. We ran into difficulties when I tried to organise a roundtable with candidates from the government and opposition. A compromise was brokered by the British High Commission in Sri Lanka, under whose remit the Maldives fell. This led to the adoption of a set of election reporting guidelines which the Maldivian journalists devised themselves from a mix of those they found from the UK, India and Sri Lanka. I was told that the guidelines would only be effective if both the state and private media agreed to abide by them. For several weeks each side waited for the other to move. A month or so after the training, I

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received an email from the Ministry of Information saying they had instructed their journalists to follow the guidelines. I knew then that the private media would follow suit, as they did. In this instance, the journalism training coincided with the mood of the time and was able to contribute to a change which was already gathering pace. I have trained in China and Vietnam—both Communist countries, where there is little room for dissent. In both, I found that the journalists could cover unfair dealings or issues that did not impact on the central government, and where a relatively simple remedy was available to the authorities. The secret here was not to challenge the authority of the Party, or to talk about human rights. Instead, the journalists had to focus on, for example, a ‘lack of access for disabled people’ or highlight how a certain village was still without electricity following floods, despite promises from the local authorities. But do developing countries want international trainers at the expense (literally) of their own trainers? Certainly there are cases where they would prefer their own national trainers. It’s cheaper (if they are paying for the training), there is no language barrier and their understanding of the local context is a great advantage. However, whilst local trainers can, and do, fulfil an important role, in my experience journalists in the South also want to hear from trainers with experience of having worked for an internationally known media organisation. This was reinforced for me when, mid-way through a journalism workshop in China, I asked my local project manager if she thought my being ethnically Chinese was an advantage. She shook her head and said, “No, they were hoping for someone more exotic.” Many countries I have worked in have a rich tradition of storytelling—a tradition which uses imagery and allegory. One of the challenges I face as trainer is to enable those journalists (who can also be scriptwriters or filmmakers) to build on this heritage and use their talents while at the same time differentiating between art and journalism. Of course, this is on a spectrum rather than a binary divide. There are short news stories going through to non-fiction features. I believe that clear labelling overcomes some of the ambiguity. Journalists can produce content as auteurs but their audience needs to be aware which of their content has a more personal stamp and which is more conventional ‘news’. There is a trend now for journalists to define their brand so that their online followers are clearer about their individual outlook.

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After two decades of training and supporting media workers in the Balkans and Global South I have had cause to reflect on my previous attitudes towards western intervention delivered in the name of development and progress. In August 2021, I deleted all the images and references to female journalists in Afghanistan from my social media. My association with them had the potential to put them in danger for as long as the Taliban controlled the government in Kabul. The way the West abandoned Afghanistan and failed to implement a satisfactory refugee programme is a cause of great shame and sadness to me. Many Afghan media outlets were forced to close because of financial and political pressures. The West supported the training of hundreds of female media workers and raised their hopes but ultimately was not prepared to pay the long-term price of securing their future in a country where a significant proportion of people wanted a return to a particular interpretation of Sharia Law. The lesson I learnt here, is that some interventions may not be for the best if they are not backed up by longer term commitments. It’s like a surgeon cutting open a body, fiddling around inside but then failing to suture and close the gaping wound. But Western trainers are, of course, not journalistic surgeons—our job is to offer advice and insights—but during the process we end up learning much about ourselves and our own attitudes and prejudices, which in turn (hopefully) informs and enriches what we can offer in subsequent assignments.

References Babalola, S., & Alokan, O. (2013). African concept of time, a socio-cultural reality in the process of change. Journal of Education and Practice, 7/4. BBC. (n.d.). Section 4: Impartiality  – Introduction Section 4.1. https://www. bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines/guidelines/impartiality Berger, G. (2005). Current challenges. In A. Hadland (Ed.), Changing the fourth estate: Essays on South African journalism. HSRC Press. Bernstein, C. (2022). Carl Bernstein on chasing history. CBS News 9 January 2022. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/carl-­bernstein-­on-­chasing-­history/ Christians, C., Glasser, T., McQuail, D., & Nordenstreng, K. (2009). Normative theories of the media: Journalism in democratic societies. University of Illinois Press. Chuma, W.  Wasserman, H.  Bosch, T., & Pointer, R. (2017). Questioning the media-democracy link: South African journalists’ views in African Journalism Quarterly published online 2017 ­ file:///C:/Users/ivorg/Dropbox/A/ chumaetal2017media-­democracyjournalists.pdf.

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Downing, J.  D. H. (1996). Internationalizing media theory. Peace Review, 8(1), 113–117. Gaber, I. (2020). Kovach and Rosenstiel’s elements of journalism: A foundational text or a moment in history? Journal of Education, 9(1), 58–65. Hachten, William A. (1968). The training of African journalists. Gazette, 14, 101–110. Leiden, Nethrelands. Hallin, D., & Mancini, P. (2004). Comparing media systems: Three models of media systems. Cambridge University Press. Jimada, U. (1992). Eurocentric media training in Nigeria: What alternative? Journal of Black Studies, 22(3), 366–379. McBride, S. (1980). Many voices one world. UNESCO. Myers, M., & Juma, L. (2018). Defending independent media: A comprehensive analysis of aid flows. Washington DC, Center for International Media Assistance. https://www.cima.ned.org/publication/comprehensive-­analysis-­ media-­aid-­flows/. Nyamnjoh, F. (2005). Africa’s media: Democracy and the politics of belonging. Zed Books. Sen, A. (1999). Development as freedom. Oxford University Press. Shaw, I. S. (2009). Towards an African journalism model: A critical historical perspective. International Communication Gazette, 71(16), 491–510. Siebert, F., Peterson, F., & Schramm, W. (1956). Four theories of the press: The authoritarian, libertarian, social responsibility and Soviet communist concepts of what the press should be and do. University of Illinois Press. Skjerdal, T.  S. (2009). Between journalism universals and cultural particulars: Challenges facing the development of a journalism programme in an East African context. Journal of African Media Studies, 1(1), 23–34. Uganda Radio Network. (n.d.). URN at work. https://ugandaradionetwork. com/s/about/the-­work-­of-­urn/ UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office. (2021). Human rights and democracy: 2020. Report https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ human-­rights-­and-­democracy-­r eport-­2020/human-­rights-­and-­democracy-­ 2020-­foreign-­commonwealth-­development-­office-­report#chapter-­1-­human-­ri ghts-­and-­democracy-­priority-­themes USAID. (n.d.). Supporting vibrant civil society & independent media. https://www. usaid.gov/democracy/supporting-­vibrant-­civil-­society-­independent-­media

CHAPTER 10

Understanding Different Journalisms Saba Bebawi

This chapter will take a closer look at how local journalists from the global south practice journalism and how they view the development of their practice. Specifically, this chapter explores how Arab journalists and investigative reporters have gone about developing a model of practice that strikes a balance between how they are trained on Western methods of reporting and how they practice journalism in their own communities. This chapter looks and discusses the tensions that arise from this and how they are resolved and dealt with by Arab reporters. This final chapter of the book aims to echo what previous chapters have focussed on, that there is no universal method of practicing journalism, thus acknowledging that ‘different journalisms’ is about how reporters from around the globe take into consideration their contexts when teaching and practicing their trade.

S. Bebawi (*) Faculty of Arts, School of Communication, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0_10

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Universalism in Journalism Universalism in journalism is a notion that has been entrenched in the practice and training of journalism across the world. Concepts such as the inverted pyramid, avoidance of emotion and bias, systematic access to data and sources, freedom of information requests, are all staples in journalism taught in the Global North and yet expected to be adhered to and applied in all other parts of the globe. However, and as the chapters in this book have evidenced, this is certainly not the case. To assume that there is a universalism in the way journalism is practiced is not only problematic, but also undermines the nuances and particularities of contexts surrounding journalism in various countries. One classic model to conceptualise the contextual effects on journalism practice in different cultural settings is that of Pamela J. Shoemaker and Stephen D. Reese’s ‘hierarchical model’ (1996). Starting from the bottom of the ‘hierarchical model’ is what they position as the ‘individual level’ which could be understood as the ‘influences on content from individual media workers’. At this level, the ‘factors that are intrinsic to the communication worker’ are considered, such as their education, personal background and professional history (Shoemaker & Reese, 1996: 64). Additionally, other considerations include their value and belief systems, and how they perceive their roles (Shoemaker & Reese, 1996: 64). This is followed by the ‘media routines level’, thus referring to the ‘influence of media routines’ which is associated with ‘an organizational perspective on the mass media’ (Shoemaker & Reese, 1996: 107). Then the ‘organization level’, meaning the ‘organizational influences on content’, which look into the nature of ‘roles performed, the way they are structured, the policies flowing through that structure, and the methods used to enforce those policies’ (Shoemaker & Reese, 1996: 172–173). The ‘extramedia level’ follows which ties with ‘influences on content from outside of media organizations’ and that incorporate ‘sources of the information’, ‘revenue sources’, the ‘economic environment’, ‘technology’, and ‘other social institutions’ which include governments and businesses (Shoemaker & Reese, 1996: 175). At the top of the ‘hierarchical model’—and which includes all the above influences—is the ‘ideological level’ which refers to as the ‘influence of ideology’. This influence is concerned with relations of power since ‘media transmission of ideology works as it does by drawing on familiar cultural themes that resonate with audiences’ (Shoemaker & Reese, 1996: 222). Overall, these factors play a significant role in the

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construction of news discourses, and when considering these factors, it becomes apparent that a universal notion of journalism is not possible. The complexity of how these factors operate to form diverse journalism practices is argued by Cherian George (2013), who distinguishes between what is referred to as ‘paradigmatic differences’ and ‘contextual differences’. Paradigmatic differences ‘refer to dominant world views within a discipline’, where ‘shared systems of thought that are legitimated and reinforced by professional organizations, educational institutions, and regulators and other government agencies’ develop. In this context, ‘[i]ndividuals operating within the same paradigm may work on different problems, but agree on a shared basis for assessing one another’s work, using terms that are mutually understood’ (George, 2013: 494). Contextual differences, on the other hand, refer to ‘the circumstances in which something occurs, which would include relevant historical, cultural, economic and political factors [and which are] potentially limitless’ (George, 2013: 494). What this means, according to George, is that ‘[t]wo sets of practices may occur within the same context but answer to different paradigms, or share paradigms despite operating in different contexts’ (George, 2013: 494). In essence, George’s argument can be summarised through the following: Journalism around the world is being shaped by both convergent and divergent forces. The resulting landscape, comprising a patchwork of journalistic traditions that are both similar and different, leaves scholars torn between a universalist impulse that risks imposing eurocentric benchmarks outside of their proper context, and a moral relativism that is unable to make any value judgments. (George, 2013: 490). With this in mind, I will now consider and discuss how journalism practice is shaped in the Global South outside the context of Western practice, and through the example of Arab journalism.

Arab Culture of Journalism An Arab culture of journalism has slowly been on the rise, especially when Arab journalists reporting from their countries have found it difficult to apply what they are trained in during coaching sessions delivered by trainers from Western backgrounds. One of the overarching challenges facing Arab investigative reporting, for example, are traditional styles of

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reporting that have been entrenched in the Arab culture of journalism. William A. Rugh contextualises this: Historically, the Arab press has had a strong tie to Arab culture. Arab literature, including poetry, tales, and stories, predated mass media by more than a millennium and had developed a very rich tradition by the time the first newspapers appeared. The publishers of these papers, influenced to some extent by the example of the contemporary French newspapers which were heavily cultural in content, quite naturally regarded the Arab press as a proper vehicle for Arab literature. (Rugh, 2004: 7).

The Arabic language has historically been a vehicle for poetry and literary expression, where tournaments would be held in the Arabian Peninsula for the strongest poetic expressions. The Arabic language can, in turn, be described as an emotive language (Bebawi, 2016), that is still today dominant in Arab reporting. This strongly affects how the reporting is structured and, in turn, conveyed. Essentially, the effect of this on journalism is that the Arabic language and its cultural usage have a few characteristics that Raphael Patai (2007) pinpoints as exaggeration, overemphasis, overassertion, and repetition. Patai notes that ‘[i]t is almost inevitable that people who are used to expressing their thoughts in such (and much more complex) ready-made phraseology, to which must be added the frequent use of innumerable proverbs and sayings, should be led by their language into exaggeration and overemphasis’ (Patai, 2007: 53). This superlative form of expression is certainly a distortion to facts-based reporting, and one that needs to be addressed. It is important to note that it is not the literary component of reporting, which also exists in other journalism cultures, that is problematic; rather, it is that news content in Arab media is heavily literary in content and is used mainly for emotive persuasion. Yet, the cultural influence on news reporting is reflected not only in content but also in news processes. Examples of this include difficulty in adhering to deadlines, inability to differentiate between fact and opinion while researching a story, and a focus on one side of the story without considering the multiplicity of views on the topic. A close observation of journalism practice by Arab reporters reveals a distinct Arab culture of journalism stemming from traditional practices, and which, in turn, have had an effect on the development of investigative reporting. One issue that was notable during the observation of the

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training and practice of investigative reporting is the lack of accuracy in the investigative process. Rana Sabbagh, who was the Executive Director and Co-Founder of Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ), notes that perfection is not part of the culture (Sabbagh, 16 June 2013), although it is, in fact, crucial when developing a form of journalism that relies on the accuracy of facts. She states: ‘I guess whoever works on investigative journalism cannot afford to do one mistake […] you can afford to do mistakes if you’re a beat reporter—if you’re covering day-to-day stories—but not as an investigative journalist’ (Sabbagh, 16 June 2013). There is, therefore, a need for Arab journalists to develop the habit of being meticulous in their reporting, and to realise that investigative reporting is a thorough and lengthy process. Sabbagh notes that journalists tend to get bored, and do not have the resilience to keep working and rewriting a story. Another characteristic that is dominant in the culture of Arab journalism is that journalists have traditionally tended to play a steering role in the construction of the news message, dictating to audiences how to think and how to react to the events at hand. Jerichow, who is a board member of ARIJ, states: ‘You get audiences who cannot think for themselves, they are told what to think, journalists have pre-empted ideas’ (Jerichow, 6 December 2014). The reason behind this journalistic role goes back to the news media being used as a political tool and a mouthpiece for the state. Hence, the concept of using a hypothesis-based process of investigating a story can be problematic for Arab journalists, who are trained to report on pre-empted angles that provide a certain narrative to a story. This was noted during the observational analysis of training sessions whereby there was a continuous attempt by coaches to remind journalists that they cannot predict the findings of the investigation before first going through the process. Accordingly, training investigative journalism in the region is not only focused on teaching investigative reporting skills, but also involves lengthy processes of eradicating previous journalistic habits. The process of training is, therefore, twofold: first, abolishing traditional journalistic practices that are embedded in the Arab culture of journalism; and second, teaching new journalism processes and skills, thus developing a revived culture of journalism. Upon returning to their newsrooms after training, Arab journalists find it difficult to implement what they have learnt. They find themselves dealing with editors who are still operating within traditional frameworks. They feel isolated. They are motivated to continue work on

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their investigative stories; however, editors do not always give trained journalists the time to implement what they have learnt. It is worth noting here that when talking about the culture of journalism as a challenge, it does not mean that there is a need to adjust traditional formats of Arab reporting to adopt a Western standard of journalism. Jerichow argues there is a need for journalists to maintain their reporting practices within local parameters (Jerichow, 6 December 2014), since it is problematic to assume that Western practices and processes of reporting would be suitable for Arab journalism. What the Arab culture of journalism needs, however, is to rid itself of traditional practices that impede the development of investigative reporting specifically, and professional reporting in general. In turn, Arab reporting needs to develop its own practices that suit its operation within the region, thus creating a professional contemporary Arab culture of journalism. One way of developing a revamped Arab culture of journalism is for newly trained journalists to get together and form a network through which trained journalists can apply and maintain what they have learnt. Jerichow believes that by creating a network of young and trained journalists, this could help address the issue and develop a new Arab culture of journalism.

Different Journalisms Different journalisms, as this book has centred on, is a notion in journalism studies that many scholars have increasingly been acknowledging and focussing on. Interestingly, amongst journalists from the Global South there has been tension, on the one hand, between the need to practice Western forms of journalism that reports from the global south have witnessed and have been trained in as an ideal standard of universal practice; and between the tension of how to apply this adopted Western form of journalism in an environment where journalism functions in another reality all together. Interestingly, more than often, Arab journalists are not aware of this tension although it is visible in the output and practice. This is because they have learnt to overcome or go around the obstacles that face them at a local level when trying to apply an ideal standard of universal practice. The result? A hybrid way of doing joutnalism that becomes unique to the media environments local journalists are operating within. One thing many of these global south journalists are realising, however, is that there is no ‘wrong’ or ‘right’ way of doing journalism—there is no

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one way of doing journalism. By removing themselves from the shackles of the concept of a ‘universal’ journalism practice, they are giving way to a plethora of universal and diverse journalisms to emerge and flourish. More importantly, and as this book strives for, there is a need for journalists from the global north to realise this, acknowledge it, and in turn train their journalists on the different practices that journalism can adopt around the world. Not only does this create global journalism understanding, but it also allows for the emergence of foreign correspondents who can adapt and report to different perspectives, voices, and views when telling a story (Bebawi & Evans, 2019).

References Bebawi, S. (2016). Investigative journalism in the Arab world: Issues and challenges. Palgrave. Bebawi, S., & Evans, M. (2019). The future foreign correspondent. Palgrave. George, C. (2013). Diversity around a democratic core: The universal and the particular in journalism. Journalism, 14(4), 490–503. Jerichow, A. (2014). ARIJ board member, interview with Author, Amman, Jordan, 6 December 2014. Patai, R. (2007). The Arab Mind. Recovery Resources Press: Tucson. Rugh, W. A. (2004). Arab mass media: Newspapers, radio, and television in Arab politics. Praeger. Sabbagh, R. (2013). Executive director of Arab reporters for investigative journalism, interview with Author, Amman, Jordan, 16 June 2013. Shoemaker, P. J., & Reese, S. D. (1996). Mediating the message: Theories of influences on mass media content (2nd ed.). Longman.

Index1

A Activist, 6, 108, 139, 140 Advertising, 14, 44, 52, 100, 109, 112, 117, 132, 161, 169 Advocacy reporting, 11 Agenda setting, 93–94, 101 AI, 16, 26, 118 Alternative, 15, 44, 49, 69, 74, 75, 77, 88, 91, 101, 122, 130, 136–138, 144, 167, 180, 182 Anglo-American, 7, 55, 155, 157, 163, 174, 175, 179 Arab, 7, 99, 129, 164, 185, 186, 193, 195–198 Arab Spring, 99, 129, 165 Argentina, 6, 15, 17, 19, 21, 23, 24, 63–80 Asia, 40, 46, 48n10, 109, 155, 163

Audience, 5, 11, 12, 15, 20–23, 25, 27, 70, 79, 80, 91, 111, 112, 120, 121, 143, 145, 161, 177, 189 B Blogger, 6, 86, 88, 89, 92, 95, 96, 99 Bollywoodized, 112 Bonding social capital, 139 Bridging social capital, 139 Broadcasting, 37, 39, 40n4, 45, 46, 56, 58, 91, 107, 110–112, 115, 117, 142, 185 Burma News International (BNI), 48n8 Business models, 5, 11, 14, 16, 25, 26

 Note: Page numbers followed by ‘n’ refer to notes.

1

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 S. Bebawi, O. Onilov (eds.), Different Global Journalisms, Palgrave Studies in Journalism and the Global South, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18992-0

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C Censorship, 10, 36–38, 40, 41, 44, 54, 99, 103, 134, 184 China, 38n2, 40, 55, 111, 116, 120, 157, 163, 163n7, 163n8, 164, 164n9, 189 Citizen journalism, 6, 85–103 Civil society, 11, 19, 132, 165, 175, 186 Clientelism, 10, 128, 133 Collaboration, 10–12, 16, 17, 19, 21, 111, 120, 158, 160, 162, 169, 187 Commercial, 6, 12, 47, 108, 112, 119, 156, 159, 166, 180 Community, 2, 7, 13, 17–19, 24, 53, 54, 72–75, 78, 121, 162, 167, 175, 180, 183, 186, 188 Context, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 12, 20, 49, 55, 63, 65, 69, 72, 80, 94, 99, 100, 107–110, 112, 127, 128, 130, 134, 145, 174, 189, 195 Convergence, 11, 73, 115 Creativity, 10, 16, 21, 25, 64 Cultures of journalism, 4, 5, 195–198 D Data, 5, 11, 12, 16–20, 25, 56, 58, 67, 91, 92, 95, 116, 128, 135, 140, 158–161, 164, 169, 194 Data journalism, 5, 16–19, 25, 169 Data storytelling, 16–17, 20 Developmental journalism, see Development journalism Development journalism, 120, 174 Different journalisms, 4, 193 Digital divide, 128, 130 Digital journalism, 5, 11, 96 Digital media, 10, 12–14, 85, 90, 91, 94, 101, 103

Diversity, 9, 13, 36, 45, 70, 91, 109, 134, 168, 175, 186 Divides, 116, 130, 145 Domination, 2, 4, 179 E Editorial autonomy, 4 Emerging, 2, 6, 7, 25, 26, 85, 145, 162 Entrepreneurial journalism, 65 Ethnic, 6, 37–39, 44, 45, 47–50, 47n7, 48n9, 50n12, 53, 55, 109, 175 Ethnic media, 37, 44, 47–50 Exile journalists, 45 Exile media, 6, 45–47, 50, 59 Explanatory journalism, 24 F Facebook, 16, 22, 23, 26, 42, 49, 52, 54, 55, 57, 86, 88, 90, 95, 96, 98–100, 113, 116, 130, 134–144 Fact-checking, 118, 169 Financial resilience, 44 FOI, see Freedom of information Foreign aid, 15 Freedom of expression, 40, 57, 121, 177, 179 Freedom of information (FOI), 18, 194 Freedom of speech, 37, 42 G Gatekeeping, 94, 100 Global, 2–4, 55, 66, 110, 112, 119–122, 156, 159, 162, 168, 181n3, 193, 198 Globalization, 110–112

 INDEX 

Global North, 3, 4, 179, 194 Global South, 3, 4, 7, 10, 16, 56, 64, 173, 174, 179, 181, 190, 195, 198 Google, 16, 22, 24 H Hacktivist, 100 Harvesting, 92 Hate speech, 42, 52 Hybrid, 36, 130, 145, 198 I Impartiality, 156, 161, 176, 177 Inclusive, 4, 72, 93, 175, 177 Independent media, 13, 38, 44, 49, 89, 97, 137, 174 India, 6, 40, 47, 107–122, 156, 162, 166, 188 Infotainment, 6, 107, 112, 119, 122 Innovation, 11, 12, 15–17, 26, 75, 162 Instagram, 21, 23, 24, 113 Insurgent media, 47–49 Integrated media, 25, 47, 134 Integrity, 18, 142, 176, 182 Investigative journalism, 7, 113, 156–159, 163–169, 171, 197 Investigative journalists, 51, 86, 156, 158, 160, 161, 165, 166, 169 Investigative reporters, see Investigative journalists J Journalism cultures, 11 See also Cultures of journalism Journalism practice, 1, 16, 88, 90, 95, 99, 175, 182, 194–196, 199 Journalistic cultures, see Cultures of journalism

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L Latin America, 5, 9–27, 75 Liberal media, 110, 116 Live, 10, 23, 114, 138, 142, 182 Local journalist, 64, 180, 181, 188, 193, 198 M Mainstream media, 12, 14, 86, 89, 91, 92, 94, 99–101, 113, 117–119, 128, 134, 143, 145, 159, 170 Media, 2, 5, 6, 23, 35–59, 48n8, 48n9, 63–80, 127–145, 156, 163n8, 164, 164n9, 166, 174, 184 activist, 38, 103 environment, 12, 120 ethics, 41, 120 freedom, 36, 40, 41, 50, 132, 188 literacy, 53, 57 ownership, 41, 91, 133 routines, 194 Medinya, 53 Military coup, 6, 36, 56 Military dictatorship, 38, 45, 55 Mistrust, 36, 41, 42, 53, 139 Models of journalism, see Cultures of journalism Moldova, 128, 131–135, 138–140, 142 Myanmar, 5, 35–59, 39n3, 40n4, 47n7, 56n14, 56n15 Myanmar Journalists Association (MJA), 43 N National, 2, 18, 24, 41, 44, 47, 48, 50, 50n12, 53, 92, 109–111, 115, 119–121, 164, 174, 179, 180, 185, 187, 189 Neo-liberalism, 110

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Netizens, 91, 164 News, 2, 5, 6, 9–16, 18, 20–26, 37n1, 38n2, 39, 44, 45, 48–50, 48n10, 52, 53, 56, 56n14, 57, 63, 64, 67, 70, 71, 79, 80, 87–92, 94, 96, 98–101, 107–122, 128, 130, 133, 134, 136–138, 141–143, 157, 162, 166, 169, 176, 179, 180, 180n2, 182, 189, 195–197 Newspaper, 11, 23, 27, 36, 39, 42, 49, 56n15, 63, 68, 70–74, 77, 78, 91, 100, 108 News production, 15, 52, 70, 90, 91, 100 Newsrooms, 3, 5, 11, 12, 15–19, 22, 25, 26, 56, 58, 99, 100, 197 Non-democratic, 6, 89 Non-profit media, 68 Non-Western, 2, 4, 5, 11, 26, 133 O Objectivity, 79, 88, 95, 175, 176 Online, 7, 14, 42, 45, 46, 63, 64, 69, 90, 92, 94, 95, 98, 113, 116–120, 129–131, 134–137, 139, 143, 144, 162, 166, 167, 169, 189 Open data, 19 P Paradigm, 64, 73, 79, 169, 195 Passive audiences, 86, 87 Philanthropic, 14–16, 26, 169 Platforms, 5, 11, 14, 20–26, 49, 55, 73, 86, 88–91, 100, 113, 116, 118, 128, 130, 134, 156, 161, 162 Pluralism, 10, 121, 133 Plurality, see Pluralism Polarisation, 114–119, 157

Political affiliation, 55 Political oppression, 10 Positive news, 179 Post-Soviet, 6, 127–145 Practice, 1, 2, 4–7, 17, 19, 26, 37, 43, 50–54, 57, 70, 86–88, 90, 93, 95, 96, 159, 176, 177, 180, 181, 186, 193–195, 197, 198 Private media, 6, 12, 37, 38, 40, 41, 44, 52, 57, 100, 188 Privatization, 108, 110 Propaganda, 12, 41, 42, 47, 53, 58, 94, 110, 132, 136, 141, 143, 157, 164 Prosumers, 86, 87 Protest participation, 6, 127–132, 134, 135, 137, 140–142, 144, 145 Protocol news, 111 Public opinion, 39, 122, 133 Public sphere, 2–4, 93, 108, 110, 121, 137 R Recovered media, 6, 63–65, 67, 68, 71, 72, 74, 75, 77, 79, 80 Regional media systems, 11 Reporter, 44, 53, 54, 56, 76, 94, 160, 165, 167, 184, 197 Reporting, 2, 10, 16, 17, 20, 22, 26, 52–56, 58, 86, 91, 162, 164, 165, 167, 180, 181, 188, 193, 195–198 Representative, 2, 4, 46, 128, 135, 139 Repression, 10, 45, 86, 129, 169 S Self-censorship, 37 Self-censure, see Self-censorship

 INDEX 

Self-management, 6, 65–69, 71, 75, 77, 79 Social media, 6, 20–23, 42, 55, 58, 64, 73, 86, 88–90, 92, 93, 97–100, 102, 112, 113, 115–118, 127–132, 134–137, 139, 141, 143–145, 164, 167, 190 Social movement, 69 Soft news, 112 Southeast Asia, 39, 42, 43 Soviet, 6, 128, 132, 136, 138, 139, 141–145, 165, 183 Spotify, 23–25 State broadcasting, 37 State control, 38, 38n2, 39 State controlled, 4 State media, 37, 47, 97, 99, 188 Status quo, 12, 141 Storytelling, 20, 22, 25, 189 Sub-Saharan Africa, 174 Sustainable, 14, 25, 58, 80, 122, 132, 187 T Technology, 2, 5, 11, 16, 22, 26, 45, 73, 118, 121, 129, 159, 162, 171, 194 Telegram, 24, 25 Television, 3, 6, 38n2, 40n4, 45, 90, 94, 107, 110–115, 120, 121, 129, 130, 133, 135, 137, 139, 141–144, 156 Traditional media, 10, 14, 89, 90, 101, 103, 128, 136, 143–145 Trainer, 175, 176, 178, 180, 181, 185–189 Training, 2, 4, 5, 7, 10, 14, 17, 43, 53, 55, 58, 164, 173–178, 180–190, 194, 197 Transition, 5, 36, 37, 39, 42, 45, 50, 55, 69

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Transparency, 177 Trust, 46, 71, 96, 134, 138, 139, 141, 144 Twitter, 22, 57, 90, 99, 100, 113, 129, 130, 135 U Ubiquitous journalism, 26 UGC, see User-generated content Universal, 3, 7, 156, 157, 163, 164, 174, 193, 195, 198, 199 Universalism, 4, 163, 194 User-generated content (UGC), 20 V Viewership, 113, 119, 133 W Western, 1–7, 10, 11, 14, 15, 19, 45, 64, 70, 72, 79, 80, 111, 120, 128, 130, 132, 137, 138, 145, 157, 168, 173–175, 177, 178, 182, 183, 187, 188, 190, 193, 195, 198 Western culture, 72, 79, 80 WhatsApp, 23–25, 116, 119 Whistle-blowers, 85, 89, 102, 159, 167 Whistle-blowing, 6, 86, 89 Workers’ co-ops, 63, 64 Y YouTube, 23–25, 117 Z Zimbabwe, 6, 86–90, 95–99, 101, 102