The volume of international media assistance (IMA) has significantly grown during the past two decades. Major donors, including the United States’ government, have increased support for initiatives aimed at fostering freedom of expression, media independence, diversity of opinion, democratic press legislation, investigative journalism, and equal access to information technologies. Yet, despite this explosion, we still know very little about the link between aid interventions and media transformations? This article analyzes how selected programs articulate broad media objectives with program goals and apply indicators to determine impact with the goal of understanding how media assistance goals are operationalized and measured, and how program goals are linked to broad objectives. Guided by the notion that institutions and institutional incentives matter in international aid, it is proposed that IMA program goals should not only be the reflection of normative arguments about desirable media structures and practices, and models of development and change. They also need to be viewed as the expression of the dynamics and organizational goals of aid institutions.

"This thesis examines the impact on the Media Assistance sector of the arrival of digital technologies into the ‘information ecosystems’ in which it operates. Whereas historically in Media Assistance, broadcast media and the press have been the preferred (or available) media for achieving development objectives, digital technologies such as mobile phones and social media are radically altering the landscape of Media Assistance." (abstract)

"[This book] examines the way in which foreign aid has shaped professional ideologies of journalism as part of systematic and orchestrated efforts since the beginning of the twentieth century to shape journalism as a political institution of the Global South. Foreign aid pushed for cultural convergence around a set of ideologies as a way of exporting ideology and expanding markets, reflecting the market society along with the expansion of U.S. power and culture across the globe.

Jairo Lugo-Ocando argues that these policies were not confined to the Cold War and were not a purely modern phenomenon; today’s journalism grammar was not invented in one place and spread to the rest, but was instead a forced colonial and post-colonial nation-building exercise that reflected both imposition and contestation to these attempts. As a result, Lugo-Ocando claims, journalism grammar and ideology differ between societies in the Global South, regardless of claims of universality." (publisher)

This collection is the first of its kind on the topic of media development. It brings together luminary thinkers in the field—both researchers and practitioners—to reflect on how advocacy groups, researchers, the international community and others can work to ensure that media can continue to serve as a force of democracy and development. But that mission faces considerable challenges. Media development paradigms are still too frequently associated with Western prejudices, or out of touch with the digital age. As we move past Western blueprints and into an uncertain digital future, what does media development mean? If we are to act meaningfully to shape the future of our increasingly mediated societies, we must answer this question.

More and more news outlets rely on philanthropic funding. With such funding come new questions about the effect that media content has on citizens and policymakers. Traditional metrics, most observers agree, are insufficient. But the value of alternative metrics is an open issue. Two scholars analyze an array of current approaches to gauging whether and how news organizations make a difference in the world.