Evaluation
Research, reports and articles about the evaluation of donor and foundation-support to journalism an media development.
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Research, reports and articles about the evaluation of donor and foundation-support to journalism an media development.
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This resource page is a work in progress. Please get in touch to let us know what is missing using this form.
Center for International Media Assistance - MARY MYERS & LINEY ANGAYA JUMA
"When donors provide assistance to the media sector, they frequently back projects that aim to strengthen the media’s contribution to good governance in some way or another. This kind of funding is consistent with recent declarations made by the international community on the importance of protecting independent media for the sake of democracy and development. Yet, in the bigger picture, donors still only commit a tiny fraction to this sector and appear to be responding slowly, if at all, to the unique challenges of press freedom in the digital age."
BBC Media Action
"The international standards referred to in this report include those of Freedom House and Reporters Without Borders, which measure media freedom, and others such as a set of indicators designed to measure progress towards media development developed by UNESCO. None of these organisations claim that their indicators are perfect or cover all issues relevant to the role of media in society. Media freedom indicators have tended to be criticised for taking an overly Western, liberal, ‘one-size- fits-all’ approach, and of not taking into consideration the cultures of Africa and other developing regions. It can be argued, for instance, that it is unfair to censure media systems that are forced, through economic necessity, to rely on political and other narrow interests for financial sponsorship and compare them unfavourably with media systems in more robust economies. It can also be argued that it is unreasonable to use the same standard to assess media in countries at very different stages of political or economic development. Within this context, this report uses some of the traditional international standards and indicators simply as short-hand: a convenient way to compare and summarise the degrees of repression and control over the media in the five countries studied."
DW Akademie - JAN LUBLINSKI, SACHA MEUTER, MARK NELSON
"News media have the potential to support economic and social improvements in developing countries and emerging economies. But in reality they often fail to do so. Instead of serving the public and speaking truth to power, many media may act as mouthpieces of the powerful, repeat rumors without verification, discriminate against minorities, and feed the polarization of societies. Such media actions have a harmful influence that reaches far beyond the media sector itself. In this paper, we describe different phenomena of what we call the dark side of the media, and we look at how the dark side interacts in a dynamic way with other features of the governance environment. We propose a heuristic model to describe negative and positive dynamics between the media sector and the wider politi- cal, economic, and cultural context. New and broader strategies in media development are needed to tackle this problem."
Open Society on Independent Journalism
"The project assesses the global opportunities and risks that are created for media by the switch- over from analog broadcasting to digital broadcasting; the growth of new media platforms as sources of news; and the convergence of traditional broadcasting with telecommunications. These changes redefine the ways that media can operate sustainably while staying true to values of pluralism and diversity, transparency and accountability, editorial independence, freedom of expression and information, public service, and high professional standards.
The project, which examines the changes in-depth, builds bridges between researchers and policymakers, activists, academics and standard-setters. It also builds policy capacity in countries where this is less developed, encouraging stakeholders to participate in and influence change. At the same time, this research creates a knowledge base, laying foundations for advocacy work, building capacity and enhancing debate."
This report contains the findings of a mapping of innovative and public interest media in Bangladesh, carried out by Digitally Right for International Media Support (IMS) Asia Regional Programme in the period 7 November to 15 December 2021. The study covers three main regions and consulted 130 people and media, including thorough desk research and existing information available. This report describes the overall media environment in 2021, but for privacy protection reasons does not include names of people interviewed or internal details of media houses contacted.
The full report is available here.
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