Transcript Karen Wilkins: New Challenges in Communication for Development Articulating Power in Models of Development Communication Development Communication • Development as strategic social change (Jan Nederveen Pieterse) • Development communication.

Karen Wilkins:
New Challenges in
Communication for
Development
Articulating Power in Models of
Development Communication
Development Communication
• Development as strategic social change
(Jan Nederveen Pieterse)
• Development communication as one set
of strategies (Karin Wilkins)
• Entertainment Education as an
approach to Dev Com (Rafael Obregon
& Thomas Tufte)
Development Communication
• Communication FOR Development
– Strategic intervention
• Build Infrastructure
• Create messages on existing infrastructure
• Communication ABOUT Development
– Critical approach to discourse
– Deconstruction leading to constructive
praxis
Approach to Power
• Third Face of Power
– Power to change the rules of the game
• Underlying Assumptions
– Audiences (individuals, communities)
– Texts
– Media Producers
– Political-Economic Structures
– Historical & Global Contexts
Modernization
• Focus on the individual
– Empathy
• Linear transmission model
• National contexts
• Less emphasis on specific texts, more
on exposure more generally
Dependency Critique
• Global contexts
• Political-Economic structures
• Less attention to
– specific texts
– Individual or collective agency in audience
Participatory Approaches
• Development
– Communities not nations
• Communication
– Dialogic not linear
• Focus
– Collective agency of audience
– Process over outcomes
Complexities of “Participation”
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End vs. means
Process vs. outcome
Ethics vs. efficiency
Working within, against, or parallel to
dominant agencies
Power in Participation
• Community Beneficiary Focus
– Processes within Funding Recipients
• Community Media Focus
– Focus on Community Production
• Structural Participation
– Recognition of key players and processes
of funding agents and others with allocative
control
Social Movements
• Development
– Collective groups not formal agencies
• Communication
– Mobilization toward resistance
• Focus
– Nature of message
– Collective agency
Communicating for
Development
• Power of media technologies
– Radio, tv, film, internet
• Power of strategies
– Social marketing: individual behavior
– Ent-educ: social norms, individual behavior
– Media Advocacy: media coverage, policy
change
• Infrastructure
– Government Agendas
• Transmission models
• Feedback loops
– Community Media
• Power of text
• Process of production
• Structure of funding
Communicating about
Development
• Focus on development industry
• Development institutions connected to
political-economic structures relevant to
global, regional, national, local contexts
• Post-development
Deconstruction of Discourse
• Rhetoric
– Use of terms to describe problems, groups,
solutions
– Cooptation of terms over time (women/gender,
empowerment, sustainable dev)
• Practice
– Funding of projects
– Policies structuring practice
– Project implementation
Geometry of Development
• Dominant approach
– Nation-states
– First, second, third worlds
• Emerging approach
– Transnational concerns and organizations
– Social, financial… capital
• Access to resources
• Apart from geographical positioning
Approaches to Power
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Individual Behavior
Social Norms
Mediated texts
Communication Technologies
Process of Production
Political Agencies
Corporate Agencies
Potential Contributions of
Research to Dev Com
• To satisfy intellectual curiosity?
• To improve program efficiency?
• TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE
Nature of Critique
• Structural Independence of Researchers
– Importance of Research Universities and
Organizations
• Funding parameters
• Political affiliations
– Selection of Researchers
• Investment in projects?
• In theories?
• Methodological approaches?
Constraint to Critique
• Need to demonstrate success
– Economic
• Funding cycles
• Composition of funding
– Political
• Affirm approach
• Foster commitment
Research Questions & Design
• Scope of Focus
– Not just one project but sets of interventions
• Duration of Time
– Not just immediate effects but long-term trends
• Comprehension of Context
– Cultural, political, economic contexts
– Historical conditions
Research Advocacy
• Contributes to improved efficient and
effective allocation of resources
• Engages salient ethical issues of social
change, such as poverty, violence,
discrimination, disease, human rights
abuses, and more
New Research Agendas
• Importance of Collaborative Work
– Orecomm: across countries
– Interdisciplinary
– Varied institutional affiliations
• Value of Critical Approach
– Ability to pursue critical questions
– Abililty to address long-term, systemic
issues