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In Africa, the media plays a significant role in conflict management and resolution. Which conflicts the media report, which are ignored, and how conflicts are represented can have a profound impact on the outcomes. While the media can in some cases ensure the stability of African democracy, critics have pointed out that in other cases, the media actually increases tensions in areas of conflict. The media tends to privilege only elite voices, offering superficial coverage of marginalized groups in a way that increases polarization. In The Ethics of Engagement, Herman Wasserman explores the ethics of the media in conflicts that arise during transitions to democracy in Africa. He examines the roles, responsibilities, and obligations of media in contexts of high socioeconomic inequality. In doing so, he looks at ethnic and racial polarization in the histories of colonialism, post-colonial authoritarianism, and hybrid regimes. Taking a critical view of the normative guidelines and professional identities of journalism inherited from contexts outside of Africa, he argues that a more reciprocal and collaborative approach is needed. He develops a new ethics of engagement that would require the media to facilitate the resolution of conflicts across differences of ethnicity, citizenship, and class. A central point of this theory is the development of an "ethics of listening" which would enable the media to conceive of their role as facilitators in democratic deliberation and community-building. Wasserman applies his ethics of listening to case studies across the African continent. He finds that by following this new model of conduct, the media may actually deepen democracy and help de-escalate conflict. This original study provides a useful framework for reimaging the media's role in transitional democracies in Africa - and across the globe.

What role should the media play in conflicts that arise during transitions to democracy? What makes the role of the media in Africa different from those in other parts of the world? What ethical responsibilities and obligations do the media have towards societies mired in conflict and characterized by social and economic inequality, ethnic and racial polarization and histories of oppression and violence? The Ethics of Engagement sets out to answer these questions by considering various examples of conflicts in African democracies and proposes an "ethics of listening" as a normative framework for the media.

This text discusses the relationship between media, conflict, and democratization in Africa from the perspective of media ethics. Despite the commonly held view that conflict is a destructive political force that can destabilize democracies, the argument in this book is that while many conflicts can indeed become violent and destructive, they can also be managed in a way that can render them productive and communicative to democracy. Drawing on theoretical insights from the fields of journalism studies, political studies, and cultural studies, the volume discusses the ethics of conflict coverage and proposes a normative model for covering conflict and democratization.

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- Part I: Transitions -- 1 From Apartheid to a New Democracy: Areas of Shift -- 2 "This Time for Africa"? Global Media Studies and the View from the South -- 3 A Changing Media Culture: Professional Ideologies between Past and Present -- Part II: Local Contestations -- 4 Is This Freedom? Media Ethics, "African Culture," and Universal Values -- 5 Global Genres and Local Context: What Controversies around Tabloidization Tell Us about South African Media and Society -- 6 Rethinking Global and Local: South African Perspectives on the "Future of Journalism" -- Part III: Global Shifts -- 7 BRICS and Beyond: Mediating New Geopolitical Relationships -- 8 New Pressures and Opportunities: Technology, Geopolitics, and Social Change -- Conclusion -- Notes -- References -- Index

The end of apartheid brought South Africa into the global media environment. Outside companies invested in the nation's newspapers while South African conglomerates pursued lucrative tech ventures and communication markets around the world. Many observers viewed the rapid development of South African media as a roadmap from authoritarianism to global modernity. Herman Wasserman analyzes the debates surrounding South Africa's new media presence against the backdrop of rapidly changing geopolitics. His exploration reveals how South African disputes regarding access to, and representation in, the media reflect the domination and inequality in the global communication sphere. Optimists see post-apartheid media as providing a vital space that encourages exchanges of opinion in a young democracy. Critics argue the public sphere mirrors South Africa's past divisions and privileges the viewpoints of the elite. Wasserman delves into the ways these simplistic narratives obscure the country's internal tensions, conflicts, and paradoxes even as he charts the diverse nature of South African entry into the global arena.

Includes bibliographical references and index

Introduction -- The popular media sphere : theoretical interventions. De-westernizing media theory to make room for African experience / FRANCIS NYAMNJOH -- Revisiting cultural imperialism and its critics / P. ERIC LOUW -- At the crossroads of the formal and popular : convergence culture and new publics in Zimbabwe / WENDY WILLEMS -- Theorising development and democracy through popular community media / Victor Ayedun-Aluma -- Talk radio, democracy and citizenship in (South) Africa / Tanja Bosch -- Popular media, politics and power : engaging with democracy and development. Popular music as journalism in Africa : issues and contexts / WINSTON MANO -- Street news : the role of posters in democratic participation in Ghana / AUDREY GADZEKPO -- If you rattle a snake, be prepared to be bitten? : popular culture, politics and the Kenyan news media / GEORGE OGOLA -- Post-Apartheid South African social movements on film / SEAN JACOBS -- Audiences, agency and media in everyday life. The amazing race in Burkina Faso / H. LESLIE STEEVES -- (South) African articulations of the ordinary, or, how popular print commodities (re)organize our lives / SONJA NARUNSKY-LADEN -- Popular TV programmes and audiences in Kinshasa / MARIE-SOLEIL FRORE -- New technologies as tools of empowerment : African youth and public sphere participation / LEVI OBIJIOFOR -- Identity and community between the local and the global. Transnational flows and local identities in Muslim Northern Nigerian films : from Dead Poets Society through Mohabbatein to So? / ABDALLA UBA ADAMU -- Local stories, global discussions. Websites, politics and identity in African contexts / INGE BRINKMAN. [et al.] -- Survival of "radio culture" in a converged networked new media environment / OKOTH FRED MUDHAI -- Policing popular media in Africa / MONICA CHIBITA.

The emergence of the Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) group of states as a new geopolitical power bloc has received substantial coverage in the media. South Africa's inclusion in the group has been particularly controversial, and media attention tended to focus on the country's relationship with China against the backdrop of the BRICS alignment. The media industry itself has also been a part of global movements of people and capital. This article seeks to establish how this relationship has been represented in the South African media, and to explore the attitudes of senior journalists and editors towards South Africa's position within the changing global geopolitical landscape.

[Conclusion] I started this lecture by recalling how, as a youngster, it was stories that helped me to understand the country I was growing up in, and helped me imagine the lives of others that I did not read about in the media of that time. For journalism in a new democracy such as South Africa to serve more than an elite, for it to enable citizens to actively practice their citizenship through media, for it to treat all South Africans with dignity, it would have to learn to listen across the different lines that continue to keep South Africans apart – journalists would have to learn to listen to the stories of those on the other side of the railway line, the breadline, the picket line, the barbed wire fence. What would this listening mean for journalists in practice? Let me end by returning to the coverage of the Marikana massacre. In a recent interview with Greg Marinovich, the journalist that did the investigation that cast doubt on the official accounts of the events, he was asked if what was needed for better journalism was more investment of resources. 'Do we need a team (or teams) of journalists to get to the bottom of this?' he was asked. Marinovich responded as follows: "I wouldn't say that. I think other journalists have been spending more time there than I have (…) It's about opening your eyes and looking at what people are telling you, looking at their stories."

Sous l'apartheid, les médias afrikaans véhiculaient l'idéologie du régime. Depuis la démocratisation, ils ont tenté de se débarrasser de leur héritage idéologique et ont adhéré en échange à une idéologie de marché d'où la notion de race était ostensiblement absente. Cependent, cette transformation demeure limitée en raison d'une articulation paradoxale entre les discours libéral et identitaire. Cet article retrace la manière dont les médias afrikaans accommodent ces processus en apparence contradictoires et analyse les implications de ces phénomènes pour la sphère publique sud-africaine dans la péride post-apartheid. (Pol afr/GIGA)

Under apartheid, the Afrikaans media served as vehicles for the ideology of the regime. Since democratization, they have attempted to rid themselves of this ideological baggage, & instead embraced a free-market ideology in which race has ostensibly disappeared. This repositioning has seemingly benefited the Afrikaans media sector, with an increase of the number & type of media, under the proclaimed banner of non-racialism. However, this transformation remains limited, as a result of the combination of the discourses of liberalism & identity politics. This article will set out to give an overview of these discourses & their implications for the postapartheid public sphere. Adapted from the source document.