Media Matters - GFMD 2009-2011

The Global Forum for Media Development (GFMD)'s publication “Media Matters - GFMD 2009-2011” sets out its arguments for making media a central part of development policy. According to the GFMD, the document looks at how free, independent media have a positive impact on economic development and good governance; it raises issues of new technology and what that means for media development; and it offers new approaches to evaluating the impact of media assistance work. Interviews with donors reflect on how donor policy on media development has changed and what strategies are being developed for the future. The publication describes the work of the organisation at global and regional levels to create co-operation within the media development sector dedicated to making the case for media development.

The Executive Summary presents five core messages. They are:

1. "The New Governance Agenda: Independent media are integral to good governance. Media and press freedom indicators are being included in governance monitoring frameworks. But development agency engagement in media and communications assistance remains fragmented and marginal. Media support needs to be mainstreamed far more effectively across both policy and practice.
   
2. Media, Governance and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs): Independent media systems have a positive impact on governance, democratic transitions and the 2015 MDG targets. A growing body of empirical evidence exists to demonstrate this. New communications technologies are reframing relationships between media, citizens and the state. Community media empowers those poorest communities who will benefit most from achieving the MDGs. However, research on the impact of media and communications on the poor needs to be strengthened.
   
3. Counterbalance to Extremism: Independent media systems that are inclusive and responsive to diversity play a key role in preventing the exclusion of voices that breed extremism. Healthy public spheres can host a wide range of views which can dilute intolerance. Policy makers should increase support for media assistance programmes to widen access for moderate voices and balanced discourse. And donors should engage systematically in media development in countries affected by extremism, as this threatens progress on the MDGs.
   
4. Media and Global Issues: the lack of local media coverage of the external driving forces of change on poor countries - international trade, climate change and global health for instance - is generating deficits in governance through continued public disengagement in these issues. These deficits can be tackled, however, through concerted media and communications strategies, that include assisting developing country journalists to cover processes such as the next phase of the Kyoto Protocol.
   
5. Strategies for Healthy Media Systems: a global media assistance community exists that has its own history, experience base, metrics and research agenda. Development agencies need to engage with this sector with more urgency in order to harness the proven contribution that media development can make to the MDGs; through established strategies such as support to media policy and legislation, the development of journalism associations, the provision of affordable capital, professional training and the capacity-building of indigenous media assistance organisations. ...Media assistance aims to strengthen regional, national and local media systems and institutions in ways that serve the public interest. Examples of media assistance include support to regulatory reform, journalism training and media business management. It also covers support to community media, citizen journalism and media for sustainable development - on health and environmental issues, for instance - in ways that ensure that people are able to access information and to express their own opinions and priorities in the public arena.

Communication is a critical missing link in development policy and practice.

A major point of consensus at the GFMD was the need for the media assistance sector to argue more cogently for its place within the framework of international development. The ... World Bank Institute had made the case for the role of the media in economic development in its publication ‘The Right to Tell’. The GFMD called for the role of media and media support strategies to be examined more broadly against the wider canvas of the development agenda, encapsulated by the set of international targets, the 2015 Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).” The document then sets out 4 sections of essays from a year-long collaboration with media practitioners and social, political, and communications scientists. Sections include: Why Media Matters: Global Perspectives; How Media Matters: Measuring Its Impact; Challenges in Media Matters: Practitioner Experiences; and Mapping the Sector: Literature, Surveys & Resources.