Impact Examples: Democracy and Governance Communication Programming

Credible Elections in Sierra Leone

In 2007, Search for Common Ground (SRCG) and Independent Radio Network (IRN), set up in 2002 to support that year's elections and now a national network of 21 community and private radio stations, placed 420 roving election reporters into areas of Sierra Leone where high tension existed between rival parties and in remote regions that otherwise had no broadcast coverage. The reporters, members of SFCG's staff and IRN member stations, were requested to report on the conditions they observed. As part of this initiative, National Election Watch (NEW), a coalition of over 375 local and international civil society organisations including SFCG, Oxfam, and the Sierra Leonean teachers' union and farmers' association, also worked to: deploy a trained observer at each polling station; implement a rapid reporting mechanism to get a clear snapshot of activities across the country; and conduct a parallel vote count.

Key findings (2007) include:

• Gradually releasing information in the period between the closing of the polls and the National Election Commission (NEC)'s initial announcements gave the public confidence that there was an independent watchdog monitoring the process and was a key element in reducing tension around the country. In addition, IRN invited leading political analysts and electoral experts to share their views with the public. In this way, they ensured that credible information and a clear voice was injected into the highly charged public debate.
• NEW used its network to mobilise observers in every small town and village and placed trained civil society observers in 97% of the polling stations around the country.
• The authors conclude that the presence of the observers and the amount of real-time communication gave voters confidence in the electoral process and helped ensure a peaceful election.

La Benevolencija Reconciliation Radio Project - Rwanda

This was a year-long series of weekly radio programmes produced in 2004 designed to promote reconciliation in Rwanda, where, ten years prior, a war and genocide resulted in the deaths of more than 10% of the population and 75% of the Tutsi ethnic minority population over the course of 3 months.

2006 evaluation showed:

• Members of the control group were much more likely to deny that there is any mistrust in their community: 39% were unqualified denials of the existence of community mistrust, compared with 7% of comments in the reconciliation focus groups. Yet there were high levels of mistrust reported in individual interviews. This difference seems to indicate the reconciliation group’s willingness to speak out about difficult divisions in front of their community, even when this violates normative concerns about portraying Rwandans as "unified and reconciled" according to official government rhetoric.
• Attitudes toward intermarriage between Hutus and Tutsis is seen as one indicator of tolerance for other tribes. 27 % of all comments in the reconciliation focus groups could be characterised as claiming that intermarriage can shift social norms and influence people, compared to 5.7% of all comments in the control group.
• Do participants think they can rebuild trust in their communities? The majority of participants in both the reconciliation and the control group responded yes, but they envisioned this process in different ways. Group interaction (socialising, sharing resources, and generally engaging with people) was significantly more frequent among those in the reconciliation group (39% of responses compared to 13%). Reconciliation programme groups were also more likely to bring up the reconciliation process: the importance of mutual forgiveness, of asking pardon, and truth telling about the past as a way toward trust building (48% vs 25%). The health groups were more likely to mention the need for government policies: "sensitisation" (a common Rwandan term for governmental campaigns), and policies that prohibit "divisionism" or political favoritism (28% vs. 4%).
• Those who had listened to the reconciliation programme were far more likely to act out scenes where the bystander intervened, and where bystanders who do nothing are somehow punished. Bystanders in the control group were more likely to seek help from authorities rather than intervene directly. One suggestive trend among the male role-plays was the presence of restorative justice in the reconciliation groups and not in the control groups. In half of the four treatment groups, the participants ordered the attackers to treat the wounds of their victim or to pay for his hospital bills, whereas none of the control groups suggested this type of justice for the victim.

Power of Information: Evidence From a Newspaper Campaign to Reduce Capture

This article examines the media’s role in increasing political accountability by focusing on an information campaign in Uganda aimed at reducing the capture of public funds by providing schools (parents) with information to monitor local officials’ handling of a large school-grant programme.

Key findings (2003):

Increased public access to information reduces corruption of public funds. Corrupt capture of public funds was reduced from 80 percent in 1995 to less than 20 percent in 2001.

Click It or Ticket - North Carolina, USA

This was a social marketing campaign to increase seat belt and child safety use across the state of North Carolina. The campaign included:

• television and radio advertisements
• billboards and posters
• political and celebrity events, and
• media outreach through press releases, op-eds, and programme statistics for each county published in local newspapers.

1999 evaluation showed:

• Of those who knew about the programme, 57% said that it had made them buckle up more often; 86 percent of all of those surveyed said that they favored programmes to increase seat belt use.
• As a direct result of this campaign, the average seat-belt usage rate in North Carolina jumped from 65% to over 80% in the first six months of the programme, and currently stands at 84%. The dramatic increase in seat-belt usage has led to a 14% reduction in fatal and serious highway injuries and a corresponding savings of $125 million in health care-related costs since the programme began in 1993. The decrease in the number and severity of auto injuries also resulted in a $33 million reduction in insurance premiums paid to North Carolina auto insurers.
• When the communication was withdrawn and the enforcement left in place, seat belt use dropped dramatically. Once the communication component was restored, compliance went back up.
• Because of the Click It or Ticket's system of checkpoints throughout the state, law enforcement officials have discovered more than 56,000 other auto-related criminal offences since the programme's start, including stolen vehicles, felony drug violations, illegal firearms, and fugitives from justice. During a three-week period of the first year, police officers discovered 1,829 driving while intoxicated (DWI) violations and 2,043 drivers with revoked licenses. Funds generated as a result of these offenses and the more than 200,000 seat belt citations, which amounted to $1.6 million after the first year alone, go to benefit local public schools across the state.

Democracy and Governance Programme - Nigeria

This programme was directed toward Nigerian adults of voting age (18+) (especially women and women's groups). Activities encompassed 4 broad areas: a national mass media campaign, media advocacy, capacity building, and NGO networking.

1998 evaluation showed:

• Medium exposure to the project corresponded to a threefold increase, while high exposure was associated with an eightfold increase in the likelihood of discussion of voting for a woman.
• The proportion of people manifesting knowledge of appropriate legal steps to take on advising after unlawful arrest increased from 50% to 68% after the campaign. For every socio-demographic group the proportion with knowledge of a valid course of action increased compared to the baseline.
• Low level of exposure to messages was associated with up to a 50% increase in knowledge of constitutional rights.
• 76.7% of those with high levels of exposure knew any basic rights compared with only 29.4% who had no exposure.
• Those with high levels of exposure were twice as likely to be able to name women political candidates.
• The number of respondents who believed that "women should be able to compete with men in politics" increased from 79.5% to 86.8%.