Media in Fragile States A critical view of the Kenyan media system - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Media in Fragile States

A critical view of the Kenyan media system through the lens of the journalists

Literary review

• Independence of journalists, regulation of the media and

its political economy

• Liberalized media - susceptible to both political influence,

business interests and market pressure

• Political economy: political party influence on media

content combined with media owners and advertisers (Nyamnjoh 2004)

• Jürgen Habermas’ notion of a public sphere and the need

for dialogical space (Habermas 1985)

• Media’s role in curbing corruption in the public sector in

Africa (Rønning 2009) -however lacking analysis of corruption in the media itself

A field study in Nairobi 2009

• Extensive interviews aiming to find out how

the practice of journalism is related to the structure of the media system

• Critique of the normative ideal: high quality

professional journalism

A thematic analysis of the interviews

• The media is compromised by the owners, the

advertisers and the politicians

• Common norms and standards are not upheld by any

institution, worsened by poor employment conditions and threats to journalists

• A wide gap between the reporting that journalists

think they should do and what they are expected to do by their employers

Brown envelope journalism

• Who and what to expose when can be influenced through

bribes and other indirect means

• Privately owned media, instead of championing democracy,

part of the problem

• Corruption in transitional democracy often stems from the

competing interests groups in the intermediate class vying for influence over government and economy. Institutions lacking legitimacy, leads to contestation over the rules and a scope for corrupt practices (Kahn 1998)

• The institutions that regulate media in Kenya: The Media

Council of Kenya, Kenya Union of Journalists, the judiciary

Ethnicity

• Referring to ethnic groups in mass media is

unavoidable, or not

• Pamoja FM, a station in the poorest part of Nairobi,

has banned the mention of ethnic groups

• Ethnicity is a very useful campaign tool for the

politicians, appealing to a group

• Media relaying what politicians said in campaign

speeches

Regulation

• Civil society requires a vigorous political and

constitutional defense (Keane 1996 p.149)

• Position of journalists exposed to several threats in a

transitional democracy

• Media’s responsibility to the citizens
• Media toes the line of government, which in turn

helps their business interests

• Media market is small in financial terms and
• wnership is highly concentrated

Conclusion

• Media being used as instruments for political actors in

various ways

• Lifting censorship and holding democratic elections -

recipe for conflict?

• Need to transform the media institutions and its

relation to business and government

• The open and inclusive mass media everyone wants is
• elusive. In Kenya it has a detrimental effect around

each election, where misinformation, tendentious reporting and rumor spreading heightens underlying tensions.

Questions

• Neither State driven media or commercial

independent media has been able to facilitate the inclusive and open debate on politics. Public Service BC?

• Among Kenyan journalists there is the feeling that

it is easy to get away with corrupt practices in many parts of society including the media

• industry. Enforcement?
• Examples of good practice and appropriate media

regulation - is there a case for more donor funded community media?