Citizen Journalism and humanitarian aid: Bane or boon?
July 30, 2007
Despite our best efforts, information available to citizens at times of crises – man-made or natural – is often inadequate, biased, incorrect and late. Studies show that the problem lies not with technology (or lack thereof), but with the culture of information sharing. Technology, while it can help address problems of access, dissemination and archival, cannot in and of itself overcome the oftentimes parochial interests of those who control it. Governments, humanitarian agencies, non-governmental institutions, civil society organisations and influential individuals are at once victims and perpetrators of this information secrecy. In controlling the flow of information – what gets out where, to whom, how and when – these stakeholders, often with the best of intentions but blithely unaware of the larger ripple effects & unintended consequences of their decisions, directly influence relief & aid work, humanitarian support and conflict transformation initiatives. Regrettably, information exchange best practices and international standards, though prevalent on paper and touted in academic studies, are still the exception on the ground. With no real incentive to change their ham-fisted approach to information sharing and its corollaries – collaboration and coordination – key stakeholders in charge of relief and peacebuilding continue to blame each other for the problems that bedevil effective, sustainable, timely and participatory post-disaster and conflict transformation initiatives. Obviously lost in this zero sum exchange is the fact that collectively, these stakeholders are themselves responsible for much that is wrong with present day responses to humanitarian crises in particular, and long term conflict transformation initiatives (that share similar characteristics of short term relief and aid efforts but are often far more multifarious) in general.
We need to bridge this divide between policy and practice. Necessarily, doing so requires an emphasis on a rights-based approach to information sharing. Seeing humanitarian relief and conflict transformation from a rights perspective affords a unique range of perspectives that give primacy to the needs and aspiration of citizens, as opposed to the provincial perspectives of key stakeholders including governments. We are acutely aware of the significant challenges of approaching disaster management & response through such a rights framework. Protracted conflict, especially complex political emergencies and deep-seated ethnic and communal violence, pose significant challenges to communication rights. Unimpeded communication and the free flow of information are cornerstones of any successful post-disaster relief framework and a peace process. However, the urgency of war usually augments the repression of mainstream print & electronic media. Censorship and threats to journalists invariably affect how news & information is selected, gathered, published and stored. Successive governments in Sri Lanka have grossly undermined the development of media responsive to citizen’s needs and aspirations.
Information, seen in this light, though a vital ingredient in a vibrant democracy, is often censored and restricted. Herein lies the shared challenge to both effective disaster response and peacebuilding – to secure and strengthen communications and the free-flow of information in the public interest. It is argued here that the growth of the Internet and the World Wide Web (seen here primarily as networks that facilitate communication) augments the potential for such progressive and pervasive communications architectures.
Citizens as watchdogs of democracy take a new twist with new media and the increasing accessibility of the web and Internet. Using technologies such as mobile phones that over the past five to ten years have taken root in every tier of society even in Sri Lanka, citizens are increasingly “speaking” out against the systemic failures of governance, and in support of rights. With new tools that help citizens create, consume, store and distribute information – such as SMS on mobile phones, podcasts and video editing on every PC, and the advent of blogs on the web – we are witnessing the democratisation of content production, and with it, the emergence of a new timbre of communications & media more attuned to needs and aspirations of all citizens. Multi-million rupee studios and equipment worth hundreds of thousands of rupees, available only to large corporations and media organisations, have hitherto packaged the news & information we consume. Today, even illiterate citizens living below the poverty line can record for posterity – for example through podcasts facilitated by NGOs – their ideas for pro-poor growth which often run counter to the equally reprehensible neo-conservative and neo-liberal notions of development. Text, audio and video production is now a standard feature in mobile devices including mobile phones, PC’s and Personal Digital Assistants (PDA’s). The web and Internet are accessible almost anywhere with the footprints of mobile telephony & wireless Internet nearly coast-to-coast. Accordingly, initiatives such as Witness that seek to document gross human rights violations and strengthen the Rule of Law and democracy now have new human rights monitors in their service – ordinary citizens, using ordinary devices to record extra-ordinary events .
Much has already been written on the potential of new technologies, ICT, new media and the latest buzzword, citizen journalism. Citizen journalism is the act of citizens “playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and disseminating news and information” according to the seminal report We Media: How Audiences are Shaping the Future of News and Information . As is noted in this report “The intent of this participation is to provide independent, reliable, accurate, wide-ranging and relevant information that a democracy requires.” However, we are acutely aware of the limits of technology, both in the design of and access to the technology itself, and in the manner of they are used in countries with a growing democratic deficit, such as Sri Lanka. As I note in an article published recently on the import of citizen journalism on anti-terrorism measures :
Often, this new age of citizen journalism lacks the grammar of age-old diplomacy and socio-political norms – the conversation is raw, visceral, impatient, irreverent, pithy, provocative. In Sri Lanka, it is a conversation that’s largely still in English, and also limited to urban centres.
The potential of citizen journalism, however, is its ability to provide a forum for all citizens – male and female, of all ethnicities, castes, classes and religions – to express themselves freely, society will better accommodate ideas and measures that engender peace.
As we have witnessed in countries such as the Philippines, information in the hands of a public equipped with mobile phones can be a powerful democratic imperative that brings down an authoritarian and corrupt governments . We also note stories, even from China – notorious for its media and Internet censorship – of mobiles used to warn populations of disasters, hold mass demonstrations organised via SMS, and even the emergence of m-government. However, success stories such as this run the risk of romanticising the gravity of problems that bedevil post-conflict democratic reform. The deep-rooted power of politicians in rigid social structures, casteism, a clientelist political architecture, rampant nepotism and corruption, among others, temper the progressive social transformation promised by the New Media and Citizen Journalism in particular. Scalability is another problem – projects that show great potential when funded often join a graveyard of well-intentioned initiatives when the funding dries up. Countries such as Sri Lanka are still bedevilled by the lack of standards based swabhasha data input frameworks that in turn strangle the awareness and growth of new media content, such as blogs, in Sinhala and Tamil. As a result, contrary to its moniker, citizen journalism today shows an urban bias, is mediated in English and, inescapably, elite. This will need to change and soon.
There are other significant challenges, not unique to citizen journalism and new media, but certainly augmented by the very nature of the media that they rest on. In a conversation with the author, Dan Gillmor, Director of the Centre for Citizen Media based in the US and widely regarding as a leading expert in Citizen Journalism averred, “… we must also be careful that citizen media that is irresponsible, unprofessional, partial and inaccurate – does not hinder the growth of free voices on the web.” The early experience with citizen journalism in Sri Lanka clearly brings out the tendency for slander, bitter personal invective and polemics that are strengthened in part because of the conventions of anonymity that citizen journalism as it exists today rests on. And as an article by Julien Pain, Head of the Internet Freedom desk at Reporters Sans Frontiers, suggests , the very technologies of liberation and democracy such as those which power citizen journalism are those now used by dictatorships and repressive regimes to clamp down even more on citizens.
Clearly however, new media and citizen journalism are emerging as powerful new ways through which citizens – even victims of protracted conflict, or of natural disasters – can access and create content that sheds light on their lives their viewpoints and their ideas. The litmus test for new media and citizen journalism, in the service of strengthening democracy and securing conflict transformation, is to mirror the same professional ethics and standards that underpin professional journalism in the content produced by citizens. The central challenge, and a very difficult one at that, is celebrating the personal, insider-partial, raw perspectives of citizens and balancing this commentary and opinion with context and analysis . The challenge to established print and electronic media today is quite simply to respond to the growing “impertinence” of citizens keen to know more than what reporters have traditionally handed out to them as news and information.
This article continually referred to information as a public good, as a human right, and as a central pillar of a vibrant democracy. Information in the hands of citizens continues to instill fear and loathing in the minds of those who wish to manufacture public opinion to their benefit by the careful selection and publication of information. New media and citizen journalism don’t, in and of themselves, promise a stronger democracy. Used for advocating the rights of all citizens and especially those affected by disasters, however, these technologies create new ways for citizens to be heard, governments to be held accountable and the State to answer to failures of governance. Ordinary citizens, trained journalists, civil rights activists, youth and more are increasingly using technology, though devices such as mobile phones, to support powerful frameworks of transparency and accountability that citizens can use to hold decision makers responsible for their action and indeed, inaction.
It’s an irreversible trend. Our challenge is to temper the euphoria and ensure the best of new media and citizen journalism is used to alleviate the continuing suffering of communities embroiled in conflict, or faced with the sudden wrath of nature.
From the Sinclair ZX81 to OLPC’s Sugar
July 28, 2007
My first personal computer was a Sinclair ZX81. I still remember plugging away on it in BASIC, with wondrous eyes that lit up every time something appeared on the Sony Trinitron TV to which it was plugged into. This something would range from “Hello World!” on screen that was the result of my first foray into BASIC programming, to the cutting-edge graphics of the day – 3D Monster Maze. I never graduated, as many did, to the ZX Spectrum and remained faithful to the ZX81 until I got my first PC in 1996 – a Cyrix 150P+ based machine. The web had not been invented at the time I got the ZX81 and was for the majority of users, a luxury in 1996.
A computer in every pot, an article in the Economist, tells us how far we’ve come. For millions of children in many countries, the OLPC – now called the XO – will be their first PC.
Having actually used a pre-production OLPC earlier this year, I can attest that the machine and the operating system are truly amazing. The screen is an engineering marvel, and the OS, running on an cut-down but incredibly capable version of Red Hat’s Fedora, is a joy to use. The User Interface is incredibly intuitive (called Sugar) and it’s got a built in camera, wifi and wireless mesh networking to boot.
Toy, serious education tool, or both and more? The fullness of time will tell us whether Negroponte’s vision significantly changed the approach to and understanding of ICT in education, development and the creation of social capital in under-developed regions and countries. And as much as I have reservations on his approach, I do believe that the OLPC, in terms of design and engineering, is well ahead of many mainstream laptops sold today.
As the Economist avers:
The question now is when can the rest of us get laptops as cheap and clever as the OLPC’s radical design? Judging from the stir the XO has created, the answer is more likely to be months rather than years.
Read the full story here.
Also read:
Porn on the “$100″ PC
ICT4Peace, OLPC and Technology for Social Change – A conversation with Paul Currion
To be or not to be – The $100 laptop
Technorati Tags: OLPC, $100 Laptop, XO-1, Negroponte
Impact of technology on humanitarian work
July 28, 2007
While the joys of gadgetry may seem obvious to aid workers, how much has it really done to help victims? The full answer to that question has yet to emerge, and it is aid recipients who will give it. The Tsunami Evaluation Coalition, a group of agencies bent on learning from past mistakes, notes that “local people themselves provided almost all immediate life-saving action and the early-emergency support, as is commonly the case in disasters.”
Flood, famine and mobile phones, an article in the Economist deals with the impact, or lack thereof, of technology in humanitarian relief operations.
Also read:
ICT as a tool for Peacebuilding, Conflict Prevention and Crisis Management: Some pertinent questions
Humanitarian aid and peacebuilding
Technology for humanitarian aid – 6 mantras
The ICT4Peace Foundation announced the launch of ICT4Peace: An International Process for Crisis Management today.
ICT4Peace aims to enhance the performance of the international community in crisis management through the application of information Communications Technology (ICT) – technologies that can facilitate effective and sustained communication between peoples, communities and stakeholders involved in crisis management, humanitarian aid and peacebuilding. Crisis management is defined, for the purposes of this process, as civilian and/or military intervention in a crisis that may be a violent or non-violent with the intention of preventing a further escalation of the crisis and facilitating its resolution. This definition covers peace mediation, peace-keeping and peace-building activities of the international community. In bridging the fragmentation between various organisations and activities during different crisis phases, ICT4Peace aims to facilitate a holistic, cohesive and collaborative mechanisms directly in line with Paragraph 36 of the WSIS Tunis Commitment.
Please read more about ICT4Peace here. Download the concept note and roadmap of ICT4Peace as an Adobe PDF here.
PCs, mobiles and the growth of citizen media
July 22, 2007
Dan Gillmor who I met during Strong Angel III in San Diego last year has posted some thoughts on the state of citizen journalism globally. He touches on many interesting aspects of the growth of citizen driven content and importantly, towards the end, emphasizes the need for media literacy. He does not however touch on some of the problems facing citizen media – such as those experienced in France and Egypt and China in particular, or the growth in calls for the curtailment and control of content on the internet or the challenges to the freedom of expression on the web in general.
Porn on the “$100″ PC
July 22, 2007
A story on TechCrunch points to the discovery that the One Laptop Per Child initiative’s technology was used for a purpose no greater than surfing for pornography on the web! What surprised me more was the response to this incident, where a representative of the One Laptop Per Child group was reported saying that the OLPC computers would now be fitted with porn filters.
I find this typical for an enterprise that has consistently devalued the importance of teachers to guide the use of technology by the target audience of the OLPC – children. Porn filter can be bypassed and the very nature of the OLPC, by the Nicholas Negroponte’s own admission, is that it encourages its users to take it apart and hack the software.
“The children—and their teachers—will have the freedom to reshape, reinvent, and reapply their software, hardware, and content.”
The importance of good teachers – in physical classrooms or through distance education – is not going to be replaced by a cheap laptop. Teachers play more than the role of educating – they are a weathervane of the values of progressive society and a compass for the growth of impressionable adolescent minds. Instead of augmenting their work, the OLPC Foundation attempts to dislodge their importance by suggesting that their laptop, now armed with porn filters, is a panacea for the lack of robust primary and secondary education in the countries it is deployed in.
It is a great folly and a dangerous technological determinism that lays the seeds for more conflict in the future.
Breaking the language barrier?
July 19, 2007
CNN has an interesting video of a real time translation device designed for combat operations where troops (aka liberators) don’t understand the language of the native communities (aka the oppressed). While the language of violence is often deemed the only one terrorists understand, these devices spring from the need to be more “culturally sensitive” in long term peacekeeping, humanitarian and so-called stability operations.
Can they succeed? The video ends on a note of skepticism, but we need to see these devices as the first generation of devices and technologies, some of which I’ve covered earlier on this blog, that offer simultaneous cross-translation. As the technology improves, these products and services can only get better.
See also:
The military and the use of technology
Terrorists also use Google: So what?
Questioning a world wide web of terror
July 16, 2007
Image courtesy The Economist
An interesting article published in the Economist explores the use of the interweb by Al Qaeda in particular and terrorists in general to promote and record their beliefs, actions and tactics. Internet jihad: A world wide web of terror states that:
In short, the hand-held video camera has become as important a tool of insurgency as the AK-47 or the RPG rocket-launcher. As Mr Zawahiri himself once put it in an intercepted letter to Zarqawi, “More than half of this battle is taking place in the battlefield of the media.” Or as one jihadi magazine found on Irhabi007’s computer explained: “Film everything; this is good advice for all mujahideen [holy warriors]. Brothers, don’t disdain photography. You should be aware that every frame you take is as good as a missile fired at the Crusader enemy and his puppets.” Just before his arrest, Irhabi007 had set up a website that, he hoped, would rival YouTube, to share jihadi videos. He called it Youbombit.com.
The article goes on to mention that “In a global network, outside the control of any single government, attempts to close down extremist sites are little more than short-lived harassment. What is needed is a systematic campaign of counter-propaganda, not least in support of friendly Muslim governments and moderate Muslims, to try to reclaim the ground ceded to the jihadists.“
While this essay delineates the contours of the use of the interweb by the likes of Al Qaeda, it does not address the problem of State sponsored terrorism and repression, such as the that experienced by citizens in China and Egypt. Dissidents to the incumbent regimes in both countries are jailed, on occasion tortured and subject to jail sentences and harassment after being branded as threats to national security and the establishment by those unwilling to cede any space for the growth of democracy and fundamental rights. In Sri Lanka, the recent closure of Tamilnet raised the ire of many media freedom advocates since it was not seen as a move conducive to addressing the raison d’etre of terrorism in the country, aimed as it is to a diasporic audience and far less extremist than some of the other sites that can continue to be accessed. It is here that we must be cautious about endorsing carte blanche counter-insurgency propaganda. Too often, such propaganda is as biased and partial as that which it seeks to replace. The war, as it is called, of media on the interweb cannot be won by shrill voices each shouting down others in a manner that severely vitiates the growth of reasoned voices and debates that address the roots of terrorism.
For more read, Modern terrorism, technology and fundamental rights and Terrorists also use Google: So what?
ICT as a tool for Peacebuilding, Conflict Prevention and Crisis Management: Some pertinent questions
July 8, 2007
I was invited to attend a panel discussion on “ICT as a Tool for Peace, Conflict Prevention and Crisis Management” on 17 July 2007 at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. Participants of the panel were asked to respond to questions that pushed them to address the realities of using ICT in conflict prevention, mitigation and transformation. Time permitting, I hope to answer these in a far more comprehensive manner, but for now, some thought pointers to content on this blog that flesh out in detail some of the vital issues raised by these questions.
Do ICT have a special role in promoting peace and if so, how do you see the future of ICTs in conflict and crisis management, what will the priorities and challenges be in coming years? Can ICT be used in other ways, by other actors, to diffuse a situation leading to conflict, help end a conflict, or allow the stabilization of a post conflict situation?
ICT4Peace before ICT4D: Why it is important to look at ICT for peacebuilding and conflict resolution
Negotiating extremism – How to talk with terrorists…
Writing in pacifism to technology – An impossible vision?
What is ICT4Peace?
Academic research on ICT4Peace
Is technology neutral – Redux
How can we enable a greater degree of cohesion, transparency and accountability to processes of conflict transformation? Can ICT augment existing stakeholder interventions, enable marginalized actors to participate more fully in peacebuilding processes, empower grassroots communities, and bring cohesion to full-field peacebuilding activities?
Untying the Gordian Knot: ICT for Conflict Transformation and Peacebuilding
Thoughts on ICT, ODR and Peacebuilding
Discussions on International Applications of ODR and/or Use of Mobile Technology in Conflict Transformation
How can IT be used for pol. conflict transformation? (Cyberweek 2005 discussion)
Discussions on Information Technology and Disaster Relief and Mitigation – Cyberweek 2005
Discussions on on Information Technology and Disaster Relief and Mitigation – Cyberweek 2006
Humanitarian aid and peacebuilding
Establishing computers and internet connections is insufficient if the technology is not used effectively, if people are discouraged from using it or if local economies and patterns of access cannot sustain long term application. How do we make sure that a strong political will supports these transformations?
Desperate for a revolution
Humanitarian aid and peacebuilding
Discussions on International Applications of ODR and/or Use of Mobile Technology in Conflict Transformation
How can IT be used for pol. conflict transformation? (Cyberweek 2005 discussion)
Wikis, Webs and Networks: Creating Connections for Conflict-Prone Settings
One important application of technology is enabling communication and connection between people beyond their immediate environment. Modern communication technologies such as live satellite broadcasting, the Internet or video cameras have the potential to create empathy and understanding on a global scale. Depending on how technology is deployed, can enable or disable public expression and elaboration of contending interests and give voice to the differences of identity, experience, values and histories that inform conflicts. Does this open up new possibilities for an international public sphere of understanding and solidarity?
Citizens + Media: Amplifying voices for peace through citizen journalism
Citizen Journalism and Peacebuilding: Is there a connection?
Public Service Broadcasting – using technology for democracy
Terrorists also use Google: So what?
How do we integrate ICT in enhancing the competency and profesionalism of the international community in crisis management?
Interview with Information Technology and Crisis Management (ITCM) on ICT4Peace
Technology for humanitarian aid – 6 mantras
Diplomacy and blogs
Open Source Disaster Recovery: Case Studies of networked collaboration
How do we improve inter-agency interoperability and collaboration within the international community (UN system, EU/EC efforts, etc.) to harnessing ICT for peace-keeping, conflict prevention and crisis management?
Strong Angel III
Soldiers and State-Building
How much information should we share in peacebuilding and humanitarian operations?
SSTR – Observations and Recommendations from the Field
The military and the use of technology
How do we promote information-sharing in places of conflict and/or crises?
Building peace through ICT – Ideas for practical ICT4Peace projects
Looking back, moving forward – ICT4Peace in Sri Lanka
SSTR – Observations and Recommendations from the Field
Darfur through Google Earth: The reality of conflict through “Crisis in Darfur”
Darfur is Dying : Using games for political activism
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