Participatory Politics and Citizen Journalism in a Networked Africa: A Connected Continent

304 Pages·2016·1.372 MB·English

by  Bruce Mutsvairo (eds.)

Participatory Politics and Citizen Journalism
in a Networked Africa
This page intentionally left blank
Participatory Politics
and Citizen Journalism
in a Networked Africa
A Connected Continent
Editedby
Bruce Mutsvairo
NorthumbriaUniversity,UK
Selection,introductionandeditorialmatter©BruceMutsvairo2016
Foreword©StuartAllan2016
Individualchapters©Respectiveauthors2016
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2016 978-1-137-55449-9
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Title:Participatorypoliticsandcitizenjournalismina
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Identifiers:LCCN2015025770 | ISBN9781137554499
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Contents
ListofTablesandFigures vii
ForewordbyStuartAllan viii
NotesonContributors xii
1 RecapturingCitizenJournalism:ProcessesandPatterns 1
BruceMutsvairo
Part I RecapturingProductionPractices
2 NetworkedSocialJournalism:Media,CitizenParticipationand
DemocracyinNigeria 19
FarooqA.Kperogi
3 CrossingTabooLines:CitizenJournalismEthicsinPolitical
CrisisSettings 34
LastMoyo
4 ThePositioningofCitizen-InfluencedRadiointheBattlefor
theControlofMinds 59
EveretteNdlovu
5 WhytheArabSpringNeverCametoEthiopia 77
TerjeSkjerdal
6 CitizenJournalismatCrossroads:MediatedPoliticalAgency
andDuressinCentralAfrica 90
MirjamdeBruijn
Part II Prospects,PromisesandPitfalls
7 SouthAfricanArabSpringorDemocracytoCome?
AnAnalysisofSouthAfricanJournalists’Engagementwith
CitizenrythroughTwitter 107
GlendaDaniels
8 DigitalTechnologiesandtheExtractiveSector:TheNewWave
ofCitizenJournalisminResource-RichCountries 123
ErikaRodriguesandAnyaSchiffrin
9 Crowdfunding:AHarambeeforAfricanJournalism? 139
KristinSkareOrgeret
v
vi Contents
10 PoliticsofPassionandthePursuitofPropagandain
Zimbabwe’sStateMedia:AStudyoftheCaseofTheHerald 157
BruceMutsvairo
11 BeyondBlindOptimism:TheCaseofCitizenJournalisminthe
StruggleforDemocracyinZimbabwe 171
CleophasT.Muneri
Part III PerceptionsandCritiques
12 PoliticalParticipation,AlternativeMediaandCitizen
JournalisminLusophoneAfrica 187
SusanaSalgado
13 Between“Bottom-Up”JournalismandSocialActivismin
UnequalSocieties:TheCaseofGroundUpinSouthAfrica 202
WallaceChuma
14 CitizenJournalismandNationalPoliticsinZimbabwe:The
Caseofthe2008and2013Elections 215
JosephMujereandWesleyMwatwara
15 CitizenJournalisminKenyaasaContested“ThirdSpace” 229
GeorgeOgolaandMikeOwuor
16 CitizenJournalismandtheEbolaOutbreakinAfrica 244
WinstonManoandviolac.milton
17 FromCitizenJournalismtoHumanRightsJournalism:
FramingtheEbolaEpidemicinSierraLeoneonFacebook 262
IbrahimSeagaShaw
Index 279
Tables and Figures
Tables
16.1 Selectedheadlinesofnewsstoriesinthedigitaleditionof
TheHerald(2014) 249
16.2 SelectedheadlinesontheEbola2014newsstoriesonwww.
NewZimbabwe.com 253
16.3 EbolanewsstoriesonMyNews24rankedinorderof
“newsworthiness” 255
17.1 BasicbinaryfeaturesofHRJandHWJ 266
17.2 Fact-andcomment-basedposts,andtotalposts 271
17.3 Eliteandgrass-rootsources’postsonFBSLDECFbetween
FebruaryandApril2015 273
17.4 PPPF,EAVF,OFandtotalposts 275
Figures
2.1 ThesocialmediafollowingofNigeriannewsmedia 28
6.1 FacebookpostswithYouTubefilmaboutthepolicetortureof
studentsafterMarch9protests 96
6.2 Facebookpost,pickinguptheYouTubefilmaboutthepolice
tortureofstudentsafterMarch9protests 97
6.3 FacebookpostinreactiontotheYouTubefilmaboutthe
policetortureofstudentsafterMarch9protests 98
6.4 PostofY.whileprotesting,andacommentofG.tothispost
(11March) 99
6.5 G.’sfirstpost 100
7.1 Publicengagementversusothertweets 112
17.1 Eliteandgrass-rootsources’posts 271
17.2 Fact-vscomment-basedposts 273
17.3 PPPF,EAVFandOF 275
vii
Foreword
Tracing the twists and turns in the evolution of citizen journalism in our
digitalageisaformidablechallenge,notleastbecauseofthedazzlingspeed
technologicalimperativesseemtounfoldacrosstheglobe.Still,whenreflect-
ingonvariousenquiriesdelvingintohowsuchinnovationshavehelpedto
recastwhatcountsasjournalism–andwhocanlayclaimtotheroleofjour-
nalist – over the last decade, it is worth recalling contrary instances when
thelimitsoftechnology-centredthinkingwerethrownintosharprelief.
Back in 2006 I came across one such example when reading a New York
TimesnewsstoryaboutAlfredSirleafandhisplywoodshed,TheDailyTalk,
in civil war-torn Liberia at the time. “In a country where wheelbarrows fill
inforpickuptrucks,wateriscarriedonlittlegirls’headsinsteadofinpipes
andgallon-sizejarsreplacegaspumps,”TimesreporterLydiaPolgreen(2006)
wrote,“itisperhapsnowonderthatabatteredblackboardservesasnewspa-
perandnewsreelallinone.”ThestorydetailedhowSirleafpostednewsand
editorialsontheblackboardpositionedonthestreetoutsidehis“newsroom”
every day, thereby providing passers-by with important insights into what
was happening in Monrovia. Equipped with his “nose for a good scoop”,
this“self-taughtnewshound”scoursnewspapers–andcallsonaninformal
network of friends acting as correspondents – for the information neces-
sary to keep everyone “in the know”. News stories are concisely written in
a style relying on street words that people used themselves (“big stealing”
rather than “embezzlement”, for example). “I like to write the way people
talksotheycanunderstanditwell,”hesaid.“Yougottoreachthecommon
man”andwoman.Sirleaf’sdedicationtocitizenreportinghasmetresistance
from those in power over the years; he was arrested and spent a brief spell
in prison, then went into exile while his news-stand was torn down. Hav-
ingrebuiltitbythetimehemetPolgreen,heremainedassteadfastasever
in his belief that what he was doing mattered for the country’s emergent
democracy.
It is precisely this commitment to an alternative ethos of citizen-led
reportage that shines brightly through the celebratory hype that so often
accompanies discussions of prodigious “technological revolutions” trans-
forming the digital mediascape. In 2014, I visited the Kenyan Red Cross
and Red Crescent operations compound on the outskirts of Nairobi, where
I heard how significant the first-hand reportage of health-care workers was
proving to be for those tracking the Ebola crisis in West Africa. Their per-
sonal, impromptu accounts, photographs and video clips, shared across
blogs and social media sites, were vital sources of news, bearing witness
viii
Foreword ix
to what was actually transpiring on the ground, often with heart-rending
poignancy.Meanwhile,criticismsoftheAfricanmedia’scoverageofthecri-
sis were growing ever sharper. Eric Chinje (2014), writing in Nairobi’s The
Star, pointed out that “coverage of the pandemic has brought to the fore
some of the fundamental challenges facing media in Africa and, possibly,
aroundtheworld”.Morespecifically,heargued:
ReportsontheEbolapandemicarerepletewithimagesofdeathandthe
violence of the disease, giving media consumers a real life equivalent of
a Hollywood horror movie of alien invaders. [...] Media has not been
complicit in some macabre plot to return Africa to the disease narra-
tive. Certainly not media in Africa. If anything, media professionals on
thecontinenthave,intheircut-and-pasteapproachtocoverage,demon-
stratedadebilitatingignoranceoftheissuesandoftheirroleinassisting
societydealwiththeimpactofthedisease.
(Chinje,2014)
ForChinje,thecrucialissuerevolvedaroundwhatheregardedasthefailure
of journalists and editors to ask the right questions. Coming to terms with
the crisis meant pursuing robust lines of enquiry, such as looking “beyond
the frightening body count” to examine coping mechanisms; addressing
larger, structural problems of governance, leadership and trust; identifying
breakdownsintheuseofforeignaid;recognizing“thehavoconfragilesoci-
eties brought about by the unregulated international market for guns and
bombs”;andunravellingforscrutinyhowthepharmaceuticalindustryoper-
ates in Africa, amongst other exigent issues. As Chinje reminded us, “until
therealquestionsareasked,therealstorywillneverbetold”.
It is in striving to inspire African journalism to move swiftly beyond
“cut-and-paste approaches to coverage” that Bruce Mutsvairo’s edited col-
lection Participatory Politics and Citizen Journalism in a Networked Africa:
A Connected Continent makes its intervention. Gathered on these pages is
a remarkably impressive range of studies exploring how, when and why
ordinary individuals are engaging in news-making, and what it means for
re-visioning journalism’s future prospects. It opens with Mutsvairo’s intro-
duction, “Recapturing Citizen Journalism: Processes and Patterns”, which
sets the terms for the ensuing discussion and debate. From there, in Part I,
weturntoFarooqA.Kperogi’sexaminationoftheroleofthe“guerrillapress”
inarticulatingdissentinNigeriasincethe1990s.LastMoyo’schapterfocuses
oncertain“moralpanics”engenderedbyperceivedlapsesincitizenjournal-
ism ethics and their implications for African journalism. Short Wave Radio
Africa is centred for attention in Everette Ndlovu’s study, which considers
how this UK-based diasporic radio station encourages political activism in
Zimbabwe. Terje Skjerdal investigates “why the Arab Spring never came to
Ethiopia”, offering an effective contrast to triumphant treatments of social