mediadev library

Media Pluralism, Public Trust, and Democracy: New Evidence from Latin America and the Caribbean

Mariana Rodríguez, Elizabeth J. Zechmeister

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2018), 25 pp.

"There has been a decline in trust in the media in the LAC region. While in 2004 nearly two-thirds of individuals reported having high trust in the media, this result dropped to only half of individuals in 2016/17. Individuals who perceive the media as representative of different viewpoints or who h ... more

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"Free Internet" and the Costs to Media Pluralism: The Hazards of Zero-Rating the News

Daniel O'Maley, Amba Kak

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2018), 20 pp.

"In many countries, mobile operators have teamed up with social media platforms to offer free access to specific websites or internet services—including news websites. The most well-known of these offerings, Facebook’s Free Basics, has been explicitly pitched as a way to give citizens in develop ... more

A New Wave of Censorship: Distributed Attacks on Expression and Press Freedom

Daniel Arnaudo

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2018)

"In both authoritarian and democratic contexts, new forms of censorship online are carried out through distributed attacks on freedom of expression that are insidiously difficult to detect, and often just as effective, if not more, than the kinds of brute force techniques by state agents that came b ... more

Defending Independent Media: A Comprehensive Analysis of Aid Flows
Top Insights

Mary Myers, Linet Angaya Juma

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2018), 37 pp.

"When donors provide assistance to the media sector, they frequently back projects that aim to strengthen the media’s contribution to good governance in some way or another. This kind of funding is consistent with recent declarations made by the international community on the importance of protect ... more

Pathways to Media Reform in Sub-Saharan Africa: Reflections from a Regional Consultation
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Herman Wasserman, Nicholas Benequista

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017), 25 pp.

"To ensure that African media organizations remain viable players in this changing political and economic landscape, new coalitions need to be built and existing ones strengthened. The existing coalitions in the region display certain weaknesses: they tend to be unevenly spread across the region and ... more

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In the Service of Power: Media Capture and the Threat to Democracy
Top Insights

Anya Schiffrin (ed.)

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017), 162 pp.

"In this volume of essays edited by Anya Schiffrin, media capture is shown to be a growing phenomenon linked both to the resurgence of authoritarian governments as well as to the structural weaknesses presently afflicting media markets. In this environment, political figures and economic elites are ... more

Beyond the Great Firewall: How China Became a Global Information Power

Shanthi Kalathil

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA); Article 19 (2017), 41 pp.

A Slowly Shifting Field: Understanding Donor Priorities in Media Development

Shanthi Kalathil

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017)

"Funding to support independent media remains a small, but vital part of international assistance. But while the share of aid directed at this issue remains steady, there are signs that priorities within this field of international support may be shifting. This report looks at the trends identified ... more

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Live from the Bully Pulpit: The Abuse of Obligatory Presidential Broadcasts in Latin America

Andrés Cañizález

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017)

"In Latin America, several countries’ laws permit the president to commandeer all radio and television broadcasts. Initially contemplated for use in rare circumstances such as national emergencies, a few leaders in the region, beginning with Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez, have taken advantage of thes ... more

Estándares internacionales de libertad de expresión: Guía básica para operadores de justicia en América Latina
Key Guidance

Silvia Chocarro

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017), 39 pp.

"[...] es una herramienta indispensable para operadores de justicia que tratan casos sobre la libertad de expresión. La guía, producida conjuntamente por la UNESCO y la oficina del Relator Especial para Libertad de Expresión (RELE) y escrita por Silvia Chocarro, es un mapa esencial de los estánd ... more

Media Development in the Digital Age: Five Ways to Engage in Internet Governance
Top Insights

Corinne Cath, Niels ten Oever, Daniel O'Maley

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA); Article 19 (2017), 29 pp.

"The digital convergence means that how the Internet develops going forward — both in terms of policy and technology — will shape the very environment in which all other media operate. This report makes the case to this community that they can, and must, engage in the decision-making bodies that ... more

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The Power of Airwaves: The Role of Spectrum Management in Media Development
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Nathalia Foditsch

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017), 17 pp.

"Actors interested in media development and freedom of expression can easily inform themselves about the current issues related to spectrum management; this report summarizes those issues, and highlights resources for further research. A “spectrum commons” approach – one that focuses on treati ... more

Advocating for Openness: Nine Ways Civil Society Groups Have Mobilized to Defend Internet Freedom

Sarah Oh

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017)

"Civil society groups from the Global South are leading the charge to advocate for an Internet that remains open, pluralistic, and democratic. The nine case studies highlighted in this report demonstrate various ways groups in different countries have successfully fought for policies and norms that ... more

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Same Beds, Different Dreams? Charitable Foundations and Newsroom Independence in the Global South

Anya Schiffrin

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017), 32 pp.

"The growing trend of non-profit journalism has received much attention of late, but this report takes a unique look at how non-profit funding is affecting journalism in the Global South. Amidst the collapse of traditional business models for news organizations, funding from philanthropic foundation ... more

Media Feast, News Famine: Ten Global Advertising Trends That Threaten Independent Journalism

Michelle Foster

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017), 25 pp.

"This report looks at ten factors that have altered the media marketplace and that pose challenges to national and local news producers and their sources of revenue. They include ways in which governments interfere in media markets; changes in the structure of news distribution and audience behavior ... more

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In Repressive Countries, Citizens Go 'dark' to Share Independent News

Kate Musgrave

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2017)

"CIMA’s analysis of audience data from nearly 40 countries yields a statistically significant correlation between freedom of the press and reliance on dark social sharing: the more repressive the media environment, the more likely the audience is to access news through dark social. Even more illus ... more

Cuba’s Parallel Worlds: Digital Media Crosses the Divide

Anne Nelson

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2016), 25 pp.

"For many years, the media development conversation regarding Cuba has largely focused on the country’s harsh censorship practices and other restrictions on freedom of expression. Those concerns remain. But with the opening of relations with the United States over the past two years, the conversat ... more

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Captured News Media: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, and Montenegro

Milka Tadic Mijovic, Marija Sajkas

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2016), 16 pp.

"Political and business elites in the countries that are the subject of this report have acquired control over a large number of public and private media, mostly through non-transparent privatization, advertising and/or budgetary support to loyal media. Consequently, media freedoms and freedom of ex ... more