Communication in International Development: Doing Good or Looking Good?
Top Insights
London; New York: Routledge (2018), xiv, 182 pp.
Contains index
Series: Rethinking Development
ISBN 9781138569928 (pbk); 9780203703977 (online)
Signature commbox: 10-Development-E 2018
"International development stakeholders harness communication with two broad purposes: to do good, via communication for development and media assistance, and to communicate do-gooding, via public relations and information. This book unpacks various ways in which different efforts to do good are combined with attempts to look good, be it in the eyes of donor constituencies at large, or among more specific audiences, such as journalists or intra-agency decision-makers. Development communication studies have tended to focus primarily on interventions aimed at doing good among recipients, at the expense of examining the extent to which promotion and reputation management are elements of those practices. This book establishes the importance of interrogating the tensions generated by overlapping uses of communication to do good and to look good within international development cooperation." (Publisher description)
Introduction: Communication in international development: towards theorizing across hybrid practices / Florencia Enghel & Jessica Noske-Turner, 1
I. "FOR" AND "ABOUT": INTERROGATING PRACTICES ACROSS DOMAINS
1 A 'success story' unpacked: doing good and communicating do-gooding in The Videoletters Project [Bosnia-Herzegovina] / Florencia Enghel, 21
2 'Doing good' and 'looking good' in global humanitarian reporting: Is philanthro-journalism good news? [IRIN News] / Martin Scott, Kate Wright, Mel Bunce, 39
3 Shifting development discourses in public and in private: The case of the Scotland-Malawi partnership / Ben Wilson, 58
4 Communication about development and the challenge of doing well: Donor branding in the West Bank / Karin Wilkins, 76
II. WHAT NEXT? RETHINKING CONVENTIONAL APPROACHES
5 Becoming visible: an institutional histories approach to understanding practices and tensions in communication for development [UNICEF] / Jessica Noske-Turner, Jo Tacchi, Vinod Pavarala, 99
6 For celebrity communication about development to do good: Reframing purpose and discourses / Lauren Kogen, 118
7 Communication and evaluation: Can a decision-making hybrid reframe an age-old dichotomy? / Ricardo Ramirez & Wendy Quarry, 135
8 Communicating development results in an emerging "post-aid" era / Peter da Costa, 153
Epilogue: What's bad about "looking good"? Can it be done better? / Silvio Waisbord, 170
I. "FOR" AND "ABOUT": INTERROGATING PRACTICES ACROSS DOMAINS
1 A 'success story' unpacked: doing good and communicating do-gooding in The Videoletters Project [Bosnia-Herzegovina] / Florencia Enghel, 21
2 'Doing good' and 'looking good' in global humanitarian reporting: Is philanthro-journalism good news? [IRIN News] / Martin Scott, Kate Wright, Mel Bunce, 39
3 Shifting development discourses in public and in private: The case of the Scotland-Malawi partnership / Ben Wilson, 58
4 Communication about development and the challenge of doing well: Donor branding in the West Bank / Karin Wilkins, 76
II. WHAT NEXT? RETHINKING CONVENTIONAL APPROACHES
5 Becoming visible: an institutional histories approach to understanding practices and tensions in communication for development [UNICEF] / Jessica Noske-Turner, Jo Tacchi, Vinod Pavarala, 99
6 For celebrity communication about development to do good: Reframing purpose and discourses / Lauren Kogen, 118
7 Communication and evaluation: Can a decision-making hybrid reframe an age-old dichotomy? / Ricardo Ramirez & Wendy Quarry, 135
8 Communicating development results in an emerging "post-aid" era / Peter da Costa, 153
Epilogue: What's bad about "looking good"? Can it be done better? / Silvio Waisbord, 170
