Document details

Soft Power Development: The Values and Priorities of Foreign Media Interventions in South Sudan

In: Intersections Between Public Diplomacy and International Development: Case Studies in Converging Fields
James Pamment (ed.)
Los Angeles: Figueroa Press (2016), pp. 77-102

Contains bibliogr. pp. 96-102

ISBN 978-0-18-220287-4

"According to the methodology (page 81-82), the basis of this research "is a rhetorical analysis of literature concerning journalism training programs conducted by international development organizations in South Sudan since the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in order to determine the values and priorities of these organizations and understand how they view the role of media and how this impacts their approach to training. A rhetorical analysis is based on the idea of rhetoric being “writing and language with intent” (McCloskey 1994)—in this case, the intent being to persuade donors, taxpayers, even participants that the trainings are necessary and beneficial to the recipient country’s wellbeing." The author concludes (page 90) that "the ethical questions facing media development are not very different from those faced by the larger international development sector as a whole. Though media development superficially appears to be more value-neutral than other sectors, in reality it is just as steeped in the modernization paradigm and promotion of one culture’s values over another’s." (commbox)