"What emerges from the discussion of the Southern African media councils is a picture of relatively new institutions, struggling to find their place in a changing, difficult media and political terrain. They share many common challenges, as they contend with hostile governments, poor journalistic pr
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actices and a lack of resources. And yet there are significant differences between them. The strongest councils are undoubtedly those of Tanzania and South Africa. The Media Council of Tanzania (MCT) is far and away the biggest, with a large number of staff involved in a wide range of projects. Besides adjudicating complaints against the media, it is actively involved in lobbying on media freedom issues, even having drafted alternative laws to put to government. It has a substantial publication programme, has developed regional Press Clubs and offered training. Its ethics committee seems to be well established and generally respected, as indicated by the fact that several very prominent people have used it. Respect among the media is high: although there have been some cases of rulings being ignored, these are exceptions. The media provide the council’s core funding, while an extensive additional programme of activities is funded by donors. In general, the MCT is an excellent example of how a body of this kind can work. The South African council is by far the busiest, even though it has a much smaller staff. It has chose to concentrate almost entirely on the adjudication function. Only recently has it added the defence of media freedoms to its aims, but it is still developing a sense of what this might mean in concrete terms. One of the factors restraining the council from leaping too quickly into this arena is the fact that South Africa has several other media groups, which are already active in the area. Sensibly, there is little appetite on the council for duplicating work that the SA National Editors Forum (Sanef), the Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI), Misa and others are already doing." (Conclusion)
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"El presente estudio se propone describir y analizar las representaciones de la pobreza en los medios gráficos de 8 países de Centroamérica y el Caribe. Para tal fin se ha tomado como referencia un período de 6 meses, entre abril y septiembre de 2008, considerando el cual se realizó un relevami
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ento de las noticias que hacen referencia, directa o indirectamente, a la problemática de la pobreza en los siguientes diarios según países [...] El discurso narrativo provee principios de inteligibilidad de la realidad histórica que resultan constitutivos de la propia comprensión humana del pasado y su contemporaneidad. Lo propio del relato es la posibilidad de ordenar una serie cronológica de eventos en una trama cuyo tema será la confi guración de un conjunto de relaciones entre agentes, acciones y acontecimientos." (Presentación del estudio, página 7)
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"Based on the above preliminary research on the current status of the digital divide, latest and emerging technologies, and ICT for development initiatives in Asia and the Pacific, this report concludes that the LDCs, LLDCs and SIDS still face numerous difficulties in terms of implementation of ICT
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initiatives, introducing ICT access and assessing the ICT access need of people in the region. This report then recommends holistic and comprehensive ICT implementation approaches among the developing countries of Asia and the Pacific, namely 1) reinforcing regional cooperation initiatives, 2) adopting appropriate technologies and maximizing the benefits of existing infrastructure and initiatives, and 3) raising public awareness." (Conclusion, page 26)
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"El objeto del presente estudio son las industrias llamadas "infocomunicacionales", que incluyen medios de comunicación, industrias de telecomunicaciones, internet y otras industrias culturales (editorial gráfica, fonografía y cinematografía). La investigación se ha realizado en Sudamérica y M
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éxico. También se relevaron datos de España. Se muestra en este texto cómo muy pocos grupos infocomunicacionales concentran la mayor parte de la producción, edición y distribución de los contenidos (información y entretenimiento) que circulan en las sociedades latinoamericanas, condicionando de este modo la diversidad de voces a escala masiva." (Descripción de la casa editorial)
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"This highly accessible text compares media institutions and political experiences in countries around the world, including the United States, the United Kingdom, and Russia, to enable students to think critically about the central questions in the study of media and politics. The book balances cont
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emporary case studies with explanations of key theories and concepts, and includes a section on political communication research methods, empowering students to fully understand - and conduct their own comparative research into - the impact of media on the political sphere." (Publisher description)
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"This book is meant to present the basics of freedom of information or right to information, defined as the universal right to access information held by public bodies. It presents in an easy-to-understand and non-technical fashion the basic principles of freedom of information, such as maximum disc
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losure, obligation to publish, promotion of open government, limited scope of exceptions and the process to facilitate access. In this new edition, the introduction, the comparative chapter, and the section on international standards and trends, have been totally revised. The country chapters provide an in-depth-analysis to the right of access in Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, India, Jamaica, Japan, Kyrgyzstan, Mexico, Peru, South Africa, Sweden, Thailand, Uganda, United Kigdom and the USA. According to the author "since the last edition five years ago, we can now say that every region of the world has adopted right to information laws." (CAMECO Update 2-2008)
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"This study explores perceptions of freedom of the press by those who practice it: journalists and media organizations. References to freedom of the press in codes of ethics worldwide were analyzed according to the respective characteristics of organizations and the political-economic status of each
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country considered. The findings show that the concern journalists express about their freedom is not necessarily related to with the level of freedom of the press prevailing in their respective countries. Moreover, the codes of developing countries primarily display concern about the most fundamental freedoms of all." (Abstract)
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"Training programs of NGOs can help low-income youth effectively adopt ICTs. There is no doubt that acquiring ICT skills in demand in the current market can help these young people find jobs. They face obstacles such as a poor education, lack of ICT skills and the necessary social capital to identif
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y the most attractive ICT positions for their professional development. They also lack support networks for finding jobs or starting businesses. Training in ICT offers socially and economically excluded groups the chance to enter the knowledge-based economy. We wanted to explore whether individuals enrolled in the selected NGO training programs had taken advantage of these opportunities. To this end, we conducted a comparative study among countries to determine whether youth (primarily) ICT training courses had an effect on beneficiaries’ labor participation, in terms of job searches, employment obtained, establishment of a business or improvements to an existing business. For this study, training beneficiaries and NGO staff members were interviewed and surveyed to learn about their perceptions regarding the usefulness of ICT training for employability. We also analyzed how the organizational tools of the NGOs have supported beneficiaries in finding jobs, setting up businesses, or increasing employment opportunities." (Introduction, page 9)
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"The two main questions of the research were as follows. To what degree are PSBs in the five selected Southeast European countries ready to meet the new challenges? What actions and policies are needed to ensure the existence and development of public service TV programming in a digital environment?
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Having in mind importance of development and sustainability of public media, Mediacentar Sarajevo and South East European Network for Professionalization of Media (SEENMP) recognized the need for a comprehensive analysis of current situation and possible transformations of media landscape and initiated this regional study of public service television in the digital age. Research includes five countries: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Slovenia and Serbia. Eash of the case studies analyzed: readiness of the market to face new challenges, media scene and consumer/audience habits; existing legal framework, state policy and their roles in process of digitalization; public TV service, their market and social standing, as well as strategic planning for new trends." (https://www.media.ba)
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"Los enfoques de agenda setting, de network society y de public sphere constituyen el marco teórico básico para el abordaje metodológico y posterior desarrollo de “El Observador de Medios de Comunicación en América Latina” que presentamos. El Observador analiza la agenda de los principales
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medios de comunicación masiva, determinando si el tratamiento de unos temas (y la exclusión de otros) favorecen a los principios e ideales del sistema democrático y contribuyen a su desarrollo." (Introducción, página 9-10)
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