"For six months between November 2012 and April 2013, fifty citizen watchdog monitors carefully noted incidents of hate speech and dangerous speech broadcast by five radio stations in Kenya. It was part of Internews in Kenya’s Free and Fair Media (FFM) programme aimed at working with the media to
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ensure that they covered the General Election of 2013 fairly and responsibly. Known as Citizen Watchdog, the exercise was not so much one of policing as one of accountability – to check incidents of hate speech and dangerous speech on air in the run-up to the 2013 General Election, during the election, and afterwards. Citizen Watchdog ran parallel to Internews’ support to the media through its Free and Fair Media journalism training activities focused on conflict sensitive journalism practices. The five radio stations included KBC Radio Taifa (Kenya Broadcasting Corporation), three vernacular radio stations, and one Swahili broadcaster based in the coastal region. The findings of Citizen Watchdog showed a sharp decline in cases of dangerous speech documented over the six month period: from 20 in November 2012 to zero in April 2013." (Executive summary)
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"There is immense difficulty in regulating hate speech on the ground of ethnicity when ethnicity is a prime cehicle for political organization and mobilization. On the one hand, substantive (real) equality demands that certain marginalized ethnic gropus be shielded from hate speech in order to have
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any chance of successfully renegotiating and reclaiming the places they have lost in the society. On the other hand, hate speech regulation should not be used as a pretext for perpetuation of ethnic hierarchies and criminalization of dissent. If the solution is not clear, the Ethiopian example at least casts light on the curious tension between the two sides of the equality paradox." (Conclusion, page 377)
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"The contributors to this volume consider whether it is possible to establish carefully tailored hate speech policies that are cognizant of the varying traditions, histories, and values of different countries. Throughout, there is a strong comparative emphasis, with examples (and authors) drawn from
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around the world. All the authors explore whether or when different cultural and historical setting justify different substntive rules given that such cultural relativism can be used to justify content-based restrictions and so endanger freedom of expression." (Back cover)
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"Ein Teil der Subkulturen des russischen Internets unterstützt heute offen und aggressiv das Regierungslager. Insbesondere sind dies die sogenannten padonki („Prolls“), die mit ihrer falschen Orthographie und obszönen Lexik früher gezielt provozierten, deren Wortschöpfungen heute aber Teil d
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er Populärkultur geworden sind. Der scheinbare Widerspruch zwischen dem einst rebellischen Auftreten dieser Gruppen und ihrer heutigen staatsnahen Position löst sich bei näherer Betrachtung auf. Zur psychosozialen Disposition der padonki gehörte von Beginn an das Ressentiment. Das herrschende Regime hat sich diese Disposition erfolgreich zunutze gemacht und profitiert heute mit von der Bekanntheit der ehemaligen „Prolls." (Abstract)
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"The article focuses on the use of metaphors during the 2007 pre- and post-election violence in Kenya that left at least 1400 people dead and more than 350,000 internally displaced. During and after the violence, vernacular radio stations, though not entirely responsible for the violence, were highl
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y chastised for constructing and disseminating narratives of hate, using embellished metaphors. This article acknowledges the presence of these metaphors and the ethnicized stereotypical humour they provided before the election. But it is the political tension that provided the context for the deployment of metaphors in a way that framed their meaning and potency of use. Whether these metaphors contributed to fanning ethnic passion cannot be quantitatively assessed. However, their potency was not in themselves, but in the meaning imbued in them; which was as fluid and transient as the context changed. Metaphors, therefore, became substitutes for past ethnic grievances. They served as a rallying cry and a call to arms, not because of the totality of what can be inferred from them, both positive and negative, but their signification of the aspects of difference. It is this difference, which was exploited during the election violence, not because of the metaphors but in spite of them. With the background of the political tension that suffocated the country, metaphors became materials to propagate ethnic identities and a basis for ethnic nomenclature." (Abstract)
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"This book offers a rigorous, theory-based, and uniquely comprehensive, analysis of European and international legal standards shaping minorities’ right to freedom of expression. The analysis pays particular attention to the instrumental role played by traditional and new forms of media in ensurin
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g that the right to freedom of expression of persons belonging to minorities is effective in practice. The relevant international legal framework is set out in detail, including a careful examination of the relationship between generalist and minority-specific international human rights instruments. Due attention is paid to the historical circumstances in which key instruments were developed and the contemporary context in which they are now being interpreted. The analysis is also informed by an awareness of institutional and political dynamics. All of this forms the basis for the book’s central objective: to mount a critical evaluation of the existing international legal framework governing freedom of expression for minorities, while drawing on theoretical insights gained from human rights scholarship and communications science. The first major focus of the evaluation is the regulation and restriction of expression to protect minority rights, in which issues such as pluralism, tolerance and “hate speech” feature centrally. Its second major focus, the regulation and facilitation of expression to promote minority rights, explores cultural and linguistic rights and media access questions." (Back cover)
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"This book examines the crucial role the media played in the 1994 Rwanda genocide, bringing together local reporters and commentators from Rwanda, Western journalists, and media theorists. Part One (eight articles) describes and analyzes "Hate Media in Rwanda", mainly, but not exclusively, focusing
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on Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM). Part Two (thirteen articles) presents a critique of international media coverage of the genocide, including not only the United States and Western Europe, but also Kenya and Nigeria. Part three (five articles) covers the deliberations by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda on the role of the media in the genocide, identifying various missed opportunities. Part Four, "After the Genocide and the Way Forward" (six articles), goes beyond the Rwanda experiences, tackling issues like the use and abuse of media in vulnerable societies. The authors outline how censorship and propaganda can be avoided, argue for a new responsibility in media reporting, and give recommendations for media intervention in the prevention of genocidal violence." (CAMECO Update 1-2008)
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"The importance of hate radio pervades commentary on the Rwandan genocide, and Rwanda has become a paradigmatic case of media sparking extreme violence. However, there exists little social scientific analysis of radio's impact on the onset of genocide and the mobilization of genocide participants. T
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hrough an analysis of exposure, timing, and content as well as interviews with perpetrators, the article refutes the conventional wisdom that broadcasts from the notorious radio station RTLM were a primary determinant of genocide. Instead, the article finds evidence of conditional media effects, which take on significance only when situated in a broader context of violence." (Abstract)
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"Tel est donc l’objectif de cet ouvrage : allier la réflexion théorique sur le rôle des médias dans les conflits et les processus de paix à des études de cas pratiques issus de l’expérience récente de neuf pays d’Afrique centrale. Cette recherche vise donc, d’une part, à mieux compr
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endre les dynamiques qui sont en jeu dans les paysages médiatiques de ces États et, d’autre part, à identifier des voies pouvant contribuer à les renforcer ou à les freiner. La documentation et la réflexion devant préparer l’action, ce livre ambitionne de fournir certains éléments d’analyse susceptibles d’aider à mieux comprendre et donc à mieux agir." (Introduction, page 8)
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"Les articles sont issus de trois conférences organisées à Accra en 1996, Kampala en 1997 et Accra en 1999 sur le thème "Les médias et la construction de la paix en Afrique". Le comportement et la coresponsabilité des médias pendant le génocide rwandais de 1994 ont été à l'origine de cett
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e réflexion. Dans ce contexte, les auteurs s'interrogent sur le rôle que les journalistes doivent (ou peuvent) jouer dans les sociétés africaines en cas de conflit et sur la possibilité pour eux d'adopter une attitude impartiale lorsque l'État justifie la répression sous diverses formes par l'argument de la sécurité nationale. Les explications d'ordre général sont étayées par des exemples individuels détaillés." (DÜI-Wgm)
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"This paper is an analytical study and presentation of the Nightwatch column (Nocna kronika) that has been published weekly in the Slovenian Sunday paper Nedelo since the end of summer 1995. The author in the first place endeavors to present this phenomenon in the light of its chauvinist, macho and
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racist nature, and (possible as well as actual) the anti-political and extremist impact of the discourse communicated through this column. The ‘products’ of the Nightwatch column presented here are: foreigners, those from the south, Yugoslavia, Balkan creatures, being s with a half-roof over their heads, citizenship granted to foreigners, Bosnians, Muslims, Islam, refugees, sevdah, pedophiles, transvestites, girls, chicks, and women. Through the analysis of this rich material and particularly the characteristic ‘bar flies discourse’, the author exposes the inner workings of unprecedented dehumanization of those seen as “other” and different in Slovenia. He also proves that dreams about a racism-free Slovenia are the dreams of people who believe they are “innocent” and hence can indulge in comfortable pretense and ‘unknowingness’. The analysis of Nightwatch reveals numerous criminal dimensions of chauvinism, sexism, racism and radical intolerance in general. The author’s main interpretative point is directed towards antipolitical and criminal impacts of the Nightwatch discourse which should be taken extremely seriously as a direct incitement to more or less violent action against those who are seen as other and different." (Abstract)
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