"Oral history is inherently about memory, and when oral history interviews are used "in public," they invariably both reflect and shape public memories of the past. Oral History and Public Memories is the only book that explores this relationship, in fourteen case studies of oral history's use in a
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variety of venues and media around the world. Readers will learn, for example, of oral history based efforts to reclaim community memory in post-apartheid Cape Town, South Africa; of the role of personal testimony in changing public understanding of Japanese American history in the American West; of oral history's value in mapping heritage sites important to Australia's Aboriginal population; and of the way an oral history project with homeless people in Cleveland, Ohio became a tool for popular education. Taken together, these original essays link the well established practice of oral history to the burgeoning field of memory studies." (Publisher description)
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"The volume begins with a general overview of faith-based peacebuilding by pastor and peace-practitioner David Steele. Several CRS staff members provided input on the early drafts [...] The case studies that follow all deal with initiatives involving Catholic actors. This is the tradition out of whi
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ch CRS functions, and within which it learns. However, CRS and its church partners frequently and intentionally act in tandem with other civil society organizations, and they cooperate with other faith-based actors. Two of the case studies in this work (one from Uganda and one from The Philippines) deal with inter-religious efforts, while a third (India) deals with a broad ecumenical effort among leaders and members of diverse Christian denominations. In addition, many cases demonstrate how church partners are able to engage key decision-makers and leaders at different levels of society at critical moments in the course of a conflict. The central learning question for all the case studies is “what are the key factors that have contributed to, or impeded, the effectiveness of church peacebuilding action?” The intent is to surface lessons while helping to develop an internal, disciplined habit of reflection within the organization. The general guidelines for writing the studies emphasize four good learning practices: a) linking interventions to the context, b) articulating the implicit and explicit hypotheses or “theories of change,” c) using, building upon and/or complementing evaluation, and d) recognizing potential rival explanations for why things happened. It should be clear that the cases are exemplary, not representative. They provide a small sampling of the peacebuilding activities conducted by CRS and its partners in recent years. Each CRS region freely determined which particular case it would bring to the undertaking. Adherence to the initial qualifying criteria — including engagement with external actors (civil society, government or inter-religious) and commitments to social cohesion or equity — varied considerably." (Introduction, page 3-4)
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"This paper intends to look at the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) as a communication tool instead of an object of communication. The MDGs possess the potential to make development more understandable to people at the centre of development policies: the poor, vulnerable and socially excluded. Th
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e potential to make development interventions more effective and, ultimately, to achieve the MDGs, lies in improving the capability of these people to use information about development to claim their rights and to hold authorities accountable for their commitments. Based on the available literature and international conventions, the paper will elaborate a framework for the application of communication for development in promoting the MDGs at the country level. The framework will be used to examine the Albanian experience in using the MDGs to mobilize participation around national and local development strategies. It will also highlight the contribution that communication can make in Serbia to the social inclusion of marginalized groups such as Roma, refugees, internally displaced persons and people with disabilities. The proposed framework can be used to identify gaps, opportunities and entry points in each country. It can help make the best use of the MDGs at the national level through including excluded groups in the policy debate, which will enhance transparency, accountability and responsiveness to their needs." (Abstract)
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"From 1995 to 2005, the international community provided significant support to media in the Western Balkans. Based on a meta-analysis of 37 project reports and interviews with a broad range of media experts, this study finds that direct support to independent media was a key factor in helping the c
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itizens of several Balkan countries to rid themselves of authoritarian regimes. At the same time, the publication states that often journalism training - the greatest share of media support - has had few lasting effects. Support for legislative and regulatory reform has been efficient and effective, but the new media legislation has not been sufficiently well implemented. The overall conclusion (page 36): 'Media assistance in the Balkans proved itself an effective way to promote democracy by removing barriers to the enjoyment of fundamental rights to information and expression as protected by international law, and without intervening in political choices themselves. When media support was perceived as being primarily driven by political objectives, it was in danger of being like the problem it sought to alleviate and obscuring the concept of independent media." (CAMECO Update 1-2008)
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"Editors and journalists who have been trained to understand issues of gender-based violence and human rights can have a positive influence on educating public and political understanding of these issues. This article describes two workshops held recently in Senegal and Albania for male and female e
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ditors and journalists. The UNFPA workshop for journalists and editors from six African countries in postconflict situations, held in Senegal, was deliberately scheduled to coincide with the Dakar film festival on gender-based violence. The purpose of the UNFPA strategy was to achieve extensive media coverage in these six countries. The Albanian workshop for local and national media took place in Tirana as part of a three-year project against sex-trafficking, conducted by the NGO Albanian Centre for Population and Development in partnership with the Mediterranean Women’s Studies Centre." (Abstract)
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"It is a simple fact that it is hard to find reliable information on the media in South Eastern Europe. The 'South East Europe Media Handbook' bridges this gap in a unique way and offers basic information about the situation of the media in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus,
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Greece, Hungary, Macedonia, Moldova, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro/Kosovo, Slovakia, Slovenia, Turkey and Ukraine. It hereby supports the better understanding of the particular situation of the media in the countries of South Eastern Europe. On the other hand, it gives a very good overview and provides a useful database of all important media in South Eastern Europe. Last but not least it is an outstanding source of information regarding press freedom violations in the past year. Once again I want to emphasize that the media are the agents of democracy. Hence it is very important to encourage the governments in the region to establish safe working conditions for journalists and this is one of the basic objectives of this handbook." (Erhard Busek, Special Coordinator Stability Pact for Eastern Europe, page XI).
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"This report looks at how countries in Western Europe, in particular Sweden, Germany and the UK have developed press councils or complaints commissions and analyses recent initiatives in five countries of South East Europe aimed at improving journalistic standards and establishing some form of media
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self-regulation. Developments in Albania, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Romania and Slovenia are explored through the testimonies of key stakeholders in the process: media owners, editors, journalists and non-governmental organisations. As the key findings and recommendations of the research reveal, there is no single fit-all model of media self-regulation that can be easily transferred from one country to another, but there are fundamental principles, which should be observed and useful lessons that can be learned." (Executive summary, page 6)
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"What follows from the analysis of the surveyed cases is a high level of variety of public television activity on the regional level. This clearly depends on the size and population of different countries, on the central and local administrative organization, on the level of linguistic homogeneity a
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nd from a series of historical, political and cultural factors. For this reason is difficult to talk of variable models of public regional television. In reality, however, there is an important factor of comparison, which allows us to subdivide the surveyed cases in two large categories how we did in the first step report: the statute of regional television centres in terms of independence or organic dependence on the national television companies. In Bosnia, Denmark, Greece, Netherland, Portugal, Russia and Serbia there are public regional television centres independent from national television companies. In Albania, Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Ireland and Slovenia there are regional centres, which constitute an organic and integrated part of the national television companies. Where regional public televisions are independent in some cases they broadcast only to the regional population as in Denmark, Portugal, Netherland, Finland, Russia, in other cases they broadcast at national level as in Belgium and Greece. Where regional public televisions are local branch of national companies in some case they produce only for regional transmissions as in Albania and Finland, in other cases they produce also for national public television channels as in Czech Republic and Sweden. In the case of Portugal, regional television centres are independent companies, owned in part by national public television, and they produce programs also for the international public channel to reach the “diaspora” of regional population. A second factor of comparison concerns the relationship between the regional television centres and the regional political, cultural, and social context. In some cases the relationship is important as in Bosnia, Portugal, Belgium, Russia, Serbia in other are not evident as in Ireland, Netherlands, Sweden, Finland. A third factor of comparison concern the extension of regional broadcasting activities. In some cases the regional activity is limited to some daily news broadcasted in a window inside the national programs as in Finland and Ireland, in other cases it concern a more or less wide range of programs of various genres as in Netherlands, Denmark, Russia, Portugal. In correspondence to that dimension there are differences of the economic resources at disposal of each regional television." (Introduction, page 2-3)
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