From: Mustafa Akgul (akgul@Bilkent.EDU.TR)
Date: Mon 16 Jun 2003 - 23:21:18 EEST
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Date sent: Mon, 16 Jun 2003 09:29:58 -0700
Subject: The Drum Beat - 201 - Political Participation
From: The Drum Beat <drumbeat@comminit.com>
The Drum Beat - Issue 201 - Political Participation
June 16, 2003
from The Communication Initiative...global forces...local
choices...critical voices...telling stories...
Partners: The Rockefeller Foundation, BBC World Service Trust, The
CHANGE Project, CIDA, Exchange, FAO, Johns Hopkins University Center
for Communication Programs, OneWorld, The Panos Institute, PCI, Soul
City, The Synergy Project, UNAIDS, UNICEF, USAID, WHO.
Chair of Partners Group: Denise Gray-Felder, Rockefeller Foundation
dgray-felder@rockfound.org Director: Warren Feek wfeek@comminit.com
Website: http://www.comminit.com
***
How can communication strategies and activities support people
further
participating in their own political development bearing in mind Jan
Servaes's observation that "participation does not always entail
cooperation or consensus. It can often mean conflict and usually
poses
a threat to existent structures..."? (Servaes 1996, 23 - as quoted in
http://www.comminit.com/stsilviocomm/sld-2891.html#servaes)
This issue of The Drum Beat presents a number of initiatives, many of
them grassroots, that raise this and other questions related to
community involvement in political change.
PROGRAMMES
http://www.comminit.com/programmes.html
1. SEELINE (South Eastern European Legal Initiative) - South Eastern
Europe Initiated by the Croatia-based Be active Be emancipated
(B.a.B.e.), this regional network of women's human rights
organisations exchanges knowledge and engages in advocacy work to
prevent violence against women and protect women's rights. Strategies
include encouraging regional governments and parliaments to
incorporate gender-sensitive provisions into the legal system,
strengthening collaboration between women's human rights groups and
concerned individuals, and making tribunals' work regarding violence
against women publicly known and visible.
http://www.comminit.com/pdskdv42003/sld-7698.html Contact
seeline@zamir.net
2. Praxis Institute for Participatory Practices - India
This locally-based non-profit NGO seeks to effect change in
communities throughout India by focusing on democracy at a grassroots
level. Established by ActionAid in 1997, Praxis works to empower
communities by conducting research and training that asks community
members to identify and address their own problems. The goal is to
communicate principles of democracy and to promote social equity and
participation. http://www.comminit.com/pdskdv72002/sld-5281.html
Contact Carolyn D. Williams princesspariah@angelfire.com
3. Red TV - Peru
Red TV's network includes 115 television channels in 24 departments
throughout Peru, ranging from small municipal channels to commercial
television companies. The network focuses on democracy and citizen
awareness by developing skills in participative television
production,
debate, and discussion. It seeks to involve communities as well as
universities and NGOs throughout Peru. Televisión Ciudadana (Citizen
TV) provides training and technical assistance to local channels for
segments that strive to strengthen local democracy, build citizen
awareness, and promote debate and the participation of leaders and
the
local public. Pantalla Viva (The Living Screen) is a talk show
featuring debate and opinion. The programme gives special importance
to public participation by, for instance, inviting questions by
telephone. http://www.comminit.com/pdskellogg/sld-6155.html Contact
Redtv@rcp.net.pe
4. Election 2002 Coverage - Sierra Leone
The Search for Common Ground - Sierra Leone (SFCG-SL), in conjunction
with the European Centre for Common Ground, conducted a programme to
ensure that the results of the May 14, 2002 Presidential &
Parliamentary elections would be shared with the public in Sierra
Leone. SFCG-SL engaged in coalition-building in the form of an
Independent Radio Network and a network of youth monitors who worked
to make the elections process transparent to citizens.
http://www.comminit.com/pdskdv102002/sld-6450.html Contact
eccg@eccg.be
THINKING
http://www.comminit.com/strategic.html
5. Information Age Government: Success Stories of Online Land Records
& Revenue Governance from India Details the justification for and
outcome of efforts to foster and support e-governance in India, which
has focused on systematising manual land use records. The successes
and challenges associated with Karnataka: Bhooomi (Land), Himachal
Pradesh: Lokmitra (People’s Friend), and Haryana: Rewari District are
explored. The author concludes by noting that "Participation of the
people in the developmental and democratic processes requires that
the
access to new technologies should be taken to grassroots. Merely
putting computers in a government office won't help".
http://www.comminit.com/st2003/sld-7837.html
6. Can Social Movements Save Democracy?
Reviews 4 books, drawing out these common themes: 1) Organising
strategies can work, even in places with a diverse population and
widespread poverty. 2) Groups organise themselves in participatory
ways because it works, not simply because of an abstract commitment
to
participation. They build power by organising people through
individual and group meetings, studying public issues that affect
their interests, and engaging in direct action. 3) People participate
in these groups to advance deep interests and values often rooted in
religious conviction and practice. The reviewer concludes that social
movements can press governments to restructure decision-making in
ways
that foster the direct and indirect participation of more citizens,
as
well as help community institutions create and engage in new
approaches to democratic politics.
http://www.comminit.com/st2003/sld-7710.html
7. Looking Behind the Internet: Empowering Women for Public Policy
Advocacy in Central America Current research in Costa Rica and
Nicaragua finds that e-government approaches view women as individual
recipients and users of ICTs rather than organised actors.
"Action-research" is designed to empower women by making public
information (PI) and associated services more participatory and
responsive to women's strategic and immediate needs. Research
findings
support: 1) Placing PI systems in the context of state-civil society
relations. 2) Making PI systems and applications of ICTs more readily
understandable. 3) Measuring the value of PI based on an
understanding
of where it comes from and how it is produced and disseminated. 4)
Identifying key obstacles to the access, use, and appropriation of
PI.
5) Prioritising possible solutions for PI production. 6) Using PI in
solutions to social, economic, and political problems.
http://www.comminit.com/st2003/sld-7539.html
***
The Pulse Poll - http://www.comminit.com/pulse.html
Decisions on who will lead major international development agencies
should include an election process involving the people most affected
by the issues that agency is seeking to address - eg: children 10 to
18 should vote for the next UNICEF Executive Director and people
living on less than USD 2 per day should vote for the next World Bank
President.
Do you agree or disagree?
[for context, please see -
http://www.comminit.com/drum_beat_199.html]
VOTE! http://www.comminit.com/pulse.html
Please also participate in a discussion/debate on this issue. To
join
and contribute please go to
http://www.comminit.com/email_forum.html#drumbeatchat
To read contributions please access
http://www.comminit.com/majordomo/drumbeatchat/threads.html
***
MATERIALS
http://www.comminit.com/materials.html
8. Gacaca: Living Together Again in Rwanda? [film]
This 55-minute documentary film features a Rwanda-based grassroots
justice system called the Gacaca Tribunals, which are designed to
unify a nation that in the early 1990s experienced politically
motivated ethnic killings. Citizens act as judges in an effort to
democratise the justice system. By exploring the process of building
and sustaining this new justice system, the film portrays the Tutsi
and Hutu peoples' struggles to rebuild their lives and communities by
dealing with the emotional trauma of their past and reconciling their
deep differences. http://www.comminit.com/ma2003/sld-7715.html
9. Legislative Theatre: Using Performance to Make Politicians
An attempt to use theatre in a political context to engage the
populace, Forum Theatre is based on the concept of the "spect-actor,"
the spectator who intervenes in an unresolved scenario on stage to
try
to break a cycle of oppression. As a politician in his native Rio de
Janeiro, the author used Forum Theatre to involve the local populace
in generating legislation and social change.
http://www.comminit.com/Materials/sld-5190.html
10. The People Have Spoken
This review of the June 1999 democratic elections in South Africa
includes chapters on the role of civil society, voter education,
election monitoring, and the media in the election process.
http://www.comminit.com/Materials/sld-3069.html
11. Zimbabwe: My Land, My Life [film]
Filmed over the 3-month period preceding the presidential elections,
this 52-minute documentary explores political unrest and violence in
Zimbabwe. Set in the farmlands of the tense and violent Mashonaland
East area, the film follows the lives of a farmer, a farm worker, and
a war veteran. http://www.comminit.com/Materials/sld-6252.html
***
New from Patricia Castano & Adelaida Trujillo (Director of La
Iniciativa de Comunicacion - http://www.comminit.com/la)
War Takes: a documentary film
For over 4 years, 3 Colombian filmmakers turned their cameras on
themselves, using personal stories to expose the reality in their
war-ravaged country. According to these filmmakers, Colombia has been
functioning for many years in the gray area between legalism and
lawlessness... http://www.comminit.com/ma2003/sld-7898.html
***
LINKS
http://www.comminit.com/links.html
12. Coalition of Women for Peace
A group of Jewish and Palestinian women who coordinate and organise
activities to mobilise Israelis to support: a political agreement
between Israel and its Arab neighbours; the involvement of women in
peace negotiations; the elimination of militarism in Israeli society;
and equality, inclusion, and justice for all Israeli citizens.
http://www.coalitionofwomen4peace.org/
13. Partnerships for Development Models (PDM)
Facilitates partnership formation between local governments, the
private sector, and civil society for improved delivery of services
and socio-economic development in South Africa.
http://www.ewet.org.za/pdm/pdm.html
14. Generation Europe S.A.
An online community catering to people aged 19-29 from countries
across Europe. It's interactive features seeks to articulate and
quantify young people's opinions on social and political issues and
to
shape public and corporate policy.
http://www.generation-europe.eu.com/
15. Tanzania Association of Non-Governmental Organizations (TANGO)
Supports the active role of NGOs in people-centred development in
Tanzania based on the values of justice, peace, good governance,
human
rights, gender equality and equity, and sustainable human
development.
Offers information about activities conducted by Tanzanian NGOs and
highlights events, partner news, job placements, and online lobby
campaigns. http://www.tango.or.tz/
***
This issue written by Kier Olsen DeVries.
***
The Drum Beat seeks to cover the full range of communication for
development activities. Inclusion of an item does not imply
endorsement or support by The Partners.
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Heimann
dheimann@comminit.com
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