After the formal greetings and a string of political and international organisation figures lining up to express their good intentions towards communication for development, the World Congress on the Communication for Development (WCCD) really got started with an introductory plenary session explaining what the goals of the congress were.
One main panellist, Mario Acunzo, of the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) in Rome said that what’s aimed at here in Rome and for the next three days is to “produce policy change”. What’s meant here, he specified, is to give the drafting team a chance to bounce off its ideas with policy makers and practitioners in attendance. “We want a reality check.”
The WCCD drafting team is composed of the ‘usual suspects’ from the World Bank, the FAO, as well as The Communication Initiative – an organisation based in Canada. It has already released a draft document containing a number of recommendations for rejuvenating and giving the field of ‘communication for development’ some impulse.
The Association for Progressive Communications (APC), a non-profit network organisation working to promote ICT policies and strategic use of technologies such as the internet, is presently studying the draft document that is to become the main tangible outcome of the WCCD. A statement by this organisation is expected for October 27.
Calling the prime minister for a quick chat
After the orientation talk, the WCCD plenary went into discussion mode. Several high-profile “development communicators” started breaking the ice in trying to touch upon a number of issues that are at stake in “communication for development” (C4D).
José Ramos Horta, Prime Minister of East Timor (Nobel Peace Prize 1996) was the first off the bat to make the crowd of more than 500 burst out into laughter when he explained how seriously he stood by C4D. “I’m probably the only prime minister whose cellphone number is known and used by all,” he said. Elected since last July, Horta is the head of a relatively small country (947,000) with .tl as its top level domain. He illustrated his unconditional belief in a participatory communication recently, when he went as far as reloading credit on a cellphone card of one of his constituents who could not afford an important call.
He insisted on the fact that the great majority of people did not have access to mobile telephone technology in his country but that a growing number of people who can’t read, most of them located in rural areas, actually do use this direct communication mode.
He finished his speech in asking a few questions that he’s trying to get a grip on: How do you inform people in the rural setting about seeds that have not been tested, diseases in farming? This educative orientation Mr. Horta is taking with regards to the use of ICTs is of utmost importance today, but it remains to be seen if the governmental agencies and administration would actually learn themselves from that two-way communication. The top-down “we-inform-you” approach can have its limits, as some in the audience rightly pointed out.
Public policy and political will at the root of development
Moderator and RaiNews 24 anchor Piero Di Pasquale picked up on Horta’s anecdotes, taking it a bit further: “Communication is not technology”. Marta Mauras, Secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean did not need more to get going.
The Chilean specified that in her view, Michelle Bachelet (head of state in Chile) is creating public debate, “she’s facing the public and trying ‘to give voice’ to people in a country dominated by private media.” If one might find the statement “give voice” somewhat patronising (since people have a voice), one must agree that multistakeholder open consultations can only help in making space for these voices to co-determine public policy. “Let’s not make communication for development” a recipe, she concluded, insisting on the importance of integrating this into a larger democratisation process and building of citizenship.
“Create citizens”
Aram Aharonian, director of Venezuela-based TV Telesur argued with no detour for media that permit all to “know where we come from to know where we’re going”. Qualifying Telesur’s programming as “alternative” Aharonian’s understanding of C4D necessarily goes through the mass media.
But the “alternative” label, generally used by community media to self-describe is here referred to as offering something that is not submitted to “the hegemonic discourse coming from the North”. Telesur is a joint effort of five Latin American countries to make a counter-weight to CNN en español & co.
Here too, interestingly, the discourse of the democratisation of information, was expressed as something that “creates citizens”, in the way a textile shop produces clothes. If this top-down language did not add to the good intentions and a different vision, the moderator rapidly put the finger on the issue in explaining that the issue of independence from governments (a very real issue in the case of Telesur) needed to be part of a new C4D push.
Social media and the difficulty to find a C4D niche
The last speaker in the TV-show like panel was Garthet Japhet, executive director of Soul City, a large non governmental organisation based South Africa. “Mass media, bundled with interpersonal communication are the biggest drive of development,” he declared. What he means is that the potentially most beneficial use of ICTs, is to use pay-TV and radio broadcasting in a big way, but also integrating peoples’ voices back in the communication. “That’s absolutely key,” said he, recognising that using the mass media as platforms implies a lot of funding.
“Communication for development is not just about communication,” Japhet argued. “It’s not because you are communicating with people that it means you are listening to what they are saying or that you are producing development.” Japhet valued the listening aspect. “It’s priority no. 1 to listen to what people have to say” on the ground, he pointed out, right before making a pitch in favour of more political will, more resources, more commitment on behalf of governments, development agencies, NGOs, funders and international organisations.
“What’s important in this congress, is looking forward to mainstreaming communication into development, not the other way round,” he concluded. In the course of the WCCD, we will be able to measure if this exercise is possible. With the diversity of voices in the audience though, one might scratch her head, doubting about the feasibility of finding a clear focus and identity over the next three days.
Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean: http://www.eclac.org
José Ramos Horta: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Ramos_Horta
RaiNews 24: http://www.rainews24.it/
Soul City Institute: http://www.soulcity.org.za/
Telesur: http://www.telesurtv.net/
WCCD: http://www.devcomm-congress.org/worldbank/macro/2.asp