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ABSTRACT
This paper offers a critical assessment of the role that the media, and in particular peace and conflict-sensitive journalism, can play in peacebuilding in African countries with a primary focus on the history and roles of the media in Nigeria. The theoretical lenses offered by post-colonial and southern criminologies, along with emancipatory peace, global, and human rights journalism are deployed to engage with the prospects and challenges for peace and conflict-sensitive journalism in Nigeria. Overall, this paper aims to serve as a resource material for further research on the role of the media in Nigeria’s conflicts.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
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54. As part of our ongoing Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council project we have undertaken work on two literature data bases that compile and summarize published research on these topics that has been completed by Nigerian-based and international media scholars and other researchers. These data bases, entitled “Media Content Analysis Studies of Crime, Insurgencies, and State Counter-terrorism in Nigeria – A Descriptive Summary Database” and “International and Nigerian Research on Media Theories and Media Industry Roles – A Descriptive Summary Database,” have been worked on collectively by project co-investigators and research assistants, and are currently being made available upon request and will be archived on our project website when completed.
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74. The following list of references comprise only a partial list of Professor Pate’s many significant publications (Pate, 2011a, 2011b; Pate, 2017; Pate, Oso & Taraba, 2018; Pate & Abubakar, 2013; Pate & Dauda, 2013, 2015; Pate & Dauda, 2020; Pate, Gambo & Ibrahim, 2019; Pate & Ibrahim, 2021; Pate & Idris, 2017, 2019; Pate & Oso, 2017; Pate, Oso & Jibril, 2018).
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81. The Nigerian component of our current three-year (2020–2023) project on “Reframing Media Studies of Crime, Insurgencies, and Counterterrorism in Nigeria: Toward a New Multi-Disciplinary Criminology-Mass Communication Stakeholder Approach” is based out of the Peace and Anti-Conflict Journalism Research Center at Baze University, under the directorship of Dr. Muhammad Kabir Yusuf.
83. Tejumaiye A, and Adelabu, O., editor. Mass media and governance: Issues and challenges in contemporary Nigeria. Lagos: Malthouse Press.2011.
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90. We refer here to organizations and regulatory bodies like the (hopefully reformed) Nigerian Press Council (NPC), the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE), the Broadcasting Organization of Nigeria (BON), the Nigerian Association of Women Journalists (NAWOJ), and the Nigerian Peace Journalists Network (Jacob, 2019; Pepple & Acholonu, 2018; Touitou, 2017).
91. Youngblood, S. Peace Journalism Principles and Practices: Responsibility Reporting Conflicts, Reconciliation, and Solutions. New York: Routledge.2017
92. Adebayo J.O. The impact of peace journalism training on journalists’ reportage of the 2015 elections in Nigeria: An action research case study. Communication: South African Journal for Communication Theory and Research. 2016;42(3):361–77
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95. Lederach’s theory is also commonly referred to in peacebuilding and peace and conflict studies literature as “transformative peacebuilding theory” (Paffenholz, 2014, p. 25).
96. Lederach J.P. Building peace: Sustainable reconciliation in divided societies: United States Institute of Peace Press Washington, DC; 1997.
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98. Leonardsson H, and Rudd, G. The “local turn” in peacebuilding: A literature review of effective and emancipatory local peacebuilding. Third World Quarterly 2015;36(5):825–39
99. Christie R, and Algar-Faria, G. Timely interventions: Temporality and peacebuilding. Journal of International Security. 2020;5:155–78
100. Okyere J. Peacebuilding through the lens of an emancipatory peacebuilding paradigm: A reflection on methodologies, interventions, and principles. Journal for Peace and Justice Studies. 2021;30(1):173–86.
101. Oloke I, Lindsay, P., & Byrne, S. he intersection of critical emancipatory peacebuilding and social enterprise: A dialogical approach to social entrepreneurship. Treaties and Documents. Journal of Ethnic Studies. 2018;81:67–86
102. Paffenholz T. Unpacking the local turn in peacebuilding: A critical assessment and agenda for future research. Third World Quarterly. 2015;36(5):857–74.
103. Ogenga F, editor. Researching Africa peace journalism through borderlands: A theoretical and methodological exploration. London: Routledge; 2021.
104. Sowo F, editor. The role of the media in conflict and peacebuilding in Sierra Leone. London: Routledge; 2021.
105. Maweu J, editor. Catalysts of conflict or messengers of peace? Promoting interfaith dialogue between Christians and Muslims in Kenya through the media. London: Routledge.; 2021.
106. For example, see: Agozino, 2003; 2005, 2014; 2017; Brown, 2021; Carrington, Hogg, Scott, & Sozzo, 2018; Cunneen, 2011; Cunneen & Tauri, 2016; Dimou, 2021; Moosavi, 2019; Oriola, 2006; Tauri, 2013.
107. Viriri A, & Mungwini, P. African cosmology and the duality of Western hegemony: The search for an African identity. Journal of Pan African Studies. 2010;3(6):27–42.
108. Chasi C, & Rodny-Gumede, Y., editor. An ubuntu approach to peace journalism. Namibia University of Science and Technology: African Peacebuilding Network.; 2019.
109. Shaw I.S, editor. Human rights journalism: A critical conceptual framework of a complementary strand of peace journalism. Sydney: Sydney University Press; 2011.
110. More recently, Shaw (2021) has developed his human rights journalism approach further and applied it specifically to issues related to the prospects and challenges of mediating peacebuilding in Africa and specifically Nigeria.
111. Or, alternatively-termed, “glocal” (Aas, 2013).