Lesson 1 - Conflict-Sensitive Journalism (CSJ)

Lesson 1 – Conflict-Sensitive Journalism (CSJ)

 A body of knowledge borne from the study of journalism as a discipline, an

understanding of conflict sciene, and the experience of hundreds of local, national, and
international journalists (PECOJON-Peace and Conflict Journalism Network) –Rama,
2018
 Effectively covering conflict- a situation where two or more people have incompatible
goals
 Not the resolution of conflicts- it is things that reporter should be covering, with good
reporting, the conflict could result to a better situation, it could be reduced.
4 key concepts in CSJ

 Truth-seeking – a commitment to seek and make known what is previously unknown

 Active accuracy – concepts, pursue of truths
 Focus on relevance- concepts, putting the needs of the audience first, what to write,
prominence, currency, audity
 Good writing – proper presentation of perspectives
 Journalists must know how to fulfill their roles without feeding theflames –CSJ
 Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creations
 Quality Journalism- Access to Information, freedom of expression, conditions of safety

and security (and the 4 key concepts)
Journalists Role in Peace keeping, building and making
 Mediator gets better overview that the ones in conflict since he/she gets to talk to the
parties more -Prof Johan Galtung
Lesson 2 (Power of media)
•Framing involves a communication source presenting and defining an issue -de Vreese and
Lecheler (2012)
Episodic Frames
• depicting social issues like poverty as limited to events only and not placed in a broader
interpretation or context.
 “Poverty is covered in terms of personal experience; the viewer is provided with a
particular instance of an individual or family living under economic duress” –Shanto
Iyenger
 Focused on a person, or event. Specific.
Thematic Frames
• The narrative is less about the experience of particular victims or individuals and more about
societal or collective outcomes.
 In the thematic frame, the news consists of information bearing on general trends (e.g.,
the poverty rate, the number of states experiencing significant increase in hunger,
changes in the governments’ definition of poverty, etc.), or matters of public policy...
These are essentially background or takeout stories in which the object of the coverage is
abstract and impersonal
 Focused on the problem/issue
Framing techniques in media raports
 Metaphor • Story (myth, legend) • Tradition (rituals,
ceremonies) • Slogan, jargon, catchphrase,
and meme • Artifact • Contrast • Spin
Priming
- is the ability of the media to provide a context for the discussion of a given issue, thereby
setting the stage for audience understanding. The concept draws heavily from the
political science research of Shanto Iyengar, Mark Peters, and Donald Kinder (1982)
Agenda-setting theory
- as originally formulated in 1972 by Maxwell McCombs and Donald Shaw, explains the
relationship between the emphasis that the mass media place on issues and the
importance that media audiences attribute to those issues.
Lesson 3 (The media and the audience)
 The decision to report depends on the target group of the media house and every often
this is also influenced by news values.
 It includes timeliness, proximity, prominence, impact, currency, conflict and oddity
News values: 3 categories
 Impact – threshold (larger chanceof getting published), frequency, negativity,

unexpectedness, unambiguity or simplification
 audience identification – personalization (involving people), meaningfulness (more
relatable) , elite countries, elite people
 pragmatics of coverage – consonance (gatekeepers feel), continuity (what people already
know), and composition (positioning of stories, light stories along with serious ones)
 The idea that news is limited to events that have one or more of the news values
discussed before seriously limits what the public is made aware of and what social
processes and discourses they can meaningfully participate in.
 Some media effects are intended, some are not
 The dynamic can begin with the authorities having information for the public and
channeling it through the media and the media giving information toauthorities from the
feedback it gets from the people.
Lesson 4
 Decisions in the news room are influenced by media owners

 Groups are established to ensure that journalists are insulated from unwarranted
impositions by media owners on how stories should be framed
 In PH, media owners can influence journalists
 Due to absence of licensing, they can hire anyone to do media works
 “reporters are accompanied by militars in order to deal with conflicts”
 The media’s agenda are affected by their own industry-specific realities –Propaganda
model by E. herman and N. Chomsky
Five influences or filters that impact media operation:
 Ownership, size, and profit orientation

 Funding (advertisers)
 Sourcing
 Flak (media’s fear of being discredit)
 Ideology of fear (increases public dependence on media)
Others are newsroom operation concerns (quota, working hours, etc)
Personal Filters
 Gender, religion, rights, identity
Lesson 5 (Deconstructing Conflict)
 Conflict is not synonymous with violence. Conflict is normal and is an agent of change,
as posited by Pearson and Lounsbery (2009)
 Scholars and practitioners of conflict resolution tend to recognize that not all forms of
conflict can be considered negative interaction (Rothman and Olson, 2001). Conflict can
be quite constructive in stimulating inter-party communication and problem-solving in a
collaborative manner.
 Violence, on the other hand, is a strategy characterized by the use of force, employed to
resolve conflict.
 The international use of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself,
another person, or against a group or community, which either results in or has a high
likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, maldevelopment, or
deprivation. (WHO, 1996)
 In most contexts, conflict will predictably arise when (Howard, 2003, p. 6):
• Resources are scarce and not shared fairly, as in food, housing, jobs, or land.
• There is little or no communication between groups.
• The groups have incorrect ideas and beliefs about each other.
• Unresolved grievances exist from the past.
• Power/Influence is unevenly distributed.

 Destructive conflicts tend to expand and escalate as competition, poor communication,
hostile attitudes, misjudgment, and misperception take hold so that the parties get stuck in
a situation that makes no logical sense (Kriesberg 1998). Deutsch and Coleman (2000)
argue that the perception of any act is determined by an individual’s image of the act and
by that person’s perception of the context in which the act occurs. (Bryne and Senehi,
2009)
Categories of Conflict
•Data or information related
• Relationship related
• Structure and system related
Three types of Conflict (Galtung, 1958)
 Surface Conflict is one that is episodic and not deeply rooted, but is being directly
expressed, hopefully by non-violent means.
 Latent Conflict, meanwhile, is unexpressed frustration that continues to develop over
time.
 Open Conflict, on the other hand, is a deeply rooted frustration that is currently being
expressed.
Pearson and Lounsbery (2009):
 In a similar vein, Pearson and Lounsbery (2009), citing Curle and Lederach, built on the
element of power by clarifying that a rebalancing of power “goes beyond merely militar
or physical power, and means that all parties come to ‘recognize one another in new
ways’.
 With increased awareness comes overt conflict and confrontation, and then, depending
upon the key element of rebalancing power, in the broad sense of that term, the line can
be crossed toward negotiation (because of the parties’ greater self-assurance), and finally
even to peace if relations become stable and predictable though continuing to change. In
some sense we might view negotiations as pre- transformation and stable peace as
indicative of transformation.
 Power is important here in that the weaker party with grievances at first cannot
effectively be heard. Through increased awareness and “consciousness raising,”
confrontation arises and can be either violent or nonviolent. The stronger party thus at
least becomes aware of these grievances or demands.
 Even this first confrontation is a measure of initial empowerment or the weaker party,
and the power relationship continues to evolve and might be further transformed either
through the struggle or through third party intervention (to take part in the conflict or to
mediate it).

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Lesson 1 – Conflict-Sensitive Journalism (CSJ)

 A body of knowledge borne from the study of journalism as a discipline, an

4 key concepts in CSJ

 Truth-seeking – a commitment to seek and make known what is previously unknown

 Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creations

 Quality Journalism- Access to Information, freedom of expression, conditions of safety

Journalists Role in Peace keeping, building and making

Lesson 2 (Power of media)

Framing techniques in media raports

 Metaphor • Story (myth, legend) • Tradition (rituals,

ceremonies) • Slogan, jargon, catchphrase,

and meme • Artifact • Contrast • Spin

News values: 3 categories

 Impact – threshold (larger chanceof getting published), frequency, negativity,

 Decisions in the news room are influenced by media owners

Five influences or filters that impact media operation:

 Ownership, size, and profit orientation

Others are newsroom operation concerns (quota, working hours, etc)

 Gender, religion, rights, identity

Lesson 5 (Deconstructing Conflict)

• There is little or no communication between groups.

• Unresolved grievances exist from the past.

• Power/Influence is unevenly distributed.

•Data or information related

• Structure and system related

Three types of Conflict (Galtung, 1958)

Pearson and Lounsbery (2009):

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