Benefits of community broadcasting

Beijing, 26 May 2010 (Part 3 of 3): A recent UNESCO survey of good practice in community broadcasting shows that the contribution of community broadcasting to improving people’s lives and livelihoods is complex and many layered. It carries both intrinsic and instrumental dimensions.

To be able to communicate through community media has intrinsic value to people’s well being and quality of life. When people can speak out and be heard through the media they benefit from recognition and gain respect for their identity. For example, in Papua New Guinea, indigenous tribes are operating their own community radio stations. In the Jakarta slums the urban poor have access to the airwaves. In Gurgaon and many other fast growing urban areas, community broadcasting is serving migrant workers.

In these and other examples, communities that are not well served by the mainstream media have sought to and succeeded in establishing and operating their own media. This in turn can contribute to social cohesion and to facilitating peaceful relations. It also provides an important tool for self help and for local development.

If we turn to the instrumental functions of community broadcasting we can consider three broad areas that are important: the first is safety and protection; the second is access to information; and the third is the formation of shared knowledge and values.

As an example of the first of these – the protective function - we can look at disaster response. Two years ago AMARC undertook a survey of community radio practice in natural disaster management in Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan and Nepal, among others. The stations surveyed reported responding to floods, landslides, earthquakes, tsunami and volcanic eruptions. Programming responses included information about post-disaster risks and mitigation, missing persons, logistics distribution, trauma healing, and facilitating community dialogue. Many of the stations surveyed explained their role in organizing community-level meetings and assisting to mobilize local response.

Now let us look at the second function - access to information. This function is particularly important not only in enabling people to make informed decisions but also in allowing the critical scrutiny that is necessary in holding decision makers to account, and in identifying wrongdoing and corruption. The media’s role in these matters is well documented but community broadcasting brings an additional dimension, by providing information in a form that is accessible to local communities, including in vernacular languages, and by focusing on a level of detail that can have immediate impact on people’s lives and livelihoods, such as ensuring proper accounting for educational resources and timely action by authorities in the repair and provision of services.

The third function – of value formation – is at the core of community broadcasting because these media are not simple one way channels of communication but they are participatory and dialogical. Community broadcasting can facilitate the appropriation of knowledge into local contexts and the development of shared values in processes of social change. This might include, for example, changes in agricultural practice to adapt to climate change, combating discrimination and prejudice, improving health awareness and disease prevention. All have been a focus for community broadcasting practice.