Media

Trafficking in African stereotypes

I generally refrain from criticizing NYTimes coverage of African news, though for some inexplicable reason I now find myself unable to resist commentary. I suppose one can only read so many stereotyped and misinformed "news" stories before it becomes too much to bear. Texas in Africa, G. Pascal Zachary and the ladies at Wronging Rights, among others, have all been quick to stress the problems with NYTimes reporting on previous occasions (see here, here and here for instance), and if I may, I'd quite like to add my voice to theirs.

The story that has finally broken my silence is one written by Jeffrey Gettleman on the drought currently plaguing Kenya. Gettleman writes:

A devastating drought is sweeping across Kenya, killing livestock, crops and children. It is stirring up tensions in the ramshackle slums where the water taps have run dry, and spawning ethnic conflict in the hinterland as pastoralist communities fight over the last remaining pieces of fertile grazing land.

The twin hearts of Kenya’s economy, agriculture and tourism, are especially imperiled. The fabled game animals that safari-goers fly thousands of miles to see are keeling over from hunger and the picturesque savannah is now littered with an unusually large number of sun-bleached bones.

I don't at all question the severity of the drought, or the fact that it is indubitably a cause of great concern for Kenyans dependent on agriculture for their livelihood. As Gettleman notes, the drought is also increasing conflict in some parts of the country, with farmers struggling for access to arable land. Such conflict, however, is not "ethnic," but rather an instance of basic survival, devoid of any ethnic undertones. Where ethnicity does factor, I would venture to guess that it is of secondary, rather than primary, concern.

Aside from this point, what I find most troublesome about Gettleman's piece is his suggestion that the Kenyan economy will somehow crumble - or is crumbling - as a consequence of the drought. While the Kenyan economy is certainly still highly dependent on its agricultural exports and land more generally, there is certainly more to it than what Gettleman seems to be suggesting. The unknowing reader comes away from Gettleman's piece with an image of a completely impoverished, desert-like country on the brink of disaster - a stereotype of a "typical" African country, if such a thing exists (it doesn't). While Kenya surely does have its problems, Gettleman's imagery is highly misguiding. Technology in Kenya is expanding at a rapid pace, heralding much opportunity for development. Emphasis is also being placed on the country's private sector as an engine for growth, as well as small-scale (often creative) manufacturing. One doesn't get any of this from Gettleman's piece; quite the opposite, really.

Perhaps I'm being too harsh. Gettleman's likely objective is to call attention to a problem which is continuing to cause serious trouble for the East African country. Doing so, however, shouldn't entail a complete distortion of the country in question. This benefits no one and is, moreover, poor journalism. Can we work on this, please?


* Image: NYTimes. Incidentally also the image accompanying Gettleman's piece.

Noteworthy...

US State Department's Africa Bureau receives less than rave reviews in a recent report from State's Office of the Inspector General


Today marks the 50th anniversary of the release of Miles Davis' Kind of Blue - the best selling jazz album of all time. Fred Kaplan examines the genius behind music (and see here for a great Legacy Recordings video tribute to the album - and Davis)


A recent International Crisis Group report briefing warns of increasing insecurity and political tension in Somalia's Puntland - a semi-autonomous region in north-eastern Somalia once touted as a success of the 'building blocks' approach to reestablishing national stability, and viewed as one of the most prosperous parts of the country


Is China revamping its climate change policy? The FT seems to think so...

Feeling the African beat... in Beijing

Afrokoko Roots is a 15-piece international Afrobeat band, formed by Ghanian/Nigerian percussionist and vocalist Sunny Dada (what a great name!). The members of the band hail from Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda, Burundi, the USA, the Philippines and China, and together perform Afrobeat style music and reggae classics. The band is based out of Beijing (!) and is performing tomorrow - Wednesday, 12 August - at Yugong Yishan, should any of you find yourself in the area.



[HT: Danwei]

New Chinese television channel targets North Africa, Middle East

China is continuing to make inroads into Africa, now with a clear view of targeting the continent's Arab population as well as the Middle East more generally. Via the New York Times:

Chinese state television has begun broadcasting an Arabic-language channel for the Middle East and Africa as part of efforts to expand the Communist government’s media influence abroad. The 24-hour channel, which began operating Saturday, will air in 22 Arabic-speaking countries and reach nearly 300 million people, China Central Television said in a statement. The channel “will serve as an important bridge to strengthen communication and understanding between China and Arab countries,” a CCTV vice president, Zhang Changming, said in the statement.

[...] The Arabic channel will carry news, feature stories, entertainment and education programs and will gradually expand its offerings, CCTV said. The network already broadcasts in English, French and Spanish as well as in Mandarin.

Chinese soft power at its finest.

On Jay-Z as the world's greatest hegemon and rapping feuds as exemplars of soft power politics

It really doesn't get any better than this. Marc Lynch, a professor at George Washington University and director of the Institute of Middle East Studies, has taken to explaining international relations via the world of rap:

The way that rappers compete with each other — this is soft power. [...] This is the way you try and make a reputation, try and get what you want, and you have to do it through this very intricate series of alliances.

Particularly telling according to Lynch is the ongoing feud between rapper Jay-Z and up-and-comer The Game:

Jay-Z has been attacking other rappers for using Auto-Tune software, which corrects pitch while singers record. Auto-Tune is widely used in the industry, but Jay-Z is making a call for authenticity.

"He's saying 'these are the rules of the international system. If you want to be a civilized member of our international society, you have to not pursue nuclear weapons,''' Lynch says.

The Game is using the opportunity to tag Jay-Z as old and irrelevant.

The Game, then, is like North Korea or Iran: "He might not win, but he can hurt you if he drags you down into this extended occupation, this extended counterinsurgency campaign." And Jay-Z, a hegemon like the United States, can ill afford to get embroiled in little battles all the time. My goodness. So, then, what's a hegemon like Jay-Z to do? In his full-fledged editorial Lynch proffers a solution:

If he hits back hard in public, the Game will gain in publicity even if he loses... the classic problem of a great power confronted by a smaller annoying challenger. And given his demonstrated skills and talent, and his track record against G-Unit, the Game may well score some points. At the least, it would bring Jay-Z down to his level — bogging him down in an asymmetric war negating the hegemon's primary advantages. If Jay-Z tries to use his structural power to kill Game's career (block him from releasing albums or booking tour dates or appearing at the Grammy Awards), it could be seen as a wimpy and pathetic operation — especially since it would be exposed on Twitter and the hip hop blogs.

The Realist advice? His best hope is probably to sit back and let the Game self-destruct, something of which he's quite capable (he's already backing away from the hit on Beyonce) — while working behind the scenes to maintain his own alliance structure and to prevent any defections over to the Game's camp. And it seems that thus far, that's exactly what he's doing. We'll see if that's a winning strategy.... or if he's just biding his time getting ready for a counter-attack.

A lesson for all of us who thought rap wasn't educational. Happy weekend, everyone!

[HT: Freakanomics]

A correction

Much is being made of the Oriental Post, Botswana's first Chinese newspaper, about which I blogged in early June. The surrounding hype is, however, somewhat misleading. Last week, France 24's The Observers ran a story on the newspaper, heralding the arrival of "Africa's first Chinese newspaper." A similar kind enthusiasm was echoed in a post on Appfrica, and picked up by Bill Easterly and Blood and Milk's Alana Shaikh on their respective Twitter pages. My, how quickly news spreads!


Yet while the Post is Botswana's first Chinese newspaper, it surely is not the first in all of Africa. The Western African United Business Weekly, a Chinese newspaper run out of Lagos, Nigeria, has been in circulation since 2005. China Express has been publishing out of Johannesburg, South Africa (a SADC member), since 1994. And there may well be additional Chinese-language papers in other parts of the continent about which we are unaware. The Chinese community has been quite active in Cape Verde since the mid-1990s, for instance; I wouldn't be surprised if they have by now established a foothold in the country's print media.


While the Oriental Post further signals China's growing fascination with the African continent - and indeed the mass migration of Chinese to Africa - it is not novel in any way (save but signaling a significant intensifying of Sino-Botswanan relations). To state otherwise is, unfortunately, quite inaccurate.

Reading between the lines

It's interesting to observe the varying ways in which the Iranian crisis is depicted in the global news. What aspects are being highlighted? Excluded? Altogether mischaracterized? James Fallows has a worthwhile post outlining several guidelines to bear in mind when reading Chinese (official) responses to the crisis. An obvious though important example:

It is worth remembering that the elements of the Iranian story that give it such drama and importance in much of the world are less automatically resonant in China.


One part of the narrative -- a massed populace standing up against state power -- is obviously anathema to Chinese authorities. And many of the other themes are also less immediate and compelling to ordinary people in China than they would be in North America, Europe, or parts of the Islamic world.


To most Westerners, everything about this story matters. It involves a people's struggle to make their voices heard; it follows other "color revolutions" in former Soviet territories and indeed popular movements for democracy and rule of law in Asia and Latin America from the 1980s onwards; it potentially marks a crucial moment in the evolution of modern Islamic society; it can have war-and-peace implications for US foreign policy and Israeli actions; and so on. Ordinary members of the Western viewing audience feel a connection to these themes. I assert that they seem more distant to ordinary people in China -- even if the themes were featured on the news. People's own problems, and their business problems, and the country's problems, are enough to worry about.

Several curious examples of the way in which the story is being played out in China can be found here (a classic example of the 'blame it on the West' theme), here (short and sweet, calling for 'solidarity'), and here (from China Daily). The China Daily story required a bit of digging: it was buried deep within the 'World News' section, after stories covering Berlusconi's 'party girls,' Japan's whaling tradition, the DC metro train crash, and at least a dozen others. Go figure.

(Semi-) lighthearted on a Friday

With the sobering (though altogether unsurprising) news in this morning that Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameni, is backing Iran's election results (as is Chavez, apparently) while protests swell, I feel compelled to counteract this bad news with something a bit more cheery. It is Friday, after all!

Before I do that, though, I'd like to bring a few more interesting Iran-related links to your attention:
  • Twitter's watchdog site, Twitspam, has compiled a list of possibly fake (i.e. connected to the Iranian security apparatus) Iran election Tweeters
  • Interesting Chinese commentary on the situation in Iran, from Shanghaiist
  • Ethan Zuckerman on Iran, citizen media, and media attention (the good, the bad, and the ugly)
Right, well enough of that for now. Let's chat photography, travel and music (three of my most favorite things!), shall we? Canadian blogger and world traveler Brendan (aka Cashewman) has compiled a wonderful list of tips for photography in developing countries. At the end of the day it truly comes down to blending in with one's surroundings, though Brendan articulates this infinitely better than I have here.

In keeping with the theme of lists, White African has a running list of practical - and at times amusing - travel tips for Africa. If I have the time, I will begin a similar list for China. Until then, do please leave your tips in the comments section of this post!

And finally, I'm quite excited to see Senegalese-born singer and song writer Youssou N'Dour's new documentary film, "I Bring What I Love," this weekend. In the film N'Dour speaks about his life, his faith, his music, and his vision for human rights and tolerance:



Happy Friday, everyone! Enjoy the weekend.

Update: I happened upon a great piece by the FT's Anna Fifield on the mood among the under-30s in Iran. Definitely worth the read!

Chinese language newspaper launched in Botswana

The Oriental Post, a Chinese-language newspaper, was launched in Gaborone, Botswana last week.

Man Niles, president of the Oriental Post, said he hopes the newspaper will enable better communication between service providers, product developers and the Chinese community in Botswana. Since "most of the Chinese do not understand English and speak very little Setswana," there presently exists a rather sizable information gap and communications barrier for the Chinese resident in the country. The newspaper is the first attempt aimed at closing this gap.

China is a major actor in both the rural and urban areas in Botswana. Just this April China agreed to establish a major textile industrial park in Phakalane, and is quite eagerly investing in the country's diamond industry.

Noteworthy….

How professors think: inside the curious world of academic judgement

In its 2009 annual report, The State of the World's Human Rights, Amnesty International notes that it now considers poverty a human rights violation. Unfortunately, such a rights based approach is setting up new aid programs for failure.

Arguably the least welcome convert. Ever.

China is up to its old tricks again...

... while intern season has officially begun in Washington D.C. Oh dear.

The "Great firewall of China" rages on

Every so often I check this blog's statistics: it's a fun exercise to discover where in the world the readers are, how they got here, and what posts are of most interest to them. In recent days I've noticed a startling shift in readership demographics: where there previously was a rather sizable readership from China, there is now none. My guess is that this has something (or indeed everything) to do with China's 'internet blackout' ahead of the Tiananmen anniversary tomorrow.

Western sites like Twitter, Flickr, Hotmail, Wordpress, YouTube, Blogger and (just one day after its launch) Microsoft Bing have all been censored. Moreover, government agencies are banning delivery of foreign newspapers, and disrupting satellite news broadcasts. Access to Taiwanese news outlets, which have become quite open in recent years, has also been restricted. The Chinese media blog Danwei posted a link to this spreadsheet of currently unaccessible or otherwise blocked Chinese sites, to which one can no doubt add countless others. Even Tiananmen Square itself is closed to the public today and blocked by armed police (a chillingly ironic image, if you ask me). The 'blackout' is aimed at eliminating every possible reference to the 1989 pro-democracy student movement, which the PLA suppressed on June 4 of that year.

Unfortunately, such memory control has been quite successful in China, with the result being that only few young Chinese know anything about the so-called "June 4 Incident" other than the fact that it happened (and some don't even know that much). Hiding a nation's history from its own people is utterly repulsive and, indeed, cowardly. A stark juxtaposition to what is arguably one of the most powerful images of raw human courage in history:

Noteworthy….

The trouble with resuming aid to Zimbabwe

Tax deductible cycling: soon coming to an American city near you

Full-text of Timothy Geithner's speech at Peking University, which was seemingly well received by all in attendance

Gitmo: the video game (really? really?!)

For anyone wishing to brush up on their readings on Africa and development, this list should keep you perfectly busy for the next little while...

The New York Times does Africa

Earlier this month I posted on the often selective coverage of (African) humanitarian crises in the mainstream media, citing interesting statistics documenting the amount of NYTimes articles covering the DRC and Darfur, respectively. Further to the point, Ryan Briggs has posted what amounts to a most fascinating graphic: 


My humanitarian crisis is bigger than your humanitarian crisis

Earlier this month I grumbled (ever so slightly) over the selective coverage of humanitarian crises in the mainstream press (I was then alluding to the dearth of coverage regarding Sri Lanka). Another case in point: Congo v. Darfur:


According to Julie Hollar of Fair and Accuracy in Reporting:
To put the death rate in perspective, at the peak of the Darfur crisis, the conflict-related death rate there was less than a third of the Congo’s, and by 2005 it had dropped to less than 4,000 per month. The United Nations has estimated some 300,000 may have died in total as a result of the years of conflict in Darfur; the same number die from the Congo conflict every six and a half months. 

And yet, in the New York Times, which covers the Congo more than most U.S. outlets, Darfur has consistently received more coverage since it emerged as a media story in 2004. The Times gave Darfur nearly four times the coverage it gave the Congo in 2006, while Congolese were dying of war-related causes at nearly 10 times the rate of those in Darfur. 
Hollar goes on to suggest several potential explanations underpinning such a media disparity, among them: journalist access to the conflict zone (or lack thereof); celebrity attention (or lack thereof, until recently); and U.S. political interests which, Hollar argues, are the foremost drivers of where the West happens to invest its attention. While there may be some merit to this claim, my understanding is that the crisis failed to attract much initial attention in the U.S. and beyond, which weakens her argument. Thoughts on this, anyone?

On a somewhat unrelated, albeit related note, Texas in Africa has a great post examining why the Congo remains an "anarchic war-zone" despite all humanitarian, Western, peacekeeping, democracy promotion, and celebrity awareness efforts. Definitely worth a read.