[Marxism] African media--still colonized

[Louis Proyect]

Francis Nyamnjoh. Africa's Media: Democracy and the Politics of 
Belonging. London and New York: Zed Books, 2005. 308 pp. References, 
index. $85.00 (cloth), ISBN 1-8427-7582-0; $25.00 (paper), ISBN 1-8427-7583-9.

Reviewed by: Sean Jacobs, Center for Afroamerican and African Studies 
and Communication Studies, University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.
Published by: H-SAfrica (June, 2006)

This book has two aims: it is at once a detailed study of the 
Cameroonian media during struggles for democratization in that 
country since the early 1990s, and an attempt at writing a general 
theory of African media in the context of globalization and the 
post-Cold War period.

By all accounts Francis Nyamnjoh is well qualified to pursue such an 
ambitious project. He is well versed in media and communications 
debates on the continent, having completed his Ph.D. (awarded in 
1990) in the sociology of communication at the University of 
Leicester for a study of the evolution of broadcasting in Cameroon. 
Following an initial career teaching in Cameroon, he worked as a 
professor of sociology at the University of Botswana between 1999 and 
2001. There he published, among other things, on the widespread 
xenophobia in Botswana's media and its politics. That led to his 
current job as head of publications for the continent-wide Council 
for the Development of Research in Africa (CODESRIA) based in Dakar. 
 From his Senegalese base, Nyamnjoh oversees the publication of the 
CODESRIA journal, Africa Media Review. This book, Africa's Media: 
Democracy and the Politics of Belonging, doubles as an attempt to 
present all his past research in one place. As a result, for those 
familiar with his work, there is not much that is new.

A basic assumption of the book is that media reflect and also shape 
African societies; the latter are marked by "continuities, 
interconnections, convivialities and creative marriages of 
differences" (p. 20). Liberal ideas of democracy have to compete with 
popular ideas of democracy informed by notions of African personhood 
and agency for the attention of the media. "If the media are 
sensitive to these apparent contradictions, as they are expected to 
be, their content should reflect ongoing efforts to negotiate 
conviviality between competing traditions, influences and 
expectations" (p. 20). At the same time, how well the media play 
their role as mediators depends on "the indicators of democracy used, 
and also how sensitive to the predicaments of ordinary Africans those 
indicators are" (p. 20).

The book consists of nine chapters. Six of these deal with media and 
democratization in Cameroon. The first two chapters are taken up by 
the continental focus. These amount to a survey of the main 
characteristics of the African media landscape, including 
broadcasting, print media and Internet connectivity, despite the 
latter still being marginal in debates and impact on democracy and 
media in Africa. Nyamnjoh puts forward two basic theses: the first is 
that liberal democracy, and by extension a media system organized 
around the principles of the free market, deepens--instead of 
mitigates--the democratic deficit in Africa. The second theme is that 
liberal democracy's greatest challenge is the "politics of 
belonging." Nyamnjoh returns to these themes throughout the book.

For Nyamnjoh the political rhetoric about liberal democracy 
(originating in the West and diffused throughout the world) denies 
the possibility of inequality, inaccessibility and marginalization, 
and fails to take into account African realities. As he colorfully 
puts it early on in the book: "Implementing liberal democracy in 
Africa has been like trying to force onto the body of a full-figured 
person, rich in all cultural indicators of health with which Africans 
are familiar, a dress made to fit the slim, de-fleshed Hollywood 
consumer model of a Barbie-doll entertainment icon" (p. 25).

As a result, Nyamnjoh insists on taking seriously the 
disproportionate distribution of communications infrastructure and 
technology. He remains critical of much of the reform undertaken to 
correct information inequality. Nyamnjoh is very skeptical of civil 
society, declaring it on balance an obstacle to freedom of expression 
and media diversity. While he documents the many restrictions to 
prevent journalists from doing their job, he does not hesitate to 
blame journalists for their own predicament, accusing them of hiding 
frivolous journalism--and being manipulated by powerbrokers--behind 
professional codes.

He traces the current media configuration in many countries back to 
colonialism, arguing that nationalist rulers, instead of abolishing 
colonial public spheres, consolidated or extended them. As a result, 
diversity of media does not necessarily translate into diversity of 
perspectives. Poor, ordinary Africans are therefore left out. For 
example, though the end of apartheid in South Africa has led to some 
degree of black ownership and partnership in the media, this has not 
necessarily made the mainstream newspapers more representative of 
South Africa. Nyamnjoh quotes a study which shows that South Africa's 
print media has little relevance to the majority of its population 
and that the presence of more black journalists and news executives 
has not resulted in more or better coverage of black people's reality 
in that country.

full: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=300751159034735