News and Latest Projects

Paris Debate - Is News a Public Good?

Wed, 27 Jul 2011 15:06:00 GMT

David Levy addressed a seminar at Sciences Po in Paris on the topic of L’information est elle un bien public? organised jointly between the School of Journalism and the Political Research Centre (CEVIPOF) at Sciences Po.

Bruno Patino, Dean of the Journalism School, chaired a panel which included Nathalie Sonnac of the French Institute of the Press along with David Levy. David argued that, while news presents many of the elements of a public good, drawing immediate policy implications from that is not straightforward. Public funding might be one response but poses serious issues around balancing the accountability required from public funding with the political independence required for good journalism. This is not an easy job in countries where politicians are quick to use public funding for political control. A further issue relates to the balance between funding for public broadcasting and new online potential recipients of public funding. For live tweets of the event click here

US Interest in Research on International Journalism

Wed, 08 Jun 2011 16:35:00 GMT

Much of the US debate about the impact of the Internet on contemporary journalism has been uniquely focused on the US itself. This spring the book David Levy co-edited with Rasmus Kleis Nielsen on The Changing Business of Journalism and its Implications for Democracy has helped prompt reflection on what the US might learn from experiences elsewhere.

Levy and Nielsen were interviewed for the Nieman Lab and David Levy did an interview with Christopher Kenneally for the podcast series of interviews entitled Beyond the Book .David Levy also contributed along with Reuters Institute colleagues Nielsen and Robert Picard to the preparation of the 2011 Pew State of the News Media Survey supplement on Why US Newspapers Suffer More than Others.

Global Reporting of Climate Change

Thu, 26 May 2011 10:07:00 GMT

In the wake of the Copenhagen conference near-fiasco, Paddy Coulter co-organised a small series of specialist workshops and expert panels in Oxford with the Environmental Change Institute and the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism to examine national variations in media reporting of climate change.

One workshop was devoted entirely to the reporting of the Copenhagen conference. Freelance French science journalist Catherine Ferrieux presented her initial findings of a survey of journalists attending the COP15, concluding that climate science was seriously under-reported during the conference. Click here for a pdf of the slide presentation.

Different perspectives were added by Yue Yenan from Sian Lian Life Weekly, Beijing, Chetan Chauchan of the Hindustan Times, Delhi and Jennifer Igwe of the Nigerian Television Authority who were part of a delegation of visiting senior journalists sponsored by the British Council Global Climate Change Programme. A full account of the events, including of the panel of leading UK environment correspondents, is available on the Reuters Institute website.

Science and the Media Report

Wed, 08 Jun 2011 14:14:00 GMT

David Levy was appointed to the Science and Media Expert Group created by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills in September 2009. The group was chaired by Fiona Fox, Director of the Science Media Centre, and brought together a mix of distinguished scientists and media experts and practitioners. Its report, published in January 2010, entitled Science and the Media: Securing the Future outlines a number of actions and recommendations which, taken together, are designed to:

support the accurate reporting of science through a range of new training initiatives for journalists, press officers and scientists
foster an environment within which engaging science programmes can be made, and reach the widest possible audience
begin to address the serious threat to the quality and independence of science reporting posed by the wider crisis in journalism. The group issued a call for all who care about the quality of science reporting to act now safeguard improvements made in recent years
promote openness and transparency across science, facilitating public engagement with, and debate of, scientific issues

Future of Public Interest Journalism

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:16:00 GMT

David Levy delivered the keynote speech Beyond Fatalism, new perspectives on the future of public interest journalism at the 2010 C.V. Äkerlund Lectures in Media Management at the University of Tampere in Finland.

The event took place on Monday, 11 January with several speeches on the theme of Journalism and Media Management in the 21st Century. A copy of David Levy’s slides and talk can be accessed via this link.

Study of News and the Internet

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:31:00 GMT

David Levy has been acting as an adviser to the OECD on their forthcoming study on the Evolution of News and the Internet. The study was discussed at a meeting of the OECD Working Group on the Information Economy in Paris in December 2009 where David Levy commented on a draft.

The forthcoming study will be the first truly comparative study of the impact of the internet on news organisations across OECD countries and beyond. The revised version is due to be published in Spring 2010.

Roundtable with Amartya Sen

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:52:00 GMT

Paddy Coulter helped the Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative (OPHI) organise a roundtable on ‘Economics and the Idea of Justice’ with the Nobel prize-winning economist Professor Amartya Sen on 19 November.

The event, which attracted some 400 people to the Examination Schools, involved panels of senior academics, politicians and policy-makers in dialogue with Prof Sen in three separate roundtable sessions. The roundtable was chaired by Ngaire Woods, Director of the Global Economic Governance Programme, and former Economist journalist Frances Cairncross, the Rector of Lincoln College.

Sen’s latest thinking on justice provoked considerable debate and some re-thinking. OPHI Director Sabina Alkire. callingfor a new economic framework, said “Economics is poised to change – within the decade it will be different”.
A report and programme of the roundtable is available on the OPHI website

How to Make Money in News

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:32:00 GMT

David Levy participated in this Executive Session at the Shorenstein Center at Harvard entitled “How to make Money in News:New Business Models for the 21st Century”. For an account of the event and transcript click here

Reviewing DFID Media Work

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:34:00 GMT

DFID Communications published a major review of its media work to build support for development in the UK. This review, the first since the inception of the Building Support for Development programme in 1999, was jointly carried out by Paddy Coulter of Oxford Global Media and Amanda Barnes of The Partnership.

The review found that DFID funding had gone to creditable media projects including the development funding of 60 programmes on the developing world which had been screened by UK broadcasters and co-funding support to influential broadcasting research on UK media coverage of developing countries.

However, the review found scope for DFID to gain better value from its funding by developing a more co-ordinated media strategy and by extending its priority media targets to include new media alongside television. The report advocated the setting up of a Media Strategy Panel (to include outside media experts) to steer its activities.

The full report is available on the DFID website www.dfid.gov.uk/Documents/consultations/bsd-media.pdf

Media workshops in China on climate change

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:33:00 GMT

Paddy Coulter was invited by the British Council Climate Change Programme to address a Beijing symposium for Chinese editors-in-chief on ‘Climate Change Communication’ held at Renmin University’s International Communication Centre on 11 September, Paddy also helped lead a workshop in Guangzhou for 40 journalists gearing up to cover the Copenhagen conference. He was joined in this by his Chinese media research collaborator Wang Jin, Associate Professor of Sociology at the School of Government, Sun Yat-Sen University who directs the Center for the Public, Science, and Sustainability Studies. Click here for a pdf of the slide presentation Reporting Climate Change: An International Perspective

World Conference of Science Journalists: Climate Reporting

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:35:00 GMT

The 6th World Conference of Science Journalists, which was held in the Central Hall London between 30 June and 2 July 2009, included a session on climate change reporting around the world. It was chaired by BBC environmental analyst Roger Harrabin and the main speakers were Patrick Luganda, editor-in-chief of the Farmers Voice newspaper, Rod Harbinson, head of Panos environment programme, and Paddy Coulter of Oxford Global Media.

As the session’s aim was to compare the quality of coverage in different settings, Paddy Coulter reported on the recently published comparative study of climate change coverage by leading national newspapers in Ghana, China and Norway. The main finding was that the climate crisis was seen as no more than an important secondary or tertiary priority. Story treatment by most papers left a great deal to be desired – for further details a Powerpoint of this presentation is available, A Comparative Study of Climate Change in National Media: North and South Perspectives.

The session also reviewed initiatives to enhance journalists’ capacity to cover climate change such as the Greater Horn of Africa network of climate journalists and the Climate Change Media Partnership training initiative of Internews, IIED and Panos.

Climate Change in the Media comparative study

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:54:00 GMT

The report, Escaping Climate Change: Climate Change in the Media -North & South Perspectives, is published as a contribution to the growing research literature on the media coverage of climate change around the world. Edited by Atle Midttun of the Norwegian School of Management and Paddy Coulter, it is the fruit of a close collaboration between three core research teams from Ghana, Norway and China which in turn are part of the wider international group of scholars and senior researchers, Ceres 21.

The aim of this comparative study was to explore the framing of climate change coverage in national media in three countries representative of the affluent North, the poor South and the rapidly growing East. Three leading newspapers in Ghana, China and Norway were monitored over six months (January – June 2008) with a sample of 100 articles on climate change randomly selected from each paper for closer study.

The report’s analysis of national variations in the reporting of climate change not only provides insights into the nature and quality of journalism in the countries studied but also yields important information about the differing national policy frames adopted. Read the full study here

Nairobi Launch of Africa Means Business

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:35:00 GMT

A new pan-African media initiative to improve financial reporting on the continent, Africa Means Business, got off to a very successful start in Kenya. Its distinctive feature is to train economists in media and communications skills alongside the training of financial and business journalists. The keynote speaker in Nairobi was Professor Paul Collier, director of the Centre for the Study of African Economies (CSAE) at Oxford University and author of the influential “The Bottom Billion”.
CSAE is a core member of the Africa Means Business partnership. Other partners are the Nairobi-based African Economic Research Consortium (AERC), the Centre for Economic Journalism in Africa (CEJA) at Rhodes University, the Financial Times associated Wincott Foundation and the Thomson Foundation.

Africa Means Business secured the participation of 14 senior-level financial journalists and economists in the Nairobi workshop after gaining support for the project from the Central Bank of Kenya, Nairobi University, the Kenya Communications Commission, Kenyan Broadcasting Corporation, the Nation Media Group, the Standard Media Group, Kiss FM Radio and the Nairobi Star.

The course trainers were Sylvia Vollenhoven, Africa co-ordinator for the Thomson Foundation, Reg Rumney and Caroline Southey from CEJA (a former Financial Mail editor , Caroline is the Director of Community Banking, Standard Bank), and from the Wincott Foundation in the UK ex-FT editor Sir Geoffrey Owen and Paddy Coulter.

For further information see the Africa Means Business brochure

Media, Globalisation and Fragmentation presentation, Oxford

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:37:00 GMT

David Levy gave a presentation on Journalism and Globalisation in a Fragmenting World at a Conference held on Globalisation and Human Welfare at Green Templeton college in May. http://www.gtc.ox.ac.uk/academic/lectures-seminars/human-welfare-conf.html The presentation examined the contradictory aspects of the interactions between technological change, globalisation and the media. Click here to see a PDF copy of the slide presentation

Entertainment in the UK in 2028 - Report for Ofcom

Wed, 25 May 2011 13:51:00 GMT

Ofcom commissioned a consortium led by Plum Consulting www.plumconsulting.co.uk to produce a in-depth report examining scenarios for the Entertainment industry in 2028. This was part of the UK regulator’s work to assess likely demand for spectrum in the next two decades. The resulting report - published by Ofcom in February 2009 - offers probably the most exhaustive examination of likely scenarios for the development of the audio visual entertainment industries over the next 20 years. David Levy acted as an independent reviewer and advisor to the project team. The report is available on the Ofcom website