Global

Content

(a) Freedom House

(b) Centre for War, Peace and the News Media

(d) International Research and Exchange Board

(e) Search for Common Ground

(f) United States Institute of Peace

(g) Witness

(h) World Press Freedom Committee

Global

(a) Freedom House

Freedom House is a non-profit, non-partisan organisation, and aims to be a clear voice for democracy and freedom around the world. It conducts an array of U.S. and overseas research, advocacy, education, and training initiatives that promote human rights, democracy, free market economics, the rule of law, independent media, and U.S. engagement in international affairs. The objective is to advance the worldwide expansion of political and economic freedom through a vast array of international programmes and publications. Freedom House is an advocate of the world’s young democracies, which are coping, with the debilitating legacy of statism, dictatorship, and political repression.

1319 18th Street, NW, 20036

Washington, D.C., USA

Tel +1 202 296 5101, Fax +1 202 296 5078

fh@freedomhouse.org

www.freedomhouse.org

Contact

Leonard Sussman

Number of staff

Media 8

Publications

Press Freedom Survey 1999-2002

Press Freedom Rankings 1994-2000

Freedom House Monitor

Country Reports

Programmes

Latvian Naturalization Project

Cuban Democracy Project

Partnership for Civil Society - Serbia

Visiting Fellows Program

American Volunteers for international Development Program

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Africa, Central, South/South-East Europe, Middle East, Russia

(b) Centre for War, Peace and the News Media

Since 1993, the Media and Conflict Program has extended the Centre’s mission concerning the role of the media during the Cold War. The programme was initiated to explore the potential of the media to contribute to international peace and security. The programme’s core mission is to examine and develop media-based strategies, techniques, and approaches to prevent, lessen, manage, and help resolve international, national, ethnic, and sub-state conflicts and their consequences. It is designed to actively intervene in conflict situations to bring what techniques do exist to bear on minimising the human suffering they entail. The centre promotes the norms and practices that are necessary for independent journalism to operate effectively in diverse political, social and technological environments. Moreover, the centre’s mission is to strengthen the economic, legal and educational institutions that fully functioning media sectors in emerging democracies require.
418 Lafayette Street,

Suite 554,

New York, NY 10003

USA

Tel +1-212-998-7960

Fax +1-212-995-4143

war.peace.news@nyu.edu

www.nyu.edu/cwpnm

http://globalbeat.org

Contact

Robert Manoff, Director

Budget

$500,000-$1,000,000

Number of staff

Media 6

Publications

Global Beat

Global Beat Syndicate

Training materials

Programmes

A Network for Tolerance in Journalism

Global Journalism Program

Global Reporting Network

Media and Conflict Program

Middle East Media Project

Reporting Diversity Network

Internews is an international non-profit organisation that supports open media worldwide. The organisation’s goal is to foster independent media in emerging democracies, produce innovative television and radio programming and Internet content, and use the media to reduce conflict within and between countries. Internews’ activities include training of media professionals in various countries, supporting the development of independent media and media associations and the production of TV and radio programmes. They have an increased focus on media policy reform and issues involving ownership, access, censorship, development assistance, journalistic ethics, consumer education, and the digital divide. The Internews Network has regional offices in 24 countries worldwide. Internews programmes are based on the conviction that vigorous and diverse mass media form an essential cornerstone of a free and open society. In 1999 they developed ‘Reporting for Peace’ a special training programme for journalists who work in regions of conflict. The course teaches how reporting can reduce tension and encourage warring parties to explore peaceful approaches to resolving conflict.

P.O. Box 4448

IREX is a non-profit organisation specialising in programmes related to higher education, independent media, Internet development, and civil society in the United States, Europe, Eurasia, the Near East, and Asia. It has designed and implemented independent media programmes in more than 15 countries across Europe and Eurasia. By providing balanced and unbiased information and by serving as a forum for political expression IREX aims to nurture independent media and create an active and informed civil society capable of making a meaningful contribution to democratic and economic processes. IREX primarily focuses on developing local capacity, offering the training, consulting, and legal support necessary for building successful independent media systems. Working in transitional societies it helps independent print and broadcast media improve professional standards and adopt competitive business practices, develops supporting NGOs and associations, and creates a legal environment conducive to free media. In cooperation with other donors and implementers, IREX provides small grants, training, and consulting to improve the media’s capacity to strengthen civil society by informing the public of important social, political, and economic issues. Drawing upon its extensive media experience, the annual Media Sustainability Index (MSI) is published. It is an analytical tool that analyses the status and progress of independent media.
2121 K Street, NW, Suite 700

ProMedia in Albania, Armenia, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro, and Ukraine

Search for Common Ground, in Partnership with the European Centre for Common Ground (see separate entry), is an international non-profit peace and conflict resolution organisation. Its goal is to transform conflict into cooperative action. Currently, there are fully operative offices in Angola, Burundi, DR Congo, Liberia, Macedonia, the Middle East, Sierra Leone, Indonesia, Ukraine, and the United States. The organisation encourages a new level of thinking based on a non-adversarial framework. The SFCG’s media division, Common Ground Productions, recognises that its projects are creating a new role for radio and television in reducing violence and that their impact needs to be measured and lessons documented. CGP has actively worked with research evaluators and evaluation methodologies with the combination of media and conflict resolution backgrounds. CGP’s African-based studios, Talking Drum Studio in Liberia and Sierra Leone, and Studio Ijambo in Burundi, are pilot projects for the CGP in developing an entirely new field of impact evaluation. In Macedonia, CGP has worked with Sesame Workshop to develop a set of “research-based” indicators that are being included in the production of the Nashe Maalo television series in that country. CGP conducts summative research following the broadcasting of the series to determine the impact of the series among Macedonian children.
1601 Connecticut Ave. N.W.

(f) United States Institute of Peace

The United States Institute of Peace is an independent, non-partisan federal institution created and funded by the U.S. Congress to strengthen the nation’s capacity to promote the peaceful resolution of international conflict. The main media project is the Virtual Diplomacy Initiative. The mission of the Virtual Diplomacy initiative is to explore the role of information and communications technologies (ICTs) in the conduct of diplomacy, particularly their effect upon international conflict management and resolution. The Initiative’s practical objective is to extract lessons and insights for future training of international affairs specialists, whether in government, international organisations, or the private sector.

1200 17th St. NW #200

Networking Dissent Cyber-Activists Use the Internet to Promote Democracy in Burma.

(g) WITNESS

WITNESS advances human rights advocacy through the use of video and communications technology by providing computers, imaging and editing software, satellite phones, video cameras, and field training. In partnership with non-governmental organisations and human rights defenders, it strengthens grassroots movements for change by providing video technology and helping its partners to use video as evidence before courts and the United Nations, as a tool for public education, and as a deterrent to further abuse. Over 150 partner groups from 50 countries use these videos to overcome political, economic, and physical barriers, and to expose human rights abuses to the world via television, grassroots advocacy, and Internet broadcasting.

353 Broadway, New York,

Witness Rights Alert (online exposés shot by WITNESS partners feature both domestic and international human rights abuses and atrocities).

(h) World Press Freedom Committee

The World Press Freedom Committee is an international umbrella organisation that includes 44 journalistic groups in printing and broadcasting, labour and management, journalists and editors, and publishers and owners. The WPFC is participating and involved in monitoring and watchdog activities for free news media at UNESCO, the United Nations, the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the Council of Europe and the European Union and at human rights and other international meetings considering free-press issues. The organisation provides legal assistance grants to journalists and news media prosecuted by governments. To date the WPFC has completed nearly 200 assistance programmes in Eastern Europe, Latin America, Asia, Africa and the Caribbean including training programmes, seminars and publication of how-to journalistic manuals.

11690 C-Sunrise Valley Drive

(a) Freedom House

(c) Internews Network

(f) United States Institute of Peace

(g) WITNESS

(h) World Press Freedom Committee