In recent years, the Erich Brost Institute (EBI), headed by Prof. Dr. Susanne Fengler, has established itself as an international leader in the field of research on media development cooperation. Most recently, the Volkswagen Foundation funded a research training group at the EBI endowed with almost 2 million euros, which has carried out important basic research on the topic with eight projects by young researchers. Media development aid comprises a wide variety of initiatives by Western countries to promote press freedom and professional journalism in countries of the Global South - mostly in the form of training and technical support. However, the traditional Western media sponsors have faced stiff competition in recent years - China, Russia, Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the Emirates have become increasingly successful in the media systems of Africa in particular. There, they are linking media promotion activities with geopolitical and economic goals both skillfully and massively. “Russia Today has just opened a training center for journalists in Namibia,” reported Dr. Dani Madrid-Morales from the English University of Sheffield in his keynote speech. 

The new global framework conditions for media development cooperation are also forcing established Western providers to reflect: How can cooperation with local media partners on the ground be organized in a more partnership-based manner? Which support measures are really sustainable? Do the offers of the West meet the needs of the countries of the Global South - or is there a gap between supply and demand? Dr. Sara Namusoga-Kale from Makerere University in Uganda - she has been a Humboldt Fellow at the Erich Brost Institute since October - described the situation in Uganda as an example in her contribution. There, LGBT issues are not only viewed with great suspicion politically and legally, but also socially - Western media projects in the area of diversity can thus unintentionally lead to a threat to the editorial offices supported.
 

The FOME conference was conceived and organized on the Dortmund side by Dr. Michel Leroy and Isabella Kurkowski from the team of the Chair of International Journalism/EBI. Both are themselves proven international CET experts and are currently contributing their experience to international, EU-funded research projects at TU Dortmund University.

For queries: Prof. Dr. Susanne Fengler, susanne.fengler@tu-dortmund.de