3756 DB CLICK: Democracy and Governance October 2009

DB CLICK: Democracy and Governance
October 2009

For people seeking to address democracy and governance issues and opportunities.

DB CLICK: Democracy and Governance updates you on recent democracy and governance initiatives including programme activities, awards, evaluation and research results, networks, books, other materials, planning ideas, change theories, and other information recently placed on The Communication Initiative website.

DB CLICK: Democracy and Governance complements The Drum Beat through a specific focus on democracy and governance. It will be published bimonthly (every second month).

DB CLICK: Democracy and Governance Community: 12,094
CI Portal User Sessions, past 12 months: 3,030,625

If you have been forwarded this newsletter by a colleague or friend and would like to subscribe to the DB Click: Democracy and Governance and The Drum Beat, please send an email to drumbeat@comminit.com requesting to «subscribe: D&G».

See the Democracy and Governance Theme Site – Where communication and media are central to democracy and governance – http://www.comminit.com/en/demandgov.html

1.    Strengthening the Voices of Women Leaders: Lessons from Cambodia
Women For Prosperity (WFP) was launched in July 1994 to help women councillors in Cambodia challenge discrimination, forge positive working relationships with their colleagues, and fulfil their responsibilities as elected officials. This paper describes the strategies WFP has developed to ensure that economically poor, rural women have opportunities to participate in decision-making so that local development plans reflect their priorities…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/297578/348

2.    Evaluation of the Gacaca Promotional Campaign in Rwanda: Report of Main Findings
This document reports the findings from the evaluation of the Gacaca promotional campaign in Rwanda. Gacaca is a communal judicial system that allows active participation of the community in the provision of evidence, trial, and sentencing of genocide suspects. The overall goal of the campaign was to increase knowledge about Gacaca jurisdictions among Rwandans and to encourage active participation of community members in the process…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/275077/348

3.    Fighting for Women’s Rights in Chile: Supporting Women Workers and Promoting Women’s Political Participation
This Oxfam Great Britain paper describes the organisation’s strategies to increase women’s leadership and participation in economic and political sectors in Chile. It looks at the impact of these strategies and presents lessons learned…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/297851/348

4.    Advocacy and National Elections: Women’s Political Participation in Honduras
This paper discusses Oxfam Great Britain’s advocacy work in Honduras on women’s political rights, and women’s leadership and empowerment in the political sphere, including advocacy and campaigning activities during and after the 2005 election period. These include lobbying and advocacy on political reform, campaigning to encourage people to consider voting for female candidates, and promoting women’s leadership and political empowerment…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/297903/348

5.    Freedom of Information for Pacific Policy Makers
From a report of the workshop on Freedom of Information for Pacific Policy Makers, 2008: representatives from 10 Forum Island Countries (FICs) discussed freedom of information (FOI) legislation. This document lists the status of FOI legislation in the various island nations and describes discussions aimed at providing policy-makers with information on FOI legislation useful for their country context…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/297931/348

6.    Women’s Leadership in Economic Change in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel
This paper focuses on the activism of Sawt el-Amel (the Laborer’s Voice) to oppose the Wisconsin Plan, a welfare-to-work programme introduced by the Israeli government in 2005. «In response to the hardship that the plan has brought to themselves and their families, women have become active in leading popular opposition to the Plan. This is a significant and unprecedented move in their conservative communities, where women’s presence in the public sphere has traditionally not been accepted…»
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/297987/348

7.    Panchayati Raj Campaign – India
The Hunger Project (THP) launched a campaign, repeated in 5-year cycles from the year 2000, to strengthen the role of elected women representatives in India’s panchayati raj locally elected councils. In the first year after election, women participate in a 3-day Women’s Leadership Workshop (WLW) that alerts women to their human rights, educates them about their powers and responsibilities as panchayat leaders, builds their capacity to create a vision and plan actions to achieve it, and links them with government and other resource people in their area…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/298205/348

8.    Participation and Practice of Rights Project (PPR Project) – Ireland Eire
Ireland’s PPR Project supports communities in using a human rights-based approach (HRBA) to address social and economic inequalities. At its centre is a coalition of groups and organisations working on social justice issues, with emphasis on North Inner City Dublin and North Belfast. Their aim is to give individuals, groups, and communities the tools and support they need to actively assert and campaign for their social and economic rights…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/298668/348

9.    Africa Good Governance Programme on the Radio Waves – Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda
The Africa Good Governance Programme on the Radio Waves is a project of the World Bank Institute (WBI), launched in 2006, to support local government capacity building and community empowerment via radio. Using digital radio technology, the distance learning programme objective was to support local government capacity building and community empowerment through transmission of key information related to anti-corruption, civic participation, and fiscal decentralisation…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/134525/348

Please VOTE in our current poll:
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/288615/348

How central to democracy are newspapers – some of which are being lost to budget cuts and other changes – as opposed to blogs, YouTube, emails, text messaging, twittering, and the like?

* Pivotal – informed public debate is impossible without this kind of quality platform and trained journalistic practice.
* Of some importance – we need both traditional newspapers and new media voices/venues to sustain conversations conducive to transparency.
* Unimportant – the internet and other technologies have enabled participation on the part of both citizens and journalists by trade, making open journalistic debate both possible and popular. This is the essence of democracy.

VOTE and COMMENT at http://www.comminit.com/en/node/288615/348

RESULTS thus far (Oct 22):

46%: Pivotal – informed public debate is impossible without this kind of quality platform and trained journalistic practice.
44%: Of some importance – we need both traditional newspapers and new media voices/venues to sustain conversations conducive to transparency.
10%: Unimportant – the internet and other technologies have enabled participation on the part of both citizens and journalists by trade, making open journalistic debate both possible and popular. This is the essence of democracy.

10.    Promoting EU Citizenship among Roma – Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Slovakia
The European Roma Information Office (ERIO) is engaged in an effort to provide information and promote dialogue regarding Roma’s rights as European citizens – particularly among those who are not familiar with European Union (EU) policies and do not have access to virtual information means. Specifically, ERIO is providing Roma communities with information on EU national anti-discrimination legislation and on EU programmes on social inclusion, and is encouraging them to participate in these programmes…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/299623/348

11.    Building Organizational Networks for Good Governance and Advocacy (BONGA) – Tanzania
BONGA is a 4-year capacity-building programme designed for Tanzanian advocacy and media organisations focusing on anti-corruption and good governance. Launched in 2005, BONGA, a Kiswahili word meaning «to speak out!», works through advocacy and journalism training to support parliament and civil society to work together to increase public participation in political decision-making, while holding the government accountable on policy, budgetary, and expenditure issues, and closely monitoring expenditure and service delivery…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/135385/348

12.    The Right to Information in Latin America: A Comparative Legal Survey
This book is written to help clarify some of the tensions and challenges of drafting or promoting legislation guaranteeing the right to information. It uses a Latin American regional, comparative perspective, and, more specifically, illustrates the approaches taken to enacting right to information legislation in 11 Latin American countries…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/299821/348

13.    Communicating Change: Learning from Women’s Rights Activists’ Campaigns for Legal and Policy Change
This resource report analyses activists’ experiences in communicating change for women’s equal rights. Seventy women’s rights campaigns that intended to achieve legislative or policy change at the local, national, or international levels were studied…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/300488/348

14.    Advocacy for Peace and Conflict Resolution – Uganda
Launched by the Uganda Peace Foundation Initiative (UPFI), this programme aims to strengthen community peace and conflict transformation capacities in northern Uganda’s districts of Kitgum, Pader, and Gulu. The programme objectives include: creating community peace building and conflict resolution committees; creating links between grassroots communities and non-governmental organisations, the government, and the international community through better collaboration; and promoting the participation of women and youth in peace and development programmes, while addressing economic poverty of these 2 groups…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/135300/348

15.    Media in Conflict Prevention and Peacebuilding: An Opportunity for EU Leadership
In this opinion piece, Bernardo Monzani of Search for Common Ground (SFCG) seeks to raise awareness among European Union (EU) officials and policy-makers about the positive impact of media activities before, during, and after violent conflict. His conviction is that EU institutions and Member States «could benefit immensely from the experience of NGOs and media organisations, and such collaboration could easily lead to the definition of more efficient media strategies to complement and strengthen the EU’s development and security policies…»
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/298954/348

16.    Performance Activism and Civic Engagement Through Symbolic and Playful Actions
This document analyses performance activism as a form of communication and engagement. The authors pose the question: «How do playful, symbolic actions engage a citizenry?»…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/298236/348

17.    The Community-Driven Eden Area Livability Initiative: Principles, Priorities, and Projects
This report evaluates the Eden Area Livability Initiative (EALI), a community-driven effort to improve well-being on a local level in 6 diverse communities of Alameda County, California, United States (US). As part of the process, more than 800 people participated through community forums, town hall meetings, task force meetings, leadership committee meetings, survey completion, and a community charrette (a collaborative and open community meeting designed to solve problems and advance change)…
http://www.comminit.com/en/node/298702/348

Send us information about your Democracy and Governance communication case studies, reports, evaluations, thinking, and resources. Send to Deborah Heimann at dheimann@comminit.com

Access all information on the issues you choose through a Theme Site on The CI:

Media Development – http://www.comminit.com/en/mediadev.html
ICT4D – http://www.comminit.com/en/ict4d.html
Natural Resource Management – http://www.comminit.com/en/nrm.html
HIV/AIDS – http://www.comminit.com/en/hiv-aids.html
Avian Influenza – http://www.comminit.com/en/avianinfluenza.html
Polio – http://www.comminit.com/en/polio.html
Early Child Development – http://www.comminit.com/en/earlychild.html
Democracy and Governance – http://www.comminit.com/en/demandgov.html

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