In collaboration with the American University in Dubai (AUD)
October 2014 - September 2016
This project examines the relationship between Arab traditional mass media and the political sphere within the remit of political change in the Arab world. Based on the international scholarly work on media and democratisation, this project aims to investigate the role played by Arab national media in the process of democratisation of Arab political regimes. It looks also into the process of democratisation of national mass media in its evolution to embrace free and professional media industry.
This project builds on the field investigation conducted within the project “Arab Revolutions: Media Revolutions” led by Dr Issawi and covering Libya, Tunisia and Egypt. The in-depth field data was instrumental in mapping trends in traditional media under transitions providing sustained and updated data on the intricate link between media and democratisation in Arab countries under transition.
Building on this work, the proposed study will focus on traditional media industries in Arab countries that did not witness a change of regimes but rather polemic debates on democratic reforms including the need for a professional and free mass media. It will focus on the region of North Africa as being the main laboratory of change generated by the democratic movements swamping the Arab world since 2010. Empirical research in the national media industries in Morocco and Algeria will be conducted. The choice of these two countries is linked to the impact of the so called Arab spring on the political and media scenes generating debates on democratic reforms amid tough regional tension due to the implications of the democratic uprisings.
This research timely, especially with traditional national media bplaying an active political role in Arab states under transition with a significant outbreak of new print and broadcast outlets post-uprisings. Although social media promoted citizen activism during the revolutions, national media played a crucial role in shaping the values, beliefs and identity of Arab audiences post-revolution.
Research Team
Dr Fatima el-Issawi is Visiting Fellow at the Department of Media and Communications at LSE. She has contributed to major research projects on Arab/Arabic speaking media and diasporic audiences before leading the policy project “Arab Revolutions: Media Revolutions” (POLIS/LSE) looking at the transformations brought by the transitional political landscape to Arab traditional media. Dr el-Issawi has over 15 years of experience in covering the Middle East for international media outlets.
Dr Bradley Freeman is Associate Professor of Communication & Information Studies at the Mohammed bin Rashid School for Communication at AUD. Prior to this position he lectured at the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He has worked at various media institutions in USA & Germany. He was a television researcher with the ARS Group, Editorial Assistant for "Communication Research," and has contributed articles and papers on a wide variety of topics in popular and academic publications.