Global flows, media and developing democracies: The Ghanaian case

Abstract

This article presents a combination of factors as a framework for examining how globalization and media impact developing democracies in the Global South. In particular, it pays attention to the interplay of changing technologies, regulatory regimes and local entrepreneurs with global expertise (obtained primarily through education overseas) and their combined impact on the media ecology in such countries. Using a historical analysis of the trends that started in the early 1990s, the article shows how countries like Ghana took advantage of key changes in globalization to create a vibrant media ecology that directly impacts the role of citizens. Specifically, the author posits that in Ghana the liberalization of the broadcast industry, the expertise of glocal entrepreneurs, and the explosion of new communication technologies like the Internet and mobile phones have led to a reconstitution of the public sphere and the creation of a new cultural elite.

Radio Univers : The Story of Ghana’s Pioneer Campus-Community Radio Station

“…However, the dynamics favored liberalization of the airwaves and in December 1994, the State authorized the University of Ghana to host a lowpower campus broadcaster to be operated by its students on the 99.7FM frequency, initially on a trial basis, with full authorization granted in February 1995 (Blankson, 2019;Diedong, 2017;NCA, 2018). Thus, contrary to other accounts (Avle, 2011;Coker, 2011, p. 5;Nartey & Coker, 2011, p. 105), the University of Ghana station was the first authorized non-state broadcaster in Ghana. In 1993, the university's Dean of Students, Kwesi Yankah, in collaboration with Vice Chancellor George Benneh, and the Students Representative Council (SRC), had initiated the process to establish a student-run radio station, negotiating with the GFRCB for authorization.…”

“…Radio Univers was born within a seminal period in Ghanaian broadcasting history. Prior to 1994, broadcasting was a State monopoly maintained through the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) which provided television and radio services throughout the nation (Avle, 2011). Broadcasting was tightly controlled for regime security and political communication (Ansah, 1994).…”

Transparency for Enhancing Distinct Dimensions with Social Media Mediation on Citizens Trust in Ghana

“…Besides its contribution to networking and keeping people informed on issues relevant to democratic values and aspirations, this type of media also plays a prominent role in Ghana's mediascape broadcasting to individuals (Avle, 2011). Journalists have developed a growing trend to adopt these media as professional tools for information dissemination and citizen engagement in discussion of national and social issues, emergencies, and finding possible solutions to issues affecting citizens' life.…”

Radio via mobile phones: the intersecting logics of media technologies in Ghana

“…Both the commercial radio and mobile industries emerged out of the same moment of liberalization in the 1990s and have been intertwined through industry practices and regulation. From the onset, FM radio was associated with the mobile in ways that shaped the culture of outspokenness on the airwaves (Avle, 2011; Coker, 2012). Joy FM, Ghana’s first non-state-owned station, included call-ins from its early days, even when at the time landlines were the most available phone technology, used by bureaucrats at work and upper middle-class families at home (Avle, 2011).…”

“…From the onset, FM radio was associated with the mobile in ways that shaped the culture of outspokenness on the airwaves (Avle, 2011; Coker, 2012). Joy FM, Ghana’s first non-state-owned station, included call-ins from its early days, even when at the time landlines were the most available phone technology, used by bureaucrats at work and upper middle-class families at home (Avle, 2011). Within a relatively short period (about the span of a decade), mobile phones had replaced landlines as the technology for making and receiving calls.…”