Learning to respect and trust If peace is a measure of a society’s ability to absorb shocks without falling or relapsing into conflict, then it must be based on trust, equality,...
Months-long Covid-19 lockdowns in Colombia have resulted in “an increase in xenophobia and rejection of the migrant,” according to WACC Global partners who are providing Venezuelan migrants and host communities with access to relevant information and communication...
William F. Fore, who has died aged 92, was President of the World Association for Christian Communication (WACC) from 1982 to 1990. Graduating from Occidental College, he received his BD degree from Yale...
Sohailia Saywack, a recent graduate of Western University’s MA sociology program and current Master of Global Affairs candidate at the University of Toronto, has joined WACC as an international development intern. “WACC Global’s mission of...
A “Father Fire” around a tulpa (an Indigenous gathering) greeted communicators and members of Colombia’s Asociación de Cabildos Indigenas de Norte del Cauca (ACIN, Association of Indigenous Councils of Northern...
The new issue of WACC ‘s quarterly journal, Media Development, highlights the role of public communication, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic, lessons learned from various responses, and the challenges ahead. The pandemic highlighted many issues, including the importance of accurate and timely information in saving lives,...
A pilot project that mobilized Kenyan community media to better understand local political processes has, in turn, helped increase civic participation, awareness and transparency on how budgets are spent in eight counties across the country. The Catholic...
The theme of International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples 2020 is “Covid-19 and Indigenous peoples’ resilience”. WACC is strengthening the communication outreach of Indigenous communities in order to bring about greater preparedness and resilience in...
WACC is supporting a project in India that will help civil society sectors understand and address policy issues around digital rights, which have been greatly affected during the Covid-19 pandemic. The...
WACC Global is taking part in a campaign across Africa to promote family farming and its essential role in supporting food security and sustainable development. Yenkasa Africa, a regional communication for development and rural...
WACC’s Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP) is featured in the newly-published International Encyclopedia of Gender, Media and Communication (IEGMC), a major reference book that explores various aspects and impacts of how gender is represented in the world’s media. The IEGMC discusses...
Rising temperatures, fickle rainfall, and drought have made Kenya vulnerable to climate change. With agriculture dominating Kenya’s economy, a big challenge facing family farmers is learning how to adapt to the effects of climate change. But a particular sector – smallholder...
Fifteen years ago, Sibuguey Bay in southwestern Mindanao, Philippines, was in an alarming state. Fish and other marine resources were nearly depleted due to illegal, unregulated fishing and mangrove deforestation. But the situation began to...
When the coronavirus pandemic is over, and researchers look back on how Syrian refugees not only struggled under its weight, but also demonstrated resilience, a good source of information would...
The Indigenous Community Radio Network of Nepal’s (ICRN) production of public service announcements (PSAs) about Covid-19 in Indigenous languages has been commended by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) as one of the “promising practices”...
Non-governmental organizations belonging to the Pan Amazon Social Forum (FOSPA) are raising the alarm about the effects of Covid-19 in the Amazon, saying the highest concentration of cases are in the border towns and areas where...
In response to growing resource extraction activities in the Ecuadorian Amazon, WACC Global is supporting a project that will help four local Indigenous community radio stations produce innovative content that promotes the protection of ancestral lands from a human rights...
Sameera Zoroub, who graduated with a degree in media, used to think that her social media accounts were “secure and protected.” But when she attended a Digital Security workshop organized in late June by Community Media Centre, a Palestinian NGO,...
A WACC-supported project has been training Ecuadorian and Colombian citizen journalists on investigative journalism, media production, migrants’ rights, and human security to equip them with new skills that will help meet the communication and information needs...
[caption id="attachment_26345" align="alignleft" width="203"] Neville Jayaweera[/caption] WACC notes with sadness the death of its former Director of Research and Planning, Neville Jayaweera, at the age of 89. Appointed by Prime Minister Dudley...
Journalism, and the media, should help people to understand the world around them and to navigate the complexities of our societies. For that truly to happen, no one should be...
An Indigenous community radio in Mexico has established itself as a viable alternative to state-run and commercial broadcasting stations in Santiago de Anaya, Hidalgo state. Ximai Radio, whose mission is to promote free expression and...
WACC partner Alianza por el Derecho Humano de las Mujeres a Comunicar (ADEHMAC) has launched Violeta Radio, a feminist community radio station in Mexico City that seeks to integrate gender equality across the board – from its...
A civil society organization and WACC partner has assembled what is believed to be the first of its kind “Made in Mexico” transmitter, allowing Indigenous community radio stations to save about 200% on capital costs. After seeing many...
International public service media from G-7 countries have reported “strong audience increases” since the Covid-19 pandemic, which they interpret as a show of confidence for the “reliable and independent information” they deliver on multiple communication platforms, in a variety of languages, on all continents.
WACC is surveying its community media partners on their response to COVID-19 and their needs to help keep the communities they serve informed and safe. Community media need your help!...
WACC is surveying its community media partners on their response to COVID-19 and their needs to help keep the communities they serve informed and safe. Community media need your help!...
“Journalism without Fear or Favour” is the theme of World Press Freedom Day, Sunday, May 3, 2020. It takes place in a complex landscape, where traditional media and social media...
Covid-19 responses of governments and civil society should include strategies to address and prevent sexual and gender-based violence, said a statement issued by a global collective of religious groups and faith-based networks. The Faith in Beijing...
WACC is surveying its community media partners on their response to COVID-19 and their needs to help keep the communities they serve informed and safe. Community media need your help!...
WACC is surveying its community media partners on their response to COVID-19 and their needs to help keep the communities they serve informed and safe. Community media need your help!...
WACC is surveying its community media partners on their response to COVID-19 and their needs to help keep the communities they serve informed and safe. Community media need your help!...
The United Nations Interagency Task Force on Religion and Sustainable Development (IATF), with the endorsement of the IATF Multi-Faith Advisory Council, has urged governments and international bodies to ensure that their policies...
WACC is surveying its community media partners on their response to COVID-19 and their needs to help keep the communities they serve informed and safe. Community media need your help!...
WACC is surveying its community media partners on their response to COVID-19 and their needs to help keep the communities they serve informed and safe. Community media need your help!...
In times of crisis, information saves lives. In the response to Covid-19, we see how vital it is to get accurate and trusted messages to people so that they know what...
The global Covid-19 pandemic has shown how vital it is to get accurate and trusted information to communities in languages and channels that they understand. It has also raised awareness...
As Pacific Island Governments work on a coordinated regional response to Covid-19, Tropical Cyclone Harold, which has already hit the Solomon Islands and bears down at category 5 level on...
WACC is surveying its community media partners on their response to COVID-19 and their needs to help keep the communities they serve informed and safe. Community media need your help!...
As part of its efforts to promote communication rights around the world, WACC is proud to announce the launch of its new Communication Rights in a Digital Age Programme. The programme will support...
WACC announces the launch of a new programmatic focus as part of our efforts to promote communication for all. The new Communication Rights and Migration Programme seeks to enable migrants and host communities to access...
WACC’s response to the ongoing situation regarding COVID-19 For our common good, we need to use and promote technologies to unite people and communities who are divided by adversity. When the coronavirus...
The 20th European Festival of Religious TV and Online Programmes will not go ahead as scheduled this June in Helsinki, Finland. The postponement follows a wave of event cancellations worldwide due to the...
While life today is better for a 15-year-old girl in a developing world, she will nonetheless have to keep fighting against tremendous odds because progress made in the last 25...
Inclusion of key stakeholders in text, democratic deliberation’ needed A group of women’s rights organizations and non-governmental organizations is urging the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) to postpone the...
International Women’s Day (IWD) campaigns step up demands for the respect of women’s basic civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights. This year’s IWD, March 8, 2020, calls us to raise...
A project to establish “communication that brings us together” began with a mix of “great enthusiasm and uncertainty” over a year ago in Colombia, as the country grappled with the...
WACC Global’s quarterly journal, Media Development, has published its first issue of the year, which examines how women around the world are faring 25 years after the Beijing Declaration and Platform for...
In 2019, a year marked by divisive politics, attacks on journalists, xenophobia, digital surveillance and harassment, and other threats to freedom of information and democracy, WACC Global continued to make...
WACC ’s Centre for Communication Rights has co-published Expanding Shrinking Communication Spaces, a new e-book on communication rights and sustainable development for a digital age. The 130-page page book – which is intended...
On February 13, World Radio Day, WACC Global joins UNESCO in urging radio stations worldwide to “uphold diversity, both in their newsroom and on the airwaves.” WACC also encourages its members to...
Water shortage resulting from increased and longer periods of drought has been identified as one of the effects of climate change. Who will be affected most by the scarcity of water...
Tharu-speaking Indigenous journalists in Nepal have enhanced their news and reporting skills, and production of news in Tharu has increased, thanks to a capacity building project undertaken by WACC local...
Following four years of fruitful collaboration, WACC and Boston-based Indigenous rights organization Cultural Survival have decided to renew and enhance their ongoing partnership. Starting this year, WACC and Cultural Survival will...
About 75 Kwéyòl-speaking Saint Lucians have now increased their knowledge of the language of climate change and sustainable development in Kwéyòl, thanks to a WACC-supported project developed by the Folk...
WACC Global is proud to announce its new initiative with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to help build the capacity of communities at the grassroots level – particularly family...
WACC's Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP) has been nominated for the 2020 World Summit on Information Society’s 9th Annual Awards. The GMMP was one of 353 projects nominated out of 806 submitted projects...
Colombia is one of 20 countries most at risk from suffering the disastrous effects of climate change. Several factors contribute to environmental degradation and consequently, undermine livelihoods. These include the increasing...
How should civil society engage with the challenges and opportunities created by Artificial Intelligence (AI)? WACC Global’s No-Nonsense Guide to Communication Rights, Civil Society and Artificial Intelligence identifies several ways in which citizen...
WACC Deputy General Secretary Sara Speicher recently presented a workshop on “Upholding Human Rights and Social Justice in the Digital Age” during the 50th anniversary international conference of the Catholic Media Council...
In a country such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, which has “a strong patriarchal tradition and dominant stereotypes about women,” Abida Pehlic can’t emphasize enough how important the Global Media Monitoring Project...
On International Human Rights Day, December 10, WACC Global calls attention to the horrendous violence and abuse against journalists. “Investigative journalism is the backbone of a well-functioning democracy,” said Philip Lee, WACC...
In response to rising xenophobia and racism in the Dominican Republic, WACC partner Espacio de Comunicación Insular has launched an awareness raising campaign on the issue and is developing a...
Twenty-four technicians and broadcasters from 21 community radio stations in Nepal are now able to repair and conduct technical maintenance of broadcasting equipment on their own, thanks to a WACC-supported...
WACC Deputy General Secretary Sara Speicher recently took part in a workshop, Data and Digital Intelligence as People’s Resources: Reclaiming Freedom and Control in a Data-based Society, held in Berlin...
This year’s last issue of WACC’s quarterly journal, Media Development, takes an in-depth look at the state of the Caribbean’s media and communications industry and their influence on the region’s...
Children today would benefit from greater regulatory oversight of the Internet and social media. In an open letter to the world’s children marking the 30th anniversary of the UN Convention on...
One hundred students from four public and one private school in Georgia are now providing weekly broadcast and blogs on issues that matter to them, including human rights, gender equality...
In recent years, WACC Global has supported hundreds of communication rights-related projects that have not only been innovative, but have built the leadership skills and media visibility of its partners,...
Women journalists who ethically cover stories about gender-based violence are “human rights defenders in their own right,” and they often face challenges, including misogynistic attacks online and offline, as a...
Women continue to be excluded from peace and political processes, despite a UN resolution adopted nearly two decades ago, which acknowledged that armed conflicts disproportionately affect their health, safety and...
Journalists who challenge corruption and the abuse of power deserve special government protection, WACC General Secretary Philip Lee said on the occasion of the International Day to End Impunity for...
WACC Global is now a member of the Just Net Coalition (JNC), a global network of civil society organizations and individuals advocating for “an open, free, just and equitable Internet.” The JNC focuses...
With growing incidences of cyber violence and harassment against women and girls, including female journalists, WACC Global maintains its support for efforts that push for policies to address them and...
WACC Global has joined more than 400 civil society organizations from 94 countries in signing an open letter urging all UN member states to give their full support to the Women, Peace...
A journalist, a cultural activist, a social communicator, a former WACC director of research, and a social justice activist have been named 2019 Honorary Life Members by WACC’s Board of Directors. Since...
WACC’s Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP) received the Donald H. McGannon Award today and its global coordinator, Sarah Macharia, described it as an affirmation of the project, the network of volunteers, and...
Raising WACC’s profile as one of the key global players on gender and communication, and supporting critical applications of communication rights in new areas for...
Dr. Clifford Christians, one of the world’s leading scholars on ethics in media, will tackle “Fake News, Rights and Obligations in a Digital World” at the Religion Communication Congress (RCC),...
WACC has launched Many Voices One World - the new online home for the Centre for Communication Rights – as a multi-media website dedicated to supporting vibrant citizen media, democratic...
WACC reiterates its commitment to freedom of information, including every citizen’s right to access information they need to participate fully in the democratic process, and to open and diverse media,...
President Embert Charles has urged WACC’s new Board of Directors to roll up their sleeves to “reenergise our global movement, regroup and give a stronger voice to the regions.”...
The following statement was issued by Ary Regis, President of WACC-Caribe, on September 20, 2019:
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In a world beset by problems, including a climate emergency, political conflicts, and shrinking democratic space, WACC’s challenge is to “exercise moral leadership by discovering new directions for the values (it) embraces,” says...
Over half of the world’s population of 7.7 billion are connected to the Internet, which has profoundly changed the way people live, work and communicate....
Sunday, September 15 is the International Day of Democracy and WACC is promoting every citizen’s right to communicate and to engage in transparent, informed and democratic debate.
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On International Literacy Day, Saturday, September 8, WACC calls attention to the digital divide that excludes billions of people around the world – including Indigenous people and linguistic minorities – from accessing...
An Indigenous community radio station in El Estor, Guatemala, is taking a more active role in covering allegations of human rights abuses involving extractive industries in their municipality, an offshoot of a one-year...
An average of 80,000 people are displaced from their homes each year in Kenya, but local media hardly pay attention to their plight, says a WACC-supported media monitoring study....
It began with a simple idea of bringing together religious television broadcasters to promote ecumenical and international co-operation and give greater visibility to their programmes. ...
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WACC-Latin America has joined other civil society groups around the world in raising concerns over threats facing the Amazon rainforest, including a recent uptick in deforestation and record-setting wildfires. ...
A project that included the purchase of additional radio repeaters, the installation of solar panels, and training for reporters has made Radio Bue Xhidza in Oaxaca, Mexico, a “stronger station”...
Nigerian media pay “little attention to the real issues” affecting the country’s Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), ignore their voices and often rely on statements from government officials when reporting about them, a WACC-supported...
The ACT Alliance in North America and Central America have issued a joint regional appeal to help undocumented migrants affected by U.S. President Trump’s immigration policies, which have included the separation of children...