Next week duckrabbit will be on a panel at Amnesty International debating:
Alive or dead? The evolution of photography in the digital age.
Photojournalism has been on its knees for some time, with newspapers and magazines no longer willing or able to fund international stories that require high expenses.
This is a bad and painful thing for photojournalists who have had their livelihoods kicked out from beneath them. I never met a photojournalist who didn’t genuinely want to make the world a better place, so in theory their marginalization should also be a bad thing for good democracy and governance, which is dependent on a free press holding those in power to account.
I have another theory…
The photojournalism that gets published, alongside the text it’s published with, often only helps to further reinforce a narrow view of the world in which people with money live glamorous lives and everyone else is deep up to their necks in poverty and suffering. It certainly had that effect on me because when I moved from the UK to live in Ethiopia I kept wondering where Africa had gone? It was there of course, just not how I had been led to believe it existed.
Journalists in developing countries are often very poorly paid. Many of them have second jobs. Photojournalists especially struggle because of the cost of equipment. Up until recently many NGO’s and the western media have ignored local photographers, spending a lot of money on sending their own photographers to shoot stories. The end result is that many local photojournalists just can’t make enough to survive and either hang up their camera or try to make a living in another field of photography (like fashion). That’s disastrous for democracy because it means there is no local talent turning the lens on corruption and human rights abuses.
I once wrote to the photo editor of a very large international NGO that I greatly admire. I wanted to know why they never used local photographers in Africa and I got the rather disappointing reply that it was because:
1. They didn’t know any
2. That local photographers might not be able to deliver exactly what the NGO wants
Of course they won’t be able to deliver if they never get any commissions, which means they don’t have any money, which means they are never able to develop their talents. Its a vicious circle.
That said though there are plenty of talented photographers in Africa and yes not all of them are white ex-pats.
So if less international photographers are getting flown around the world to document misery in often a very two dimensional manner maybe more local photographers will get commissions and be able to sustain a living in the profession.
Things are starting to shift. I recently met Jessica Crombie, the photo Editor at Water Aid and was massively impressed with her commitment to developing local talent to photograph Water Aid’s projects. Recently she commissioned the Bangladeshi photographer Munem Wasif to widely praised effect and I hope sometime soon Jessica will write something about her efforts on adevelopingstory.
Of course the truth is there is a need for a balance. Local photographers can benefit greatly from meeting and working with international photographers; they’re all part of the same family. Another day I’ll set out a new model that I believe NGOs could implement which would improve the standard of the photography that documents the developing world, as well as benefiting local photographers. And that has to be a good thing for democracy and governance.
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There are a handful of local photographers and journalists down here in Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa who would jump at the chance of working for WaterAid, problem is as you said, many are overlooked.
Hopefully this does change soon
I completely agree that more local photojournalists should be used in this kind of work.
However, having managed feelancers in the past, I know it’s easier to use a few trusted ones, ones you know will get you a result with minimum hassle, leaving you free to deal with the host of other issue that need your attention.
And I guess in pre-Internet days it was almost impossible to develop the networks and contacts to manage the use of mulitple overseas freelancers.
Now, however, things are easier, portfolios are online, people are readily acessible on Skype or e-mail.
So, while it may be the case that it is initially harder to develop networks of local freelancers, I think it’s something that every NGO should be doing. Practical support for local journalism is really about empowerment, something which, as you say, is a good thing for local democracy and governance.
Hi John, good point. I thinks its also worth remembering that the big NGO’s have literally hundreds of in country staff. They usually have in country press officers too, so even pre-internet days the idea that they couldn’t develop local contacts just doesn’t stack up.
I guess that in most cases a lot of an NGO’s communications function tends to be run from headquarters, e.g. Paris, London, etc.
This is a fundamental question that most organisations, be they NGOS, Governments or companies now face.
I’d argue that the old centralised, command and control model is on the way out, and that the organisations that harness a more distributed, networked organisational model will prosper.
Johnny,
I wish many picture editors of NGO’s had the same outlook as yours. I’ve yet to get any South African NGO to even return my e-mails, let alone look at using local resources
Part of the problem here is how NGOs think about photography. Many of them think of it not as something that should happen regularly to document changes, continuity, or community, but something they want to spend a wad of cash on once or twice a year and use in big PR campaigns. The latter model necessitates an international photographer to produce the kind of slick images – often on a very very tight timeline where there’s no room for errors or mistakes – that the NGO wants. I think if NGOs used media more regularly, took photos, say, once a week, rather than once a year, they’d be able to give local photojournalists the kind of practice and experience they need to eventually take the slick photos. And they’d have surprising and wonderful results that are serendipitous in addition to the kind of images you need a skilled photographer to make.
This is an excellent point. NGOs are used to catering to the events driven news cycle. New media channels now allows them to escape this trap and produce longer term pieces which as you say can document change, and present more nuanced views.
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I suppose looking more into the reasons why these NGO’s don’t consider photography as a good way to have an awareness campaign. A recent NGO head I spoke to, didn’t really answer when I asked why..(mumbled something about money). Maybe but this particular NGO wasn’t your local charity shop.
It’s a dangerous time, a lot of Photojournalists are realizing that this is a perfect time for NGO’s and Aid organisations to use them properly – it really makes me nuts. And yet, more and more are not prepared to split the cost of getting them out there to help shed light on world problems.
I suppose if you looked at photography, in painting us with the same brush, you would see paparazzi, celebrity hunters..maybe this is what they see? I don’t know but a humanitarian NGO photojournalist has the ability to put the worlds problems in the face of both the public and G20 countries to bring change – something the smaller NGO’s make take years to do themselves! Just look at what James Nachtwey has achieved.
Its not photojournalism that achieves change but people.
Many people in developing countries would argue the work of photographers like Nachtwey has infact narrowed the way many people think about developing countries.
We need to move beyond photography.
as an african photographer descended from white ancestors, do i fall through the gaps here? too white to be local, too local to be international? yes, of course there’s a debate whether my claim to african-ness is legitimate or not, but that is my identity.