Comments on: Does photojournalism undermine democracy and governance?

By: christine

christine — Wed, 05 May 2010 10:52:12 +0000

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.

By: duckrabbitblog

duckrabbitblog — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 09:42:25 +0000

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.

By: stephensidlo

stephensidlo — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 02:08:56 +0000

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.

By: Scarlett Lion | teaching a photographer to fish, part two

Scarlett Lion | teaching a photographer to fish, part two — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 12:27:00 +0000

[...] week, Duckrabbit posted on A Developing story: Journalists in developing countries are often very poorly paid. Many of them have second jobs. [...]

By: ‘Does photojournalism undermine democracy and governance?’ « The Confidential Informant

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:05:58 +0000

[...] 3, 2009 · Leave a Comment A post well worth a read via A Developing Story. Take some time to see what this site has to offer, you wont be [...]

By: johnny

johnny — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 08:37:04 +0000

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.

By: Scarlett Lion

Scarlett Lion — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 14:42:22 +0000

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.

By: johnny

johnny — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 19:38:02 +0000

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.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 17:15:11 +0000

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

By: duckrabbit

duckrabbit — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 20:08:59 +0000

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.