5/10/16

Reporting Dangerously

© SpringerJournalist Killings, Intimidation and Security
By Simon Cottle, Richard Sambrook, and Nick Mosdell
11th May
£19.99 | $31 | Paperback | 978-1-137-40672-9

According to INSI, on average two journalists a week have lost their lives doing their job over the last decade. Most of those killed are not the international reporters who can make global headlines, but local journalists investigating crime or corruption. More journalists are being killed, attacked and intimidated than at any time in history, and this book sets out to find why.

In Reporting Dangerously: Journalist Killings, Intimidation and Security, 30-year BBC veteran Richard Sambrook and fellow academics in the School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies at Cardiff University, Simon Cottle and Nick Mosdell, examine journalist killings and intimidation around the world. Journalists, by the nature of their work, have always put themselves in harm’s way, and some have had to pay the ultimate price for doing so. However, a number of factors have significantly increased the risks they face through the last years of the 20th century and early years of the 21st. This book identifies what factors have led to this rise and positions these in historical and global contexts.

The authors show how the growth of organised crime in Asia, South and Central America and the Caucasus placed local journalists at significant risk in reporting drug cartels or corruption. Terrorist groups now see journalists as useful targets, as well, as evidenced by the murder of American journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan in 2002, through to the murders of James Foley and Steven Sotloff in 2014. Their graphic murders are a way to command global attention and horrify the wider public.

Reporting Dangerously provides case studies and first-hand accounts from journalists working in some of the most high-risk places in the world today and seeks to understand the different pressures they must confront. The book gives voice to journalists who have experience in reporting from conflict zones and unstable societies, hearing their experiences and candid reflections on why they do it and how they seek to protect themselves. It also examines industry and political responses to these trends and pressures as well as the latest international initiatives aimed at challenging cultures of impunity and keeping journalists safe.

The authors argue that journalism contributes a vital if often neglected role in the formation and conduct of civil societies. This is why reporting from ‘uncivil’ places matters and this is why journalists are often positioned in harm’s way. They argue that the responsibility to report in a globalizing world of crises and human insecurity, and the responsibility to try and keep journalists safe while they do so, belongs to all of us.

-ENDS-

 

About the Authors

Simon Cottle is Professor of Media and Communications in the School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies at Cardiff University, UK and Director of the Communications, Human Security and Atrocity in Global Context Research Group. He is the author and editor of many books including Humanitarianism, Communications, and Change (2015) and Global Crisis Reporting (2009) and is Series Editor of the Global Crises and the Media Series for Peter Lang publishing.

Richard Sambrook is Professor of Journalism in the School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies at Cardiff University, UK and Director of the Centre for Journalism which undertakes postgraduate vocational training. He is currently Chair of INSI, the International News Safety Institute. He is a former Director of Global News at the BBC where he worked as a journalist for 30 years as a producer, editor and manager.

Nick Mosdell is Deputy Director MA International Public Relations and Global Communications Management in the School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies at Cardiff University, UK. He teaches Research Methods modules to Masters students and has written research methods textbooks. He has also contributed to a variety of research-based publications, including media and military relations, and has been involved in data analysis for the International News Safety Institute (INSI) since 2006.

For more information or to get in touch with the author please contact:

Rebecca Krahenbuhl, rebecca.krahenbuhl@palgrave.com, +44 0207 014 6634