Fighting for the right to speak and be heard
The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) continues in Tunisia today. I blogged about mugabe’s speech there yesterday.
Rebecca MacKinnon, a former CNN reporter, blogs today about a seminar that she will be attending later in the day titled ‘Expression Under Repression’. The seminar is going ahead today despite the fact that the Tunisian government does not like the title:
Yesterday our sponsors were told that the Tunisian authorities deemed our seminar’s title to be incompatible with the conference’s theme of ICT for Development, and that it might be cancelled.
Rebecca has provided notes on what she plans to say at the seminar, and this is her introduction:
A powerful shift has taken place in the information society. I believe that this shift is so powerful and so important that I left a good job as a correspondent for CNN in order to work in service of the emerging citizens’ media movement.
Until recently, the only way an American or Dutch person could know what a Tunisian, or a Chinese or a Zimbabwean person thinks (unless they are incredible world travelers) was through people like me. A journalist like myself would have to interview them and put their quotes in a newspaper or their soundbites on TV. The only way for a person in one part of China to know what was going on in another part, or for a Zimbabwean to know what’s going on in the neighboring town was either through media – or physical word of mouth.
Now anybody can use the internet – set up a weblog, post information on bulletin boards, upload photos to photosharing sites – and speak directly to the world. The same tools also enable people to communicate more freely with their own countrymen – without going through media filters.
The right of people around the globe not only to speak but also to be heard is vital if we are to achieve a more equitable global information society. It is something that must be fought for.
We agree.
UPDATE: Ethan Zuckerman has written about Taurai Maduna from Kubatana.net – Taurai attended the Expression under Repression seminar at the WSIS. Visit this link to Ethan’s blog to read about Taurai’s views on the Zimbabwean government’s engagement with voices online .
UPDATE 2: Rebecca has posted feedback on the ‘Expression Under Repression’ seminar. It certainly sounds dramatic:
Despite the odds, we managed to pull off our “Expression Under Repression” seminar here at the World Summit For Internet and Society, thanks to the strong spine of our sponsors, the Dutch NGO Hivos, who fended off a phalanx of plainclothes police who tried to shut us down. The goons finally backed off after the Dutch ambassador intervened and warned of a diplomatic incident.
