sometimes we are not very good at portraying the developingworld in its humanity as opposed to people at the receiving end ofsome awful catastrophe we’ve always been told that people don’twant to watch development stories, so it’s always a risk in terms ofratings the world is becoming more interconnected and seizing onthose moments that illustrate that makes for great television weare in this together there is a need for us all the time to make surethat we are exposing ourselves to enough influences to be wideranging in our sources of information we have to stop shying awayfrom the complicated issues we saw that girl who was a fewminutes from death 20 years ago and here she was 20 years later,a beautiful woman i think the fundamental constraint is that somuch in Africa is still a far off place of which broadcasters knowlittle and very few have much of an infrastructure within thosecountries to do informed reporting part of our job in public servicebroadcasting is to embrace risk and to say ‘we'll support you whenit goes wrong’ i'm not sure we always live up to that the biggestproblem we have is persuading the broadcasters to take financialand creative risks on a project that doesn’t already exist there areso many things happening in the wider world that are on ourdoorstep or coming to our doorstep we’ve got civilization into the21st century in reasonably good shape i don’t know that we’regoing to get it out of the 21st century in anything like as good ashape where has all the money actually gone? when people seeAfricans on television it’s usually when they are broken but mostAfricans don’t live broken lives the world is becoming moreinterconnected and seizing on those moments that illustrate thatmakes for great television we’re all pandering to an existingstereotype about the developing world, particularly Africa, whichis why all these negative stories are considered newsworthy youfelt that he could maybe relate to the situation better, and that thekids might actually listen to him it feels so much more powerfulthan just some English white bloke trying to engage with thesekids i don’t want to feel depressed after a long day at work, i justwant to be entertained

REFLECTING THE

REAL WORLD?

HOW BRITISH TV PORTRAYED DEVELOPING COUNTRIES IN 2005

Joe Smith, Lucy Edge and Vanessa Morris

1

FOREWORD

The horror of 7 July 2005 is etched in all ourmemories; similarly, the Tsunami, the Pakistanearthquake or the wars and famines in Africa. But while we know that the London suicidebombings do not define the UK, we are prone tosuppose that Asian and African disasters tell us all we know, and all we need to know, about thedeveloping world. Even the Make Poverty Historycampaign and the Live 8 concerts, which enthusedmillions of people, inadvertently contrived toconfirm a stereotype of Africa as a continent on its knees.

So, despite the fact that last year we saw more of the developing world on our TV screens thanever before, I doubt that we have a much deeperunderstanding of the people who live in Africa andAsia, and with whom we share this fragile planet. This is not to dismiss a significant number ofprogrammes, spanning news and current affairs,entertainment and drama, that brought us a morediverse, rounded and even celebratory view of thedeveloping world. But there is more, much more,to be done.

Specifically, broadcasters not only need to put the developing world far more emphatically andsystematically on their agenda. They should alsoexercise far more imagination to ensure that peopleliving in poor countries are not merely seen asvictims of poverty. I do not expect, or wish, newsand current affairs programmes to become ‘goodnews’ propaganda, but they could offer a wider andmore balanced perspective. Similarly, documentary,drama, and entertainment producers should usetheir range of talents to embrace the people of the‘poor’ world as well as the ‘rich’ world.

This report points the way ahead. Throughaudience research and interviews with leadingbroadcasters, programme makers, developmentspecialists and, most important of all, viewers, it explores the impact of British television coverageof the developing world in 2005. It also offers ablueprint for programmes that engage, entertain,educate and, above all, provide British audienceswith richer representations of the world beyond oureveryday lives. I hope it will inspire those who haveit within their power to make it happen.

Jonathan DimblebyBroadcaster and VSO President

CONTENTS

1 Foreword by Jonathan Dimbleby

2 Executive summary and recommendations

4 What viewers think

12 What broadcasters and experts think

be more open to pollination from outsideinfluencesinvite risk taking and experimentlook for creative ways of splicing together genres and platforms to reach a wide range of audiences.

Too much of a shopping list? Perhaps this can best be seen as a recipe for getting goodprogrammes to wide audiences at a moment of uncertainty and change.

RECOMMENDATIONSTO BROADCASTERS:

Ensure that developing world stories and issuesfeature across genres – not just news and currentaffairs, but also drama and entertainment – toreach a range of audiences. Invest in marketingand scheduling to deliver wider audiences and to deepen impact Challenge the assumption that developing worldprogramming is very difficult to get throughcommissioning processes. Clear statements and strategies from leading commissioners, with indications of earmarked funds and slots,will unlock creative ideasReward and protect risk taking: ring fencedevelopment funding for innovative work thattakes representations of the developing world into new territorySustain commitments to programme makingbeyond the UK, and nurture new work thatexplores common experiences from around the world. Consider international co-productionpartnerships with a more diverse range of playersWhite British voices continue to dominate on both sides of the camera and in thecommissioning process. Invest in a more

diverse pool of talent to deliver morerepresentations of the developing world that people there will recogniseThe professional world of broadcasters andcommissioners is very closed and there needs to be time for pollination from a wider range ofinfluences. Invest more energy in getting to gripswith complex issues, and raising the capacity ofstaff to tell stories about them. Brainstorms withinternational development agencies and policyspecialists can help.

TO NGOS, ACADEMIA AND POLICY-MAKERS:Build trust with broadcasters and help them to tell stories about complex issues by being clear and authoritative sources of interpretationand analysisBecome storytellers when engaging the media,not issue-sellers. Work harder to uncover andpresent human stories and personalities In assessing broadcaster performance inrepresenting the developing world, recognise the impact that programmes have may count for much more than the number of programmesInvest resources in processes that allow richerlinks between broadcasters and specialists. For example, bursaries and fellowships andmedia training within the organisation, which are not simply focused on news and not only for frontline staff Work to understand the changing medialandscape. Interactivity and on-demand mediawill help create communities of interest. Thereare increasing opportunities for collaborationbetween media and civil society institutionsLook for opportunities to engage media beyond news and current affairs: drama andentertainment work differently on audiences, and can reach wider audiences.

This report presents two new pieces of researchthat seek to tell the story of how televisionaudiences and broadcasters experienced andresponded to a year of disasters, debates andevents in and about the developing world.

The work was inspired by observations fromleading broadcasters who had acknowledgedcriticism of past performance, but feltquantitative measures of broadcasting did little to improve understanding of what kinds of programmes made an impact on audiences.Previous published analyses have focused on the amount of coverage devoted to internationalissues but did not tend to examine the diversity of tastes and expectations among the public.

The focus group research has pointed to two verydifferent needs. There is a substantial body ofpeople who are already engaged with developingworld issues and want content that is richer andmore authentic. At the other end of the scale isanother group that resists broadcast materialabout the developing world unless they are drawnto it by familiar faces and formats. Both groupsexpress a desire for programmes that are positiveand transforming, contain human interest storiesand tell them something they do not already know.

These findings mesh well with the materialderived from the body of 23 interviews withleading broadcasters and developing worldspecialists. Broadcasters acknowledge past andcurrent weaknesses. But all respondents feel thatrecent experiments have broken new ground withboth engaged and disengaged audiences.

The relationship between broadcasters, audiencesand media technologies is entering a period of flux.

Multi-channel, internet and on-demand viewingare transforming the broadcasting and viewinglandscape. This moment presents both threatsand opportunities in terms of advancing publicunderstanding and debate of some of the mostcomplex but vitally important issues facing the world.

Making the most of the opportunities andminimising the risks in the new broadcastingenvironment will require an act of commitmentfrom broadcasters with regard to developingworld issues. It will require them to keepquestioning assumptions about what theaudience will and won’t watch, and to questionexisting categories. The clear distinction between‘domestic’ and ‘international’ is melting. Faster,stronger flows of people and ideas are looseningdefinitions of citizenship and identity, andglobalisation and environmental change issues point to an interdependent world.

For NGOs there are also lessons to be learned.Major collaborations such as Make Poverty History are effective ways of gaining public and media attention, but they also carry risks.Celebrity endorsement should be approached with care: audiences can respond with cynicismand messages can be distorted or lost.

Broadcasting showed some important examples of both leadership and creativity in 2005 in itsrepresentations of the developing world. Can it sustain this? This research suggests that ifpublic service broadcasting is to mean anythingin the fast-changing media environment, it needs to:

make more space to understand and think aboutcomplex and unfamiliar issues and places

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

‘We are in this together’ female focus group respondent, Oldham

HOLBY CITY, BBC ONE

a number of finely tuned ‘get-out clauses’ thatprecluded any sense of responsibility for them. A common sentiment of this group was ‘it’sdistressing but there’s nothing I can do’, and there was a strong feeling that their own lives were difficult enough in the UK without worryingabout people from the developing world.

The second and third generation respondents were,perhaps surprisingly, closer in attitude to the moreneutral/negative respondents than to the positive

ones. Many of them had severed all ties with theircountry of origin and didn’t feel a strong sense ofresponsibility to help people in the developing world.They felt that Britain was their home, and thattended to be where their loyalty – and charity – lay.

The striking difference between those with apositive attitude to the developing world and thosewith a neutral/negative view suggests that there aretwo different audiences for television about therest of the world.

In November 2001, The Live Aid Legacy, aresearch report commissioned by VSO, revealedthat attitudes in the UK towards the developingworld tend to be static and negative. The findingsshowed that people connect developing countrieswith conflict, disaster and starving people, whothey feel are very different and distant fromthemselves.

This sense of people in the developing worldappearing to be ‘different’ and neither related norrelevant to the UK public appeared to be linked to the stereotyped images of the developing worldwidely portrayed in the UK media.

Following on from this, a new qualitative researchproject was carried out to explore the impact oftelevision programming in 2005 on UK attitudesto the developing world. The research placedparticular emphasis on programmes about Africa.

The overall aim of this research was to learn how programming could better engage and inspire viewers in the future – and create apositive change in their ways of thinking about developing countries.

The methodology employed was six groupdiscussions and four paired in-depth interviews.These were conducted in London, Birminghamand Oldham among:

people with a negative or neutral dispositiontowards the developing worldpeople with a positive disposition towards the developing world (including a group ofreturned VSO volunteers)second and third generation UK nationals from Black and Minority Ethnic communities.

KEY SAMPLE DIFFERENCESThere were some key differences between thepositive and the more negative respondents,which proved to be fundamental in understandingtheir programming needs.

Those with a more positive attitude towards thedeveloping world were well informed and morewidely travelled than the more negative respondents.Their favourite types of programme often includednews and documentaries, serious drama and wildlifeprogrammes. They had a very human image ofpeople in the developing world and clearly felt asense of responsibility to help them.

Those who were more negative about developingworld issues were quite comfortably absorbed intheir own lives. Their favourite programmes werelight escapism, such as soaps, comedies, sportand reality TV. This group of people had strongerfeelings about charity beginning at home, and felt quite comfortable putting people from othercountries out of their minds. They had developed

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‘TV can’t change theworld but it can play abig part in informing us’ male, London

WHAT VIEWERS THINK

SEX TRAFFIC, CHANNEL 4

KEY DIFFERENCES BETWEEN POSITIVE AND NEUTRAL/NEGATIVE RESPONDENTS

Neutral/Negative Positive

Very absorbed in own lives Believe they are right to be soFeel there’s so much to do ‘at home’ – ‘there are children starving here, you know’Believe they can’t help – ‘it’s distressing butthere’s nothing I can do’See their lives as stressful and difficult – they don’t need any more miseryAttuned to ‘get-out clauses’Switch off

Inform themselvesSee people from the developing world as humans – ‘just like us’Find much to admire in people from the developing world – dignity,hard work, respect for eldersSee mutual benefits in a closer relationshipWant a personal connectionTake responsibility

The effect Live 8 has had on people’s attitudesdoes not appear to have been a positive one. For many, it has reinforced the fact that little or nothing has changed in the last 20 years, as the images of the event were similar to those in 1985. For neutral/negative respondents, at its most extreme, Live 8 was a worldwide publicmessage communicating that, 20 years on, there is just no point in giving to, or caring for, the developing world.

Importantly, however, there was one strong imagefrom Live 8 that gave a positive and much morehopeful image of the developing world. Theappearance of Birhan Woldou – a survivor from the Ethiopian famine of 1984/5 – was upliftingand emotional for both positive and negativerespondents. She provided a very personal and real image of Africa that people connected to. For negative respondents, this provided a glimpseof the developing world as human and worthwhile.This image is effective against their ‘get-outclauses’; they can see the effects of donations, and they can feel good about it.

‘We saw that girl who was a fewminutes from death 20 years ago,and here she was, 20 years later, a beautiful woman’ female, Oldham

Other TV coverage that was mentionedspontaneously to researchers included:

GMTV’s campaign to improve quality of life for school children in South AfricaComic ReliefChildren in NeedHolby CityThe Concert for BangladeshTribeHotel RwandaCity of GodForce Fedgeneral news coverage.

The most powerful and memorable programmingmanaged to mix identification and empathy withchallenge and transformation.

DEVELOPING WORLD: IMAGES AND ASSOCIATIONSThe new research concluded that, four years onfrom The Live Aid Legacy, associations with thedeveloping world are still static, one-dimensionalimages of desperation. Both positive and negativerespondents associated the developing world withfamine, poverty and disease. People’s initial imagewas very often of starving babies with flies aroundtheir eyes.

There is a strong sense that developing worldgovernments are corrupt. Both positive andnegative respondents talked about gross economicmismanagement and money being spent on flashcars for government officials:

‘Where has all the money actually gone?’ male, BirminghamEven natural disasters are blamed on governmentfailure to provide the right detection equipmentand housing that can withstand their force. Eventslike the G8 Summit have contributed to a sensethat the problems in the developing world arelargely political – and for politicians, not thepublic, to deal with. Media coverage of corruptionhas played a central role in further convincingnegative respondents that people from developingcountries are very different from them, and notpeople they feel connected to.

While both positive and negative respondents talkedabout corruption, their response to it was different.Positive respondents felt frustrated, but still felt asense of duty to help developing countries, perhapseven more so if their governments are corrupt. Fornegative/neutral respondents, however, governmentcorruption provided a strong and unashamedreason not to help: ‘it’s their own fault’.

There have been no signs of a positive shift inattitudes towards the developing world over the last year. Disasters such as the Asian Tsunami and the South Asian earthquake, and events likeLive 8 may have brought people’s attention to the developing world, but they may have in factreinforced (for negative respondents) the sensethat the developing world is a hopeless cause.

Crucially, the media is felt to be largely responsiblefor people’s overwhelmingly negative image of thedeveloping world. There was a very strong sentimentacross the sample that these countries are portrayedin too negative a light. Instead, people expressed a desire to hear via the media the good news, thepositive side of life in Africa, and any progress thatis being made.

REACTIONS TO TV COVERAGE IN 2005Television is definitely considered to be the mostinfluential media source, although there was littletop-of-mind awareness of specific programmesabout the developing world. The only consistentmention across the research was news coverage of the Tsunami, and to a much lesser extent, theSouth Asian earthquake. The hand-held videoimages of the Tsunami and its devastating effectsstuck in people’s minds. It was also a tragedy that everyone could relate to, as many people hadeither visited, or knew people who had visited, theaffected areas.

Live 8 was not top of mind for programming on the developing world, and was not often raisedspontaneously. The reason for this was that peoplesaw it first and foremost as a music event. Negativerespondents in particular didn’t know much about,or take an interest in, the political or campaigningangle. For most, it was seen as a big concert withcelebrities that they enjoyed watching on a bigscreen – it was a highlight of their summer.

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‘I don’t normally like documentaries; they depress me.But that lookedquite good, actually.It was interesting’ female, Birmingham on African School

‘Nothing has happened in the past year.Idi Amin was eating off gold plates andnothing has changed. If their governmentwasn’t so corrupt it wouldn’t have suchdevastating effects’ female, London

AFRICAN SCHOOL, BBC FOUR

The tone of Sex Traffic, a gritty drama about theillegal trafficking of women as prostitutes, waspopular among the more positive respondents, who said they tended to watch programmes aboutthis sort of issue. They particularly appreciated thefact that it was hard-hitting and shocking, yet stilleducational. The serious tone and subject mattermade it feel true to life and believable. However,this style of programming was not so appealing tothe more negative respondents, as they preferredmore light-hearted television. They didn’t want tofeel depressed by programmes, and some foundthe tone too heavy.

For the negative respondents, the special edition of Holby City that was set entirely in Africa wasmore to their liking. Many of them watched thiskind of programme anyway, and they engagedmuch more with it. An EastEnders’ storyline aboutHIV & AIDS was mentioned by these viewers. Theyalso said they would welcome this approach toprogramming about the developing world. TheHolby City clip was generally appealing, although a few viewers felt that some of the acting was

disappointing, which detracted from it. Ideally,stories of this kind in the future would feature in the more popular soaps and involve familiarcharacters. The more positive respondents alsotended to like this kind of programming as theywatched these shows as well, and appreciated thatthey could reach and educate a wide audience.

The programme with the least appeal was thedocumentary Battle for the Amazon. Both positiveand negative respondents felt this programme was entirely issue based with no characters theycould relate to. For the negative respondents, there was nothing they could engage with, as theyfelt that the issues were not relevant to their lives.The focus group responses clearly showed that for this type of programme to appeal to a wideaudience, it needs to demonstrate how issuesrelate directly to them and their lives.

LEARNING FROM THE PROGRAMME CLIPSRespondents were shown a short video containingTV clips from:

Geldof in Africa, BBC ONEHolby City, BBC ONELiving with AIDS, Channel 4Sex Traffic, Channel 4Battle for the Amazon, BBC TWOAfrican School, BBC FOUR.

The clips that had the most impact were those thatchallenged existing perceptions and encouragedpeople – particularly the negative respondents – to see the developing world in a different light. The presence of strong characters was importantfor building interest and connecting viewers withthe programme and its content. Any element oflight-heartedness and humour within the clips wasparticularly helpful in engaging the more negativerespondents.

The programmes with the strongest appeal andimpact were Living with AIDS and African School.Both showed elements of real life in the developingworld in a clear and personal way. The content wasnew to the viewer, at times shocking and highlyengaging. Despite covering gritty and seriousmaterial, both also showed a light or humorousside that helped to sustain viewers’ interest andattention.

In Living with AIDS, a documentary presented bySorious Samora, the focus groups particularly likedthe style of the presenter. Since he was of Africanorigin himself, this made the content and his viewsfeel more in touch with reality. Viewers also feltthat the people in the programme would havecommunicated with him in a more natural waythan with someone else.

The head teacher in African School, a fly-on-the-wall documentary series, was also well liked. Herstrong character made for compelling viewing,especially among female respondents.

Geldof in Africa, a documentary series presentedby Bob Geldof, was also popular with some of therespondents because of the beautiful scenery. Itopened people’s eyes to different, more positivepictures of Africa, and started moving theirthoughts away from images of starving children.Negative respondents tended to respond to BobGeldof as he is a familiar face, bringing the issuescloser to them. There was some sense from them,however, that he also reminds people of the lack of progress, as his message hasn’t appeared tochange in 20 years. Some of the more positiverespondents saw Geldof’s ‘give us the f*****money’ approach as part of the problem.

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LIVING WITH AIDS, CHANNEL 4

‘They should make more along the linesof that, pretty hard-hitting but also asdrama, it gets more viewers and raisesawareness’ male, Birmingham on Sex Traffic

‘It’s nice to see thegood bits of Africa,not just doom andgloom and sadness.It shows you theactual country and its beauty’ female, Birmingham on Geldof in Africa

‘It feels so muchmore powerfulthan just someEnglish white bloketrying to engagewith these kids’female, London on Living with AIDS

Battle for the Amazon Holby City Sex Traffic Geldof in Africa Living with AIDS African School

Lowest appeal/impact Highest appeal/impactAN OVERVIEW

SAMPLE – LONG-TERM UK RESIDENTS6 x two-hour groups of six respondents each

Interest in the developing world Age and lifestage RegionPositive 20–30, with children BirminghamNeutral/negative 20–30, no children LondonPositive 30–40, no children OldhamNeutral/negative 30–40, with children OldhamPositive – returned VSO volunteers 40–50, with/without children LondonNeutral/negative 40–50, with/without children Birmingham

SAMPLE – BLACK AND MINORITY ETHNIC UK NATIONALS 4 x 90-minute in-depth interviews with pairs of second or third generation UK nationals

Nationality Age Region LifestageSemi-integrated African 20–30 London Single, no childrenSemi-integrated Indian 40–50 Birmingham Younger childrenLargely integrated Bangladeshi 20–30 London Younger childrenLargely integrated African 40–50 Oldham Older children

11

THE WAY FORWARD FOR PROGRAMMING: WHAT PEOPLE WANTRespondents were clear about what they wantedfrom programmes about the developing world. Theirideals inevitably reflected their favourite genres,and there were therefore different suggestions frompositive and negative respondents. The followingelements, however, had wide appeal and wererequested across the sample:

A more balanced and honest view – no bias,show it as it isThe positive sides of the developing world – afeel-good factor, uplifting rather than depressingContaining new news – more positive stories and ‘things I don’t already know’Characters and personalities to relate to – building a rapport over timeReal-life issues, how people really live – enabling empathy, ‘they aren’t that different from us’Light-hearted tone (more for negativerespondents)Hard-hitting tone (more for positiverespondents).

PROGRAMME IDEASThe focus groups came up with several newprogramme ideas that could encompass some or all of these elements, and thus have wide appeal:

Positive and transformingJamie’s African School DinnersEthnic Cooking Made EasyAfrican Grand DesignsExtreme Makeover meets Africa’s Next Top Model.

Impactive and informative 24 or Spooks in AfricaProgrammes made in Africa, by AfricansThe effects of global environmental issues on people in the UKThe real story in seven programmes (for example, poverty, starvation, corruption,AIDS, nature, lifestyle, culture).

Up close and personalLife SwapI’m A Celebrity Get Me Out of HereOn-the-job comparisons RootsLittle Britain in AfricaFriends in AfricaBackpackers Exposed.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT MARKETINGAs important as the content is the way that theprogramme is marketed. Judging from our focusgroups, future programming may benefit from adifferent approach. For example, negative/neutralrespondents were more likely to watch programmesthat had titles and were marketed in the vernacularof more popular programmes. Programming couldalso be trailed more prominently and before or aftershows that appeal to a mass audience.

Lucy Edge, Vanessa Morris

10

‘It’s a good way of getting to people,because people do talk about this type of thing. Well I do anyway. I love Holby City!’ female, London on Holby City

METHODOLOGY FOR FOCUS GROUPS

We commissioned consumer research agency, Rosenblatt, to run a number of focus groups to explore viewers’ reactions to television coverage of the developing world in 2005.

TEN SESSIONS IN HOME AMONG THE KEY AUDIENCES6 x two-hour groups of six respondents each: 5 with long-term UK residents; 1 with returned VSO volunteers4 x 90-minute in-depth interviews with pairs of second or third generation UK nationals.

WHAT BROADCASTERS AND EXPERTS THINK

‘People tend to commission programmesabout things that, at some level, consciouslyor unconsciously, they’re a bit familiar with,so we need to get them out of their offices and expose them to different ideas anddifferent cultures’Brian Woods, independent producer

The aftermath of the Tsunami, the Commissionfor Africa, G8, Live 8, Make Poverty History,climate change conferences, Hurricane Katrina,the South Asian earthquake... 2005 was anextraordinary year, and it was television, above all, that brought these events and debates toBritish people. Many lives were lost or turnedupside down by disasters in distant places; therewere political debates concerning the developingworld that carried the highest stakes.

These were important stories but difficult to tell.Broadcasters responded with substantial newsreporting, but also new approaches in other areas of television. Some risks were taken andexperiments introduced. But did public servicebroadcasters respond adequately to the challengespresented? Was the policy community (NGOs,politicians, academia) effective in itscommunications?

ABOUT THE RESEARCHThe findings in this report are based on 23interviews that were conducted between mid-December 2005 and the end of January 2006. A mix of senior public service broadcasters(channel controllers, commissioners and newseditors), independent producers and filmmakers,

and leading academic, policy and NGO figures wereinterviewed. The interviewees are listed on page 24.

This research arose out of the Real Worldseminars project that has brought togetherleading broadcasters and developing worldspecialists in a series of dialogues over the lasttwo-and-a-half years. The seminars aim to inspirefuller and more creative representations of thedeveloping world on primetime television.

MORE BAD NEWS?‘This year I have been filming on five continents...and I know the world I see out there is very poorly reflected on the screen. Television isoverwhelmingly domestic; perhaps that’s whatviewers want but there’s very little reflection of the outside world’ (Brian Woods, independentproducer).

The charge sheet against British televisionappears in a battery of critiques spanning morethan a decade. Criticism has centred on theperpetuation of crude and damaging clichés. It is argued that television has helped to build an image of the developing world as remote,dangerous, dependent and unchanging (The LiveAid Legacy, VSO, 2001). People watching news

stories about the developing world struggle tounderstand them, or to place them in the contextof their own lives. Research suggests that theBritish public is concerned, but fatalistic and illinformed. As Onyekachi Wambu from the AfricanFoundation for Development put it:

‘when people see Africans ontelevision, it’s usually when they are broken, but most Africans don’t live broken lives.’But where should the camera point? And howshould stories be told? Should the UK broadcastmedia attempt to communicate the bulk ofexperience in the developing world – ‘normal life’ –or is it proper for it to focus on images of need anddevastation? The disasters of the Tsunami andSouth Asian earthquake were on such a scale thatthe events and their immediate aftermath wereguaranteed substantial coverage. But the ongoingneed for shelter, education and food, and for waterand energy security are much less compelling forthe media. Complex explorations of how biodiversityloss, climate change or economic globalisationaffects the developing world are even more of acommunications challenge. Explanations and

solutions are multi-layered, open-ended, fluid andcomplex. These characteristics are very difficult tomatch with the demands of broadcasting to bigaudiences.

But NGOs accept that they themselves have helpedto create over-simplified and stereotyped images andare faced with a legacy of their own making. MarkGoldring of VSO acknowledged the role that NGOsstill play in helping the media construct stereotypes,suggesting that ‘we can’t raise money withoutthem’. Onyekachi Wambu agreed and argued that‘the two biggest shapers of perception [of Africaare] the NGOs and the BBC… but what this beginsto do is to alienate young Africans or other peopleof African descent from their own continent’.

This point about unintended audience impacts wastaken a step further by people from the developingworld attending the Real World seminars.Broadcasters had not realised the extent to whichthe BBC’s domestic coverage of the developingworld has an audience in the countries that are thesubject of stories. VHS tapes funnelled viadiasporas, and, increasingly, internet reports, havegreat weight; as one Haitian women’s developmentworker put it: ‘you are defining how we think aboutour country’.

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GELDOF IN AFRICA, BBC ONE

Whatever the content, the sheer mass of programmingabout the developing world appears to have increasedin 2005, reversing a consistent trend of decline(charted by Dover and Barnett, The World on theBox, 3WE, 2004). The news and current affairsmedia were given plenty of chances in 2005 toanswer their critics. A steady flow of disasters andmajor political events made certain that thedeveloping world would command attention. Therewere also specific initiatives that worked morepurposefully to experiment with new ways ofbringing the developing world onto TV screens –above all, the BBC’s Africa Lives season. Thequestion is whether the nature of those portrayalshas moved on.

Some of the most prominent international politicaldiscourses of 2005 presented broadcasters with abody of very complex issues to explain to viewers.But Moise Shewa, an independent producer, notesthat even in a year when there was substantialcoverage of the developing world, there wasreluctance to engage with ‘agendas for change’ in the way that broadcasters will engage withdomestic issues. Others recognise the tight spaceswithin which news and current affairs productionwork, but feel that broadcasters keep taking theeasy routes on difficult questions. The lack offamiliarity with some of the underlying issues,especially among non-specialists at every level of production from researcher to director, wasidentified as an obstacle.

Channel 4’s Dorothy Byrne felt that newsproduction was in some quarters responding tosuch critiques. She was not the only broadcaster to note that more commitment to tracking storiesover time is needed, as is giving more rounded andhumane accounts. But she also saw some specificweaknesses among all broadcasters:

‘on our coverage of economic andscientific issues in the developingworld we really have to raise ourgame – we have to stop shyingaway from the complicatedissues’.Several respondents questioned whetherbroadcasters had sufficient capacity to cope.Explaining issues of aid, trade and debt, or climatechange, demands a high degree of knowledge andjudgement, and the broadcast media were felt to be lacking. Mike Green of DFID suggested that:

‘the fundamental constraint is still that so much in Africa is a far-off place of whichbroadcasters know little, and very few broadcasters have got much of an infrastructurewithin those countries to doinformed reporting’.

‘We’ve always been told thatpeople don’t want to watchdevelopmentstories, so it’salways a risk interms of ratings’Moise Shewa, independent producer

Tom Burke, an environmentalist, made a parallelpoint about climate change: ‘these [are]fantastically complex issues and television isn’tgood at the complex… The TV channels are notintellectually equipped to deal with, to put the sort of love, of effort, and planning, into dealingwith the complexity of these issues, because they simply don’t devote the resources to it’. Criticisms of capacity were not solely levelled at broadcasters. Both Tom Burke and, on thedevelopment NGO side, Mark Goldring, alsocharged the NGOs with failing to deliver in termsof an approachable language and body of materialthat the media could work with. There are othermore independent sources of advice and ideas,including academia, but Mike Hulme, head of aclimate change research institute that has done alot of media work, explained that specialists werereluctant to advise or contribute when the mediashowed so little understanding of the nature ofacademic debate.

Several respondents were critical of the NGOs’shortsighted and sometimes ill-considereddeployment of celebrity endorsements that oftentook the place of more considered communications.Steve Tibbett of the Make Poverty History coalitionbuilt on this point. He noted the increasingly short- and medium-term focus of the NGOcommunity, built on corporate-style annual targets.He suggested that this had narrowed their vision.One consequence of this is that they may have less capacity to inspire or provoke richer thinkingamong themselves, their supporters or the media.

THE VIEW FROM INSIDE A BUBBLEBoth insiders and outsiders talked about howbroadcast decision-makers work in a media bubble. In professional terms they live in ‘gatedcommunities’. Intense time pressures, and theimportance of networking within organisations and across the industry, can leave most mediaprofessionals – particularly the relatively smallnumbers of commissioning gate keepers – with few opportunities to engage with new issues andfresh (non-media) voices.

Media decision-making culture is largely implicitand difficult to track: ‘a lot of things happenthrough conversations’ (Lorraine Heggessey, former Controller of BBC ONE). Much depends on the perceived views of channel controllers andcommissioning executives. There is a handful of media professionals that set the unstatedparameters of what might amount to viableprogramme proposals. The pressures on theseexecutives to deliver audience share has always beenthere, but has intensified in a multi-channel world:‘To put it brutally, for a commercial broadcasterlike Channel 4, if you’re not increasing your marketshare these days you’re going backwards… You’rein a declining market’ (Peter Dale, Head of More4).

Channel controllers, working with schedulers andmarketing and audience researchers, get to knowtheir (ever more tightly defined) audiences well:‘they just want to consolidate that audience andmake sure they get the bums on seats, becauseevery channel controller knows that if they don’t, if audience share goes down during their tenure,then they are going to find it hard to get anotherjob’ (Brian Woods). Leading independent producershold a more subtle, but still substantial, influence:channel executives trust their (commercial) instincts.

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‘The biggest problem we have ispersuading the broadcasters to takefinancial and creative risks on a projectthat doesn’t already exist’Christopher Hird, independent producer

MOISE SHEWA CHRISTOPHER HIRD

He went back to regurgitate the same old kind ofimages that we had seen before’ (Moise Shewa,independent producer).

Broadcasters respond that familiar faces aredeployed on the main terrestrial channels becausethey can bring a good audience to a programme,whatever the subject. Indeed, broadcastersinvolved in Comic Relief and the Africa Lives onthe BBC season believe that audience share inprimetime slots can rely on their presence.

However, there was widespread acknowledgementthat broadcasters needed to improve the diversityof presenters. African reporters like SoriousSamora can bring a different tone and morechallenging content.

This debate points to a larger issue about the roleof public service broadcasting and its relationshipwith audiences. All interviewees were asked aboutwhether audiences were viewed more as consumersor citizens. Non-broadcasters and some of theindependent producers suggested that intensifyingcompetition for audience share has seen a shift inemphasis, with broadcasters moving from servingcitizens towards winning consumers. They suggestthe long-standing public service broadcastingcommitment both to entertain and inform is beingeroded in favour of the former. This was explainedin terms of the increasing levels of competition,not just among terrestrial broadcasters, but alsobetween broadcasting and other media (web, homecinema, games).

Certainly, the multi-channel environment has seena sharpened focus on attempting to understandbetter audience tastes and motivations. It is felt that this has resulted in more conservativeprogramming on the main terrestrial channels. Butone independent producer represented the view ofmost broadcasters on this question in viewing thedistinction as unhelpful and simplistic:

‘Are viewers citizens or consumers? Well, they’reboth and that varies according to how they’refeeling and how late it is and what’s happening inthe world at that moment – and they expecttelevision to be able to satisfy both’ (StephenLambert).

There are signs that at least some sections of the audience are looking for more diverseprogramming, and there is also evidence thatbroadcasters are thinking in more sophisticatedways about who their audiences are. For one thing,‘the cultural ethnic and geographical roots are 50 times more diverse than the BBC’s originalaudience of 70 or 80 years ago, and thereforethere is an awareness, an openness to theinterconnectedness of global cultures in a way that hasn’t been so in previous generations’ (RolyKeating, Controller, BBC TWO). Chris Shaw (FiveTV) cited the recent success of BBC TWO’s Tribeseries as evidence that ‘there’s an appetite forcollecting experience and that could includecollecting experiences in the developing world’.Dorothy Byrne of Channel 4 sees the fast-changingexpectations of audiences as demanding but verystimulating for programme makers. But didbroadcasters rise to this challenge in 2005?

It is taken as given within broadcasting thatprogrammes about the developing world will ratepoorly beyond a small and committed audience(identified particularly with Channel 4, BBC TWO,BBC FOUR and More4). Hence such programmes‘are very hard to get commissioned becausebroadcasters don’t think they’re going to rate, andthey can be a bit disappointing to make becauseyou’ve put a lot of effort into them and peopledon’t watch them in large numbers’ (StephenLambert, RDF Media). Another independent,Christopher Hird, goes further in explainingcommissioners’ ‘safety first’-based resistance todeveloping world programming. He believes theyare averse to taking risks with audiences, fearcritical comment from peers and are so insulatedby their professional circumstances that they are,to a large degree, ignorant of the true state of theworld.

Talking of current affairs programming, PeterHorrocks, until recently Head of Current Affairs at the BBC, spoke of the ‘paradox that people arebetter travelled and better educated than they haveever been and they’re subject to more internationalinfluences, but in their media consumption they’reprobably more parochial’. Peter Dale confirmedthat ‘it’s a given among commissioning editors thatfilms about developing countries are not going to

drive the [audience] share like a domesticdocumentary is going to’.

This corroborated one NGO media worker andformer TV producer’s own experience: ‘every time I had a programme about Africa commissioned, we didn’t get an audience. Yes, it’s absolutely true’(Onyekachi Wambu). Peter Horrocks believes thatthe public service broadcaster’s responsibility toinform domestically oriented mainstreamaudiences about the world beyond can only beachieved ‘by stealth’ with clever programming,where impact rather than quantity is the yardstick.

But several interviewees argued that theseassumptions about what audiences want areinadequately tested, and can be proven wrong.Brian Woods recalled how his Orphans of Nkandlafilm had received no trails and went out in a latenight slot, but got 650,000 viewers, and feedbacksuggested that it made a very deep impact onmany of them. Independent producers were criticalof the view that mainstream audiences would onlystay with developing world stories if they were ledby big name domestic presenters: ‘this rating thinghas become a real problem, especially when itcomes to development stories. Take the BBC AfricaLives season, they gave Bob Geldof… three hours’primetime television. What did he do with it?

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‘In the day-to-day noise of commissioningand budgets it’s very difficult to standback and say “over the next five yearswhat should we be trying to do?” So Iwould welcome that kind of strategicapproach. But in the end, it’s about theproducer that walks through the door and says “I've got a burning desire to do this”’ Peter Dale, Head of More4

‘British audiences love to see their own culture and life reflected but wewere struck by how Bruce Parry’sseries, Tribe, reached a surprisinglylarge audience with a younger focusthan BBC TWO is often used to’Roly Keating, Controller, BBC TWO

PETER DALE ROLY KEATING

Channel 4’s Unreported World is expanding in 2006.The BBC’s This World and Holidays in the DangerZone, have attracted critical acclaim for managingto lure and surprise audiences with fresh approachesto storytelling from around the world.

The Africa Lives season included some risk taking.Several respondents picked out the special editionof Holby City that was set in Ghana for praise intaking a primetime soap audience to a developingworld setting. Seetha Kumar, Executive Editor ofAfrica Lives on the BBC said:

‘it was the bravest, the most scaryone to do, because Holby is a verysuccessful brand – you have abrand that works incredibly well,the audience love it, and cherishits familiarity. So you takesomething like that and suddenlytransform it into a completelyalien territory – it could workbrilliantly or fail very badly. Youcould end up losing viewers’loyalty and damaging the brand.’ But Christopher Hird of Fulcrum suggests that this kind of risk taking can help to refresh a strand.Indeed, two of the people involved in developingthe Africa Lives season noted some substantial but unanticipated professional benefits of theseason for the BBC. The cross-BBC working, andthe experiences of people working in unfamiliarplaces, with new themes and in partnership withothers, had been challenging but refreshing forthose involved.

Respondents from outside broadcasting insistedthat it was a mistake to assume that NGOs andspecialists were asking for special treatment forthe developing world. It was repeatedly argued that broadcasters were simply not reflecting theway the world is. This was accepted by RichardBradley, an independent producer, who suggestedthat:

‘so many things are happening in the wider world that are on our doorstep or coming to ourdoorstep – it’s going to be veryhard for broadcasters to go backinto one of those very domesticblinkered periods which we arejust coming out of.’

RISING TO THE CHALLENGE? ‘I don’t think the developing world will let us forgetthem any more’ (Dorothy Byrne).

One of the most widely discussed cases in theinterviews was the BBC’s Africa Lives season. A central goal of the season was to help coverageof Africa break out of stereotypical images, and out of established niches in news and currentaffairs. The critical response from across the range of respondents was positive. StephenLambert, of leading independent productioncompany, RDF, suggested that: ‘the Africa seasonon the BBC was a big statement of commitment– to put it right at the heart of the BBC ONEschedule… [it] was celebratory and yet at the same time tried to explain to people some of the realities of life in Africa today. It was veryadmirable and very bold of the BBC to do it’.

However, there was also criticism. Channel 4’sDorothy Byrne felt that ‘by doing a lot on Africa at one moment, a broadcaster can divert attentionfrom disappointing coverage of the rest of theworld the rest of the time’.

Other respondents were particularly struck by the season’s commitment to carrying audiencesthat are seen by TV executives as resistant todeveloping world settings and stories into the heartof the season. BBC ONE brands and stars known to carry big audiences were deployed in this way –Rolf on African Art and Strictly African Dancingbeing prominent examples. Respondents sawdrama, popular entertainment and children’stelevision (linked to interactive projects including

the twinning of schools) as having shown theirpotential to bring a fuller, more complex andrealistic picture of the developing world to Britishaudiences.

But it was felt that this wouldn’t happen withoutclear signals that invite risk taking and experiment.The Africa Lives season demonstrated that one of the simplest ways of doing this is to ring fencefunds and good broadcast slots for developingworld coverage. And this coverage was notprimarily about news and current affairs. Lorraine Heggessey, who was instrumental in commissioning the season felt that:

‘the challenge for me when I set it up was, rather than it beingin the margins of the schedule, tomake it absolutely in the centre of the mainstream. Richard Curtisdid the drama, Girl in the Caféabout the G8 Summit, andbecause it was Richard over fivemillion people watched it.’One of the consequences of the season is that ithas gone some way to legitimising coverage ofAfrica. Producers/creatives already appear to feelmore confident in approaching broadcasters withproposals set in or about the developing world.This may be building on a wider trend. Channel andcommissioning executives pointed to other examplesof this having succeeded in the recent past.

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‘We should look harder for positivestories. We’re all pandering to anexisting stereotype about thedeveloping world, particularly Africa,which is why all these negative storiesare considered newsworthy’Chris Shaw, Five TV

‘In the last year we have seen a muchmore holistic picture of thedeveloping world, in particular Africa,on our TV screens’Mark Goldring, VSO

CHRIS SHAW MARK GOLDRING

That there is greater interactivity with audiences is so evident as to be banal. But this fact hasparticular significance in discussion ofrepresentations of the developing world. RolyKeating saw audience–broadcaster interaction asintegral to the decision-making environment: ‘Weare now working with a richer and more complexdashboard of measures and feedbacks from theaudience… We’ve got more soft data alongside thehard data’.

Technological developments are changing theaudience experience: Jana Bennett, for example,suggested that broadband-TV convergence allowsbroadcasters to ‘create deeper value foraudiences’. Without denying the challenges of thenew environment, she sees opportunities to carrybig audiences to important but difficult orunfamiliar issues: ‘our challenge is also to embracebig audiences and that is a challenge because ofthe way fragmentation also works. You have to bereally creative, which is why something like AfricaLives had a mix of entertainment and culture in it,drama and events. We think [these] helped toconnect more individuals to that part of the world’.

Lorraine Heggessey explained that it wasn’tintended that ‘anybody would watch everything,but that everybody might watch something, andthrough that just get a slightly different perspectiveand draw back and think “there’s this wholevibrant culture and continent out there and theyhave success stories’’’. The route to bringing the audience to difficult subjects might includecelebrity appearances, good storytelling orrecognition of a familiar writer, actor or book. But she emphasises that ‘it’s not only thedeveloping world that it’s difficult to get across’.

Christopher Hird noted that almost half of theviewers of the South African drama Red Dusthad never heard of the Truth and ReconciliationCommission. While he had heard BBC peoplesuggest that this showed the programme extendedpeople’s understanding, he turned the point roundto suggest that ‘I think that if I’d been at the BBC,I would say that this tells me we have a lot of workto do here!’

There was also self-criticism. The BBC’s KrishanArora felt that, with the benefit of hindsight, theymight have had less material in the season, andmarketed some things more vigorously: ‘the mainlesson is that you shouldn’t overdo it. Someprogrammes that felt quite big when they werebeing made didn’t [get audiences and] didn’t getmarketed at all’. Steve Tibbett offered an NGOperspective on the season. While he welcomed thefreshness of it, and the stereotype breaking, hesummarised the feelings of several respondents:‘my fear is that it’s seen as a “tick that box, doneit, move on” approach’.

A recurrent theme was that the firm boundariesbetween ‘domestic’ and ‘international’ programmingneed to be softened in a world that is, in economic,cultural and environmental terms, increasinglyinterconnected. There are broadcasters that see thisas an opportunity. The BBC’s Director of Television,Jana Bennett, suggests that:

‘the world is becoming moreinterconnected and seizing onthose moments that illustrate that,I think, makes for great television.’ In the last couple of years, programme makers havehad successes with films that have worked todemonstrate connections and commonalitiesbetween the developing world and UK audiences.Brian Woods’ films about slavery and AIDS showedthe potential for this approach: ‘people did respondstrongly to the fact that the chocolate they ate thatday may have been produced by slaves’. Referringto Orphans of Nkandla, he suggested that despitethe fact that it was about an AIDS epidemic in adistant country ‘the characters were talking aboutfamily problems and relationships, and husbandswho didn’t listen to them, and children whowouldn’t talk to them about their problems… Yes it was about AIDS, but it was also about thekinds of problems that people have here too’.

This reflects a wider trend in current affairsbroadcasting that has made space for films thatcan ‘create moments of empathy’ (Sian Kevill,BBC World). The new forms of storytelling areexhibited in BBC TWO’s This World strand, whichhas delivered a series of ambitious programmesthat have demonstrated that difficult anddemanding, often distant, issues can be madeengaging through human stories. One Day of Warand Living Positive raised awareness of ‘forgotten’wars and people’s experiences of being HIV

positive. Coming of Age and World Weddings werepraised as managing to ‘bring the world to the UK’through rich storytelling based around emotionallycharged experiences that are common to all of us.This World was built on audience research aboutwhat people would watch, but also on a desire topress for more authenticity in storytelling. However,despite the increased number of broadcasting slots that can carry new work in such areas,Lorraine Heggessey warns that resources for allbroadcasting will be spread thinner: ‘it will bemore competitive, so there will be even morechoice … [but] it will be harder to get a “hit” and there’s less money.’

Technological developments are also playing a role.It was suggested that they are changing news andcurrent affairs production more rapidly than anytime in its history. A faster news cycle and cheapercommunications technology is expanding the reachof these kinds of programming in a number ofways. Within a multi-platform broadcaster such asthe BBC, it was felt that changing communicationstechnologies are improving the flow of knowledgeand story ideas within the institution, let alonetheir significance for audiences. Severalrespondents noted the potential of the WorldService’s networks for enriching domestic outputs.

Both Nick Pollard of Sky News and Peter Horrocksof BBC News noted how technology is also making it cheaper and easier to return to stories. They feltthere were several cases in the last year where theyhad answered the longstanding criticism of newsand current affairs TV that it is constantly moving onto the latest bad news. Broadcasters suggested thatthey had, in the context of ‘return’ stories relating tothe Tsunami and South Asian earthquakes, begun toget more involved in exploring problem solving. Thiswas partly in response to feedback from audiencesthat they are frustrated and disempowered by aconstant flow of bad news stories.

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‘Sometimes we are not very good atportraying the developing world in its humanity, as opposed to people at the receiving end of some awfulcatastrophe’Sian Kevill, BBC World

‘Part of our job in public servicebroadcasting is to embrace riskand to say “we'llsupport you whenit goes wrong”. I'mnot sure we alwayslive up to that’Krishan Arora, BBC

SIAN KEVILL KRISHAN ARORA

CONCLUSION: KEEP POLISHING THE MIRRORThe years ahead are going to present a series ofchallenges – economic, cultural, environmental – that can only be adequately addressed indemocracies that have an informed and engagedcitizenship. The developing world is at the sharpend of these challenges, and choices made by, andin, Britain and other leading developed countrieswill have a big effect on outcomes.

But there is plentiful evidence – most recentlysupported by the focus group research publishedas part of this report – that substantial sections of British television audiences have very limitedunderstanding of, or feel connections to, thedeveloping world. If public service television is one of the most powerful shapers of knowledge and feelings about distant places and people, then it is continuing to fail to serve its audiences.

Public service broadcasters have been tasked withholding up a clean mirror to the world. But theyhave to keep in view the fact that their audiencesmust be seen as a strange hybrid of citizen andconsumer – there to be both informed andentertained. There are things they want to enjoy and things they need to know. The early decades of the 21st century will generate communicationsmedia that are as exhilarating as the early years ofradio and television, with rich potential for choice,exploration and control by audiences. But the on-demand, multi-channel environment will make iteasier for many people to stop at simply beingentertained.

Two solutions have come through clearly:leadership and creativity. Broadcastersacknowledge the importance of leadership by both institutions and individuals:

A CHANGING MEDIA LANDSCAPEThe convergence of television and the internetopens up the flow of communication betweenbroadcasters and audiences, and ‘the digital worldallows you to spread your agenda across differentplatforms’ (Peter Dale).

But it also starts to erode the geographicalboundaries around definitions of audience.Channel 4’s Dorothy Byrne: ‘The fact is, in tenyears’ time, if we make programmes about thedeveloping world, they will all be able to see them as they go out, simultaneously. People will just sit in Zimbabwe and watch it, and they’llbe able to say to themselves, “well that’s reallypatronising”, so they’ll immediately send me their visual e-mail condemning me, which will be broadcast round the world’.

But British broadcasting’s efforts to offer morecomplete accounts of the developing world willface substantial challenges before 2016. The UK’s multi-channel environment is maturing. It is generating a wider range of material, but alsoseeing resources (and audiences) spread morethinly. All of this is happening at a time whenaudiences are increasingly taking control of theirviewing through ‘on-demand’ technologies. Thiscombination brings threats and opportunities.Peter Horrocks fears that:

‘for “worthy” programming of anydescription it’s a very difficult andbleak outlook. There is no doubtthat the tough things in television will get significantly tougher andwe will have to be even morecreative and imaginative abouthow we try and get those topeople, because they’ll just begorging on great, amusing andenjoyable content that they love to watch – and why should theywatch this stuff that we think theyought to?’His colleagues at the BBC, Roly Keating and JanaBennett, see the glass as half full: multi-channeland on-demand will open up opportunities to giveaudiences richer experiences, more control andaccess to a wider range of voices. But they, andindependent producers, also recognised that muchhangs on decisions about marketing. Roly Keatingnoted how one of the successes of the Africa Livesseason was that large audiences that watchedpopular entertainment on BBC ONE were madeaware of material on BBC FOUR (for exampleAfrican School) that would simply not have got anairing in crowded schedules across two channels.

But some commentators pointed out in asides thatpublic service broadcasters may see their claim to be working for all communities in Britain erodedif they don’t succeed in finding dedicated spacefor the concerns and narratives of specificcommunities. The low entry costs and markets forniche media, via the web or radio, are resulting invibrant alternatives to the establishedbroadcasters.

Whatever the potential and risks of the fast-changing broadcasting environment, it was widelyacknowledged that television needed to make morespace for fresh thinking, and to open itself up towider influences. Media professionals frequentlyconfessed their isolation. They recognised theimportance of being open to a wider range ofinfluences – and the time and work-culturepressures that get in the way of this. StephenLambert insisted that:

‘there is a need for us all the timeto make sure that we are exposingourselves to enough influences tobe wide ranging in our sources ofinspiration’. This isn’t about specific programme developmentbut points to a need much further upstream in thecreative process.

Talking of the benefits of the Real World seminars,Roly Keating suggested that ‘they work brilliantlyas a place to encounter people from around theworld with interesting experiences and academicswho you would never get to encounter. As abroadcaster, you end up metabolising that kind of input in a rather unpredictable way’. One of thegoals of the seminars has been to demonstrateinterconnections between Britain and thedeveloping world, and to question the boundarybetween ‘domestic’ and ‘international’programming categories. Keating suggests this has been successful: ‘you begin to detach whatwas mainly, 10 or 15 years ago, described as thedeveloping world from being a little separatecategory.’ Similarly, Jana Bennett, stressing thatthese partnerships were not about creating ‘aninvitation to lobby’ but about giving valuableexposure to new stimuli, believes they ‘spark ideas and ideas are what, in the end, make goodtelevision. Knowledge is crucial – and if you don’tknow much you reach for what’s most familiar.’

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‘We’ve got civilisation into the 21st

century in reasonably good shape. I don’t know that we’re going to get it out of the 21st century in anything like as good a shape – and if there is a point to public service broadcasting, it’s about addressing that challenge’ Tom Burke, environmentalist

TOM BURKE

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‘One of the things you hope for is that thebroadcasters will continue to have enough clout to lead these things because they need to. One ofthe reasons 2005 was so successful [in terms ofdeveloping world TV coverage] was that the BBCreally did start to say, “look we’re really going tocommit to this’’’(Richard Bradley, independentproducer).

Richard Bradley’s comment is, of course, alsoacknowledging the possibility that the power ofbroadcasters to ‘channel’ audiences to particularmaterial may be severely eroded. But most of thebroadcasters felt that their best response to thisthreat demands exactly the qualities – imagination,a willingness to take risks and engage in self-reinvention – that richer representations of thedeveloping world require.

2005 was a year that questioned some assumptionsabout media performance in representing thedeveloping world: news producers returned todisaster stories to track progress, and some verycomplex issues – including poverty and debt, andclimate change – were tackled in popular newsbulletins. Major primetime slots were given over to diverse, more rounded and often celebratorycoverage of developing world contexts.

Broadcasting showed some important examples of both leadership and creativity in 2005 in itsrepresentations of the developing world. Can itsustain this? This research suggests that if publicservice broadcasting is to mean anything in thefast-changing media environment, it needs to:

make more space to understand and think aboutcomplex and unfamiliar issues and placesbe more open to pollination from outsideinfluences invite risk taking and experiment look for creative ways of splicing together genres and platforms to reach a range of audiences.

Too much of a shopping list? Perhaps this can best be seen as a recipe for getting goodprogrammes to wide audiences at a moment of uncertainty and change.

Joe Smith

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This report was funded by the CommonwealthBroadcasting Association, the Department for International Development, the InternationalBroadcasting Trust, the Open University GeographyDepartment and VSO.

The project team was Neera Dhingra (VSO), MarkGalloway (IBT), Joe Smith (OU), Laura Solomon(VSO) and Sally-Ann Wilson (CBA).

Thanks to Lucy Edge, Vanessa Morris and JonCohen at Rosenblatt for the focus group research,Anita Neville for planning and conducting thebroadcaster interviews, Irene Oswick fortranscribing them, Rachel Bishop for proofreadingand to birdy for the design.

Photos courtesy of BBC, Channel 4, Five TV,BSkyB, Tightrope Pictures, VSO, John Maguire/BobGeldof and individual interviewees.

L IST OFINTERVIEWEESBBCJana Bennett, Director of TelevisionRoly Keating, Controller, BBC TWOPeter Horrocks, Head of Television NewsSeetha Kumar, Executive Editor, Africa Lives on the BBCSian Kevill, Editorial Director, BBC WorldKrishan Arora, Independents Executive

OTHER BROADCASTERSDorothy Byrne, Head of News and Current Affairs, Channel 4Peter Dale, Head of More4Chris Shaw, Senior Programme Controller, News and Current Affairs, Five TVNick Pollard, Head of Sky News

INDEPENDENT PRODUCERSBrian Woods, True VisionStephen Lambert, RDFChristopher Hird, FulcrumRichard Bradley, LionMoise Shewa, SpiritworldHuma Beg, SerendipLorraine Heggessey, Talkback Thames

POLICY EXPERTSMark Goldring, Chief Executive, VSOSteve Tibbett, Head of Policy, ActionAid and Make Poverty History coordination teamOnyekachi Wambu, African Foundation for Development (AFFORD)Tom Burke, E3G, Third GenerationEnvironmentalismMike Hulme, Tyndall Centre for Climate Change ResearchMike Green, Head of Civil Society and Information Department, DFID

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