AFK-EuPRA – 18 (Part 1) and Panel 23 (Part 2):
Conflict and Peace in Arts, Media and the Public
The role of conflict in peace, arts, media and the public will be covered in two panel sessions. In the first panel (panel 18), contributors will critically investigate the powerful impact of visual discourse and tools, which has long been neglected in academia. From a historical perspective, one presentation empirically analyses how the world peace discourse has been characterized in visual representations and how symbols of peace have been appropriated. The second contribution reveals dualistic spatial and cartographic allocations of a (peaceful) here and a (violent) there, arguing for a reflected use of maps and images of space in order to unmask Eurocentric inequities. Linking both, visual analysis and cartography, the third presentation draws on participatory research and mapping, using the example of street art and narratives of social movement in the city of Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina. The second panel (panel 23) deals with the impact of media discourse and peace journalism. The first contribution aims to reveal myths and realities in the political rhetoric of far-right parties in Austria and France. Three more contributions deal with different aspects of peace journalism: While one paper employs Galtung’s concept of peace journalism to investigate how international news agencies are covering the case of Syrian refugees, another case study focuses on post-intervention divided Cyprus. From a meta-perspective, the final presentation discusses how journalists are practicing peace journalism by using social networking sites.
AFK-EuPRA – 18 (Part 1):
Conflict and Peace in Arts, Media and the Public
Chair: Lisa Bogerts (Goethe University Frankfurt, Germany)
Presenters:
Angel Iglesias Ortiz (University of Tampere, Finland): The visual representation of peace in scenarios of hegemony and antagonism
From a discursive perspective the presentation reviews the ways “peace” has been visually characterized by different national and international actors. This is seen through the categories of hegemony and antagonism as proposed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe’s Discourse Theory.
The images included in the presentation deal with the visual representation and symbolization of peace by different actors that try to fix certain meaning to it. Thus, the different attempts to articulate a signifier like peace in a discursive field will activate dynamics of hegemony and antagonism. The point of the analysis is to understand the ways the logics of difference and equivalence and issues of identity formation take place through these dynamics.
Fabian Namberger (University of London, UK) & Gerdis Wischnath (FU Berlin, Germany): Cartographies of Violence: Postcolonial Views on the (De-)Construction of Space in Research and Practice
Dualistic spatial allocations of a (peaceful) here and a (violent) there, near and far, global north-south, which bear on the construction of differences, are omnipresent. From the perspective of (political) science their task is to “order” and make researchable peace and war. Especially, cartographic images play a central role in the spatial fixture of conflict, peace and violence, since they not only cast complex and contested (conflict) realities into the visual frame of hegemonic patterns of interpretation (“north vs. south”, “strong state vs. failed state”), but at the same time use their visual power to move the causes of global conflicts to the global south’s “spaces of violence”. Against the reductionism of common spatial meta-narratives (state container, deterritorialisation) our contribution argues for a reflected use of maps in particular and images of space in general, in order to unmask Eurocentric inequities and to clear space for social hybridity and polyphonies.
AFK-EuPRA – 23 (Part 2):
Conflict and Peace in Arts, Media and the Public
Chair: Thomas Daffern (EuPRA)
Presenters:
Jamileh Dastmardi & Metin Ersoy (Eastern Mediterranean University, North Cyprus): The Role of the Media in Syrian Refugee Cases
Over the course of many years refugee cases are substantive phenomenon of the world. Refugee term is defined as “the emphasis of this definition is on the protection of persons from political or other forms of persecution. A refugee, according to the Convention, is someone who is unable or unwilling to return to their country of origin owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion” (Geneva Convention, 1951).
Throughout this era, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugee (UNHCR) and other humanitarian organizations employed in some largescale multimedia advocacy exercises, aiming at convincing Europe to do more to help refugees. It had been crucial work, placing the firmness for the remarkable rise in to focus on the refugee cases that implemented in the next half of 2015.
But the press was definitely not united in its response. Most of all, they found major variations between countries, in condition of the resources journalists used (local politicians, overseas politicians, individuals, or NGOs), the terminology they employed, the reason why they provided for the go up in refugee moves, the nice reasons they offered for the climb in refugee flows, and the alternatives they suggested (Berry et.al., 2015).
However, it is impossible to disregard the role of the media in influencing open public and elite politic behavior towards refugees. Mass media can arrange agendas and structure debates. They provide the information which citizens use to seem sensible of the world and their place within it.
International news agencies such as Reuters, AFP, AP, AA and TASS have enormous impact on the information news flow. Thus, it is necessary to do a research on how international news agencies are covering the Syrian refugees from the peace journalism perspective. Galtung (1998), the prominent proponent of this concept, defines it as healthy journalism. Galtung regards this new journalistic understanding as being healthy because PJ focuses on solving problems and being fair, balanced, truthful, human oriented and critical journalism.
The aims of this study are; to understand, how international news agencies news coverage can effect on refugees? The basic aim of this study is to explore how international news agencies are covering (framing) the Syrian refugees from the peace journalism perspective. The study will employ critical discourse analysis method.
Metin Ersoy & Raziye Nevzat (Eastern Mediterranean University, North Cyprus): Peace Journalism in Post-Intervention Divided Cyprus
This paper discusses how journalists are practicing „peace journalism“ by using Social Network Sites. Cypriot journalists who are living in Cyprus use SNS, as a tool for news sources, education, sharing news and finding new contacts. Cypriot journalists have created a Facebook group in order to use quick, cheap and easy communication features of it. In this group, journalists stay in contact with each other and learn new stories from each other.
The case study conducted in Cyprus in 2016 followed a qualitative research methodology: semi-structured interviews and document analysis were used for data collection. The study sample of 15 journalists was selected from volunteers among the Facebook group titled: „Journalists in Cyprus“.
Social networks contribute to journalists’ news collecting process. In addition to providing them with positive gratification and awareness, they also contribute to their news exchange between the communities. This digital platform could be a good example to journalists for establishing positive relations, raise awareness on getting the news from the right source and developing peace journalism assumption among the Cypriot journalists.
Papers in absentia:
Sandra Martínez Domingo (International Catalan Institute for Peace, Spain): What is the Link Between Immigration and Terrorism? Analyzing the Discourse of the Far-Right Parties from Austria and France.
Far-right parties gained considerable support in many European countries in recent years. Austria comes within a whisker of becoming the first country in the history of the European Union to elect a far-right president, Horbert Hofer, the candidate from the Freedom Party. Similarly, in France, Marie Le Pen is expected to be Front National’s (FN) candidate in the 2017 presidential election and probably to make it to the second round of voting.
For this reason, it is worth to analyse the political rhetoric of these parties, which is characterized by enhancing “national identity” and by appealing to fears and insecurity to the native population. Thus, this paper aims to investigate the myths and realities of their political discourse.
Each far-right party has its own particularities, but the analysis presents that all of them have a common strategic framework: defending a causal link between immigration and terrorism and describing the current context as an „invasion of violent radical Islamists“ who seek to incite the „decline of the Western civilization“. This discourse serves to justify its immigration and security political proposals, focusing on two main factors: the increase in the number of asylum seekers over the last few years and the Islamist terrorist attacks that have taken place in Europe. With a Eurocentric vision and with an in-group bias, these parties reduce current social context to a matter of national security and they stigmatise anyone who applies for asylum as an „enemy“ through usual processes of hate speech: dehumanization and objectification.
On the one hand, the paper contrasts the arguments and justifications regarding securitization and migration policies of FPÖ and FN parties with the latest data on terrorism and migration. On the other hand, this study summarizes social consequences that may arise from the growth of these anti-immigrant movements and policies.
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