Human Rights and
International Democratic Solidarity

Research Reports

12-30-2005

Local level journalism and Democracy indicators in Latin America

By Fernando J. Ruiz
 

SUMMARY

The worst areas to practice journalism in Latin America in the last semester

  • BLACK AREAS
  • RED AREAS
  • BROWN AREAS

Impunity retreats
Police and Journalism
Goverment advertising and "subtle censorship"
Words to be remembered
Neopopulism in the communication media

About the author:
Fernando Javier Ruiz
Fernando.Ruiz@fci.austral.edu.ar

Advisor to the Democratic Strengthening Area of the Centre for the Opening and Development of Latin America (CADAL). Ph.D. in Public Communication from the University of Navarra Degree in Political Science from the Universidad Católica Argentina (UCA).
Professor at the Seminars on Journalism and Democracy and on History and Culture of Communications, at the Austral University School of Communications.

Author of the following books:

  • Otra grieta en la pared: Informe y testimonios de la nueva prensa cubana, 2003,(Another crack in the wall: Reports and testimonies of the new Cuban press) CADAL / Konrad Adenauer Stiftung
  • Las palabras son acciones: historia política y profesional del diario La Opinión de Jacobo Timerman, (Words are action: Political & professional history of the La Opinión newspaper belonging to Jacobo Timerman ), 1971-77, Perfil Libros, Buenos Aires, 2001.
  • El señor de los mercados. Ambito Financiero, la City y el poder del periodismo económico,(The master of the markets: Ambito Financiero, the City & the power of the financial press), El Ateneo, Buenos Aires, 2005.

Executive Summary

  • The Cuban dictatorship continues to harass journalists: a female journalist was imprisoned.
  • Mexico and Colombia continue to be the two most dangerous countries for journalists.
  • The chronic instability in Haiti maintains insecurity at a high level.
  • In Brazil, death can occur at any moment in any State.
  • Venezuela can become a Black Area if the Government implements the press controls that have been decreed.
  • At the Inter American Press Association’s ( SIP) request, Mexican and Peruvian editors arrived at a historic agreement to fight impunity.
  • In most Latin American countries, the police force is one of the main sources of aggression to the free press.
  • Populism in the different countries has a similar communicational policy of not valuing the role of journalism.
Fernando J. Ruiz
Fernando J. Ruiz
Academic Advisor
PhD in Public Communication (Universidad de Navarra) and degree in Political Science (Universidad Católica Argentina). Professor and researcher of Journalism and Democracy and History of Communications at Universidad Austral. He is the author of “Las palabras son acciones: historia política y profesional del diario La Opinión de Jacobo Timerman, 1971-1977”, “Otra grieta en la pared: informe y testimonios de la nueva prensa cubana”, “El señor de los mercados. Ámbito Financiero, la City y el poder del periodismo económico”. He is the president of the Foro del Periodismo Argentino (FOPEA).
 
 
 

 
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