Media, Conflicts & Journalism Commission (MCJ)

Media as one of the central components of the norm of global civil society has a moral responsibility to focus its attention on the issues of human rights and play a caring and educative role with the view to protect and promote human rights and peace in times of conflicts by exposing abuses and their underlying causes wherever they occur, as part of its ‘fourth estate’ role.

This role requires the media to demonstrate ‘news analysis’ in its coverage of conflicts as much as possible so that it can help construct the reality of conflict situations and enable human rights advocates and conflict resolution practitioners to deal with the situations. 

Media, Conflicts & Journalism Commission (MCJC) is mindful of this responsibility of journalists and expects to take a vigorous part in its assignment to assume this responsibility. MCJC,

  • Envisages its duty of fashioning a mindful awareness of ‘moral responsibility’ of the media towards protecting and promoting peace and human rights.
  • Intends to be the prominent ‘knowledge force’ that supports transforming media’s role in conflicts beyond the notion of objectivity to play a proactive role to contribute to the promotion and protection of human rights, which is indispensable for building peace.
  • Takes a critical evaluation, research and analysis of the traditional journalism in conflicts and provide unpretentious ideas, outlooks and information with the view to construct Martin Shaw’s call for ‘global society’ where media can play a significant role in addressing power imbalance in the society and being part of ‘global voice’.
  • Expects to scale, reach and influence the politicians, diplomats, policymakers, academics, organizations, media and journalists, and rightly respond to the emerging challenges and opportunities to achieve this objective.

 The commission aims:

  • To generate an exchange of ideas and insights between academics and professionals on the role of media for constructing human rights and peacebuilding options in conflict and post-conflict societies.
  • To uncover the challenges, difficulties and obstacles faced by media and journalists in upholding the international human rights norms and addressing justice and accountability issues as well as their implications for constructing human rights and peacebuilding options in conflict and post-conflict societies.

Commission Convener:

Senthan Selvarajan, - Center for Media, Human Rights and Peacebuilding, UK