Such a conception could have been appropriate in the past, currently, the scope of development communication has broadened to include an analytical aspect as well as a dialogical one—intended to open public spaces where perceptions, opinions, and knowledge of relevant stakeholders can be aired and assessed.
The artistic side of communication involves designing creative messages and products, and identifying effective interpersonal, group and mass-media channels based on the sound knowledge of the participants we seek to reach.
[96] The "policy sciences" therefore adopts an approach to understanding and solving problems that draw on and contribute to all fields of knowledge (Quebral, 2006)[97] and sets out procedures in an integrated and comprehensive form to help clarify and secure common interests.
As such, the notion of the policy sciences is construed in various shades since it was introduced in the 1940s and over the years, Lasswell and his colleagues refined the concept, through practice and peer review, as the intellectual tools needed to support problem-oriented, contextual, and multi-method inquiry in the service of human dignity for all.
[71] According to Laswell (1971, p. 39),[101] an adequate strategy of problem solving in policy sciences encompasses five intellectual tasks performed at varying levels of insight and understanding namely: goal clarification; trend description; analysis of conditions; projection of developments; and invention, evaluation, and selection of alternatives.
Picard and Pickard (2017)[110] note that "policy principles are coherent statements based on underlying norms and values that help policymakers and organisations respond to issues and take part in legislative and regulatory activities".
This is aligned with the long tradition of strategic communication initiatives used in development projects related to human rights, democracy, poverty alleviation and health aimed at generating awareness, promoting behavioral changes, affording mobilization, and creating partnerships to reach common goals.
Steeves (1993)[134] drew attention to critical scholarship about the political economy of communication and participatory approaches to development (Freire, 1983)[135] to propose the creation of a global, imagined feminist community that challenges power relations.
Watkins (1999) cites Steeves (1993) whose summary of feminist scholarship concluded that, among other areas, research is needed "on women's roles and representations in Third World development communication activities, including funding agency projects" (p. 120).
The policymakers simply blame the despondent lives led by the poor in Third World countries and it is being attributed to the lack of motivation and access to information relating to the various social and economic aspects that they need in order to redeem themselves.
There is research indicating that the use of big data represents an important complement to country level statistics (Taylor & Schroeder, 2015).,[165] better water quality modelling (Korfmacher, 1998)[166] and improved agricultural development (WESTERVELT, 2001).
[168] Collste and the researchers have shown in a Tanzania experiment that modelling approach towards SGDs can bring interlinks to the forefront and facilitate a shift to a discussion on development grounded in systems thinking.
According to Flor & Smith (1997), these three areas in Transformational Communication operate as institutional or network level, process-driven social learning which initiates values formation, and strategic by working with specific leaders and policy makers key to the mobilization of the critical mass in environment revolution.
Therefore, policy creation in fostering environmental communication is vital as it has significantly contributed to the totality growth of economy and serve as a platform to raise key questions that positively helpful in decision making.
A UNICEF commissioned report by Galway,[184] for example, cited that there was a large communication initiative in Bangladesh where a national information campaign was launched to raise awareness of villagers on arsenic in drinking water.
Under the strategy, the World Bank, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) focus on three priorities: (1) Transformation, by making developments more open and accountable and improving service delivery; (2) Connectivity, by scaling up affordable access to broadband including for women, disabled citizens, disadvantaged communities and people living in remote and rural areas; and (3) Innovation, by developing competitive IT-based industries and fostering ICT innovation with a focus on job creation.
Rather, the problematic conditions of women, along with the interventions designed to resolve them, need to be situated within a broader context of discourse and practice that privileges individual consumption and structural privatization in strategies for social change (Watkins, 1999, 63).
Wong (2012)[207] illustrates that restricted access to assets, gender-biased institutional arrangements, and unfavourable social structures have reduced women's capability to draw on ICTs in tackling climate change.
Since its early inception, development communication has been widely utilized by many regions of the world owing its strategic direction of alleviating the lives of the poor by extending knowledge and information to a number of projects and programs intended to create a sustainable life.
[212] In this website, one document dates back to 1936, an Encyclical Letter of Pope Pius XI, called "Vigilanti Cura", manifesting his thoughts on the "Motion Picture" as it affects the moral and religious life of Christians.
[233] Further, organizational theory (OT), according to Barzilai (2016), is the "study of organizations for the benefit of identifying common themes for the purpose of solving problems, maximizing efficiency and productivity, and meeting the needs of stakeholders".
It is then instructive to highlight their commonalities or similarities to affirm their interface: (1) systematic (planned, organized, designed, or an approach); (2) change-oriented, preferably for the better if not the best (public good); (3) holistic and multidimensional; (4) pro-people or advocates of equity or social justice, and (5) largely participatory.
[240] However, the demarcation of the First, Second and Third Worlds by the late 1960s to early 1980s has broken down and the cross-over centre-periphery can be found in every region, a need for a new concept of development which emphasizes cultural identity and multidimensionality is raised (Servaes and Malikhao, 2005).
[241] Apart from the obvious economic and financial crisis, they elaborate that one could also refer to social, ideological, moral, political, ethnic, ecological and security crises thus the previously held dependency perspective has become more difficult to support because of the growing interdependency of regions, nations and communities in the globalized world.
Flor (n. d., as cited in Academia, 2015) states that policy sciences and development communication have seemingly identical underlying function in society: to solve societal issues and make social change possible for the benefit of the greater majority.
Pooling their land together, the farmers in this community leveraged their social and political networks to take advantage of the changing economic climate in Pune and built a mixed-use township on their 400 acres of farmland (Sami, 2013).
In Malawi, one of the poorest regions in Africa, Agunga (2012) emphasised that the success rate of poverty-reduction programming could be greater if C4D education was provided for development decision-makers and field staff, especially agricultural extension workers.
Employing a nationwide marketing network composed mainly of fellow Filipino-Chinese traders, the cartel has held a viselike grip over rice trading since the post World War II years that enable them to virtually dictate the buying price of dried paddy all over the country (pp.
For instance, Kaunda (1990) described that a smallholder development strategy in Malawi, Africa puts emphasis on commercialization of agriculture, combined with decision making processes which are centralized in the bureaucracy, serving only to reproduce and perpetuate historical forms of social differentiation which are the basis of the women's subordination and/or subjugation.
Gail has spent the last two decades creating and directing the development and integration of innovative economic ideas and campaigns and strategic alliances with policy makers to advance women in leadership throughout the world... She has held numerous corporate board positions for start-up companies and guided new social venture partnerships.