Media and Ethnic Conflict Management: Case Study Nation Media Group

Abstract

The growth of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) has led to rising worldwide connectivity and both states and societies are being impacted by these changes. Mobile phones and Internet have provided many new possibilities and media for communication. This paper highlights the impacts of ICTs on conflict management, although it mainly focuses on the Media and Ethnic Conflict Management with case study of Nation Media Group. With the coming of the fiber optic and the increase with the number of people with mobile phones, communication has become more effective despite the good that comes with increased platforms of communication and interaction, the society has made this a battle field, with criminals using this platform to create war among the communities. This therefore is a great challenge in conflict management because this is a virtual platform where it would be difficult to bring the culprits to book. The objective of this study is to assess the Media and Ethnic Conflict Management by looking at various ways through which the media have been abused which include; through blog sites , hate speech messages and incitement. The primordialist theory indicates that the starting point of technological development, changes and innovation is always people. Proponents of primordialist accounts of ethnic conflict argue that ethnic groups and nationalities exist because there are traditions of belief and action towards primordial objects. This theory provides a way to assess the organization or community readiness for technological innovation. The study used a descriptive design approach. The target population in this study is Nation Media group departments. The researcher used a stratified sampling approach to cover the total population and examined a sample of 47, which is 60% of whole population. The data collection instrument used was self- administered questionnaire. The data collected was presented in tables and graphs. The findings indicated that 66.6 % of the respondents trust blogs sites , 68.2% of the respondents felt that hate speech is wide spread among Kenyans and 68.1% of the respondents indicate that incitement is rampant in the media fraternity which therefore affect conflict management. The researcher recommends that the young generation benefited a lot from the use of ICTs with an increasing access to information, freedom of expression and dissemination of information. At the same time ICTs can contributed to the promotion of peace, being the most obvious instrument among people using it on a daily basis. Greater and closer attention needs to be paid to the new media in order to regulate how private companies could work together taking the states responsibility and legitimate regulation of new media into account. There should be an increased focus on ensuring peace and security to states. Basically, governments should identify strategies to engage with private companies through opportunities such as consultative workshops to which commercial actors can actively participate that would help to develop an ethical framework, which could be used to guide the commercial media sector in their work. In order to appropriately prevent the negative impact of ICTs and social media, such ethical framework is needed for a responsible use of new media and to regulate the content of social media.