Digital and social media as sites for ‘collaborative circumvention’: journalism and democracy in Zambia

This thesis develops the notion of ‘collaborative circumvention’ to explain how digital technologies facilitate synergies between citizens and journalists, and across interconnected platforms, to enhance the circumvention of political and economic restrictions imposed on journalism’s democratic functioning in authoritarian contexts. Using the case of Zambia, this conceptualisation draws from studies of circumvention (e.g., Parks and Mukherjee, 2017) and collaboration (e.g., Canter, 2013). I argue that similar and unique limitations emerge when citizens and journalists use digital and social media to circumvent restrictions on mainstream media and journalism. I therefore argue further that collaboration between mainstream and citizen journalism, and their synergetic use of mainstream, digital and social media platforms, strengthen the circumvention of the restrictions imposed on the democratic functioning of journalism. This collaboration profiles the interconnectedness of mainstream and digital/social media spaces. The thesis not only extends Parks and Mukherjee’s (2017) research on circumvention practices in Zambia, it also contributes to studies on collaborative journalism, grounded mostly in Western academy. By bringing these two concepts together the study bridges analyses grounded in the Global South and the Western academy respectively. This theorization provides new understandings of the Zambian media landscape, as well as speaking beyond it to both African and global concerns.

The thesis uses a critical political economy approach – which is calibrated to the conditions in Zambia and the Global South – to make visible the way the concentration of power in the president, agency of media owners, and practices of journalists, constrain the democratic functioning of journalism. It shows how similar and unique influences impinge on citizen journalism and social media. The research is based on interviews with political and government elites, media owners, journalists, and other stakeholders. It also draws on focus groups, online ethnographic methods, content analysis, and archival data.