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DW
03-07-2025
- Politics
- DW
Effective dialogue initiative: Role of journalists and media
DW Freedom research shows that community engagement and active participation by media makers are key for facilitating dialogue. Reporting stories from rural parts of the country is not particularly attractive to most Ugandan journalists: They must traverse longer distances to meet with sources, transportation costs eat into their story fees, and stories from outside the capital don't attract as much interest among urban news consumers. But who tells the stories of Ugandans who live outside the capital Kampala? Who bridges gaps between citizens and local authorities in rural areas? Who nurtures a feeling of connectedness and understanding within rural communities? The project 'Uplifting Community Voices' empowers community reporters and local correspondents to take care of that. 'Uplifting Community Voices' is one of several initiatives currently being researched by DW Freedom to uncover the key factors behind initiatives that successfully create and host formats for constructive and inclusive public dialogue. The research is based on a two-step methodology including desk-research to identify and evaluate dialogue initiatives and 18 in-depth interviews with representatives of selected initiatives. A comprehensive report is currently in the making and will be available soon. The report showcases ways in which societal dialogue can be achieved, identifies challenges along the way and key factors in achieving success. Preliminary results are already emerging, for example, on the role of journalists in fostering dialogue. Journalists in dialogue initiatives: Not only storytellers but active participants The Tribal News Network (TNN) in Pakistan promotes dialogue between Afghan refugees and host communities by training women as local reporters Image: Tabish Naqvi Many dialogue initiatives specifically focus on marginalized and minority groups, including ethnic and religious minorities, women, refugees, and underserved urban residents. Agência Mural , for example, amplifies voices from Brazil's urban peripheries, while the Tribal News Network (TNN) in Pakistan promotes dialogue between Afghan refugees and host communities by training women as local reporters. Media plays a central role in many of these initiatives, which is why journalists and media professionals are not only involved but are also a key target group. Some interventions encourage journalists to examine their own role within public discourse critically – particularly in contexts shaped by conflict or its aftermath. In such settings, journalism takes on added dimensions, touching on issues of reconciliation, representation, and collective healing. A dialogue project in Colombia, for example, seeks to rebuild trust between journalists and survivors of conflict through public dialogues and storytelling workshops designed to foster mutual understanding. Likewise, MiCT's 'Restoring Hope' project in Iraq brings together local journalists and artists to engage with the difficult legacy of enforced disappearances. In both cases, media professionals are not only storytellers but also active participants in broader societal conversations about justice, memory, and the path forward. Media as platforms for dialogue and tools for empowerment Overall, media plays a central and multifaceted role in the dialogue initiatives studied. In several projects, they serve as a direct platform for dialogue. For instance, DW Akademie's initiatives in Ghana and Uganda leverage radio programs and live townhall broadcasts to connect communities with local authorities and encourage public discussion. In Uganda, the project 'Uplifting Community Voices' mentioned above supports radio stations in reporting on rural stories more affordably, helping bridge communication between village, district, and national levels. At the district level, the radio stations themselves take on the role of dialogue facilitator. The outcomes of these discussions are then carried forward by the project partner, Media Challenge Initiative, which reports on the district-level dialogues to ensure that grassroots concerns are elevated to the national level. A district community reporter interviewing a local officer of a waste dump in Uganda Image: Musoke Lawrence Several projects deploy creative and artistic media to stimulate dialogue and reconciliation. In Iraq, MiCT's visual‑arts‑based programs use art to open discussion on trauma and coexistence. In Colombia, DW Akademie supports communities in creating historical story‑timelines and collective narrative projects to advance local peacebuilding. A similar approach is visible in Lebanon through Adyan Foundation's 'Alwan Debate' project, where teachers and youth are trained on pluralism, nonviolent communication, and inter‑faith dialogue, backed by manuals and experiential learning activities. Scaling dialogue initiatives: Expanding beyond the community level Community-level engagement forms the backbone of many dialogue initiatives. These programs often depend on direct, face-to-face interaction to involve citizens in discussions about issues that affect their daily lives. When successful, many projects try to scale their efforts to the district level or even national level, building a network that spans multiple communities. Some initiatives also start at this level. Projects like OMNI Ethiopia's 'Voice of Peace' radio campaign involved state-level actors and regional dialogues from the start, demonstrating how government partnerships can expand reach. While scaling remains a persistent challenge in participatory civic media, several promising initiatives have demonstrated the potential to bridge effectively between local, national, and even transnational levels. How exactly they managed to do so will be illustrated in the upcoming report. This much can be revealed: 'Uplifting Community Voices' is one of them. Written by Ines Drefs, Hanna Hempel and David Schneider
DW
27-06-2025
- Business
- DW
Advancing dialogue with the help of AI
AI can be used to create safe spaces for audiences as well as new revenue streams for digital newsrooms, argues Rappler's Don Kevin Hapal. DW Freedom: Don Kevin Hapal, you are Head of Data and Innovation at Philippine digital news outlet Rappler , and currently developing new digital exchange spaces for your audiences. Why don't you just use what big social media platforms have to offer? Don Kevin Hapal: We are often overly dependent on big platforms like Facebook. Our Facebook traffic has dropped significantly over the past year. Generally speaking, these platforms have given up on working with newsrooms. So this is not a question of if we can be independent — we must. We must get our communities to go onto our own platforms directly. And, at the same time, we wanted to build a space where people could not only access information from our newsroom but also have a conversation without all the toxicity, harassment and fear. A safe conversation which is moderated and managed by journalists. But this then will be a rather small public sphere — is it limited to Rappler's community only? We are hoping to bring other newsrooms into this and use the same technology as well — so that in the end different communities can be in exchange. We use a decentralized platform technology for this, which is called "matrix". The idea behind this is that we want to see people having control over their own communication. So you offer users of the Rappler app the opportunity to take part in different exchanges. Yes, and we have plugged a lot of AI features into this app, to help keep the conversation clean. The AI checks for violations of community guidelines, but we also have a layer of human moderation to make sure it covers the spaces that should be covered by humans. The AI checks 24/7 and flags problems — and the human moderator then takes a look and decides on actions. And then we use a chatbot that we call Rai. What is special about this chatbot? Rai is largely using latest information from the Rappler website. It is built on a large language model (LLM). But we are limiting the data it uses to avoid hallucinations based on a technique called GraphRAG, a method for enhancing accuracy. It is still early stages. We started building this in 2023. The acceptance seems to be OK. Rai provides the users with a unique Filipino and Asian perspective when it comes to world events. And this project shows that we can integrate AI responsibly to support journalistic rigor in the face of disinformation. You also run something called "AI dialogue"? One of our general ambitions is to develop new deliberative technologies and work through surveys with our audience. For this we are experimenting with an online AI moderated focus group discussion tool called AI dialogue. A bot hosts online discussion groups that can talk about specific topics. The AI then asks people a lot of questions and creates ideas for policy recommendations that come from these discussions. Overall we introduce a three step process: We synthesize information, the bot then asks follow-up questions and then it creates a quick summary of what has been said. Can you give an example? One example is a creative process we started for collecting democratic input on how AI could be governed. We ran this as a project in cooperation with Open AI. We built a scalable conversation where many people gave their input. For other topics we have been working with local governments. Because we can offer AI powered public consultations. They used the tool to consult with their constituency and then came up with local policies. This line of work has turned out to be profitable for us, too: We have been able to monetize AI-powered market research. But don't traditional representative audience surveys deliver more reliable insights? The traditional surveys have their limitations, too. What we offer is that we can complement this with qualitative information. In your experience, what is the most important thing to consider when governing AI? We at Rappler were the first to publish an AI guideline . What is important for me is that whatever we build we ensure transparency. We must be open about what data is used and what for. Rappler is a digital company. Has your innovative power made you an interesting partner for Big Tech? We must see that most of Big Tech's business is with other sectors. I know that in the US some news organizations were able to agree on deals with them. But I think we cannot do that here, in the Philippines. They are not interested. When we did the project with Open AI, we had a lot of conversations with them. But in the end nothing concrete has come out. Don Kevin Hapal was introduced to data journalism while writing and researching about social media, disinformation, and propaganda. One of his investigative pieces led to one of the biggest network takedowns by Facebook, covering 220 pages, 73 accounts, and 29 instagram accounts, with a combined following of 43 million users. Interview: Jan Lublinski
