Empty hands!
With CARE in Tanzania September 2012
Report 2012
One of the privileges of my independence as a senior free-lancer is the wide range of jobs I get involved in and the contacts to many fine people that follows with it. Often in areas that are quit new to me. Pure curiosity seems to be a considerable part of my motivation. The past year has been no exception.
Take for instance the investigation I conducted during the spring and summer for the Nordic Council of Ministers on “Neighboring Culture in the Nordic Countries - distribution, access and use”, (only published in Danish!). Although electronic media play an important role in this cultural exchange, the report covers a much broader cultural field also encompassing music, literature, film etc. One element of the investigation was an e-survey carried out in all the five Nordic countries revealing the rather sad message that the interest in neighboring culture amongst the Nordic people is not as vide spread as some of us would like it to be.
Besides that I also had time to finish two contributions to upcoming books (in English) on Public Service Media, one of them dealing with the evolution of public service management from the past era of monopoly to the digital present and future. In the same area I have continued my job as one of the five editorial commissioners with the Open Society/Sorros Foundations program “Mapping Digital Media - journalism, democracy and values" (see here) now having published a considerable part of the planned 60 country reports on the effects of media digitalization. In February I was a surprised yet proud receiver of the "The 2012 emma award - in Recognition of a Lifetime's Commitment to Media Management and Education" at the European Media Management Education Association's conference in Budapest (see here).
In the more general field of management I have continued my work at the boards of Roskilde University and the Danish Film Institute. Also my participation in the SLIP program (Strategic Leadership in the Public Sector, see here), at the Copenhagen Business School, Center for Business Development and Management should be mentioned. Now with more than a dozen Ph.D. projects under way.
The work in CARE International brought me this year to field visits to CARE projects in Tanzania, Kenya and Mozambique, both en- and dis-couraging experiences. As in many other places in Africa we are now witnessing a considerable growth in “BNP/capita” and a parallel concentration of the wealth in the hands of a tiny elite leaving the rural masses marginalized in continued poverty. Giving these people in the periphery – both nationally and internationally – a voice and establishing sustainable improvements of their living conditions is the mission of CARE.