African Journalists at Crossroads: Examining the Impact of China, US, and the UK’s Short-Journalism Training Programs Offered to African Journalists

ABSTRACT

This study examined the impact of short-term journalism training courses offered to African journalists by China, the US, and the UK. The purpose was to examine how such trainings shape editorial independence, culture, and institutional autonomy of African journalism. Through the lenses of 28 journalists interviewed across the Sub-Saharan continent, we demonstrated that, unlike the US and Britain who were reluctant to openly show their influence, the Chinese government was directly involved, and the training focused on exposing journalists to the Chinese culture, and how to report China. Journalists who attended the Chinese training program indicated that China controlled the process of their news writing and reporting, and those who adhered were incentivized. On the other hand, the British curriculum focused on how to criticize and challenge the African leaders and their governments. The US training program emphasized the questions of ethics.

KEYWORDS:

• African journalists
• short-term journalism training
• US
• British
• Chinese curriculum
• African narrative

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Correction

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article was originally published with errors, which have now been corrected in the online version. Please see Correction (https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2022.2154482)

Notes

1 Note that we only focus on in-house and short-term trainings to distinguish them from students who go to study for degrees in these countries. This distinction is important in understanding the difference in curriculums.