Reporting on a foreign war or a crisis is a challenging activity, a true professional test for a journalist. Media is often criticized for promoting violence by its conflict reporting: either by staying detached or by being biased. Peace, or conflict-sensitive, journalism was created for improvement of conflict coverage: it emphasizes the active role of journalists in de-escalation of conflict and encourages them to report on peaceful solutions. This relatively novel approach might be met with skepticism, as it appears too idealistic and demanding to be followed by journalists. In order to verify the applicability of peace journalism, this book presents a comparative analysis of six US, UK and German newspapers on how conflict-sensitive, or at least balanced, they were in their reporting on the Russia-Georgia war of 2008. The content analysis of those six media has demonstrated that the peace journalism approach is not easy to implement into practice due to some imperfections of its models its parameters need to become more feasible and more specific. The case study has showed that those particular western media were neither conflict-sensitive nor war-oriented in their coverage of the Russia-Georgia war, and thus they kept the in-between stance. Overall, the reporting was balanced, particularly in its negative attitude towards all parties involved in the conflict.

Textprobe: Chapter 2.1.9, Russia-Georgia war: The war in Georgia in August 2008 can be found in different sources under different names: Russia-Georgia war, Caucasus war, Caucasus crisis, Georgian crisis, Georgian war, Ossetian war, August war, Five-day war, war 08.08.08 etc. For the study the name ‘Russia-Georgia war’ is used to be precise in the researched topic, i.e. it deals with the military actions between Georgia and Russia within the Georgian-Ossetian conflict from 7(8).08.2008 until 12.08.2008 (when the ceasefire agreement was signed). The Georgian-Ossetian conflict between Georgia and its breakaway republic South Ossetia has existed since 1991 and has considered as ‘frozen’ for years. There have been several outbreaks of violence, especially large-scale in 1991-92, 2004 and the last in 2008. As a case study for this study it has been chosen exactly the five-day war as well as the period before and after it within one month of August 2008. 2.2, Clarification of concepts: 2.2.1, Foreign reporting: Foreign reporting presents an outlook-window to the rest world, where perception of foreign cultures, countries and continents depends on quality, location and size of that window that ‘channels our view’. To be more precise, foreign reporting is ‘any system of transmission of journalistic information within which this information goes beyond state borders’. There are three main types of foreign reporting: foreign news abroad, home news abroad and foreign news at home. Moreover, Hahn describes a foreign correspondent as ‘homo limitaneu, a terrestrial border crosser, who is not everywhere to encounter and who belongs to the species incognita of the mass communication studies’. Foreign reporting is not a homogeneous theory, it heavily depends on other approaches, such as globalization, domestication (‘foreign news is hung on a domestic peg’), news value, information flow, media effects on international or domestic politics (e.g. CNN-effect, agenda-setting). However, it should not be forgotten that the nature of media is to follow and not to administrate so, its influences are rather limited by being able to ‘confirm and legitimate national politics”, and therefore to accompany the ‘hurra-patriotic’ mood as it was in the US during the Iraq war. Human beings have been always curios about what is happening in the neighborhood. In the age of Pre-Gutenberg world people get information about foreign countries and cultures through curriers, in a literature form, from letters, sailors etc. The nature of foreign news is changing steadily. This can be seen on particular cases, for example, reporting on the Cold War was conducted in a specific manner. As Sambrook mentions, ‘in the days of the Cold War there was a clear narrative which provided a simple lens through which to see international events’, i.e. if journalist reported from the US about the Soviet Union, he already knew which perspective to take and what kind of attitudes have been expected from him. So, ‘the newsworthiness of individual countries and their leaders was largely determined by their relationship to the United States and the Soviet Union’. It has become more complicated to create framing for international news as soon as the Iron Curtain fell down and the world become multipolar: journalists nowadays have to make more decisions of how to pack news. Some countries are more interested in foreign news, for example, third world countries depend on the European countries or the US. There are countries always in vogue of coverage for every country. Big and developed countries are busier with their home events. The unevenness of the flow of information was largely discussed in the MacBride Report in line with the New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO). This topic found further development in the study of foreign news of UNESCO. The terroristic attacks of 9/11 triggered a surge of interest to foreign news even in leading opinion-maker countries, such as the US. The audiences of those countries have become eager to consume world issues, but they prefer those issues ‘made as real as if it were ‘local’. So, even foreign news needs to be domesticated in order to become more welcome and close to the public. The second aspect that influences foreign reporting is globalization: understanding of us living in the multicultural world that, to technical and other development, is interconnected and turns into the ‘global village’. As a rule, inhabitants of a village always are happy to learn what is going own within the village, what people outside of their home are thinking, doing, dreaming of, creating and experiencing. This happen not because of the mere interest for the other’s news but also due to realization: that kind of information has nowadays ‘greater direct impact on lives than ever before’. Foreign reporting has different functions one of them is to build a bridge between different cultures. This property should not be overestimated. Indeed, in some cases foreign reporting contributes in increasing of misunderstanding between nations and countries, for example, through fertilizing stereotypes. Though, in general, media effects are difficult to be measured. For example, Hafez advices not to mix foreign reporting (for example, events in India) with reporting about foreigners (Indians in the home country), also there might be some interferences between both types of coverage. Investigation on how strong those dependencies are might become a possible topic for future researches. No doubt, each journalist has always some ‘trustworthy picture inside his head’ of any remote country and culture: sometimes the more information about that country is available the more stereotypical the image is. Moreover, there is often a call for stereotypes especially if there is no sufficient previous knowledge on a country or, on contrary, the audience is used to certain framing of some culture, so stereotypization seems to be a good ‘guarantee for high media sales’. By covering foreign affairs journalists use own experience and home knowledge, and report ‘through particular instead of global perspectives’. As Lippmann says, ‘for the most part we do not first see, and then define we define first and then see’. Some scholars look for the reasons of this stereotypical depiction in lack of time for journalists, when they, for example, need to prepare a proper and comprehensive TV piece in shorter time, and therefore simply refer to the habitual full of clichés way of coverage. Certainly, stereotypes affect immediately on the psychological level, and thus do not require lots of reflection and brain work. It is a sort of defense mechanism, desire to preserve some stability around, because stereotypes ‘may not be a complete picture of the world, but they are a picture of a possible world to which we are adapted. In that world people and things have their well-known places, and do certain expected things. We feel at home there. We fit in.’ In order to avoid stereotypes scholars suggest a concept of ‘dialogue journalism’ that means more interaction between journalists of different countries, more exchange of information in order to assure the equality of its flow and empower local journalists ‘to tell his or her own story’. However, the own story is always subjectively painted, so there is always need for outsider’s view, as ‘distance provides perspective’. Besides, there appear changes in the development and possible consequences of foreign reporting, first of all, foreign reporting about any remote country can also serve as a ‘raw material” for the local reporting of that country, thus the responsibility of foreign reporting increases. Second, journalists cannot longer ‘get away’: due to globalization and access to whatever information produced, subjects of report can now read, see or hear what was said about them, which is an additional ‘consequent pressure to deliver greater accuracy, fairness and accountability’. One of the important aspects of information flow and repetitions, or stereotypization, is the dependence of media on news agencies, especially on global largest ones, such as Reuters, AP etc. Even though having the same sources of information, media of different countries and different orientation construct their own media reality. However, there is still some impact of those international agencies that are ‘trickling down’ initial information received from government and other sources to other media and public. Even after appearance of various alternative international broadcasters, such as Al Jazeera, media products are still coined with the western stamp.

• Kriegsberichterstattung

• War Journalism

• Foreign Reporting

• Peace Journalism

• Conflict-Sensitive Journalism

• Russland-Georgien Krieg

• Russia-Georgia War

Amalia Oganjanyan wurde 1984 in Tiflis, Georgien, geboren. Als Stipendiatin des DAAD und der Deutschen Welle Akademie erhielt sie in 2011 ihren Master in International Master Studies an der Hochschule Bonn-Rhein-Sieg. Die erste journalistische Ausbildung schloss sie in Georgien ab. Außerdem studierte sie ein Jahr in Armenien. Seit 2003 schreibt Amalia Oganjanyan für zahlreiche Medien Deutschlands, Georgiens, Russlands sowie Armeniens und der Ukraine. Während des Sammelns ihrer beruflichen und akademischen Erfahrungen hat sie sich mit politischen Themen beschäftigt, insbesondere mit den komplexen Beziehungen zwischen Russland und Georgien. Während des Kaukasuskrieges 2008 und eines Seminars bei der DW-Akademie zum Thema Friedensjournalismus entwickelte die Autorin ein besonderes Interesse an der Konfliktsensitivität der Auslandsberichterstattung über den Russland-Georgien-Krieg.