To improve the information ecosystem we need to rebuild trust and focus on local, community-driven initiatives
On October 26, we gathered online with over 20 organisers, activists and journalists from 9 countries in Latin America. We were inspired to hear from speakers Nathaly Espitia (Nois Radio-Internews) and Maria Juliana (Universidad Icesi, Cali. Colombia) from Colectivo Noís Radio, Júlia Rocha from Artigo 19, and Ramiro Alvarez Ugarte from CELE, as well as from participants in the call, who joined us in an open discussion about challenges we’re facing in the information ecosystem in the region and opportunities we see for action. In this blog post we’re sharing some of the key takeaways from our conversation.
A healthy information ecosystem is one where people are able to listen and talk to each other
Our conversation started with learnings from Maria Juliana and Nathaly Espitia from Noís Radio,
a collective from Cali (Colombia) that has been working since 2009 on
producing live radio programs using voices, music, live sounds and
performative actions. They shared that they don’t see themselves as a
“traditional” radio station, but rather as a “medio de conversación” (or
conversation medium) that creates spaces for conversation and listening, not just one-sided sharing of information. For Noís Radio, the key to a healthy information ecosystem is that people are able to listen and talk to each other. This
approach was echoed by other participants in the call: for Ramiro
Ugarte from CELE, it is key that we think about how to generate more
dialogue and conversations, because building spaces where people can
have dialogue and connect face-to-face is key to combating polarisation
and achieving a healthier information ecosystem.
Building trust is a slow-burning process (but it’s worth it!)
During the call, we talked about some of the factors that serve as a
backdrop to our broken information system: the region is going through a
period of heightened lack of trust in media and institutions, there is
acute political polarisation in various countries, and citizens are
dissatisfied with political systems and experiencing information
overload. To respond to this scenario, many participants spoke about the value of creating information initiatives that include processes designed to rebuild trust with people in our communities.
For example, in their work, Noís Radio doesn’t approach communities
with a fixed, previously defined project – instead, the collective
invites people to join them in conversations and share what their needs
are, then they work on establishing relationships of trust and “pass the
microphone to people in their communities”. During the national strike
in Colombia, in 2021, for example, Noís Radio was in Cali recording shows from “puntos de resistencia”
(resistance points) with social organisations, young people, artists,
mothers and other protesters who trusted their microphones and shared
their voices. (You can listen to the shows here!). When talking about their experience, Nathaly and Maria Juliana shared that, though the trust
building process can be slow, it has proven to be essential, because it
gives you an important foundation when you need to organise during a
moment of crisis. Having already built trust with the people in
their communities over time and having meaningfully involved people in
their work in the past meant that Noís Radio were able to mobilise
quickly in a difficult political context, generating important
conversations within their communities.
The value of local information initiatives and fostering a sense of community
The sense that community-led efforts are fundamental to a stronger information ecosystem
in the region was echoed by Júlia Rocha, who leads the Access to
Information and Transparency team at Artigo 19 in Brazil. In her
perspective, “local solutions are the ones that work the most”.
In a region where the notion of public interest information has been
often shaped by corporate interests, as phrased by Júlia, investing in
local, independent, community-led communications is indispensable. Since
2020, her organisation has been supporting the work of popular
communication initiatives throughout the country with the campaign #CompartilheInformação, which has given grants to groups providing trustworthy information about health, democracy and elections and, soon, the environment. Brazilian journalism organisations Agência Mural and Énois
(who also joined our call!) are also showing how valuable local
initiatives can be for the information ecosystem. Seeing that people
lack access to information at the local, city level, they argue that
there needs to be more support to the “development of local initiatives that contribute to reducing news deserts”, which
provides citizens with the information they need in order to
“participate in public life from the territory where they live”. As Izabela Moi and Nina Weingrill put it: “quality local coverage creates and sustains the feeling of belonging to a
community and opens spaces for action and citizen participation.“ We see this in the work of Noís Radio too, in their work to empower
more independent voices in the information ecosystem. In our chat,
Nathaly and Maria Juliana talked about the importance of creating
initiatives that go beyond capital cities, as well as how crucial it is
to support the work coming from indigenous communities, afro colombian
communities and migrant communities. During the call, we also heard from Agencia Baudó in Colombia, who is doing “journalism that connects communities” by working with community storytellers that are not only providers of information, but also local leaders working in their communities for social transformation. Another example shared is the work of +COMUNIDAD, an argentinian “solutions journalism medium” that investigates, finds and tells stories of people and cities, solving their challenges and inspiring others to transform themselves.Participants also talked about the importance of counterbalancing the lack of “official” data about certain topics, especially in regions that lack access to information about issues such as sexual and reproductive health and rights or the environment, with the production of community-driven data or initiatives that democratise access to information.To that end, we talked about initiatives like Artigo 19’s map made for Brazilian women to know where to access abortion care in their states – information that had been previously unavailable.
Fighting harmful trends at a regional level and more support for sustained, long term alliances
We discussed some of the regional trends in information disorder and
how civil society in the region is witnessing the same types of disinformation being shared in many countries. Research led by Chequeado (Argentina), La Silla Vacía (Colombia), Lupa (Brazil), Ocote (Guatemala) and OjoPúblico (Perú), for instance, has shown how groups are organising to spread falsehoods about gender-related issues in Latin America. Recent investigative project Mercenarios Digitales, led by a cross-border and collaborative media alliance, has gathered evidence on the impact of an international network of disinformation actors operating in the region. In this context, participants shared that it is key to foster more multi-country spaces where civil society organisations, journalists and human rights defenders can work in an articulated manner to build a healthier information ecosystem. Similarly, participants also talked about how important it could be to have regional alliances that would allow them to foresee the types of disinformation and attacks that are emerging in the continent.