Reader´s corner

Keeble, Richard L. ed., Tulloch, John, ed., Zollmann, Florian, ed. 2010. Peace Journalism, War and Conflict Resolution. 1st ed. New York: Peter Lang.

This informative book, which deals with the theory and practice of peace journalism, brings together a wide range of contributors from all sorts of backgrounds. Thus, the nearly 400-page long work is far from giving one final definition of the term peace journalism.

             The first section of the book examines new theoretical positions of this ever-changing term. Professor Richard Lance Keeble from the University of Lincoln points out how far even qualitative newspapers still are from embracing this model of journalism, and to which extent they promote the interests of the military-industrial complex instead.

            In the second section a range of authors evaluate the international importance of peace journalism by focusing on countries ranging from Sweden to the Philippines. German Ph.D. candidate Florian Zollmann shows by the example of Dahr Jamail, who covered the Battle of Falludja in the third Iraq War, that unembedded journalism from the perspective of the Iraqi citizens was important and possible.  

           In the final section of the book several contributors look at the critique of peace journalism. David Edwards impressively points out the role that mainstream journalism has played and still plays in mass killings and to which extent journalists are aware of that.

          Altogether, this book offers a good overview of the current state of research and practice of peace journalism and also does not exclude voices which are critical about it.