A consideration of development journalism In the context of Rwandan newspapers, 2013

Twenty years after the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, the country of Rwanda continues to struggle to realize successful strategies for national development. Development journalism is a widely practiced media model that implements theories of communication for development. Through content analysis of two Rwandan daily newspapers, one an independent English language newspaper and the other a government-owned Kinyarwanda language newspaper, this study examined the form that development journalism takes in Rwanda to understand more about the way it was implemented in the country, the historical, cultural, and structural challenges by development journalism and media more broadly in Rwanda; and the potential for development journalism to impact national development. Strong support was found for government sponsored pro-market programs demonstrating modernization and dependency theories of development rather than a pro-poor, participatory development and communication strategy.