99987 - Journalism and Conflicts

Learning outcomes

At the end of the workshop, students will be able to understand the role played by journalism in understanding the causes of national and international armed conflicts, as well as in activating state and non-state responses to the outbreak of violence. In addition, students will practise the tools necessary to understand how exposure to journalism and the relation between journalism and governments, plus international organizations, civil society actors and public opinion, matters in international politics when conflicts are rising. The legitimization or the criticism of international conduct of state and interstate actors is also part of this complex puzzle.

Course contents

1. In the Beginning Was Herodotus: Travel and Frontline Chronicles
2. Journalism vs. Propaganda: The Contiguity with Power
3. Nature, Role, and Objectives of Journalism in Democratic Societies
4. The ring that Does not hold and Investigative Journalism: the Watergate investigation
5. Can Investigative Journalism stop Wars? The Pentagon Papers
6. War Reporters: when history meets the present. David van Reybrouck.
7. War Reporters: the role of the witness in the Lebanese civil war. Robert Fisk.
8. Witnessing versus Voyeurism: a moral dilemma. Ryszard Kapuscinski.
9. Witnessing versus Voyeurism in the Era of Live Wars. The Gulf Wars
10. The role of the media in the collective psychology of conflicts: representation and hidden scares.

Readings/Bibliography

Two books chosen among the following list:

Bob Woodward-Carl Bernstein – All the President’s Men – Res Gestae (2012)

Katherine Graham – The Secret Papers of the Post. From the Pentagon Papers to Watergate – Aliberti (2018)
David van Reybrouck – Congo – Feltrinelli (2016)
Robert Fisk – Middle Eastern Chronicles – Il Saggiatore (2023)
Robert Fisk – The Martyrdom of a Nation. Lebanon at War – Il Saggiatore (2010)
Ryszard Kapuscinski – The Cynic is Not Fit for This Job – and E/O (2010)
Ryszard Kapuscinski – Works – Mondadori Meridiani (2009)
Amedeo Ricucci – The War Live – Pendragon (2004)
Noam Chomsky – Media and Power – Bepress (2014)
Daniel Bar-Tal – The Trap of Intractable Conflicts – Franco Angeli (2024)
Laura Silvia Battaglia – Letters from Guantanamo – Castelvecchi (2021)

Teaching methods

Open Source Investigation
Fact-checking techniques applied to case studies
Video and audio content analysis
AI content detection

Assessment methods

Periodic Exercises
Pools with Mentimeter

Teaching tools

Lecture's Slides
Handouts
Papers

Office hours

See the website of Laura Silvia Carmen Irene Battaglia