ABSTRACT
Communication has always been central to all paradigms of development. Governments, institutions, civil society and divergent ideologies pursue their ideas of social change with an array of communication strategies. For governments, it is an essential tool for fulfilling the citizens’ desire for better life and opportunities. As an academic, discipline development communication is like the conscience of journalism and development studies. It implies the aid of technology, education and mass communications for betterment of life. Unlike in the 1940s and the 1950s when the term development was implicitly used for modernising industry, agriculture and governance systems by whatever means, today it is a value-loaded term where development is a site for conflict over natural resources, forced displacement and contentious policy choices. Obviously, the implications of both development and communication have changed considerably.
