ABSTRACT
The media structure of anglophone West Africa is commonly viewed as comprising three components: traditional or indigenous media; modern ‘mass’ media; and post-modern ‘new’ media (Ansu-Kyeremeh 1998; Wilson 1998). And in the ambit of modern mass media, three tiers are identified: government and public media; private and commercial media; and community media. The concept and practice of community media within this environment raises fundamental problems about its potential utility as agents of democracy and development. This chapter explores these problems. It critiques current conceptualizations of community media in light of their primary rationales as facilitators of democracy and development, suggests the reconceptualization of community media as a form of popular media (defining it as ‘popular community media’), and analyses the community radio process in Ghana and Nigeria in terms of this definition of popular community media.
