Social-economic role of mass media in peacebuilding: the case of Uganda

Abstract

Peacebuilding is a fundamental and gradual process which cannot only exist through proper managing of political affairs as most people think. But also, there is a need to understand other dimensions of peace which exist in the social and economic aspects of people in different countries or communities. Indeed, in the world where there is free circulation of ideas or information, mass media like; radios, televisions, songs and newspaper play a vital role in social-economic peacebuilding which may improve the quality of people’s wellbeing. Besides, people choose to use different media platforms depending on the gratification they hope to achieve from them. Therefore, inspired by uses and gratification theory, this chapter intends to explore the role of mass media in promoting social-economic peace among people. This was a case study research design and interviews were used to collect primary data. Content and descriptive analyses were used to interpret the data collected.