[Development] Focusing on Metrics and Not People

Whew. I just published the third and final part of my “New Era of Media Development” series over at Idea Lab. I’m glad to have that out of the way. I know I’ve been whining quite a bit lately about the funding community, but that’s...

The New Era of Media Development

Update: I’ve decided to publish this one over at Idea Lab instead. Below is a teaser. Media development as a field within international development has existed for at least 30 years. Broadly speaking, media development organizations provide financial support,...
The Chapters of Cities

The Chapters of Cities

This is an especially American perspective of looking at the development of cities, but I think that the same basic evolution is generally true for cities around the world, even if they haven’t yet reached some of the later chapters. Chapter 1: Make-shift Slums...

[Video] TauTona Gold Mine

Another video from our bloggers’ trip to South Africa. In March 1886, nearly forty years after the California Gold Rush, legend has it that Australian gold miner George Harrison stumbled across a rocky outcrop of gold in what was then the Zuid Afrikaanse...
Monrovia

Monrovia

She had the silent solemnity of those who are either insistently spoiled or have suffered greatly. I felt badly for having taken her seat – I was sure, but wrong, that the Accra to Monrovia leg of the flight would be less crowded. But she waved me back down with...
Monrovia

Rebuilding Liberia's Media

How do you rebuild a country from scratch? First you need a government. Liberia, so far, has that under the leadership of President Ellen “Irony Lady” Johnson-Sirleaf, Africa’s first elected female head of state. Second, especially in the case of a...

Bangladesh

It’s difficult to believe that it’s that time again. Looking around my hotel room, all my stuff strewn about, and knowing that somehow, someway, it will all fit back into my little suitcase. Early tomorrow morning I will head back to the one place that has...

Big Banks Crush Mobile Innovation in Bangladesh

In addition to struggling through Amartya Sen’s The Argumentative Indian, I’m also reading Lawrence Lessig’s Free Culture. I first encountered Lessig in an international political economy class in college. This was before I was blogging and before...