Strategic Participatory Communication and Development

Engagement and Empowerment

Anne Gregory author Gregoria Arum Yudarwati author

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Taylor & Francis Ltd

Publishing:15th Nov '24

£49.99

This title is due to be published on 15th November, and will be despatched as soon as possible.

Strategic Participatory Communication and Development cover

There has been a recent shift in the nature of public engagement from a culture of paternalism and control towards a public-centred approach involving collaboration and co-creation. This book draws on public relations and development communication insights to build a new community engagement model for public sector organisations who wish to engage with rural communities in developing countries. This theoretical model also offers a practical framework for Government in particular to engage with and empower rural communities as they adopt and exploit infrastructure developments. The outcome is mutual benefit.

By examining in detail how Government communicates with rural communities on renewable energy infrastructure projects in Indonesia, and underpinned by empirical research with those communities, this new participatory framework has been developed. It envisages progressive empowerment of rural communities as Government encourages active engagement on the installation and exploitation of renewable energy. This entails encouraging communities to determine for themselves their uses of sustainable energy sources and to take ownership of a co-determined future. In so doing, the Government itself is more likely to achieve its own renewable energy commitments.

Research-based and combining theory with practice, this thought-provoking book will be welcomed by strategic communication and public relations scholars and practitioners alike.

This book is a major and innovative contribution to strategic communication research and practice. With solid empirical foundations in local communities in the Global South and particularly Indonesia, the authors demonstrate the value of participatory communication when planning and implementing development projects. At the communicative core lies a mission to empower local communities by giving them a significant voice in decision-making, which in the long run also increases success for those funding developments.

- Dr. Jesper Falkheimer, Professor of Strategic Communication (Lund University, Sweden), President (European Public Relations Education and Research Association, 2024 and 2025)

Strategic Participatory Communication and Development: Engagement and Empowerment” combines insight based on “mainstream” engagement models predominantly developed in the Northern Hemisphere with findings and analyses from the Global South, particularly research done in Indonesia, where empowerment needs to be at the core of engagement to achieve meaningful outcomes. This vast archipelago of currently 280 million ethnically diverse people inhabiting a chain of islands stretching the same distance as London – Baghdad in one political entity, has for years been under-represented in academic treatises on community issues. This book by two outstanding academics, professors Anne Gregory and Gregoria Yudarwati is an essential contribution to fill this gap.

- Noke Kiroyan, Chairman (Kiroyan Partners and Kreab Indonesia), member of Global Strategic Communications Advisory, Kreab Worldwide

ISBN: 9781032716039

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: unknown

94 pages