Evaluation of USAID/OTI Media Transition Grants in Bosnia and Herzegovina

摘要

The United States government seeks to foster the development of a free and independent media in Bosnia. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), Bureau of Humanitarian Relief (BHR), Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI) has assumed a leadership role in this area. In 1996, after the signing of the Dayton Peace Agreement, OTI opened offices in Bosnia--Banja Luka, Sarajevo, Tuzla, and Zenica--to assist in the peace process. One of the most important goals of the Bosnian Transition Initiative is the development of a free and independent media. The state-controlled media in Bosnia are partly blamed for the genocide of the 1990s. Government media ownership and manipulation of news content heightened ethnic tensions. Today, with support from international humanitarian organizations, Bosnian alternative media outlets offer different perspectives than the state media. Commercial media, known as alternative, include radio, television, and print outlets that now serve many regions of the nation. These alternative media outlets moderate the strangle-hold that the government media has traditionally maintained over news content. USAID/OTI supported the research of Maureen Taylor, Assistant Professor at The School of Communication, Information and Library Studies at Rutgers University to evaluate the impact of the media transition grants.