IAMCR and the Global Alliance on Media and Gender

IAMCR Newsletter | December 2014

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The International Steering Committee of the Global Alliance on Media and Gender (GAMAG) held its first meeting at UNESCO headquarters in Geneva, Nov. 3-4, 2014. IAMCR is a member of the committee and was represented by Janet Wasko, IAMCR President, and Aimée Vega Montiel, IAMCR Vice-President. IAMCR’s participation at the meeting was discussed before the meeting by the members of the Task Force on GAMAG, which was recently created to coordinate IAMCR’s activities related to the alliance. 

The steering committee agenda included an overview of UNESCO’s role in GAMAG, as well as discussion of GAMAG’s structure, legal character, finances, key initiatives, communication guidelines, action plan and research agenda. Six committees were created to coordinate key strategic areas:

  1. Executive Committee;
  2. Youth Committee;
  3. Research Committee;
  4. Media and ICT Policies and Practice;
  5. Capacity Building and Training, and Content Production Committee; and
  6. Advocacy, Communications, Campaigning, and Outreach Committee.

Each committee will count on the representation of various ISC members and will be led by one of them.

IAMCR agreed to coordinate the Research Committee, which will include participation by World Association for Christian Communication, IT for Change, International Women’s Media Foundation, World Association for Newspapers and News Publishers and Arab Women Media Centre. Key activities that were suggested for the Research Committee were:

  1. To create a repository of existing research 
  2. To continue the discussions of a research agenda, which started with the book co-edited by UNESCO and IAMCR
  3. To commission and disseminate research  

The steering committee members emphasized the participation of GAMAG in the fifty-ninth session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) and the review of the BDPA (Beijing+20) in March 2015 in New York. Among the ideas discussed for the CSW agenda were issues related to gender representation in media content, access and participation of women in media industries, production of gender-sensitive journalism, gender media/information literacy, gender activism and social media, safety of women journalists, women with disabilities relations to media, and establishment of high-level committees on gender and media at UN agencies.

Other initiatives discussed were GAMAG’s participation at the Anniversary of the Beijing Declaration during the United General Assembly in September 2015 in New York and at WSIS+10.

For more information about IAMCR’s activities with GAMAG, contact Aimée Vega Montiel <aimeevm [at] servidor.unam.mx>.