Mediawatch's weekly catch-up with Lately. Jeremy Rose talks to Karyn Hay about The Guardian's new New Zealand and Pacific offerings, media coverage of the political turmoil in Bolivia, and the blossoming of prison journalism in the USA
Who is The Guardian's beefed up NZ section aimed at?
Last week The Guardian announced it was beefing up its New Zealand coverage. In a message to readers The Guardian said: "We intend to increase the scope of our journalism here, covering inequality and social justice, Māori affairs, environment and the climate emergency, politics, culture and sport."
Photo: Guardian: screenshot
It's early days but at this stage it's hard to know whether the primary audience is the rest of the world or readers in New Zealand.
The message to readers with its plea for donations from New Zealanders and its claim "that our audience here is well established and wants more" suggests that the stories are being written with Kiwis in mind but much of what's on offer feels more suited to an international audience.
Today's offerings include: a backgrounder on Chlöe Swarbrick by political scientist Bryce Edwards; a piece on Richard Hadlee; and responses to a Guardian questionnaire on the changes New Zealanders want to become a nation of 5 million.
The Chlöe Swarbrick story doesn't add much to what most New Zealanders will already know about the young Green MP - but foreign audiences will doubt be interested to read more about the young politician whose "OK boomer" retort boomeranged around the world.
With Sir Richard Hadlee playing his last game for New Zealand in 1990 it seems unlikely there's that much interest in his playing career either here or overseas. Definitely one for cricket tragics - and originating as it does for the Guardian's cricket email The Spin that seems like its intended audience. (And its a vocal audience with 200 plus comments on the story.)
The changes New Zealanders want is a kind of self-selecting vox pop and is probably of more interest to foreigners than New Zealanders but the series that spawned it is a substantial look at the state of Aotearoa written by Guardian writer Eleanor Ainge Roy, freelance journalist Mark Roach and Harriet Sherwood.
The picture it paints will be familiar to New Zealand readers but it's packed with facts and figures and is a useful and engaging backgrounder that will inform both local and international audiences.
In the week since its launch the New Zealand Aotearoa section has featured stories on James Shaw, Chlöe Swarbrick, Jacinda Ardern and Helen Clark - all could be characterised as on the laudatory side of things. And it seems likely the Guardian's liberal readership's appetite for stories celebrating the successes of progressive politicians is driving the news selection.
Charlotte Graham-McLay's glowing profile of James Shaw is a case in point. Shaw is portrayed as a reluctant politician pioneering world firsts in battling climate change while literally pulling down walls separating the elites from the common people - or in his case the minister's office and those of his staff.
It's an entertaining yarn but readers would have benefited from hearing some of the criticism of the Zero Carbon bill. The bi-partisan support for the bill while welcomed by virtually everyone did lead to something of a void when it came to political criticism. With the notable exception of James Shaw's predecessor as male co-leader of the Green Party Russel Norman.
The now head of Greenpeace provided a detailed and scathing critique of the zero carbon bill in this year's Bruce Jesson lecture. Audience in New Zealand and overseas would have benefitted from hearing some of the points he made.
There's always going to be a tension between writing with the sort of depth that's required to add value to what's already being covered by the New Zealand media and providing coverage for a global audience.
One organisation that successfully walked that tight rope is Vice - which opened a New Zealand office in 2015 and was closed earlier this year when the company slashed staffing around the globe. It produced some truly memorable work including Gangsters in Paradise and A brief guide to riding out the Apocalypse in New Zealand.
The thing that made Vice's content stand out was that it was new. They tackled stories that hadn't been covered by anyone else.
Many of its documentaries received New Zealand on Air funding and presumably The Guardian could benefit from public funds in the future too.
Pacific journalists set to benefit from Guardian's push into Oceania
Last month the Guardian announced a Pacific journalism project that sounds promising. Headed up by Kate Lyons in Australia the project will see the Guardian "establish a network of Indigenous Pacific journalists and collaborate with publications across the Pacific, including Vanuatu, Tonga, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, the Marshall Islands, the Solomon Islands, Samoa, French Polynesia and New Caledonia."
The project is being funded by the Judith Neilson Institute which has pumped $100 million into Australian journalism.
One person's coup is another's democratic uprising
"Pachamama will never return to the palace. Bolivia belongs to Christ.” Those were the words of Bolivian protest leader Luis Fernando Camacho after he stormed the abandoned presidential palace earlier this week.
The rights of Pachamama - or Papatuanuku as we know her - are enshrined in the Bolivian constitution introduced by Evo Morales who is now in exile in Mexico.
One of the concrete outcomes of the law was the nationalisation of most of the country's natural resources - including gas fields owned by Fernando Camacho's family.
Luis Fernando Camacho's tweet of himself inside Bolivia's presidential palace Photo: Luis Fernando Camacho: Twitter
Those and many other details are included in a fascinating article by journalist Max Blumenthal and Ben Norton on the Grayzone website.
The article describes Camacho as a Christian fascist and there's a wealth of background material backing up the claim - including links to fascist movements in Europe and the rest of Latin America.
Last week indigenous supporters of Evo Morales prevented Camacho from leaving the airport in La Paz to deliver a letter to the presidential palace. Reuters reports published by the Otago Daily Times, Newshub and RNZ describe Camacho as a "civic leader" and made no mention of his far right leanings or connections to violent organisations.
Fair - a US NGO dedicated to promoting fairness and accuracy in reporting - has taken issue with the US media reporting of the situation in Bolivia and in particular its reluctance to call it a coup.
And the report pointed out that while it's been widely reported that the Organisation of American States had raised concerns about the election process a thorough analysis of those results by the Centre for Economic and Policy Research largely rejected the OAS concerns.
Journalism from the inside
The Listening Post is Al Jazeera's answer to Mediawatch: a weekly look at how the media is covering the important stories of the day. The big difference is that their beat is the world - with a budget to match.
A recent episode featured a story about some stunning journalism being produced by America's prisoners. Journalist Flo Phillips reports that not only is the journalism illuminating the prisoners are learning new skills - with one, John J Lennon, even acting as a contributing editor to Esquire magazine from inside his cell.
Photo: Al Jazeera: screenshot
Last month he wrote a powerful piece explaining why it had taken him so long to write a letter of apology to the family of the man he killed - one of his childhood friends. Well worth a read.
The Al Jazeera report also features Ear Hustle a true crime podcast produced from inside and outside San Quentin prison. Most recent episode featured a prisoner and the cop he shot and nearly killed. It's a gripping story of redemption and restorative justice.
As far as I'm aware there's nothing similar happening in New Zealand. If I'm wrong I'd love to hear about it. Email me at: jeremy.rose@rnz.co.nz
