Promoting peace through the news media: Some initial lessons from the Oslo peace process

This article attempts to examine the role of the news media in an ongoing peace process.The Israeli-Palestinian negotiations in the city of Oslo led, in August 1993, to one of the most important breakthroughs in the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. The Rabin government saw the news media as a crucial tool for mobilizing Israeli public opinion in favor of the peace process. Yet a study of the ongoing transactions between antagonists and journalists has provided some troubling lessons about the ability of leaders to promote peace through the news media.There are at least three major ways in which the news media can serve as obstacles to peace: (1) by focusing on events rather than processes; (2) by focusing on the unusual, the dramatic, and the conflictual aspects of the process; and (3) by making it difficult to conduct successful negotiations. In-depth interviews with a variety of leaders, activists, and journalists reveal that all three of these problems made it more difficult for the Israeli government to promote the peace process to the Israeli media.