| Chapter 1: | Introduction—Surveying the Cyberterrain of Developing Country Head of State Web Sites |
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Tsehai (2002) takes a broader view and refuses to pin all blame on the media, suggesting a need for African practitioners to generate more “positive” stories. Some NGOs and aid agencies are already culling demographic information about African countries not to engender media coverage but to formulate public relations programs to better communicate educational messages to a continent where illiteracy rates soar. The Baobab Press (1991), an African NGO, has said this information will allow communications experts to “disseminate ‘smart propaganda’ as effective and as potentially destructive as the so-called ‘smart bombs’ used in the recent wars” (p. 2). Although the number of dictators in Africa has diminished since the early 1980s, journalist David Lamb (1983) blamed the wave of propaganda squarely on Africa’s leaders, who he says want “boosterism” for themselves rather than their respective nations above all else.
Evidence shows that the media are not the only culprits in projecting a questionable image of Africa. Fürsich and Robins (2002) suggested in their study of Sub-Saharan country government Web sites that the sites “present a ‘reflected’ identity mirroring Western interests” (p. 190). According to these authors, the Web sites brand African nations as attractive sites for tourism and investment while downplaying the continent’s problems. In an article on South Africa’s tourism industry, Witz, Rassool, and Minley (2001) similarly suggested Western tourists want an “authentic” African experience without the unpleasantries. The dialectic tension between a branded Africa for the West collides with the “real” Africa, challenging the practice of public relations in Africa. It also provides a contested frame for testing existing propaganda and public relations theory in a dynamic cross-cultural context.
Middle East
The practice of public relations in the Middle East remains an understudied area (Taylor, 2001). Scholars have stressed the need to understand the historical and ideological context of the region, which in Islamic countries is often based on the Qur’an, resulting in a strong pan-Islamic identity and allegiance (Jowett & O’Donnell, 1999; Kruckeberg, 1996; Zaharna, 1995).