Center for Media Research-Nepal Joins Media Influence Matrix Project
The Center for Media Research-Nepal (CMR Nepal), an autonomous, research- and policy-oriented, think tank in Nepal, has joined the Media and Power Consortium. The consortium runs the Media Influence Matrix, a project launched in 2017 by the CMDS.
Incorporated in 2011, CMR Nepal is based in Kathmandu, the capital city of Nepal. The center’s mission is to enhance the knowledge related to media policy and media development through research positioned to inform Nepal’s policymakers and media stakeholders.
CMR-Nepal’s vision is “to enable all Nepali citizens to access accurate information without hindrance, engage in public discourse without fear, and media to become ethical and professional playing a positive role in the process of democratization.” CMR-Nepal strongly believes in liberal democracy, human rights and media’s role in strengthening liberal democracy.
CMR-Nepal members include academics, practicing journalists and media researchers. Its Executive Board, elected every two years by the Annual General Assembly of all members, meets quarterly to make policy decisions and agree on mechanisms to supervise the activities carried out by the Secretariat. Day to day affairs at the center are overseen by the Secretariat with the executive director acting as the head of the office. Mr. Bhuwan KC is the CMR-Nepal chair and Mr. Ujjwal Acharya is the center’s executive director.
CMDS launched the Media Influence Matrix Project to investigate the profound influence that rapid shifts in policy, sources of funding and technology companies in the public sphere are having on journalism today. The project emphasizes news media in particular, including newly emerged players. The study is neither aimed at exhaustively mapping the entire media industry nor is it intended to target specific media sectors. Instead, its goal is to map the most popular and most influential news media on a country-by-country basis and analyze their changing relations with politics, government and technology companies.
Nicholas Benequista of the Washington, D.C.-based Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA), a consortium partner, wrote that Media Influence Matrix “addresses some glaring gaps in our knowledge”: it focuses on countries that are under-researched, gives us a view into the complex political economy of media that other research projects don’t and collects data in a comparative and publicly available format, which is a an invaluable resource for researchers, but also for the purposes of peer-to-peer learning.
See more information about the Media Influence Matrix