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‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism

Louisa Esther Orcid Logo, Richard Thomas Orcid Logo

Media, War & Conflict, Volume: 18, Issue: 2, Pages: 273 - 294

Swansea University Author: Richard Thomas Orcid Logo

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DOI (Published version): 10.1177/17506352241268814

Abstract

Since the renewed outbreak of the ongoing crisis in Burundi in May 2015, triggering a media crackdown, over one-third of the country’s reporters have gone into exile. They therefore joined an increasing number of journalists worldwide who are forced into exile. Between 2015 and 2021, many of the exi...

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Published in: Media, War & Conflict
ISSN: 1750-6352 1750-6360
Published: SAGE Publications 2025
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa67536
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last_indexed 2025-12-10T05:23:06Z
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Between 2015 and 2021, many of the exiled Burundian journalists continued reporting for newly founded exile media in neighbouring Rwanda. Before their forced closure in 2021, these exile media had established themselves as successful outlets providing the only independent information from an otherwise blacked-out country. Based on semi-structured interviews with 10 exiled Burundian journalists conducted in Rwanda in 2020, this article exemplifies how the condition of exile impacts journalistic practice and norms, and renegotiates ideas of media professionalism. It is shown how Burundian exiled journalists display a strong personal conscience as journalists highlighting the voice of the voiceless and attempting to separate activism from their journalism. At the same time, the findings identify the main struggles of Burundian exiled journalists in maintaining operational objectivity, which depends on funding, providing balanced reporting without access to official sources and conducting verification of information in the unattainable field. These challenges are in line with the findings of several other case studies with exiled journalists from different regions. Therefore, this article complements the rapidly growing body of literature on exile journalism with a Global South perspective, which to date is not well represented on the map of exile journalism that mostly features cases of exile in the Global North. 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spelling 2025-12-09T21:37:06.8373350 v2 67536 2024-09-02 ‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism 6458b4d9c68a8d6431e86961e74dccb5 0000-0003-3511-5628 Richard Thomas Richard Thomas true false 2024-09-02 CACS Since the renewed outbreak of the ongoing crisis in Burundi in May 2015, triggering a media crackdown, over one-third of the country’s reporters have gone into exile. They therefore joined an increasing number of journalists worldwide who are forced into exile. Between 2015 and 2021, many of the exiled Burundian journalists continued reporting for newly founded exile media in neighbouring Rwanda. Before their forced closure in 2021, these exile media had established themselves as successful outlets providing the only independent information from an otherwise blacked-out country. Based on semi-structured interviews with 10 exiled Burundian journalists conducted in Rwanda in 2020, this article exemplifies how the condition of exile impacts journalistic practice and norms, and renegotiates ideas of media professionalism. It is shown how Burundian exiled journalists display a strong personal conscience as journalists highlighting the voice of the voiceless and attempting to separate activism from their journalism. At the same time, the findings identify the main struggles of Burundian exiled journalists in maintaining operational objectivity, which depends on funding, providing balanced reporting without access to official sources and conducting verification of information in the unattainable field. These challenges are in line with the findings of several other case studies with exiled journalists from different regions. Therefore, this article complements the rapidly growing body of literature on exile journalism with a Global South perspective, which to date is not well represented on the map of exile journalism that mostly features cases of exile in the Global North. Furthermore, this article shows that situating exile experiences within existing theories and frameworks of journalism presents limits as exile journalism, as in the Burundian case, is journalism ‘in another form’ with new practices and renegotiated standards of professionalism. Journal Article Media, War & Conflict 18 2 273 294 SAGE Publications 1750-6352 1750-6360 conflict reporting, exile journalism, exile media, normative theories 1 6 2025 2025-06-01 10.1177/17506352241268814 COLLEGE NANME Culture and Communications School COLLEGE CODE CACS Swansea University Another institution paid the OA fee Louisa Esther conducted this research while on a scholarship by Cusanuswerk, funding her research stay in Rwanda as part of the Erasmus Mundus MA Journalism Programme. The authors received no financial support for the authorship and publication of this article. 2025-12-09T21:37:06.8373350 2024-09-02T16:40:28.2599178 Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences School of Culture and Communication - Media, Communications, Journalism and PR Louisa Esther 0009-0004-0987-0026 1 Richard Thomas 0000-0003-3511-5628 2 67536__32649__689e6f0886494083831572e1c7312068.pdf 67536.VOR.pdf 2024-10-18T17:20:30.4796551 Output 1875314 application/pdf Version of Record true Distributed under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial CC-BY-NC licence. true eng https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
title ‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism
spellingShingle ‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism
Richard Thomas
title_short ‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism
title_full ‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism
title_fullStr ‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism
title_full_unstemmed ‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism
title_sort ‘Journalism in another form’: How exile experiences from Burundi renegotiate key elements of journalism
author_id_str_mv 6458b4d9c68a8d6431e86961e74dccb5
author_id_fullname_str_mv 6458b4d9c68a8d6431e86961e74dccb5_***_Richard Thomas
author Richard Thomas
author2 Louisa Esther
Richard Thomas
format Journal article
container_title Media, War & Conflict
container_volume 18
container_issue 2
container_start_page 273
publishDate 2025
institution Swansea University
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hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
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department_str School of Culture and Communication - Media, Communications, Journalism and PR{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences{{{_:::_}}}School of Culture and Communication - Media, Communications, Journalism and PR
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description Since the renewed outbreak of the ongoing crisis in Burundi in May 2015, triggering a media crackdown, over one-third of the country’s reporters have gone into exile. They therefore joined an increasing number of journalists worldwide who are forced into exile. Between 2015 and 2021, many of the exiled Burundian journalists continued reporting for newly founded exile media in neighbouring Rwanda. Before their forced closure in 2021, these exile media had established themselves as successful outlets providing the only independent information from an otherwise blacked-out country. Based on semi-structured interviews with 10 exiled Burundian journalists conducted in Rwanda in 2020, this article exemplifies how the condition of exile impacts journalistic practice and norms, and renegotiates ideas of media professionalism. It is shown how Burundian exiled journalists display a strong personal conscience as journalists highlighting the voice of the voiceless and attempting to separate activism from their journalism. At the same time, the findings identify the main struggles of Burundian exiled journalists in maintaining operational objectivity, which depends on funding, providing balanced reporting without access to official sources and conducting verification of information in the unattainable field. These challenges are in line with the findings of several other case studies with exiled journalists from different regions. Therefore, this article complements the rapidly growing body of literature on exile journalism with a Global South perspective, which to date is not well represented on the map of exile journalism that mostly features cases of exile in the Global North. Furthermore, this article shows that situating exile experiences within existing theories and frameworks of journalism presents limits as exile journalism, as in the Burundian case, is journalism ‘in another form’ with new practices and renegotiated standards of professionalism.
published_date 2025-06-01T05:23:48Z
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