[ecrea] CFP India at ULB Brussels

The Voice of Society in Indian Culture



January 21-22, 2014, Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Brussels

Official languages of the conference: English and French



This conference aims at exploring the Indian Information, Communication 
and Media Scene through the prism of its Civil Society.

Does the “Right to Information” or the capacity built in legitimate 
media advocacy lead to a more transparent and democratic resolution of 
civil society issues, or does it raise more questions regarding the 
darker aspects of lobbying and political influence mongering? Where does 
advocacy end and lobbying start?

What are the roles, rights and duties of journalists, bloggers or civil 
society activists in this debate?

Does media advocacy eventually results in any change in behaviours, 
cultural values or just perceptions and what are the potential and 
unintended consequences? The issues at stake are the following: how is 
civil society mobilised and organized in India?



Contributions to the conference can focus on the following themes:

1 – Perceptions and debates around the notions of advocacy and lobbying: 
the definition of the limits of advocacy and lobbying are still vague. 
If, in Brussels, these two are often equivalent, in India, lobbying is 
mainly connected to the actions of the industry or to politicians and 
civil servants’ bribery. Advocacy is still related to social, urban or 
rural movements. This theme is going to precise the key lines of these 
terms comparing Europe with India.



2 – Protagonists facing a regulating state: numerous stakeholders from 
the civil society have understood that they have to develop a 
communication strategy towards public opinion and politicians in order 
to be heard. This theme is trying to understand the role, rights and 
duties of protagonists like journalists, bloggers, activists against the 
State, which is hesitating between binding regulations and the right to 
information.

3 – Citizenship representations and practices: Indian society is a 
society in transition, which evolves between the demands of the middle 
class, the identity claims related to the different religions and the 
social and cultural conservatism of the rural areas. This theme is going 
to discuss representations, understandings and confrontations conveyed 
by the stakeholders who give birth to these different conceptions of 
citizenship.



4 – Law, medias and democracy: Indian law includes a right to 
information and an Internet regulation. However, in a society that 
claims to be democratic, journalists and medias have to cope with 
diverse pressures forcing them to moderate their comments. This axis is 
going to study actions taken by medias and journalists in order to 
acquire new spaces of expression or to professionalize the processes, 
especially when the fight against raping cases or corruption are 
becoming national causes.



Call for papers

Abstracts about the theme of the conference can be sent in English or 
French (max. of 500 words) to (oarifon /at/ ulb.ac.be) and 
(Sybille.De.Poortere /at/ ulb.ac.be) before June 15, 2013.



Calendar

Diffusion: March 28, 2013.

Deadline for abstracts: June 24, 2013.

Acceptance communication: August 26, 2013.

Deadline for full papers: November 12, 2013.



Organised by:

ReSIC: Centre de Recherche en Information et Communication (Université 
Libre de Bruxelles).



Presented in partnership with:

Europalia.India www.europalia.be

Architempo www.architempo.com



Participation fees: 50 €



Organising committee

Olivier Arifon (Université Libre de Bruxelles), Sybille De Poortere 
(Université Libre de Bruxelles), Marie-Soleil Frère (Université Libre de 
Bruxelles).



Scientific committee

· Olivier Arifon (Université libre de Bruxelles, Belgium)

· Biswajit Das (Jamia Millia Islamia University, India)

· Johan De Rycker (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium)

· Marie-Soleil Frère (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium)

· Idesbald Goddeeris (KU Leuven, India Forum, Belgium)

· Ravindra Gopalan (Madras University, India)

· Pierre-Michael Gröning (Foreign Trade Association, Belgium)

· François Heinderyckx (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium)

· Alok B. Nandi (Architempo, Belgium)

· Madi Sharma (European economic and social committee, Belgium)



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