The CVU Produces Impact on Four Levels:
It encourages governments and authorities to take action
The CVU’s premise is that people who know their rights are much more likely to exercise those rights. The videos provide basic legal information,advice on government schemes, and even such simple tips as locations of the local government agencies. Armed with this basic information, local people have the courage and the knowledge to lobby with authority on their own. Government, in turn, is much more likely to carry out its functions properly when it knows it is being watched. The CVU model, therefore, can strengthen democracy by helping fight corruption and by encouraging local people to participate in government.
It encourages local people to take action
All the CVU videos project the message that local people need to take the lead in their own development, and culminate in an “action point,” something concrete and locally do-able. The videos inspire audiences with “success stories” of local people who are making a difference, and the screenings and discussions provide otherwise absent platforms for the community to come together to discuss constructive steps.
It expands the scale and reach of social programs
The CVU screenings draw large crowds on an average night, between 200 and 300 people, which is sometimes the majority of the whole community! Many organizations operate on the “Self-Help Group” (SHG) model, in which ten to twenty women in that group are an organization’s primary level of contact in that village. The CVU, with its ability to spread messages to much larger groups of people, is a very effective parallel strategy for our NGO partners.
It transforms the Community Producers into community leaders
Leadership has sometimes been described as the ability to tell stories. The journalism training given to the Community Producers teaches them how to ask questions, how to listen, how to research and deeply understand a problem, how to communicate with authority, how to inspire, and how to speak in public, amongst other critical-thinking skills. Community Producers learn to “articulate” and crucially, they learn to articulate on any issue. This addresses a major development challenge: today’s communities served by NGOs often know how to organize on one issue (such as water or health), but when a disaster of a different nature strikes, the community lacks the deeper problem-solving skills to address any problem. The CVU provides cross-cutting training in communications, articulation, and analyzing problems that is applicable to any situation.
How Video Creates Change
- It communicates in the medium most appealing to people today
- It breaks the literacy barrier
- It is the most cost-effective way to reach large numbers of people if distributed strategically
- It expands an NGOs’ reach and scale
- It promotes behavior change
- TVs and films are present in nearly every village on the planet
- It is a powerful tool in education, fundraising, networking and advocacy
- It gives a voice to the poor to communicate their needs and knowledge to the outside world
- It provides a platform to demand accountability and transparency from those in power
- It acts as a forum for communities to discuss critical but unspoken social issues
- It encourages ‘people’s led development’, where the call for change is coming from within the community
- It develops grassroots leaders and communicators
- It provides livelihoods