TITLE:
Media and Justice in Cameroon or the Dynamics of a Dual Interaction
AUTHORS:
François Wakata Bolvine
KEYWORDS:
Legal Matters, Right to Information, Investigation, Public Opinion, Presumption of Innocence, Fair Trial
JOURNAL NAME:
Advances in Journalism and Communication,
Vol.5 No.2,
June
21,
2017
ABSTRACT: Information on justice in Cameroon examines the balance of power between justice and the media in an environment characterised by an interaction highlighting tension between the objectives of the field of journalism confronted with constrains and the rigours of a judicial environment that preserves its tenets. Referring to the TOURAINE approach which associates the sociology of action with the theory of conflicts, prompts strategies of actors vacillating between conflict and collaboration, in a dynamics with well-defined requirements: if legal matters easily become media events, the contrary, namely the influence of justice by the press is hardly recognised by the judge, confronted with the norms governing his socio-professional group. Influence, if necessary, emerges from two narrow channels: speedy proceedings and exemplary sentence.