Go Group Media

Contact Information

• Where – Georgia
• Website – www.gogroupmedia.net
• Contact Person – Margarita Akhvlediani
• Email – margarita@gogroupmedia.net
• Address – 73, Chubinashvili Street, Tbilisi, 0112, Georgia
• Other – Facebook

Areas of Expertise

Go Group Media has expertise in a range of areas, including:

• Culture
• Media Reform and Peace Journalism

Main Aims and Objectives

Go Group Media sees its mission as contributing to transformation of the conflicts in Georgia and broader South Caucasus by enhancing the quality of media and citizen journalism throughout the region.

Upholding the Principles of Conflict Transformation

Home to three unresolved conflicts, the South Caucasus represents a crisscross of borders, real and perceived. The governments here have indulged in flag-waving rhetoric, whipping-up – with connivance of the politically-engaged or professionally-deficient local media – nationalistic sentiment in their respective societies, and, what with people-to-people contacts across the conflict lines being scarce due to closed borders, self-serving bias and other-denigrating stereotypes have been rife.

Go Group Media’s strong belief is that no formal political agreements can ever bring a lasting peace here unless these dangerous perceptions at the grassroots level change. And changing them is what is has striven to contribute to, through a host of cross-border initiatives that have, in the five years of its existence, directly benefited hundreds of ordinary Georgians, Abkhaz, Ossetians, Armenians and Azerbaijanis by bringing them to get to know one another while learning new skills and working collaboratively. Effectively, it has reared a network of multipliers of what is a conflict transformation sine qua non – tolerance for and constructive understanding of ‘the other’.

Where and with Whom?

To date, Go Group Media has built an impressive beneficiary base spanning most of the South Caucasus, boasting a unique presence in the disputed regions of Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh and South Ossetia.

In carrying out its many programs, Go Group Media has relied on the support and generosity of many international donors/programs, such as the European Commission, the UK government’s Conflict Pool, COBERM, VIKES, the Visegrad Fund, FPU, and others.

Go Group Media’s long-term partners who have supported its work and helped spread word about it are: Conciliation Resources, International Alert, Internews, Transitions Online, Saferworld, Dart Society and others.

Main Activities in the Field of Conflict Transformation

At least 300 ordinary citizens and journalists from around the region have joined in Go Group Media’s work in a variety of capacities:

• Contributors of its Eyewitness Studio, a network of ordinary people who have been producing, with Go Group Media’s training guidance and professional editing input, short documentary films. The 300 doc stories they have come up with so far (see them by clicking here) are intimate close-ups of their fellow citizens sharing their life experiences, and each of the stories is, effectively, a snapshot of a broader trend or problem shared by whole population segments.
• Students of its Caucasus Authors Course (better known as CAC School), a journalism skills enhancement program that has brought together tyro reporters from across the South Caucasus, including, uniquely, from its three disputed territories, to expose them to a year-long real-cum-virtual learning agenda combining classes in documentary filmmaking, photo reporting and conflict analysis. The School has produced two batches of students so far (in 2012 and 2013, respectively), many of whom now compete successfully in their respective media environments as producers of reliable, conflict-sensitive journalism. Presently, the School is going through a third round, attending to a new group of young Caucasian journalists.
• Participants of its journalistic expeditions – arrangements taking groups of Caucasian media practitioners to different areas of the region and beyond to investigate and report important issues that have been mostly overlooked in the local media mainstream. There have been ten of these, including a week-long tour of Armenia and Turkey probing prospects of the two countries ever resolving their centennial feud; a trip to Samtskhe-Javakheti (investigating incidents of confrontation between Georgian Christians and Muslims, which some experts say might be signs of a growing Orthodox Christian fundamentalism in Georgia); and to Nagorno-Karabakh (sounding out the possibility of a new conflict outbreak there), etc.;

Also, Go Group Media has been asserting itself as a producer of feature length documentaries. One of its forays into the field is Generation of War – film exploring young minds on both sides of the Georgian-Ossetian conflict – which has recently won a prestigious award at an international festival in Kyrgyzstan.