Martin Scott

I am a Professor of Media and Global Development. I study media freedom; international journalism; media influence on aid; humanitarian news; media capture, and audiences of distant suffering.

My publications include Capturing News, Capturing Democracy (2024), Humanitarian Journalists (2022), Media and Development (2014) and From Entertainment to Citizenship (2014) and I am the co-author of the Index on International Media Freedom Support (IMFS).

I have won multiple awards for my research including MeCCSA’s Monograph of the Year award (2025), the Wolfgang Donsbach Outstanding Journal Article of the Year Award (2020) and UEA’s Outstanding Impact in Policy and Practice award (2019). I hold a PhD and MA in Media and Development Studies from the University of East Anglia (UEA) and am a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. My current research examines advocacy for media freedom and the media’s influence on aid.  

My research has been supported by grants from the AHRC, ESRC, ISRF and British Academy. I have worked with UNESCO, UNOCHA, the FCDO, The New Humanitarian and Voice of America. My research has regularly featured in the media, including on BBC Newsnight, BBC World, the NYT, NPR, The Guardian, the Telegraph, the Independent and Al Jazeera. I have successfully supervised 6 PhD students to completion and am currently supervising 4 further PhD students.

I co-direct a BA and MA in Media and Global Development and convene and teach on the modules: Media, Communication and Social Change, Perspectives on Global Development, Media, Democracy and Social Change and Media, Communication and Development. Before joining UEA as a lecturer in 2009, I worked as a secondary school teacher. I have taught in secondary schools in the UK, Kenya and in the British Overseas Territory of St. Helena.