Marshall Plan Films and Documentaries: a Meditation on Origin of Communication for Development in Turkey

Abstract

Concerned with exploiting communication tools for development purposes, Communication for Development was born in the specific context of post-World War II years as an implementation area or practice, prior to its establishment as an academic research domain. The same era coincidences with implementation of Marshall Plan, which included Turkey among its beneficiary countries. Marshall Plan and its communication, with a specific focus on the films in/about Turkey, constitute the core to the study, which aims to contribute to the limited literature on Marshall Plan communication in Turkey and the history of Communication for Development in Turkey. Underlying impulses of the Plan, its implication, the communication strategies and methods utilized throughout the Plan and films are studied, while the Marshall Plan films about Turkey are contextualized in the modernization paradigm-dominated period of communication for development practice and research.