Dr. Ibrahim Seaga Shaw is Chairman and Information Commissioner, Right to Access Information Commission in Sierra Leone. Before taking up this post in October 2018, Dr Shaw worked as Senior Lecturer in Media and Politics at Northumbria university in Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK since September 2011. He was Secretary General of the International Peace Research Association (IPRA) between 2012 and 2016 following his election at the organisation's biennial conference in Japan on November 24-28 2012.
In 2013, 2015, and 2016, he was nominated Best Lecturer for student-led teaching by the Northumbria Students Union, and in 2014 for an award for Communication for Social Change run by the Centre for Communication for Social Change at Queensland University, Australia. Dr Shaw was elected member of the Executive Committee of the International Conference of Information Commissioners (ICIC) at the organisation’s 10rh annual Conference in Johannesburg, South Africa between March 10 and 14 2019
Dr Shaw contributes his expertise to scholarship and policy in the following areas: Media and human rights; Human Rights Journalism; Humanitarian Journalism, media, conflict and development; Media and Business; Business and Journalism; Intercultural Communication; Media, democracy and Human Rights; Media, Digital Media and Political Economy; international development, public diplomacy, Media, Culture and Human Rights; Political Communication, Media History, peace journalism; global journalism; and media and humanitarian intervention. He taught journalism and mass communication and supervised four PhD students working on human rights journalism, conflict, social media, political communication, and public diplomacy. He has examined six PhD and several Masters/Mphil theses as external examiner. He has supervised three PhD students to completion (one graduated in December 2017 while the two others graduated in July 2018)
Dr Shaw’s background is in journalism as a reporter, editor, sub-editor and correspondent in Sierra Leone, France and the UK(www.ibrahimseagashaw.com). He was founder, editor and publisher of Sierra Leone’s award winning Expo Times newspaper published in print in Sierra Leone between 1995 and 1998, and since 2000 available online (www.expotimesonline.net). He worked as sub editor in London and correspondent in Paris for New African magazine between 2000 and 2003.
Dr Shaw holds a PhD from the Sorbonne in Paris and has published several articles in leading academic journals, including the Journal of Global Ethics and International Communication Gazette.
He is author of five books : S ‘Reporting Human Rights, Conflicts, and Peacebuilding: Critical and Global Perspectives Palgrave(2019);-Business Journalism: A Critical Political Economy Approach. (2016, Routledge), and co-editor of Communicating Differences: Culture, Media, Peace and Conflict Negotiation. Palgrave Macmillan (2016); ‘Human Rights Journalism’ Palgrave Macmillan (2012) and co-editor of ‘Expanding Peace Journalism’ Sydney University Press (2012). He guest co-edited two issues of journal of International Communication Gazette and Journal of African Media Studies in 2012
Dr Shaw was commissioned by UNESCO to do a module on humanitarian journalism as a contribution to the revised UNESCO urnalism Education Model curricula (http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0022/002211/221199E.pdf) launched by the organization’s Director General in July 2013. He served as editor of the newsletter of the Black and Minority Communication Commission of the Association for Journalism and Communication Education between 2012 and 2013. Before taking up his academic post at Northumbria University in 2011, he served as Senior Research Fellow in media and politics, and Project Manager of the Refugees and Migrant Support Hub at the University of West of England in Bristol. I also served as a commissioner for the Bristol Legacy Commission between 2008 and 2011.
