Recovery, Renewal, Resilience

Throughout the pandemic, the media has played a critical role in communicating aspects of crisis management, containment and response. A further opportunity may lie in harnessing the current levels of public engagement that have been developed through COVID-19 response to drive a new narrative. Consider the potential for media communications to:

• Support and drive a national recovery and renewal narrative that focuses on the next steps, generates awareness and interest from the public and builds a collective national effort to recover and renew from COVID-19 (as was highly effective for response and the recruitment of volunteers)
• Clearly communicate who is responsible for recovery and renewal priorities, what these priorities are and why, and how citizens should be encouraged to participate in recovery and renewal efforts
• Generate public interest in specific topics/recovery areas to encourage donations/funding for organisations that are working to create societal changes that reduce inequalities
• Local government and voluntary organisations can utilize the media to engage the government and public in societal changes that are crucial, through agenda setting, i.e. influencing public interest and the importance placed on certain topics through the deliberate coverage of certain topics/issues. Agenda setting has been found to influence public agendas, spending/funding generation and policies, with the media prompting policymakers to take action and satisfy the public's interest
• Generate funding by mobilising a local and national community of supporters