School of Social and Political Science

Professor Kate Wright and colleagues win International Studies Association Award for Best Book



Professor Kate Wright and her co-authors have won the Award for Best Book in International Communications, given by the International Studies Association. This follows a previous award and runner-up prizes for their book Capturing News, Capturing Democracy: Trump and Voice of America. 

Their book examines what happened to the oldest and largest US-funded media network during the final months of the first Trump administration. It spans the period from the Black Lives Matter protests in the summer of 2020 to the attempted insurrection on January 6 2021. 

Professor Wright, Personal Chair in Media and Communications at the University of Edinburgh, lead-authored the book, together with Professor Martin Scott (University of East Anglia) and Professor Mel Bunce (City St George’s, University of London). 

Recording the changes at Voice of America 

Using rare interviews and declassified documents from Freedom of Information archives, the authors explain why VOA became very rapidly politicised, despite having its editorial independence supposedly guaranteed by law. The book also models how media capture relates to broader patterns of democratic backsliding in the USA, including the expansion of executive power into previously independent federal agencies.  

It predicts the intense crackdown on VOA and other journalistic outlets that has characterised the second Trump administration, as well as growing executive control over government agencies.   

A series of awards 

Each year, the International Studies Association Awards honour outstanding scholarly contributions to the field of international studies, with prizes for papers, books, achievements and service. 

This is the fourth award given to Capturing News, Capturing Democracy by research associations.  It has previously been: 

  • Winner of the Outstanding Monograph of the Year Award from the Media, Communication and Cultural Studies Association (MeCCSA) 
  • Runner up for The Best Book Award from the Journalism Studies Division of the International Communication Association (ICA) 
  • Runner up for The Tankard Award from the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC) 

Professor Wright said: “We are deeply honoured to receive this award and only wish that our predictions had turned out to be wrong.” 

Learn more about the International Studies Association Awards. 

Learn more about Professor Wright’s work.