Abstract:  Broadcasting has historically been understood as a spectrum-based medium organised through the territorial transmission of radio signals. Yet under conditions of conflict and media capture, the organisational practices associated with broadcasting may increasingly be reproduced through alternative communication infrastructures. This article examines the emergence of WhatsApp radio in conflict-affected Mali, where political pressure, declining media independence, and widespread mobile connectivity have encouraged journalists and audiences to organise the production and circulation of news through encrypted messaging networks. Drawing on long-term digital ethnographic observation of Fulani WhatsApp groups, computational analysis of shared visual material, documentary research, and field engagement with journalists, community members, and WhatsApp administrators, the article addresses two questions: how are organisational practices traditionally associated with broadcasting reproduced through WhatsApp under conditions of conflict and media capture; and what does the emergence of WhatsApp radio reveal about the changing organisation of broadcasting beyond the electromagnetic spectrum? The findings show that, although WhatsApp radio operates through digital messaging infrastructures rather than conventional broadcast transmission, it reproduces key organisational characteristics historically associated with broadcasting, including scheduled news bulletins, editorial gatekeeping, recurring programming, and audience expectation. Comparing these practices with earlier forms of pirate broadcasting and other adaptive responses to communicative constraint, the article argues that WhatsApp radio represents a form of post-spectrum broadcasting in which broadcasting is defined less by transmission technology than by the organisational practices through which public information is produced, curated, and circulated.

Keywords:  broadcasting; conflict; Mali; media capture; pirate radio; post-spectrum broadcasting; WhatsApp radio

Published:   12 November 2026

Issue:   Vol 15 (2027): Digital Media in Contemporary Conflicts (In Progress)