David Ensor is the former director of Voice of America, the official external broadcast institution of the U.S. Government which provides multimedia programming to international audiences. He stepped down from his role in early 2015 after four years. Previously, Ensor served as director of communications at the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan and spent thirty years as an award-winning television and radio correspondent, reporting on foreign policy and national security issues for NPR, ABC News and CNN. While at the Shorenstein Center, Ensor wrote about international state media, and how the West should respond to media challengers.
Exporting the First Amendment: Strengthening U.S. Soft Power through Journalism
December 14, 2015
A paper by David Ensor, Joan Shorenstein Fellow (fall 2015) and former director of the Voice of America (VOA), makes the case for protecting and strengthening VOA as an independent journalistic voice in order to increase American soft power. VOA’s news programming, which is funded by the U.S. government but remains by law editorially independent,
