Invisible Power: Newspaper News Sources and the Limits of Diversity (original) (raw)
Related papers
News Media as Political Institutions
This chapter discusses research on the policies, laws, and subsidies that create and shape the organizational structures and practices that form the basis of the news media. The research reviewed treats news media institutions as political actors and makes assumptions about journalism’s importance in a democratic society. Although this line of research, with its emphasis on political economic and normative questions, often has been marginalized in American mass communication scholarship, the authors explain its ongoing importance, particularly in relation to the journalism crisis, and, suggest future directions.
This chapter discusses the journalistic practices shaping the reporting of politics. It is argued to conceive of political journalism as a subspace within the journalistic field that interacts intensively with the political field, because this theoretical approach highlights the power relations and world views produced by the insider culture of journalists and political actors. Moreover, the chapter suggests that this insider culture affords political journalists privileged access to information, but may also hamper their autonomy and the transparency of their actions. Further, the chapter argues that the routines and constraints of news production only strengthen this reliance on authoritative sources. Technological change and commercial pressures, however, may represent a challenge to this relationship and the practices which govern it. The chapter closes with a call for studies on political journalism in non-Western contexts, on non-elite, local media and for more comparative research efforts in order to broaden the rather partial and limited picture of political journalism we have so far.
Journalism, Pluralism, and Diversity
The ideal that journalism should reflect different interests and values in society, and provide access to the widest possible range of voices is broadly shared among journalists, researchers and other media critics. The acknowledgement of pluralism and diversity, in different guises, can also be
Political Ideology and News Organizational Control
1985
Reporters in Hong Kong who wete working for 21 Chinese-language newspapers were mailed questionnaires to elicit information on the following: how news organizations in a highly politicized enbirondent exercise control on recruitment, policy direction with regard to the coverage of conflicting issues, and the resolution of possible conflicts between tie press and journalists. Respondents were. encouraged to return the questionnaire with the assurance of.anonymity. The findings revealed that (1) political ideology Sf the pyess determines staff recruitment, policy governing the coverage of conflicting issues, and the resolution of conflicts between the press and journalists; (2) reporters are highly congruent with their employing organizations in terms of political ideology on a rightist-.centrist-leftist continuum; (3) the party-owned press has a higher propensity to impose policy control over the coverage of social issues than the nonparty press; (4) reporters on occasion dispute policibs; and (5) older reporters working in the party press tend to be more submissive to policy control than their counterparts in the nonparty press, and the more educated reporters are less compliant at both types of newspapers. (HOD)
The News Media as a Political Institution
Journalism Studies, 2011
On the basis of Scandinavian journalism research this article discusses the changing political roles of news organizations and journalists after the fall of the party press and the dissolution of broadcasting as a state-controlled monopoly. Given these institutional changes, we ask the following: what new roles, if any, are news organizations and journalists playing in the political system? What are the characteristics of these new roles, and how do news organizations use their newfound political power? We address these questions in the context of an institutional approach to the news coupled with Hallin and Mancini's analysis of media systems.
Journalism and Political Exclusion: Social Conditions of News Production and Reception
Canadian Journal of Communication, 2016
In Journalism and Political Exclusion: Social Conditions of News Production and Reception, author Debra M. Clarke critiques the paradox of information poverty in an age of information wealth. Clarke flips the notion of "news publics" on its head and instead posits that there is no true democratic public. Instead, there are news publics constrained by the social conditions of production: limited resources, limited news value criteria, and limited expression for fear of legal repercussion (pp. 145-147). The underrepresentation of a diversity of views in mainstream media can therefore explain the false notion that an increase in media access correlates with an increase in democracy. The author opts to focus her analysis on the social conditions that render political engagement by marginalized communities muted. She concludes that the ironic "journalism-democracy relationship envisioned by neoliberalism" (p. 266) has been refuted by its own politicoideological constraints. Major social groups are already excluded from democratic publics due to structural inequalities (p. 20), and journalism can be seen to contribute to this exclusion. Clarke, associate professor of sociology at Trent University, embarks on an extensive study to question how the exclusion of representative groups from information publics reifies dominant discourses in news production. She achieves this through an empirical study of news media reception and critical engagement with the literature. Clarke's notable contribution to the literature is her empirical study on news reception. The longitudinal study (2001-2007) of 188 Canadian news consumers challenges journalism's political inclusivity and undresses the fallacy of increased access via "new media" by revealing the consistent connections between new media and the media of old (the press, television, and radio). What, then, is "new media" to the politically engaged, other than old media packaged differently? The author also offers a critical analysis of the "contemporary social conditions of news production" (p. 9), which serves as commentary on journalism practice. Clarke therefore touches on key concepts in communication theory at the core of political exclusion. For example, she examines how professional journalism as a medium encourages political engagement (p. 226-228). Further, she considers how textual analysis can be better understood beyond communication theory (pp. 104-105, referring to Hall, 1980). The key themes of Clarke's book include what news publics are perceived to be, what news publics are in reality, who can participate and on what basis, and what the implications are for media democracy. Clarke debunks popular myths about news media, such as its mandate to facilitate political involvement. The structure of sociopolitical engagement as co-opted by the narrative news genre has more of a delimiting than an empowering effect. This is in part due to market demands and mass media ownership. The recentring of political views overwhelmingly shared by the state and