ABSTRACT
News reporting is descriptive and news reporters are admired when they describe in a manner that is accurate, explanatory, vivid or moving, regardless of medium. Analytical journalism, on the other hand, seeks to take the data available and reconfigure it, helping us to ask questions about the situation or statement or see it in a different way. Clive Edwards, of the BBC’s flagship current affairs programme Panorama, argues that even though his programme is not always investigative in the sense of resulting from long-term investigation and revelation of the hidden: in some sense every week’s Panorama is telling you about things that you do not know enough about. Even a relatively innocuous subject such as house prices will be treated in such a way as to show you how they are affecting society and to bring to your attention the problems caused by the situation that most people take for granted. We are trying to get to the bottom of exactly what is happening, the forces behind it (Edwards, 1999).
