ABSTRACT
To declare that journalism and newsmaking are in a state of flux and subject to deep, multi-dimensional changes in the first decade of the twenty-first century may be an understatement. We don’t merely refer to the multiple innovations in the production and distribution of news enabled by the Internet and a whole cluster of other radical technological developments. Nor only to the growing array of news media ‘products’ and formats available on our television and computer screens, mobile handsets or other devices, all promising up-to-thesecond, mobile and ambient news services in keeping with our brave ‘new’, ‘knowledgebased’ or ‘networked’ society. Nor are we only thinking of the more recent buzz around user-generated content, audience engagement in the co-production of news or even the evolution of a new species, citizen-journalists, threatening the privileged status if not the survival of the old professional sort. Certainly, these constitute important and much-studied aspects of the state of flux in newsmaking today. But they are also accompanied by other significant, if ‘old’, concerns to do with the qualitative aspects of news culture. We refer to concerns about the substantive or quality aspects of news culture, including journalism’s changing roles and responsibilities towards its public – modern journalism’s presumed raison d’être or ‘god term’ (Carey, 2007). Here, we observe a growing sense that the Anglo-US model of journalistic
values and newsmaking practices has become a universal standard for the remainder of the world. This appears to be particularly the case since the shift to a new world order marked by the end of the Cold War, the rise of WTO-based regulatory regimes for media and the USA’s dominant role as the biggest ‘bully’ (Colin Powell) in the world’s military playground. From a soap-box built from bits of chaos theory, one academic specialist proclaims that the old Anglo-US
model has been renewed and is now performing in a manner that transcends criticism, thanks to new digital technologies and a ‘more reflexive’ cohort of journalists (McNair, 2006). Indeed, whilst there may be ‘many ways of doing – or not doing – news’ we note a growing perception that ‘there is now only one approved mega-model’, usually referred to as ‘the Anglo-Saxon model’ (Lloyd, 2004: 29). But even as ‘the ideals of neutral professionalism’ based on AngloAmerican media history are widely proclaimed and accepted by journalists around the world, some research specialists find that this frequently occurs ‘even where the actual practice … departs radically’ from such norms (Hallin and Papathanassopoulos, 2002: 176). Equally significant, however, are the signs that this, apparently hegemonic,
model is now experiencing a crisis in its homelands. For, just as the Anglo-US model of journalism is elevated to the dominant (if not universal) global standard, ‘it is itself becoming the object of increasing internal criticism and questioning by some leading practitioners and researchers in its countries of origin’ (Preston, 2006a: 3). In the USA, for example, academics and public intellectuals express serious concerns about the quality and political independence of the news media, especially in the context of the political regimes focused on war on terror and attendant restrictions on human rights and civil rights since 2001. There is a strong sense that the mainstream news media – not merely the populist neo-conservative outlets but also standard-bearers such as the New York Times – have failed to match the standards of independent and critical journalism they frequently presume for themselves or prescribe for others (Friel and Falk, 2007). In the USA and elsewhere, we also observe major concerns about a significant and long-term decline of public confidence in the news media institutions (Gronke and Cook, 2007). Turning to the other side of the Atlantic, the past few years have witnessed
intensive soul-searching on the part of (at least, some) senior journalists and media professionals concerning the role, operations and powers of the media in Britain. This is only partly related to the various consequences and fallout arising from a now-infamous early morning radio broadcast by a BBC journalist in 2003. The scope of the expressed concern extends way beyond public service broadcasting to address private sector news organisations, including the old print media. In recent years, senior working journalists as well as academics have proclaimed the need for a fundamental review of the British model of journalism (e.g. Lloyd, 2004; Rusbridger, 2005). For example, a senior editor on the Financial Times has argued the need for a major rethink and ‘renewal of the values and tasks of free media’ and that ‘a real debate on what media do to our politics and civil society’ is urgently required (Lloyd, 2004: 1). Others (e.g. O’Neill, 2002) have even called for more extensive forms of regulation of the print media in Britain. Such moves and proposals signal a somewhat unprecedented crisis given the proud and long-standing attachments to the ideals and self-image of an autonomous press in Britain – a tradition that dates back to the writings of David Hume in the eighteenth century. Such developments in its first
country of origin, suggest that the Anglo-US model of journalism is in something of a pickle, if not facing a serious crisis. For such reasons, then, we may take it that journalism and newsmaking are in
a deep, multi-dimensional state of flux today. The prime task of this book is to map the key features and contours of such recent trends and to examine the major influences and explanatory perspectives which help us understand the sources and meaning of these developments. This book is concerned with describing and explaining the key trends and issues
in journalism and news culture in the early twenty-first century. It seeks to identify the contours and trends of multi-dimensional change now unfolding in journalism and newsmaking processes as well as the most compelling explanations of these trends – the alternative or optimal ways of understanding their sources and implications. To this end, the book provides a distinctive multilayered approach to the influences on newsmaking and news culture. It also draws on a unique, cross-national research project examining the relevant research and current trends in news and journalism cultures in 11 European countries over the past 20 years or so. It adopts a multi-level approach to news culture and journalism practices in an effort to provide a rounded, interdisciplinary account of the trends in this field. In so doing, it seeks to bridge the frequently encountered divide between journalism studies on the one hand, and media or political communication studies, on the other hand.
