ABSTRACT
In a highly mediatised world, it should be obvious that the crises of journalism and news media cannot be treated in isolation from the political and economic institutions whose performance and operations are now so deeply media dependent. At the same time, and in a similar spirit, it is now also increasingly obvious, if not an epistemological imperative, that political and economic crisis tendencies and challenges must be viewed in tandem, in their relation to each other. This chapter begins by discussing the nature and importance of links between “cascading crises”, not only in journalism and the media but especially in the wider political economy setting in which they are situated. The second section introduces select typologies of the major influences on journalism. Typologies are treated here like overview maps of the terrain, which help identify and describe the major categories of influences on news making (Preston 2009). The chapter then considers how the field of journalism studies tends to neglect or downplay economic factors (and other macro-level influences) while also identifying certain influencing factors and the kinds of themes that are favoured in the field. The fourth section describes the rise and meaning of neoliberalism as well as why and how certain features of this political economy paradigm matter for journalism studies. The final section explores potential benefits of political economy approaches and perspectives amid interlinked crises, public discourse and important silences.
