Abstract
The 2021 Digital News Report of the Reuters Institute observes that recent political events such as the election of President Trump, Brexit, the emergence of the #MeToo movement and the Black Lives Matter protests call for a critical re-examination of how the mainstream news media cover the various minorities. Its findings, covering 46 markets and over half of the world's population, suggest that political partisan groups, women and members of Generation Z tend to think they are unfairly covered. Likewise, Black and Hispanic Americans in the US, the people in the states that were formerly part of East Germany, and even those in the Northern parts of the UK think their lives are often misrepresented or are lacking adequate coverage. The report finds a link between the perceived unfairness of coverage and declining levels of trust in the media. It adds that the widespread view that ‘journalists and the news media are elitist, out of touch with people’ suggests that it may make sense for the media ‘to focus on areas … such as race, gender, and socioeconomic class’ (pp. 36–37). In a similar vein, the 2022 Digital News Report documents a decline in the number of those with an interest in the news of the traditional media organisations.
It is precisely these symptoms that make Barbie Zelizer, Pablo J. Boczkowski and C. W. Anderson, the authors of The Journalism Manifesto, the latest publication of Polity Press's ‘The Manifesto Series,’ suggest that journalism is at a crossroads and must choose either the reformist or the revolutionary path. The former means that news outlets should ‘broaden the circles of elite representation … the elites that journalism would prioritize would no longer be high-status elites, but those representing the voices of historically disenfranchised groups, thus expanding the set of voices, concerns and frameworks in the news’ and embrace new norms such as social justice (p. 96). The latter means ‘mixing up into journalism's operations various kinds of practices in situations of anti-authoritarianism, tentative steps toward democratization, creative acts of resistance’, coupled with a revolt against the authority of elites, including those within the newsrooms; this approach entails more active audience participation in the newsmaking process (p. 102).
A new strategy is now more imperative than ever, the authors of the manifesto argue, because journalism as an institution has failed: its normative assumptions about its role in society, dating back to the late 19th and the early 20th centuries, have been challenged by growing uncertainty across the globe, caused by democratic backsliding and the emergence of populist leaders in a number of countries, the pandemic, the oppression of marginal groups, and the advent of social media coupled with the fragmentation of the audiences, the polarization of news coverage and the rise of misinformation and disinformation. The pace of social, political and technological change has accelerated. We now live in a state of permanent transition, while the old institutions, including that of journalism, are lagging behind, as their norms and practices are no longer able to cope with new conditions. Journalism is now ‘disconnected from the everyday realities of everyone who matters … the conditions on the ground diverge from those in the imagination of its practitioners’ (p. 14). Public trust in elites has declined, owing to the elites’ failure to handle the recurring crises of contemporary societies (cf. Castells, 2019). So has trust in journalists, seen as parts of the elites, disconnected from the public that they are supposed to serve.
A massive exodus from legacy media news to other, digital, content is indicative that audiences can no longer be taken for granted, the authors further suggest. Nor can journalists be certain that the public has a steady interest in public affairs reporting. The communication-as-transmission view that the traditional understandings of the role of news media have been based on now occurs to be irrelevant, while the communication-as-ritual model seems to account for audience behaviour more aptly, as ‘audiences appear to be more tribal, emotional, expressive and skeptical than they used to be—or at least were assumed to be—in the canonical discourse’ (p. 89).
The authors focus on the normative theories of journalism developed in the Global North, which theories, one might add, have been successfully exported to many other parts of the world, including in the Global South, according to a recent study on journalistic roles (Standaert et al., 2019). It is these journalistic norms, including balance and neutrality, that the authors of the manifesto call into question.
But is journalism really in a crisis that it cannot resolve without a major reform or revolution? Should it really give up its old, ‘elitist,’ aspiration of leading the public, and follow it instead? Should it embrace the popular view, also voiced by populist leaders, that elites cannot and should not be trusted, and take an anti-establishment approach instead? Should it give up its old norms, including balance and neutrality, and embrace new ones such as social justice and more inclusive representation?
The crisis narrative has been a recurring part of the journalistic discourse since about the beginning of the 20th century, brought about by the rise of new communication technologies, including radio, television and the commercial net (Tófalvy, 2021), yet journalism has survived all these crises. Public service media in Europe have been especially often exposed to challenges since as early as the 1930s, which challenges have forced them to reconsider their allegedly elitist position, and yet they continue to be operational. Even so, the message of the manifesto that the symptoms of journalism's crisis must no longer be ignored can hardly be debated. The same holds for some of the remedies suggested by the authors. Few would suggest that a more critical coverage of the elites is unwarranted or reject the idea that a sense of social justice should be a central part of contemporary journalism.
That said, other remedies recommended by the authors might raise some doubts. In a context of increasing political polarisation and social fragmentation, media ‘expanding the set of voices, concerns and frameworks in the news,’ (p. 96) as suggested by the authors, may only worsen the ongoing disintegration of contemporary societies. To avoid that trap, one might argue, media must also make sure that they continue to be the agents of dialogue among different societal groups. To be sure, audiences must be given what they want. But journalism must also continue to lead the public, not just follow it. It must provide joint references, meanings and shared understandings that bind societies together and thereby help to re-establish societal cohesion.