Abstract
While peace journalism is an often-evoked concept in academic and journalism industry literature, its exact definition remains rather elusive. This study utilizes a theoretical framework of metajournalistic discourse to understand how practitioners define peace journalism and identify its related practices. Results show that peace journalism is constructed with advocacy in mind. We argue the concepts of peace journalism and traditional journalism are not adversaries, but rather complementary.
Introduction
In a recent article in The Indian Express discussing violent incidents in Asia, Darda (2020) argued that the press—globally—continued failing at its job, writing that “the media is proving incapable of adjudicating its role properly.” The overall essence of this contention lies in the normative notion that the media should advocate for peace “and report the truth without further aggravating the conflict” (Darda, 2020). The conception that journalists have a responsibility to advocate for peace and think about their reporting as something assisting in the building of peaceful resolution is at the heart of the concept of peace journalism. The Center for Global Peace Journalism (2021) defines peace journalism as when editors and reporters make choices that improve the prospects for peace. These choices, including how to frame stories and carefully choosing which words are used, create an atmosphere conducive to peace and supportive of peace initiatives and peacemakers, without compromising the basic principles of good journalism.
While this definition may seem straightforward enough for an academic concept, it is indisputably vague in terms of highlighting the professional practices associated with peace journalism. For journalists to accomplish the overall goals of any genre of journalism, they should understand the practices needed (Vos & Singer, 2016).
Currently, the news media is under duress, both from the audience and scholars. The criticism concerns journalists not reporting in favor of ordinary people but rather striving to achieve financial gains through outdated norms (Nielsen & Graves, 2017). One clear example of this concerns what Schudson (2001) calls the profession of journalism’s god norm, objectivity. After movements such as Black Lives Matter, actors both inside and outside of journalism started becoming louder in their questioning of objectivity’s place within journalism; their argument essentially contends that objectivity as a norm is used, primarily unwillingly, by journalists as a way to strengthen hegemonic ideals (Wallace, 2020). So, therefore, objectivity forces journalism to advocate for regular people, but rather existing power structures, the kinds that made Black Lives Matter protests necessary. Shinar (2004) argued that the journalism industry is failing the public because its norms do not allow the media to be “involved in the promotion of peace” (p. 2). But if peace journalism is the answer to many issues in contemporary journalism, how do journalists implement its practices?
Norwegian sociologist Johan Galtung first proposed peace journalism in 1970, stating that peace journalism is a subconscious working notion of journalists where they can report more responsibly while covering conflict stories (Galtung, 1986). Irvin (2006) went further and labeled peace journalism as a normative theory that argues media can play a positive role in the promotion of peace. McGoldrick and Lynch (2000) contended that a peace journalism approach offers a new road map for uncovering the links between journalists, their sources, the stories they cover, and the consequences of their reporting. They called it “the ethics of journalistic intervention” (p. 5). However, as noted in much recent scholarship concerning genres of journalism, how academics see a type of journalism versus how practitioners and professionals define and practice it can be quite different (e.g., Ferrucci, 2020; Ferrucci et al., 2020; Vos & Singer, 2016). This study analyzes metajournalistic discourse from journalism trade publications to accomplish two necessary goals: First, to understand how professional journalism defines the scholarly concept of peace journalism and, second, to identify the practices associated with peace journalism.
Literature Review
Peace Journalism
The concept “peace journalism” was first introduced by Norwegian scholar Johan Galtung in 1970 (McGoldrick & Lynch, 2000). The idea came through research arguing that there is something wrong with how the press covers conflict. Galtung (1986) contends that to serve the interest of ordinary people and promote solutions to conflicts, reporters must practice peace journalism in framing their stories (Galtung, 1986). Galtung defined peace journalism as a self-conscious working concept for journalists who cover war and conflict stories. He explained that peace journalists should work for “conflict transformation. They should use conflict to find new ways, being imaginative, creative, and transforming the conflict so that opportunities take the upper hand. Without violence” (Galtung, 2003, p. 177).
Peace journalism not only stresses conflict resolution, but it also looks at the underlying reasons for conflict and argues for the use of language that does not over-emphasize conflict frames. Galtung’s concept of peace journalism suggests that in a conflict, journalists can play an important role in establishing peace, neutralizing ethnic or religious differences, advocating prevention of future conflict, and highlighting conflict resolution, reconstruction, and reconciliation (Galtung, 1986, 1998). Most saliently, Galtung (1986) argued that journalists should avoid framing a conflict as two parties pursuing the same goal because this technique produces a binary that the audience sees as win or lose. He suggested that it is better to find more actors and their interests, which may lead to a range of outcomes.
Since its introduction, scholars have sought to articulate the practices associated with peace journalism. According to Lynch and McGoldrick (2005), peace journalism is an opportunity for editors and reporters to make decisions on how and what to report on conflicts and create space for potential nonviolent responses to conflict. They defined peace journalism as a “broader, fairer and more accurate way of framing stories, drawing on the insights of conflict analysis and transformation” (McGoldrick & Lynch, 2000, p. 6). Most of the work on peace journalism is normative, outlining its benefits. Hanitzsch (2004) identified peace journalism as a special mode of socially responsible journalism, whereas McGoldrick and Lynch (2000, p. 19–20) described peace journalism as a “new form of journalism” that looks “at how journalists could be part of the solution rather than part of the problem.” To establish peace, the cycle of violence should be broken. Though conflict and violence are not the same thing, McGoldrick and Lynch (2000) indicated that in reporting, many journalists refer to conflicts as violence, which is incorrect; conflicts can be positive and provide openings for new changes.
Galtung’s (1986) model of peace journalism builds on the contrast between what he calls a “war journalism” and “peace journalism” approach. The war journalism model includes four main types of approaches that are violence-oriented, propaganda-oriented, elite-oriented, and victory-oriented. On the other hand, peace journalism is peace-oriented, truth-oriented, people-oriented, and solution-oriented approach (Galtung, 1986, 2003). Galtung compared “war journalism” with sports reporting, where the winner takes all, and peace journalism with health reporting, where reporters talk about the disease, why it happened, and what could be the remedy.
While peace journalism is not an entirely new thing, but rather a furthering of already existing practices, the concept emerged, as a new field within peace and conflict studies (Lynch & McGoldrick, 2007). Although peace journalism does not always mean “good news,” it is widely regarded as a more positive way to cover conflict, relative to the usual coverage (McGoldrick & Lynch, 2000). Peace journalism suggests possibilities to improve professional attitudes and performances. It also tends to strengthen human, moral, and ethical values, widen scholarly and professional media horizons, and allow professional journalists to better serve the citizenry (Kempf, 2007).
Objectivity and Peace Journalism
Since peace journalism effectively advocates for peace, some opponents contend that it violates the engrained norm of “objectivity” of traditional journalism (Loyn, 2007). According to Schudson (1981), objectivity is an ideological concept that helps to “separate facts from values” (p. 5). The dissemination of facts and not values allows journalism to appear neutral. This “neutral” standpoint implies the reporter should avoid any “conscious or unconscious preferences for what the world should be” (Schudson, 1981, p. 6), which is a subjective inclination toward a topic. So, in the context of news production, the acceptance of objectivity is a promise in facts, a distrust of values, and a guarantee that facts will prevail, and subjective representation will be avoided.
Nowadays, professionals and academic scholars are debating and discussing whether to move beyond objectivity and uphold other norms such as accuracy, fairness, nonpartisanship, accountability, and the pursuit of truth to establish trust in journalism (Downie, 2023). Scholars argued that in the age of mediatization where journalism is not only influenced by society but also by culture, politics, corporations, technology, social media, fake news, disinformation, and misinformation, it is hard for journalists just to present facts (Bhowmik & Fisher, 2023).
Research on Peace Journalism
Historically, the press extensively covers war and conflict-related issues. Lowry (1971) carried out a two-month content analysis of United States-based television journalism and found that American media focused its coverage most intently on conflict and war, international tensions, and social conflict-related stories. Almost two decades later, R. Johnson and Russell (1990) also found the same phenomenon when they examined coverage from CBS. Scholars contended that media usually cover war or conflict-related stories in a manner best suited to improve viewership or readership (R. N. Johnson, 1996). Lynch and McGoldrick (2007) argued that “news representations of conflict now form a key site for the exercise of power” (p. 249). Even recently, a cursory examination of major newspapers or television channels illustrates a focus on conflict with stories of Israel and Palestine, immigration, the United States and Russia, or the United States and China. Reporters provide information on bombings, killings, and violence, which can cause frustration and conflict in society (Boleik, 2012). While focusing on the war and conflict stories in the media, there has been less attention on peace initiatives in the media. Scholars sometimes argue that it is not journalists’ job to pursue peace for society, but when we talk about socially responsible journalism, the question arises: Can journalists overlook peace initiatives in their reporting while covering sensitive issues such as war and conflict?
Most studies of peace journalism utilize content analyses, in-depth interviews, or surveys (Adebayo, 2016; Bhowmik & Beyene, 2021; Bhowmik & Fisher, 2023; Lee & Maslog, 2005) to understand the coverage of conflict stories. Scholars have contended that in the last two decades, peace journalism research received more attention when examining conflict reporting (Gouse et al., 2019). While there is criticism that peace journalism takes an advocacy approach to journalism (Loyn, 2007), others contend that this normative idea helps journalism achieve its goals (Kempf, 2007). Furthermore, peace journalism does not only include reporting on war and conflict, but the framework can also be used in coverage of race, class and numerous other subjects that are often examined through a binary approach (Galtung, 1967, 2000). The aforementioned previous interview and survey studies, though, overwhelmingly indicate that peace journalism means different things to different journalists. Presumably, this is because most normative theories of journalism are difficult to define in terms of professional practice (Christians et al., 2009). This current study seeks to understand how professional journalists define peace journalism and its associated practices. To that end, we draw on metajournalistic discourse as our theoretical framework.
Metajournalistic Discourse
Zelizer (1993) conceptualized the journalism industry as an interpretative community, contending that the many shared understandings that collectively define and normatively guide the profession are socially constructed. Essentially, actors from within and outside the profession discursively aim to create boundaries around the industry (Carlson & Lewis, 2015). Unlike medicine or law, there are no universally set and enforced definitions, ethical codes, or practices within journalism; the norms and collective beliefs of the field are consistently fluid and socially constructed over time, and through this discursive process comes “the knowledge that guides conduct” within the field (Berger & Luckmann, 1990, p. 19). Though there are numerous associations, professional groups and individual organizations that have created and distributed codes of ethics, research suggests that the field of journalism, in terms of ethics, is becoming more fractured (Ferrucci & Taylor, 2019). In general, there is a body of literature arguing that journalism is becoming deprofessionalized in that ethics and norms that historically cut across the entire field now are more of an organizational decision (Ferrucci & Kuhn, 2022). To best understand how, in a specific moment, definitions, practices, and boundaries are constructed within journalism, scholars often turn to metajournalistic discourse. Often simplistically defined as “what journalists say about their capacity to do what they ought to do” (Craft & Thomas, 2016, p. 1). Metajournalistic discourse is, fundamentally, the public utterances made by both professional journalists and those from outside the field that attempt to define, legitimize, delegitimize or describe the profession (Carlson, 2016). It is through these public missives that scholars can understand “both the exercise of institutionalized news practices and (the) explicit interpretative processes justifying or challenging these practices and their practitioners” (Carlson, 2016, p. 350). As “the primary definers of journalism,” the most impactful metajournalistic discourse, in terms of socially constructing the industry, often comes from professional journalists (Carlson, 2016; p. 355).
Metajournalistic discourse is an amalgamating term, one that brings together numerous disparate research inquiries. Fundamentally, while Carlson (2016) only relatively recently introduced his theory of metajournalistic discourse, this theory combines several previously vibrant areas of work within journalism studies, areas such as paradigm repair and the sociology of knowledge. In this theory, Carlson (2016) conceptualizes three main components of metajournalistic discourse and contends that these components provide the necessary contextual information concerning how the metajournalistic content is consumed. The first component of all types of metajournalistic discourse is site/audiences, which describes where the discourse is published. The place where the discourse is published cannot be decontextualized from the audience as the publication location dictates the audience; for example, a trade magazine is typically only read by those within the industry. The second component is the topic, which can be either reactive (discourse concerning one particular incident such as a specific ethical breach) or generative (discourse about the industry as a whole). Finally, the third component concerns the actors who publish the discourse, either journalists or non-journalists. Because journalism “is a profession that relies on internal and external actors discursively legitimizing and justifying its practices” (Ferrucci, 2019, p. 288), the study of metajournalistic discourse can help us understand how professionals in the field define a concept such as peace journalism, but also how the field delineates, legitimizes, and justifies the associated practices.
While prior work studying metajournalistic discourse often examines various boundaries of journalism (e.g., Carlson & Usher, 2016; Perreault & Vos, 2020) or how the industry outlines illegitimate practices through the process of paradigm repair (e.g., Berkowitz, 2000; Hindman, 2005), the majority of recent studies of this type of discourse often assesses generative discourse created by journalists. This work often aims to understand how the industry defines and articulates the practices associated with such disputed concepts as entrepreneurial journalism (Vos & Singer, 2016), public journalism and engaged journalism (Ferrucci et al., 2020), resistance journalism (Ferrucci & Canella, 2023), or fake news (Lawrence & Moon, 2021). This current study follows these aforementioned works by examining peace journalism through this discourse. Therefore, we ask the following questions:
Method
To conduct a study such as this one that aims to understand the philosophies and concepts undergirding the journalism industry by studying metajournalistic discourse, it is essential to understand that this work views journalism “as a variable practice situated within shifting social, economic, and technological contexts” because “this perspective opens up space for a conceptualization of metajournalistic discourse as the means through which journalistic practices, norms, and institutions come to be legitimated or contested” (Carlson, 2016, p. 354). Thus, this work follows the example of recent similar studies (e.g., Ferrucci, 2022; Lawrence & Moon, 2021) that utilized textual analysis, which is the method Craft and Thomas (2016) identified as optimal for allowing scholars to bridge the gap between normative and empirical work while studying metajournalistic discourse. Vos and Singer (2016) argued that this type of work can make significant contributions to research by allowing us to understand how professionals define concepts often only discussed within research, and this can happen despite a study such as this one’s “modest empirical goals” (p. 149).
When conducting a textual analysis, the researcher should aim to unearth a variety of potential interpretations of the text, which allows for more breadth concerning what readers could infer from the discourse (Coffey & Atkinson, 1996). Textual analysis is ideal for works examining discourse because it allows researchers the ability to analyze and contextualize how ideas and concepts are being constructed in the data. The data come from industry trade magazines as defined by Vos and Singer (2016), a corpus of 17 publications that include trade journals, content from journalism institutes, and more traditional trade magazines. The contents were written by journalists either for the general audience or for fellow practitioners (Vos & singer, 2016). This study only concerns itself with publications from the United States and Canada because doing otherwise would fail to “eliminate any potential differences due to national variances” (Ferrucci et al., 2020, p. 1592). For this particular study, we searched for articles from January 1, 2000, through June 1, 2021. We used keywords such as “peace journalism,” “peace-oriented journalism,” war journalism,” and “conflict journalism.” After careful examination and relation to the “peace journalism” concept, a total of 19 articles were analyzed. A total N is very similar to other work with similar goals (i.e., Ferrucci, 2019; Ferrucci & Canella, 2023; Vos & Singer, 2016) (see Table 1).
Publications Included in the Analysis
The unit of analysis for this study is each total article featuring metajournalistic discourse. To better emphasize this study’s focus on the journalism industry as a socially constructed institution, the following findings follow the prototype implemented by Vos and Singer (2016) and Ferrucci (2019), among numerous others, in that it does not identify names of publications, writers or speakers of a quotation. If we included this information, it would inevitably privilege some outlets and people. Therefore, the findings, both when paraphrased and quoted, exclude publication citations. Through this decision, specific outlets are given the same explanatory weight and the field at large is represented, regardless of the outwardly perceived credibility of the outlet (Ferrucci, 2019). As noted by Vos and Thomas (2019) in a similar study where they examine journalism’s institutional discourse, “attention is best focused on the discourse than on the site or authors themselves” since that would privilege certain pieces used for quotations and not others just as important to the analysis (400–401).
The researchers analyzed the data in the empirical manner defined by Emerson et al. (1995). This process includes three distinct steps: First, both researchers read through the entirety of the data, making notes about how the publications considered the concepts. Second, they once again read through the data, this time looking for emergent themes or patterns. Finally, the researchers returned to the data once more, this time with themes in mind, and wrote notes and observances concerning these themes. After completing all three stages, one researcher wrote the findings section.
Findings
After a thorough analysis of the data, the researchers found that three distinct themes emerged surrounding each of the two research questions. For the first research question, which asked how does the metajournalistic discourse from industry trade magazine define peace journalism, the three emergent themes were: peace journalism is co-constructed journalism with advocacy in mind, peace journalism is journalism that acts as a catalyst for conversation, and peace journalism is journalism that improves peace.
Co-constructed Journalism
The first and most prevalent theme that surfaced in the analysis revolved around the idea that peace journalism bypasses traditional normative ideas of journalism and is co-constructed with community members wishing to advocate for a cause. As one journalist noted in an article, “If I must choose between a newspaper column and the actions, I must take to liberate myself and my community I choose activism.” Throughout the data, this sentiment came through in many different manners. To both practitioners and those commenting on peace journalism, the main element at the heart of the concept is advocacy for peace or against conflict. Many practitioners of peace do not see this as conclusively different from traditional journalism, although they do note that most legacy journalism outwardly denounces advocacy. One journalist said, “I would consider writing part of my activism,” adding, “there is no way to separate these things. If you are writing for mainstream news, you are still advocating for something, you are just not stating what you are advocating for.”
When discussing the essence of peace journalism, while the data provided little in terms of clear definitions, an overwhelming abhorrence for objectivity became clear. To those quoted and discussing peace journalism, an adherence to the norm of objectivity prevented journalists from co-constructing coverage with an advocacy toward peace in mind. One article noted that “professional journalism needs to shift away from the way in which it performs objectivity. The critical move needs to be from objectivity as neutrality to objectivity as truth-seeking. That’s how you avoid false equivalencies.” Over and over, this idea that objectivity only encourages a false sense of reality or an “oversimplified ‘Us vs. Them’ or ‘Good Guy vs. Bad Guy’” style of reporting that presents issues far more complex as a simple binary. The need to please all, then, hinders journalism’s ability to advocate for what is right, and in the minds of peace journalists, what is right is conflict resolution. To get at this, instead of begrudgingly providing the same platform to two sides of issue, “peace reporters reject propaganda from any source, and instead seek facts from all sources.” Therefore, peace journalists, if doing their jobs correctly, co-construct all stories with advocates for peace or, at least, with a peaceful outlook in mind.
Catalyst for Conversation
Unlike traditional journalism which, according to the data, simply provides two sides of a story and then lets the audience figure it out, peace journalism must serve as a catalyst for conversation, as content that facilitates future discussions concerning how to ensure peaceful resolutions. One main manner in which peace journalists accomplish this is by allowing marginalized or previously voiceless communities space in coverage. According to adherents, this allows for previously unheard views, views most often always in favor of peace, an ability to reach people, which will then stimulate conversation. For peace journalists, “we have the task to make visible some subjects and voices that haven’t been visible,” and, by doing this, those ideas will catalyze more conversation among various stakeholders. As one scholar of peace journalism quoted in the data contended, “offering a younger generation, which has long been sidelined by traditional outlets, the opportunity to speak out and voice an opinion, (then) it has a positive impact on the country.”
Furthermore, by providing space for ideas and voices previously primarily ignored by journalism, peace journalism can then “encourage dialogue before violence occurs, and (it can) explore solutions.” This is a key part of the conversations catalyzed by peace journalism: If the journalism is good, it can provide a breadth of solutions to the conflict that communities can dialogue about. In effect, if journalists are “aware” of the potential “negative consequences” that can arise from simply performing objectivity and not providing solutions-based coverage, they can include more voices and ideas in stories, which then has the potential to foster communication between groups and “promote peace in their communities.” As one journalist said, if peace journalism is done right, it can generate conversations “that many times have not been easy to generate.”
Improving Peace
Perhaps the most consistent and reoccurring theme that emerged, but also the most difficult to truly unpack, was the tautological idea that the most salient piece of the definition of peace journalism is that it improves peace. Over and over, the discourse defined peace journalism as content that must “include the media in conflict resolution strategies” or journalism that encourages content that explores “the causes of conflict and strategies for prevention.” For peace journalism advocates, by always focusing on part of stories that make conflict resolution most salient, journalism can then improve peace. Multiple articles analyzed noted how the founder of the peace journalism movement, Galtung, argued that improving peace comes from journalists treating conflict reporting as akin to health reporting, a genre of journalism “where journalists are encouraged to explore causes and strategies for prevention of disease.” In effect, if journalists did this when reporting on conflict, it would improve peace in manifestly visible ways. But as can by now probably seem obvious, this theme revolves around a truly tautological notion: That journalism considered peace journalism improves peace, something that cannot be seen or judged until well after publishing occurs. Therefore, if taken as truth, this theme or definitional portion of peace journalism basically contends that any journalism that helps improve peace is peace journalism. Moreover, how “improving peace” can be measured is also noticeably not explained. Consequently, while improving peace is the most consistent and reoccurring theme in the discourse surrounding the definition of peace journalism, it is also the most opaque and difficult to truly understand its underlying meaning.
The second research question asked by this study concerns the practices inherent in peace journalism. As noted in Vos and Singer (2016) and Ferrucci and Canella (2023), among others, the most optimal manner to truly understand a genre of journalism is not only to define it but also to essentially operationalize it by understanding its practices. The themes emerging from the data concerning the practices essential to peace journalism are the framing of stories, the sourcing of stories, and professional development.
Framing
The most prevalent theme or practice to emerge from the data concerned how peace journalists must frame their stories. Over and over, the discourse noted that traditional journalism relies on a binary, essentially framing that implicitly illustrates a conflict as a winner-take-all endeavor between two competitors with no overlapping values or goals. As is the case with political reporting, often characterized as horse-race coverage, peace journalism advocates argue that most journalism discusses conflict with a frame of who is currently winning. This, according to the data, can be traced back to traditional news values, as most framing features “conventions of news construction” that rely on “negative references and conflict as a news value.” If, though, journalism frames its stories around peace as a news value, it would have a significantly different effect on communities. As one article noted, “Journalists need to think harder about the way they are framing stories. The news media logic that determines how important a story is and what scale of treatment it gets is too often driven by herd mentality or repeated formulae.” In effect, the idea is that traditional framing focuses on conflict, not just as something that makes a story news, but also throughout an individual article. Peace journalism, though, is about “encouraging stories with an agreement-orientation versus only focusing on points of difference.”
Consequently, the main practice inherent in peace journalism revolves around the idea that journalists need to frame their stories in ways that make most salient how groups have similar goals and points of agreement, in effect, making clear how to resolve conflict. As noted by one article, “More constructive narratives that include empathy, resilience, and positive responses (to conflict) should be created as part of the news coverage itself.”
Sourcing
Similar to the ideas undergirding the “catalyst for conversation” theme within research question one, a key practice of peace journalism lies in the way it seeks out sources for stories. Much discourse explicitly and implicitly criticized journalists and journalism overall for its reliance on expert sources, essentially sources that tend to present conflict in binary manners and often espouse hegemonic ideas. One main key to sourcing is to “give a voice to the victims of conflict instead of focusing on official sources.” By doing this, coverage can become far more empathetic and, perhaps more importantly, more accurately reflect the need for peace. In addition, by giving voice to victims or marginalized communities, peace journalism recenters “the conversation from polemicizing experts to affected communities, and (illuminates) seldom-discussed themes like gender and race in the conflict.” Moreover, because marginalized communities tend to be the main victims of conflict, including them in the conversation provides a more accurate understanding of the conflict, implicitly implores conflict resolution, and then “treats sources and subjects as human beings deserving of respect.” A byproduct of this approach to sourcing is that it advocates to “prevent identity-based violence by empowering vulnerable groups and encouraging active bystandership.” Furthering the idea of incorporating marginalized groups as sources, some discourse even suggested “co-reporting” with these subjects, basically arguing that to truly incorporate these ideas, a reporter must relinquish autonomy over a story. This can “reduce intergroup prejudice.” While that idea was rare in the discourse, it did come up multiple times. However, perhaps most saliently, the discourse consistently noted that the need for diverse sourcing is not easy and, too often, journalists espouse talking to marginalized sources, but actually do not accomplish this because they are unwilling to do the needed work. In one story, discussing peace journalism in Colombia, a reporter noted they “traveled the country in search of marginalized voices,” something they do “twice a month” for “up to give days a time.” The implication is clear: To actually perform this practice successfully, journalists must make a sincere and timely effort.
Professional Development
The final key practice essential to peace journalism, according to the data, concerns the need for consistent professional development. A reoccurring notion revolved around the idea that not only do journalists need to be trained to do peace journalism, but they also need constant refreshers, or those skills will weaken—or at least the determination to practice those skills will weaken. As one story noted, “training is important to retaining journalists with peace journalism skillsets.” This training, while vague in nature according to the discourse, primarily involves instruction around conflict resolution. Journalists, to accomplish the goals of peace journalism, need to enact conflict resolution practices that can only be gained through professional development training. As one piece noted, “journalism training, its work focuses on a range of issues, but includes governance and conflict resolution.” Discussing radio journalism and the need for professional development, one article, talking about journalists in Uganda, said, “presenters and reporters in Uganda are not trained. They go on the air and start talking, taking positions.” The implication of the story included the idea that with training, these radio reporters would utilize conflict resolution practices promoted by peace journalism and, therefore, better equip the audience to not only seek out peace but better understand how to accomplish it. As a source in one story noted, “There are many inexperienced journalists out there who fuel conflict,” so, then, “training is essential for us if we plan to move forward.”
Discussion and Conclusion
This study, through an analysis of metajournalistic discourse, examined how the journalism industry’s trade press discursively constructs the definition and related practices concerning peace journalism. Similar to peace scholars, practitioners see peace journalism as a special genre of journalism that can be thought of as a form of socially responsible journalism (Galtung, 1986; McGoldrick & Lynch, 2000). Though no concrete definition of peace journalism emerged from the practitioners’ discourse, it is clear practitioners consider peace journalism an advocacy tool to maintain or establish peace while covering conflicts concerning war, racial unrest, or other situations. It is vital to note, though, that this notion of having a specific goal (“peace”) in mind is in direct opposition to the traditional journalistic norm of objectivity (Schudson, 2001; Wallace, 2020). The discourse contended that peace journalism should be seen as a “truth-seeking” experience, not as a practice that values “neutrality.” This, of course, is in opposition to any notion of neutrality, something becoming more and more contested in newsrooms across the United States.
As noted by Lee and Maslog (2005, p. 312), “The idea that journalists have an active and conscious role to play in promoting peace is controversial . . . peace journalism may have emerged more than three decades ago, but it has not gained wide acceptance among journalists.” This sentiment clearly manifested itself within this study’s sample: Over the last 21 years, including 17 prominent industry trade periodicals, only 19 articles from four periodicals discussed peace journalism. The data analysis from this study illustrates that while the ideas behind peace journalism may have merit, the specific manner in which it could be practiced remains opaque and, perhaps more importantly, many of the very tenets undergirding the definition of the concept violate numerous journalistic norms. In a sense, peace journalism includes many specific practices that remain in stark contrast to the traditional values of journalism.
The result shows a clear distinction between journalists’ understanding of peace journalism and traditional journalism. For peace journalism, the ultimate goal is to serve people, not power, and while this may be a perceived goal of traditional journalism, norms such as objectivity often result in strengthening hegemonic power structures. Previous research shows traditional journalism is influenced by state ideology (Bhowmik & Fisher, 2023), technology, profit-oriented attitude, and commoditization. Peace journalism is more about doing socially responsible journalism where serving audience will be the main goal than making profit or serving the hegemonic power. As we are arguing that the concepts of peace journalism and traditional journalism are not rivalry but rather complementary. One of the main norms of traditional journalism is truth seeking which is similar to peace journalism norm “truth orientation.” But sometimes, in traditional journalism, where journalists are bound to serve power, they ignore the voiceless. And training is needed because the skills will tell how this notion can be practiced in a right manner. Adebayo (2016) also investigated on 40 journalists who participated in training on peace journalism and concluded that “journalists to report social issues in ways that create opportunities for society to consider and value non-violent responses to conflict, using insights from conflict analysis and transformation to update concepts of balance, fairness and accuracy in reporting” (p. 362).
Deuze (2005) conceptualized journalism as an ideological development. The researcher wrote, “Ideology can be seen as a system of beliefs characteristic of a particular group, including—but not limited to—the general process of the production of meanings and ideas,” where journalists also “speak of similar values in the context of their daily work” (p. 445). Kovach and Rosenstiel (2001) provided five values of journalism: public service, objectivity, autonomy, immediacy, and ethics. These values are contradictory to what was found in this study. During the analysis to ascertain the definition of peace journalism, three clear themes emerged: peace journalism is co-constructed by journalists and outsiders, peace journalism catalyzes conversation, and peace journalism improves peace. When considering those emergent themes, it becomes clear why peace journalism is not embraced by the journalism industry. First, none of these themes clearly defines peace journalism, leaving it as a very opaque concept difficult to fully implement. Second, while the idea of co-construction is popular within other genres of journalism such as public journalism (Ferrucci et al., 2020), to effectively accomplish this, it removes some autonomy from journalists. As noted by Kovach and Rosenstiel (2014), autonomy is perceived as absolutely vital for practicing journalists and, therefore, implementing this practice would result in some resistance within a newsroom. Third, both catalyzing conversation and improving peace are aspirational and, in truth, goals of traditional journalism, but both cannot be knowingly accomplished. Essentially, the only way to knowingly accomplish either, if it is even possible, is to observe effects after publishing the story. Putting this all together, it becomes very apparent that one clear problem encircling peace journalism is its lack of a clear and specific definition, and one that does not inherently violate traditional historical ideas of journalism. Despite searching and analyzing more than two decades of content from journalism trade publications, typically a way to understand definitions within the field (Vos & Singer, 2016), this study found no clear definition of peace journalism besides the obviously tautological sentiment that peace journalism promotes peace.
In this representational process, how journalists are outlining the topic plays a significant role. Sometimes, reporting should require expertise investigation with intended attitude to present the stories with advocacy in mind to alter the situation in a good way. Just providing facts without historical background may pose dangerous effects on audience perception. So, in that context, we will argue that it is important for the journalists to provide not only the impacts of the situation (climate change or war and conflict) but also provide potential solutions to it in order to motivate the public to take action and understand the circumstances (Galtung, 2003).
Due to the very real possibility that when researching alternative genres of journalism, discursively constructed definitions can be confusing at best, it is often optimum to identify practices associated with a genre to better understand it (i.e., Ferrucci et al., 2020; Vos & Singer, 2016). Therefore, this study’s second research question attempted to identify peace journalism’s related practices. Once again, the three practices identified illustrate the reason why peace journalism is not nearly as popular within the profession as other new genres from the last two decades such as solutions journalism or engaged journalism. As with the first research question, practices identified do, on the surface, align with journalistic norms, but there are subtle exceptions. First, while all journalism stories utilize framing, peace journalism calls for frames that explicitly promote peace. This is potentially problematic since it very clearly calls for advocacy. While peace should be a global goal, traditionally advocacy of any kind violates some of the fundamental tenets of journalism, tenets such as objectivity, which Schudson (2001) and numerous others have identified as absolutely inherent within journalistic practice. So, while all stories are framed in some way, journalists typically determine frames once they have gathered all information. Second, the identified practice of gathering a diverse group of sources simply does not differ at all from either alternative genres of journalism such as public or engaged journalism (Ferrucci et al., 2020), or even, in many cases, traditional journalism. Therefore, once again, peace journalism is not effectively separated from other types of journalism. Third, the last practice of continued professional development is also opaque in some ways. First, continued professional development in any field is expensive and, then, not likely. Second, the data did not effectively articulate why journalists needed consistent professional development for peace journalism but not for any other types of journalism. And, third, if it is difficult to effectively identify peace journalism practices, how would professional development even become effective? In general, it is overwhelmingly clear that there are numerous ambiguities surrounding peace journalism, which is the main obstacle for practitioners implementing it.
In journalism, objectivity can be understood as a moral philosophy “not just a claim about what kind of knowledge is reliable” (Schudson, 1981, p. 8). Schudson stated that both critics of the press and defenders took objectivity to be the image of American journalism, an improvement over a past of “sensationalism” and a contrast to the party papers (p. 9). Objectivity effectively allowed the profession of journalism to move away from its unethical reputation during the days of yellow journalism; however, while objectivity could be perceived as a benign journalistic routine that may impact sourcing, it is oftentimes an ideology that actually reifies hegemonic notions of society, notions such as patriarchy or capitalism (Schmidt, 2023). This became far more clear in recent years as journalists struggled to include more diverse coverage within news only to see organizational policies such as objectivity make it incredibly difficult to advocate for causes such as equality around race, gender, and class (Somani & Tyree, 2021). Schudson (2001) argued that fairness and neutrality began to effectually define the journalism industry during the 1920s as the idea of objectivity not only allowed newsroom leaders the ability “to keep lowly reporters in check,” but it also let journalists highlight objectivity as a normative practice across the field, which allows for a clear argument that journalism is a profession, one with norms allowing the field “to disaffiliate from the public relations specialists and propagandists who were suddenly all around them” (Schudson, 2001, p. 163).
But the question remains: Why is peace journalism—a genre of journalism not all that different from solutions journalism, public journalism, or engaged journalism in its calls for advocacy of something—so relatively unpopular in newsrooms? Potentially, this can be traced back to peace journalism as a concept directly emanating from academia. Johan Galtung, who coined the concept of peace journalism, is a sociologist. McGoldrick and Lynch, who later enlarged and fleshed out the concept and attempted to popularize it within newsrooms, were former journalists but had already become full-time academicians by this time. It makes perfect sense, then, that peace journalism remains an idealistic potential goal for journalism, but one that is far more theoretical in nature, a concept without a distinct definition and clear, tangible associated practices. For peace journalism to truly gain prominence within the field of journalism in a way similar to, for example, solutions journalism or engaged journalism, it needs a clear definition, a set of implementable practices, and a convincing argument for why its tenets violate traditional norms.
Based on our findings, if we look at the journalists’ understanding of peace journalism, it shows that the concept (peace journalism) is unique and requires journalists’ willingness to start conversation on a topic to enhance peace. In addition, when they identified the practice of peace journalism, the journalists talked about whom to interview, framing, and finally acknowledging training or professional development to practice the concept in a right way. From these findings, we are proposing a probable definition that the practice of peace journalism is “when expertise investigation on critical topics requires journalists’ intentional choice to promote resolution. Through sourcing and framing the stories journalists can be able to advance the conversation and give voice to the voiceless where powers can be held accountable for their actions. The whole process requires careful and intentional utilization of promoting peace and fulfilling the principle of responsible journalism.” This definition differs from the academic definition in terms of emphasizing more on general people than the journalist’s deliberate choice of framing. This definition provides more scope for journalists to create an environment in which to practice responsible journalism. Though the ultimate goal is to promote peace but the conversation will focus more on general people than the power. Through the conversation, general people will propose peace resolution, not the journalist, by articulating story in a specific manner or carefully adding words.
In short, yes, journalists should practice responsible reporting, a notion at the heart of all journalism and not just peace journalism, but the goal of ensuring peace relies on far more than journalism. Galtung (1986, 2003) wrote that peace journalism is, at its core, a specific way of doing journalism that will improve media representations and critical awareness. In that viewpoint, the concept of peace journalism and traditional journalism are not adversaries, but rather complementary. Also, to achieve this type of complementary coverage, practitioners need to understand exactly what peace journalism entails. This article illustrates why this has not happened yet, and also ideally creates a path toward it potentially happening in the future.
The contributions of this paper are twofold. First, by delving into metajournalistic discourse, we gain insights into how professionals define peace journalism and its associated practices. Notably, professionals often resist embracing the concept of peace journalism because its objectives contradict traditional journalistic norms. While existing research on peace journalism has predominantly focused on media production, this paper explores the perspectives of professionals, contending that this approach opens avenues for understanding why peace journalism is a well-researched topic but lacks popularity among practitioners. Second, our proposed definition, which we contend offers a clearer understanding of the concept and its practicing norms, emerges from the key aspect of this paper’s findings. It becomes evident that peace journalism lacks popularity compared to solution journalism or engaged journalism. The findings of this paper also indicate journalists’ reluctance to adopt peace journalism, primarily due to its perceived conflict with the “objectivity” norm. However, the results reveal that when journalists discuss the practice of peace journalism, they emphasize framing stories more sensitively, presenting voices from all sides, and the necessity for professional training for journalists interested in practicing peace journalism. Interestingly, these aspects align closely with traditional journalism practices. Therefore, our argument asserts that the concepts of peace journalism and traditional journalism are not adversaries but rather complementary.
