Abstract
This paper offers to cut the epistemic problem of journalism into smaller and more concrete pieces, mapping the desired journalistic knowledge in particular beats, according to both beat experts and journalists. Our case study focuses on highly knowledgeable Israeli military journalists, using in-depth interviews with 30 experts and journalists. The interviewees offered a sophisticated, dynamic and adjustable knowledge matrix assigning journalists broad agency how to implement their knowledge and embed their items in broader contexts, using three levels of analysis and four types of knowledge, while maintaining balance between knowledge breadth and depth. If similar matrixes exist in other beats, journalism studies must reimagine its epistemology as more complex, requiring both knowledge and understanding, mastering “adaptive expertise” representing higher levels of proficiency.
Introduction
Over a century ago, Walter Lippmann (1922) indicated that journalists’ knowledge is far from sufficient. Numerous scholars followed suit (Donsbach 2014; Nisbet and Fahy, 2015; Patterson, 2013; Stephens 2014; Ward 2018), many recently suggesting “infusing” journalists with more domain knowledge (ibid., see also Patterson, 2013; Stephens 2014). Yet, it remains unclear what ‘sufficient levels' of journalistic knowledge and journalists’ desired knowledge looks like.
This obscurity can be explained first by scholars’ tendency to (a) treat journalistic knowledge as one, homogenous, generic, overarching entity (Lippmann 1922; Patterson, 2013; Stephens 2014); and (b) imagine the missing knowledge as a set of “declarative knowledge” propositions about the state of affairs that can be quite simply “infused” into journalists.
In contrast, this paper tries to break the generic epistemic problem down into smaller beat-specific pieces of desired knowledge. Rather than explore knowledge from the perspective of either journalists (Mishaly and Reich, 2024) or expert sources (Albaek et al., 2003), allowing both to introduce their preferences and priorities, sources with their exogenous and ostensibly more ambitious standard of knowledge and journalists – with their practical input. Findings are based on a series of 30 in-depth interviews with Israeli military experts and journalists.
Surprisingly, instead of receiving a long, dry list of topics that military journalists are expected to know, our interviewees offered a dynamic matrix of knowledge whereby expert journalists must not only master some 100 topics, but also apply and adjust knowledge: embedding the story in relevant contexts, analyzing it, combining four knowledge types, all while balancing knowledge breadth and depth.
Due to the explorative nature of the study, the findings was not built around artificial hypotheses and research questions but around its basic components: core knowledge, contexts, analysis, knowledge types, and breadth-depth balance (see Figure 1). In the discussion we analyze the importance of this matrix, which offers new ways for imagining journalists’ knowledge, and – if validated in other beats and contexts – might invite some revision in the epistemology of journalism.
Some points to bear in mind about military journalists and their role in the Israeli context for readers who are unfamiliar with the peculiarities of this beat, and for scholars who wish to evaluate the relevance of the knowledge matrix to other beats and other news contexts: The military beat is “hard news” that shares prestige and elite status with political reporters (Magin and Maurer, 2019) – the higher levels of background knowledge among their audiences, most of whom served in the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) in different positions (Panievsky, 2023).
Military journalists are expected to maintain high standards of knowledge (Limor and Nossek, 2006; Nicholls, 2013) much broader and deeper than war reporters (Nicholls, 2013), since they cover preparedness for war during routine times, garnering knowledge on various military branches, and in the Israeli case – on several fronts. Furthermore, like other occupations requiring proficiency in addressing challenges (Beane, 2024; Kneebone, 2020; Sennett, 2008), military journalists must address challenges such as limited access to information, people and news scenes (Carlson, 2012; Tumber and Palmer, 2004) and performance under extreme circumstances (Allan and Zelizer, 2004). While war reporters elsewhere face restrictions on their publications (Nicholls 2013), their Israeli counterparts undergo formal censorship scrutinizing their output prior to publication (Nossek and Limor, 2011), and army surveillance of unauthorized contacts with senior IDF officials. To bypass these hurdles, Israeli military journalists tend to develop networks of unofficial news sources, including former officers and experts from all branches of the security system, and first-hand presence in training and war arenas.
Arguably, Israeli military journalists have adopted a more independent and critical tone since the Yom Kippur war (1973) and first Lebanon war (1982), yet their criticism tends to be non-strategic, focusing on tactical aspects of the IDF’s performance (Perry, 2007). Finally, due to prominence in Israeli news, military journalists are public figures whose work is prone to ongoing meta-discourse. They are typically criticized for not being critical enough and for their over-dependence on the military spokesperson apparatus (Dor, 2004) which tries to control journalists’ access to people, information and knowledge and their physical access to the field (Nossek and Limor, 2011).
Theoretical framework
According to scholarly literature, one can imagine journalists’ knowledge as a long list of “declarative” knowledge topics, that expert sources in the field master and can be “infused” into journalists (Patterson, 2013; Stephens, 2014; Ward, 2018). However, the knowledge matrix introduced below is more complex and multifaceted. None of the components of this matrix are entirely new, rather they are discussed sporadically across a myriad of topics, mostly outside the epistemic discourse. For example, context is mentioned as part of quality journalism (Fink and Schudson, 2014), levels of analysis as part of commentators’ role performance (Barnhurst, 2014b), types of knowledge in the epistemic literature (Carlson, 2020) and breadth versus depth in the division of labor in news beats (Van Leuven, Vanhaelewyn and Raeymaeckers, 2021). These matrix components are assembled here for contextualization and evaluation.
Knowledge in journalism studies
When scholars discuss the need for specialized knowledge in journalism, they refer mainly to topic content (Donsbach, 2014; Nisbet and Fahy, 2015; Patterson 2013), e.g., interest rates or medical insurance. Knowledge enabling insightful questions (Donsbach, 2014) produces high-quality informative coverage (Nisbet and Fahy, 2015; Nyhan and Sides, 2011; Patterson, 2013) enabling citizens to develop their own opinion (Isibor and Ajuwon, 2004) and make well-informed choices (Patterson, 2013).
However, such knowledge tends to be either too theoretical and general, or too specific and narrow to account for journalists’ epistemological direction, that drive their practices and thought processes. For example, military journalists need broad and deep knowledge to cover warfare and frontline occurrences (Nicholls, 2013), understand soldiers’ and officers’ war experiences (Schmidt, 2020) and different aspects of terrorism (Palmer, 2003), including familiarity with military technology and structure, chains of command, and defense policy (Bennett, 2013), as well as background knowledge on social dimensions such as anti-war movements (Reese, 2004) and the psychological impact of military service (Parry and Thumim, 2017; Zelizer and Allan, 2011).
Most literature addresses war reporting, overlooking the broader terrain of military journalists and their knowledge, focusing on the risks of war, post-trauma and ethical issues, media militarization (Kellner, 1992) embeddedness and limitations on access to information (Sylvester and Huffman, 2005) or media influence on public opinion (Zandberg and Neiger, 2005). Some works discuss factors shaping the epistemology of military journalism such as government truthfulness (Kellner, 1992), bias, objectivity, and patriotism (Zandberg and Neiger, 2005), or censorship, public diplomacy, and propaganda (Kamalipour and Snow, 2004; Tumber and Palmer, 2004). To overcome these challenges, journalists must master additional components of the knowledge matrix.
Context
“The press should offer a truthful, comprehensive account of the day’s events in a context which gives them meaning,” wrote the Hutchins Commission back in 1947 (Commission on Freedom of the Press, 1947: 21). Contextual reporting zooms out to offer a broader explanatory perspective to complicated occurrences with background information, past historical references to ongoing and future events, and sometimes data-based analysis that “goes beyond the ‘who-what-when-where' of a recent event” (Fink and Schudson, 2014: 11). Contextual information “enables citizens to make sense of the events” (Patterson, 2013: 93).
Growing contextualization is part of the shift from event-centered to meaning-centered news (Barnhurst, 2014a), in which journalists feel increasingly obliged to contextualize their stories (Fink and Schudson 2014; McIntyre et al., 2018). Nevertheless, some scholars claim journalists “tend to avoid contextualization like the plague” (McChesney, 2011: 111) to accelerate work pace, increase infotainment (Patterson, 2013) and avoid commitment to certain positions (Phillips, 2011). Contextualizing military news is especially challenging, due to audience expectation for partisan, biased, patriotic, and emotional coverage (Livio and Cohen-Yechezkely, 2019).
Analysis
While context helps illuminate the circumstances behind the news, analysis explains what it means and why it matters. Studies show that both the public and journalists consider analysis important (Loosen et al., 2020), and that journalists appreciate statements that “provide analysis of current affairs” (Hanitzsch et al., 2019). And yet, the importance of analysis of complex topics varied between cultures (Willnat et al., 2013) and domains. There are three common levels of military analysis: strategic, tactical, and operational (Samuel, 1996), that have diffused into other domains such as decision-making (Khalifa, 2021) or risk management (Hopkin, 2013). According to Khalifa (2021) strategy deals with core of guiding decisions, macro-level policy-oriented realm, and is relevant mainly to commentary, prioritizing the “why”; tactics addresses short-term, intermediate, processes-oriented knowledge; while operations is execution-oriented on a daily level. In journalism, the borders between these levels of analysis may become fluid, since operational, event-based news stories often reflect strategic causes and/or consequences, although occurrences, procedures and policies remain quite distinct.
Strategic analysis of military news examines conceptual policymaking, geopolitical implications, doctrines, or the potential impact of particular military activities and the political considerations that drive them (e.g.: Ojala and Pantti, 2017). Tactical analysis examines processes such as equipment acquisition and new technologies relating to the military-industrial complex and their relationship with the strategic level (e.g., Frenkel and Nossek, 2022). Operational analysis focuses on the “here and now” of daily events, particular military units or personnel and expectations regarding such entities in the immediate future (e.g., Lee and Maslog, 2005).
Knowledge types
The basic knowledge type mainly discussed in journalism studies (e.g. Park 1940; Patterson 2013) and in our core knowledge above, is dubbed by epistemologists as “knowledge that”: “descriptive”, “declarative” or “propositional” knowledge about the state of affairs. For our purposes we need to distinguish between at least three additional types of knowledge: • Knowledge “how” (procedural): methods, procedures and skills used in journalism (Donsbach, 2014; Örnebring, 2019) to detect news, collect information and turn it into a publishable story. • Knowledge “why” (explanatory) (Kim, 1994): the capacity to understand, explain, frame, and arrange information about the reported reality in meaningful ways that provide insight and causal explanations (Barnhurst, 2014b). Journalists are often criticized (Carey, 1986) for their incapacity to explain why something happened. Philosophers suggest that scientific understanding means understanding primarily why (see: Khalifa, 2017). • “Situational” knowledge: it is unique because it can only be acquired via real-life physical, sensory, and experiential presence, personal trial and error (Chandler and Munday, 2024) to understand particular situations that are part of military operations and warfare (Klein, 1998; Nicholls, 2013).
Depth versus breadth
While scholars and critics emphasize knowledge depth across occupations (cf. Beane, 2024; Kneebone, 2020; Sennett, 2008), there is a growing understanding of the importance of generalism, or knowledge breadth, which characterizes most journalistic work (Marchetti, 2005; Patterson, 2013; Stephens 2014; Tuchman, 1978). Even when journalists do possess specialized knowledge they are confronted with versatile and general assignments, hence in journalism “each specialist must be a generalist” (Tuchman, 1978: 67).
There is a tradeoff between breadth and depth. Breadth can extend over diverse topics and fields with a more general and superficial level of understanding (Marchetti, 2005; Stephens, 2014), enabling non-obvious connections between seemingly separate domains, yet it is less detailed and granular. Breadth suits journalism that prioritizes immediate real-time reporting for a lay audience, with minimal or no preparation (Patterson, 2013). Because of their breadth, journalists are often criticized for having a shallow understanding of scientific concepts and research methods (Boykoff and Yulsman, 2013), prioritizing skills over subject matter.
Conversely, depth involves thorough investigation of a well-defined field, requiring specialization and expertise and giving such journalists authority and credibility. However, the journalistic sweet spot between generalism and specialism is debated, ranging from Anderson’s (2008: 261) question “is journalistic knowledge an ‘expert’ domain of knowledge at all?” to claims that journalists possess “interactional expertise” (Reich, 2012; Reich and Lahav, 2021).
Method
To map the desired knowledge of military journalists we conducted in-depth interviews with 30 participants, 16 experts and 14 journalists, asking them to describe in detail the actual knowledge that military reporters and commentators are expected to master 1 .
To make the challenge vibrant and tangible, we started the interview with one major question: if there were a school for military reporters and commentators, what would the desired curriculum look like?
To guarantee as comprehensive a curriculum of desired knowledge as possible, first, we made sure our panel is diverse enough, covering both journalists and various field experts. Second, to minimize memory contingencies, eliciting some knowledge items but not others, interviewees were asked first to offer their items of desired knowledge. Then they were asked to reconsider their suggestions, after being shown a summary of complementary content analysis of military journalists’ actual publications in the previous 5 years.
While the list of relevant journalists was obvious and accessible in industry directories, the list of experts was more challenging. Our choice was to focus on former senior officers (colonel and above) with substantial past or present media experience as news sources, interviewees and contributors, and academics specializing in military affairs. We focused on retired senior officers since the retired officers tend to be more independent and even critical toward the military establishment (Table 2).
list of participants.
Experts and journalists alike were highly engaged, offering not only topics but also reflections and examples. Contrary to initial expectations, experts and IDF spokespersons were not more demanding than journalists and the latter were not more lenient regarding standards of desired knowledge. Experts’ knowledge expectations were notably pragmatic and achievable. The primary difference between both groups was their focal points. While military commanders emphasized types of knowledge regardless of journalistic coverage, highlighting normative and ethical aspects, journalists tended to emphasize the daily realities of reporting, source considerations and knowledge relating to specific news output. IDF spokespersons took an intermediary approach, serving as a nexus between the groups. Interviews took place between September 2022 and April 2023.
A complementary content analysis sampled news articles and commentary from 2015 to 2019, using 6 odd months yearly to ensure diverse coverage. The 2020-2021 period was excluded due to COVID-19’s impact on military journalism. Materials were gathered from major Israeli publications including “Yedioth Ahronoth,” “Haaretz,” and “Maariv” in both print (58%) and online (42%) formats. The final dataset comprised 1299 items, collected through custom web scraping for online content and a national press catalog for print media.
The content analysis produced a flat list of most-covered topics, issues, personalities, and entities. To prevent bias, these results were shown to interviewees only after they had shared their initial positions. Overall, the content analysis had a minimal influence on the findings, affecting just a few interviews. Some content analysis topics did make their way into the core knowledge section, primarily in softer areas like military-society relations and the daily experiences of ordinary soldiers.
Analytic approach
To ensure a comprehensive list of core knowledge items, reflecting the collective effort of our participants and their different areas of expertise, we adopted an inclusive strategy, accepting every unique and relevant item of desired knowledge, even if a single participant offered it. Over half the items relied on more than one participant. This strategy, used only for core knowledge, was also inspired by interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA), according to which participants’ qualitative insights emerge from their lived experiences (and domain expertise) and the meaning they attribute to those experiences (Eatough and Smith, 2017). The IPA approach, previously used in journalism studies, aims to authentically represent participants' perceptions, interpretations, and structures of knowledge, and thought processes.
The coding process
The first coder (author 1) conducted a comprehensive review of the transcribed interview recordings, employing a bottom-up approach to identify topics, subjects, issues, themes, and knowledge components. Main themes reflecting experts’ and journalists’ perspectives about desired knowledge for military reporters were identified.
Beat knowledge central circles.
After the completion of the initial coding, the second author examined the coded data and original materials, engaging in a peer debriefing discussion to address discrepancies. This stage was not designed to establish inter-coder reliability, but rather to enhance and refine coding. The process was intentionally fluid and evolving, allowing for collaborative improvement of the coding scheme and interpretations.
Findings
Rather than a long series of knowledge items based on existing literature, our interviewees offered a more complex, ambitious, dynamic, and adaptive knowledge matrix introduced here for the first time in Figure 1. The knowledge matrix.
Due to the large volume of data, all core knowledge items are summarized in Table 2. Hence, this is the only findings sub-chapter that has neither reference to particular interviewees nor to their quotes.
The matrix shows that journalists are expected to own or collect core knowledge constituting the most basic type of knowledge about states of affairs in different domains, embed it in a series of different circles of contexts, while analyzing the materials on one or more of three levels of analysis (operational, tactic, and strategic), depending on the circumstances, the journalist’s role (reporter or commentator), the nature of the event (live or routine reporting), at different levels of analysis; all to be done using four types of knowledge and while finding the sweet spot between knowledge depth and breadth. This matrix assigns journalists a surprisingly broad jurisdiction on how to implement their core knowledge according to the underlying circumstances. This series of adjustments involve high levels of “adaptive expertise” that requires greater proficiency than fixed expertise as clarified below.
Core knowledge
As shown in Table 2, interviewees offered some 100 distinct topics of desired core knowledge arranged under five conventional military classifications (threats & responses, power buildup, combat & ongoing security, etc.) and more than 20 sub-themes (planning, intelligence, personnel, etc.) that also constitute such conventional classification.
Obviously, the same topics can be classified in endless ways (e.g., “fire capabilities” can be part of “threats & responses” as well as “warfare & combat”). For example, journalism scholars and researchers without particular military background may prefer the following classification, across three axes, offered as an alternative to demonstrate the versatility of classification: (1) (2) (3)
Context
Core knowledge is not enough. Many panelists expect journalists to embed their knowledge in a broader context (e.g., historical, economic, social, legal, etc.). Most experts frequently insisted during the interviews that they expect every journalist, even non-senior ones, to be able to supply context, though not necessarily in every news item. It is particularly needed in disputed items that might involve international scrutiny of Israeli army or when populist politicians might try and exploit the reported matter for their purposes. Context is especially expected in long-form stories and commentary. Prominent stories might invite more than a single circle of context. For example, suicide terrorism might need both historical and geopolitical context.
Due to its tendency to involve interdisciplinary knowledge, core knowledge is often insufficient for context. For example, military operations might need historical or geopolitical context to the extent that sometimes necessitates cooperation with journalists from other beats. Though often falling outside one’s beat, like a story that requires input from an economic journalist (#22), context can sometimes fall inside the border of the military beat, e.g., when the procurement of weapons enables audiences to “understand why Israel should develop a weapons systems rather than buy off-the-shelf products” (#13).
According to most interviewees, journalists’ capacity to supply deeper context depends on several factors: curiosity (#13), intellectual approach (#12), prior knowledge and experience (#21), time constraints (#4), and availability of relevant sources (#5). It also depends on their personal inclinations and interests such as weapons systems or socio-military relations.
The six circles of context mentioned by interviewees — historical, geopolitical, economic, social, legal, and communicative — are the most frequent ones in military coverage, not all of them. Some military stories may need technological, cultural, religious, and scientific context. Interviewees claimed that context helps journalists structure narratives and increase fairness of coverage and helps audiences understand, interpret and evaluate stories and refresh their historical memory.
Levels of analysis
Analysis is part and parcel of how most interviewees imagined journalists’ knowledge work. Yet, analysis is not expected from every journalist in every item. It is especially expected, according to most expert interviewees, in “hard news” items involving threats to human lives, and as far as commentators are involved, due to their enhanced capacities to supply deeper analysis.
Analysis can use core knowledge, and even source input, yet according to both journalists and experts, a good analysis transforms knowledge into understanding, involving causes and implications of events. Interviewees mentioned three specific levels of analysis: operational, tactical, and strategic.
Operational
This most basic level of analysis is required for understanding “the most frequent that are also the most interesting” events (#22) – routine and breaking news. Mamy interviewees expressed the expectation that journalists tie these events to broader patterns or to hidden complexities using operational analysis, e.g., explaining “why the army entered the Kasbah and killed a terrorist” (#23). Operational analysis is necessary, according to journalists and experts alike, for later, more strategic analysis. “If you do not understand this level,” explained a former Deputy Chief of Staff, “you will then fail to take the abundance of tactical events and build a complete picture from it” (#7).
Even the most mundane stories, like routine training or procurement of new equipment need operational analysis to tie them to broader aspects like preparedness for war or its rising costs. Even more so in combat stories: “Take, for example, an air force operation,” offered a senior commentator. One must comprehend “how it is carried out, where the attack order was born, how it unfolded, who was involved along the chain of command” (#18).
Yet, despite its importance, journalists and experts warn, that the operative level is only the “tip of the iceberg” (#23) that in itself can be superficial or even extremely superficial, emerging typically during hectic days when journalists are trying to chase many events with minimal analysis, focusing on immediate facts rather than broader analyses (#8, #9, #12). Such stories, with only basic operational analysis, said a former IDF spokesperson, are no more than “context-free legwork” (#15).
Tactical
Tactical analysis is a bridge between strategic and operational analysis, focusing on the sequencing, coordination, and harmonization of medium-range processes and procedures such as planning, budgeting and procurement. They may include “issues of defense procurement […] defense developments of weapon systems and anti-tank weapons […] familiarity with the [defense] industries” (#22).
Tactical analysis requires acquaintance with how the military works and makes decisions throughout its organizational structure. Knowing “what the Chief of Staff forum is, who decides on taking action, how far the Chief of Staff has the authority to approve a military operation, when he goes to the Minister of Defense and when to the Prime Minister, the Cabinet and the Government” (#15). Military actions, says one interviewee, are “not a chess game where you sacrifice a pawn. It’s a collection of tactical actions that should create a systemic effect that corresponds with a strategic idea” (#5).
Strategic
This highest level of analysis, was emphasized mainly by experts who also highlighted the interconnectedness of military issues, including “economy, defense industries, technological developments […] society […] foreign policy” (#15), particularly in the Israeli context.
Whereas operational and tactical analyses are expected even from military reporters, strategic analysis was considered by most interviewees as almost the exclusive domain of commentators. Reporters may rarely need it, for example, in exclusive stories. “At the highest possible level,” as one interviewee noted, “are geo-strategic topics. That is more [the work] for commentators than reporters” (#21).
To supply a strategic analysis, which occasionally may correspond with the wider circles of context, a journalist must understand first “what is happening in the political, social and cultural environment in order to understand the consequences” of military issues (#23). Strategic analysis entails the capacity to integrate military issues, connecting a military action and its relations with broader entities such as the political, social and democratic systems (#7) overall national security, or to regional, multi-arena and global aspects.
Few experts, however, questioned the extent to which most journalists, including commentators, can indeed develop strategic understanding. Their iconic example was the late, legendary military commentator, Zeev Schiff (1932-2007), who could “write about strategic planning in the IDF and its multi-year plan, and whether the last dollar should be spent on the Apache squadron, on another infantry battalion or on another Mark 4 [Merkava] chariot” (#4). Only outstanding and highly experienced journalists are in a position to evaluate these options independently and integratively prioritize them to optimize the interests of an entire national security system.
Knowledge types
Journalists and experts agree that journalists are expected to develop at least four distinct types of knowledge: (1) (2) (3) (4)
Depth versus breadth understanding
Here, interviewees mentioned how military journalists manage their knowledge architecture, maneuvering between going deep or going broad on different issues, developing specialist or generalist knowledge. Military journalists must cover any military- and security-related issue. Interviewees acknowledged the necessity of breadth when covering a wide range of topics, due to “constant uncertainty” (#21), providing a broad but often surface-level understanding (#3,#4,#19) of various elements like military units, weaponry, and combat strategies, exploiting journalists’ panoramic view. Yet, they maintained that depth was crucial to develop a more thorough understanding of certain key topics, typically those involving risk to human lives (e.g., missile defense systems) or appearing frequently in public discourse.
Some experts see breadth as necessarily superficial, while journalists emphasized that this superficiality might be functional in addressing a quickly changing field: “technology changes very quickly” (#21), “intelligence changes its form” (#2) or since “war is changing from a physical to an information war” (#21). They suggest that knowledge breadth enables greater agility and less fixation, often characteristic of specialists (Epstein, 2021), and better adjustment to unfamiliar issues. Hence, “it is more important to teach [journalists] how to learn” so they know “basic things… [but can] modify according to urgency” (#2).
A military commentator (#19) used a musical term: military journalists must “read” the use of force as reading “musical scores” (partiture) while understanding each of the multiple instruments involved. He also claimed that while commentators must “put the puzzle together”, or to “take information and contextualize it” as one former IDF spokeswoman puts it, reporters tend to be “completely blind” to aspects of depth.
Discussion
The journalists’ knowledge matrix introduced here is more sophisticated, dynamic, and adaptive than offered by earlier scholarship. Although not entirely new, it offers a new vision of journalists’ knowledge.
This case study initiates support for the “piecemeal strategy”' to journalism epistemology, mapping desired knowledge in particular areas. This can overcome the stalemate of academics criticizing journalists’ knowledge deficits (Patterson, 2013) while journalists maintain that academics do not understand the realities of their work (Zelizer, 2009).
If confirmed in other beats, this matrix will invite a series of revisions in the epistemology of journalism; how we imagine journalists’ knowledge; greater emphasis on understanding rather than mere knowledge; higher levels of “adaptive” expertise; more complex and multifaceted journalistic decision making with greater agency and authorship for journalists. The matrix also invites new approaches to training journalists.
Greater emphasis on understanding is necessary to contextualize and analyze issues and add causal knowledge. Experts and veteran journalists alike supported it. Understanding requires higher epistemic standards since knowing relevant facts is insufficient for understanding (Khalifa, 2017). Journalists must learn the “whys” and “so whats” and relations between entities behind the stories (Nielsen, 2017) develop a grasp of structures, functions, interrelations between parts of the reported phenomena, the “nexus” between different explanations (Khalifa, 2017), etc. Furthermore, while news sources may provide second-hand knowledge, it might be insufficient for one’s own comprehension of the reported matter.
Adjusting one’s knowledge to particular circumstances involves a series of decisions, e.g., whether context, analysis or experiential knowledge are necessary, applicable and contributive for a story; how to allocate and prioritize resources to obtain and present them, etc. Journalists who can adjust such a matrix to changing circumstances, must have “adaptive expertise” (Hatano and Inagaki, 1984) which constitutes a higher type of expertise that is harder to replace with algorithms, requiring series of adjustments of one’s knowledge to particular circumstances. In the specific context of journalism, adaptive expertise requires flexible application of knowledge and skills, adjusting strategies and practices to solve particular problems under circumstances of uncertainty, partial information and fast-paced, ever-changing news environments (Carbonell et al., 2014; Guo and Volz, 2019).
(Hatano and Inagaki, 1984) that is harder to replace with algorithms. It enables reporters to flexibly apply knowledge and skills in unpredictable situations and innovatively solve problems in the fast-paced, ever-changing news environment (Carbonell et al., 2014; Guo and Volz, 2019).
To cover such a matrix, journalism studies must integrate chapters currently scattered across the literature: quality in journalism (context), commentator roles (analysis) and beat types (breadth vs depth), and epistemology and science news (causality). Finally, these decisions mean broader jurisdiction (e.g., deciding which context requires emphasis and which level of analysis is appropriate) and higher levels of authorship. Thus, role perceptions like “informer,” “watchdog”, “disseminator”, “stenographer” and more (Hanitzsch et al., 2019) are too epistemically meager to account for the considerations embedded in the knowledge matrix. These, in turn, require apprenticeship-based and coaching-based training, using case studies, scenarios and “shadow boxing” techniques (Klein, 2022).
Our findings raise a series of questions regarding the realism of the matrix, its exhaustiveness, applicability to different types of journalists, and the extent to which it was endorsed by both journalists and expert interviewees.
Isn’t the matrix too complex and ambitious to represent actual standards of knowledge? Not necessarily. As Attewell’s observed (1990) closer examination of any skill set in all professions can reveal surprising complexity. Obviously, desired knowledge is normative, aiming somewhat higher than existing knowledge, yet not too high thanks to the familiarity of our interviewees with the realities of military coverage either as regular military-beat journalists, or senior officers and experts with rich media experience as sources, interviewees, and guest contributors. These experts knew they were profiling journalists, not commanders or field experts.
Is the matrix exhaustive? It is probably exhaustive at least for Israel’s military beat, due to the diversity of interviewees, their broad overview, expertise and reflective insights given that their memory was assisted by a summary of actual publications across years of coverage. However, the actual contents of the core knowledge are always partial and contingent, changing from one era and geo-political context to another. The core knowledge list is certainly an excellent starting point for forming a curriculum of desired military-beat knowledge elsewhere.
Based on these findings, further research is needed to determine if they apply to other beats and news cultures, given the military beat’s unique characteristics in Israel. However, the matrix components—knowledge, context, analysis, breadth, and depth—are fundamental to news epistemology and likely relevant across various journalistic settings, albeit with different weights and priorities depending on the specific beat and cultural context.
Doesn’t the matrix apply mainly to commentators? Ostensibly yes, however, the distinction between reporters and commentators are becoming blurred in many news organizations, due to the “interpretative turn” (Barnhurst, 2014b), the mix between news and views, and the limited resources to employ both reporters and commentators. Hence, reporters are often expected to supply not only context, but also commentary and analysis (Ibid).
What solutions exist for the problem of journalists’ lack of knowledge? Military correspondents, like journalists in general, lack one of the basics of a profession: academic reference and ongoing academic research (Abbott, 1988; Schudson and Anderson, 2009). And yet, at least some of their desired knowledge can be acquired, in the US case, in places such as the RAND Corporation, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the Institute for National Security Studies, in universities that specialize in security studies and military academies. In smaller countries like Israel, relevant knowledge is dispersed across academia, including departments of political science (Israel’s security doctrines courses), economics (defense budget), history (military and war history), international relations (intelligence studies), as well as institutes such as the Intelligence Heritage and Commemoration Center, INSS, and the National Defense College, which has occasional brief training programs tailored for military journalists.
Despite our efforts to select interviewees familiar with the journalistic reality, desired and existing knowledge are not the same. Moreover, despite efforts to diversify interviewees, any choice of interviewee brings more granular items in the respective rubric.
Future research should validate the knowledge matrix across diverse journalistic domains, from specialized beats to generalist reporting contexts. A comprehensive evaluation requires an expansive sample of journalists and domain experts to distinguish essential from peripheral knowledge components.
Methodologically, researchers can employ techniques like observational studies and “think aloud” protocols to penetrate tacit knowledge barriers. Last, the matrix’s para-algorithmic nature (collect core knowledge, embed it into context, and use one or more levels of analysis…), demands rigorous empirical validation through comparative analyses of algorithmic and human journalistic outputs.
Footnotes
Author contributions
Oded Jackman and Zvi Reich contributed equally to this work.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was funded by the Israel Science Foundation (ISF) Grant No. 87745021.
