MediaAcT

against freedom of information. Therefore, journalistic transparency
may be wise, but should be handled with great care.
Do you practice what you preach?
Notwithstanding these important considerations, newsrooms do not
seem to practice what they preach about transparency and audience
interaction. The MediaAcT research shows a clear difference between
what journalists think their newsroom should do and what they think
their newsroom actually does. Considerable parts of the journalistic
process do not require secrecy, so something else is going on. Part of
the explanation, as we found, lies in a tendency to shift the responsibility
for transparency and audience interaction to others. As may be
the case in any other organisation or profession, journalists seem to
believe particularly that their colleagues need to make more effort.
For instance, journalists working for the dailies do not attach the
highest values to employing an ombudsman, the news agency journalists
do. This is remarkable because ombudsmen have no traditional
role for news agencies. Because we do not expect news agencies
to hire ombudsmen in the near future themselves, we suggest that
these results show a ‘telling others what to do-effect’: news agency
journalists – possibly evaluating themselves as a gateway to the news
media – consider that it is a good idea if their print colleagues employ
an ombudsman or public editor.
Telling others what to do also comes to the fore between job positions.
Journalists with managerial job positions differ from operational
journalists in their attitudes towards transparency and audience
interaction. Editors-in-chief attached the highest values and freelancers
the lowest values to providing a contact for complaints about
content. Although all respondents were rather positive about employing
an ombudsman, editors-in-chief are more positive than reporters.
In addition, compared to media managers, both reporters and
freelancers seem to shy away from audience interaction. This may be
due to assumptions about accountable organisations, which is more
the editor-in-chief’s problem, and the seemingly unfeasible interference
with journalistic production, which is more the reporter’s
problem. In the end, reporters have to deal with the audience on a
daily basis, not the editors-in-chief, who merely deal with end-ofthe-line
audience interaction.
Also, age groups account for a few, but meaningful differences.
Junior journalists appreciate direct communication on social media
and online participatory news production significantly more than
senior journalists. This does not mean that senior journalists attach
no value to audience ties in general. Senior journalists show no significant
differences on the importance of responding to users’ comments
and suggestions, and moreover, senior journalists appreciate
the more traditional means of communication, like a central contact
for complaints or an ombudsman.
Finally, the journalists’ nationalities also seem to matter. Although
it seems that European journalists share a common belief
that transparency and audience interaction is important, we found
significant differences between different countries. For instance,
Jordanian journalists show high belief in citizens’ contributions to
journalism. Contrasting with journalists from other countries, they
strongly believe in co-production and in direct communication via
social media. Moreover, Jordanian and Tunisian journalists estimate
that their audiences’ interest in media accountability issues is high.
The Arab spring may offer an explanation for this, as very recently
the citizen’s voice had significant impact on governmental regimes
in these countries. Regarding ombudsmen – as a way to offer transparent
communication with the reader – we found interesting differences
as well. On the one hand, French and Spanish journalists
clearly attach most value to employing an ombudsman. This may be
related to the relatively long tradition of having ombudsmen, who
are seen as icons of quality journalism for prestigious news media,
such as Le Monde, El País and several broadcasting organisations.
On the other hand, Finland and Estonia have no tradition of ombudsmen,
which clearly resonates in the low support given to this by
both Finnish and Estonian journalists. Moreover, in the case of Finland,
this low score emphasises that journalists seem quite satisfied
with the existing culture of audience interaction.
In summary, we found significant differences between how
groups of journalists perceive the importance and actual practices of
transparency and audience interaction. Managers think journalists
should interact more with the audience, while journalists think managers
should invest more in organisational transparency. Although,
to a certain extent, European journalists share a common ideology
on transparency and interaction with the audience, the historical
and political context of individual countries also clearly affects journalists’
faith in transparency and audience interaction. This suggests
that, if feasible, any journalistic quality management should be defined
at the national level and only in terms of improving self-regulation.
The profession itself knows best what improves quality in the
newsroom and what does not. Transparency and audience interaction
seem to be promising tools in that respect, as there still seems to
be considerable room for improvement.
And what about the audience itself?
Journalists often reject pleas for transparency claiming that the general
public is not interested in the processes behind the scenes.
This seems to be only partly true. On the one hand, Dutch research,
by Schönbach and Van der Wurff, showed that the audience is not
very keen to get in touch with journalists. The interactive character
of public accountability suggests a certain amount of reciprocity
which is certainly not the case for all news consumers. Usually the
accountability process only gets going where mistakes have been
made or in cases of public indignation. Factors further hampering
the process are the weak media literacy of the public and the poor
transparency and accessibility of news organisations. On the other
hand, other recent research by Groenhart in the Netherlands contradicts
the supposition of disinterest among news users. A group
of news users is intrinsically interested in newsroom processes, and
many like to observe what’s going on in the newsrooms more passively.
When it comes to quality management, the audience expects
a certain level of transparency in journalism. This high or low level
of interest does not depend so much on a certain medium type or
age group, but rather on media literacy. Therefore, proactive transparency
and media literacy may have more potential for public accountability
than passively waiting for the audience to correct journalism
quality. The MediaAcT project has therefore developed an
online platform for citizens and bloggers, aiming to increase media
literacy (see page 22-23). Instead of expecting the public to proactively
engage with the news process, journalists should make the
effort of making their trade more transparent. They should do so by
stating the professional intentions of news media, by revealing the
struggles behind the scenes, and above all by showing off their own
successful efforts.
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