How fragile is media credibility? Accountability and transparency in journalism: research, debates, perspectives Final Research Report | Media Accountability and Transparency in Europe
MediaAcT
Final Research Report
How fragile is media credibility?
Accountability and transparency in journalism: research, debates, perspectives
www.mediaact.eu
www.mediaspeak.org
Media Accountability and Transparency in Europe
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BIrds-EyE
vIEw
5 A RigHT ROYAl TUsslE
Between press freedom and
state-sanctioned self-regulation
8 lET’s TAlK TO THE nEWsROOM
Facts and figures of the MediaAcT research
project
9 MEDiA ACCOUnTABiliTY in
EUROPE AnD BEYOnD
The state of media accountability in different
countries
AddITIOnAl
4 EDiTORiAl
40 gUEsT EssAY
42 inTERViEWs
44 lEgAl nOTiCE
44 AUTHORs
OpEnIng ThE
TOOlBOx
12 UP-TO-DATE OR OUT OF TOUCH?
Traditional press councils and “readers’ letters”
14 EUROPEAn FlAgsHiPs
Best practice examples of media
accountability
18
20
22
PREPARing FOR THE FUTURE
Media accountability tools online
iT’s TRAnsPAREnCY, sTUPiD !
To what extent and how should
journalists engage in audience participation?
ACTiOn!
How media research can have a lasting
impact on journalists and the public
Photograph: Lutz Kampert
ZOOM-In On ThE
nEwsrOOM
24 CRiTiCAl OR HYPOCRiTiCAl
jOURnAlisTs?
Results of a worldwide survey
28 TRAining is A MUsT
Journalism education fosters media
accountability
30 HOW TO inCREAsE MEDiA
ACCOUnTABiliTY
Do journalists need more incentives or
sanctions to use accountability tools?
32 in THE PillARY!
Errors in reasoning by media management
concerning newsroom self-inspection
Photograph: Lutz Kampert
MEdIA
lAndscApEs
34 CUlTURE ClUB: sHARED VAlUEs
AnD DiVERgEnT PRACTiCEs
Accountability cultures in Europe –
first assumptions
36 MEDiA lAnDsCAPEs in
TRAnsiTiOn i
Focus on central and eastern Europe
38 MEDiA lAnDsCAPEs in
TRAnsiTiOn ii
Perspectives from the Arab world
Photograph: Lutz Kampert
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Who’s watching the
watchdogs?
Do the “Jayson Blair affair”, the
“Stephen Glass affair” or the more
recent “phone hacking affair”
(“Hackgate”) sound familiar to
you? Not a clue? You may vaguely
remember the case of this New
York Times’ journalist accused of
plagiarism, or the movie, Shattered
Glass, about a young journalist who
throws away his brilliant career
when he’s discovered of making
up all his stories… Not yet? Think
of this: the Leveson Inquiry, the
Murdoch name and the closure of
the News of the World magazine. Photograph: Lutz Kampert
If this information makes sense to
you, it’s probably because you already have heard something about
journalistic issues on ethics and deontology – or because you are
either a media professional or a media policy-maker. In any case, feel
very welcome to plunge through a thoughtful analysis on journalistic
concerns: have you ever thought of the fragility of the line which
divides “good” and “bad” journalism? Have you ever thought of
the difficulty we all face when we try to understand if a journalist
or his/her story truly defends the freedom of speech or is simply
overstepping the law?
Which leads us to an essential question: should the media be
regulated? Probably all of us agree that journalistic self-regulation is a
must, some observers have even started to question the effectiveness of
existing self-regulation practices recently. After all, journalists are free
to criticise different forms of power but the question remains of towards
whom are they responsible and held accountable. Besides, journalism is
perceived as powerful. As such it has always been the target of suspicion
and criticism. The continuous progression towards the freedom of the
press, along with the relative diminution of censorship and/or direct
control of political power over the media, gave rise to a growing debate
about media accountability and the question how media accountability
can be assured in a time of growing competition in the media business
worldwide, as well as in a time of rapid technological change.
To start, let’s talk about the word “accountability”. Indeed, in
some countries the word does not even exist. According to different
translations, the state, the markets, the media industry or even the
individual consciousness will be more or less taken into account
– while media accountability foremost means for us ”that journalists
respect their sources and their audiences” (see Mike Jempson’s text, p.
42). In other words: we understand that freedom of speech intrinsically
underpins ethical considerations about the public and the peers from
two different perspectives: transparency and responsiveness. The first
refers to shedding light on the background to news production; the
second is the practice whereby media organisations encourage users to
give feedback.
The MediaAcT project lights up the question of media accountability
at a moment of deep renewal, for at least three reasons: the generalisation
of new technologies, the integration of new democracies to traditional
western journalism practices and the questioning of journalism and its
values as we know them. These aspects were taken into account during
our research. The diversity of our sampling concerning countries and
contexts, which includes western and non-western as well as traditional,
new and emerging democracies, gives both an account of the original
jungle of media accountability and of the process of reorganisation
it is going through: The general trend might also replace traditional
instruments and institutions (such as press councils or trade journals)
by audience-oriented participative practices (media blogs, online
comments, etc.) in the long run.
This magazine gives some clues to fundamental questions: What
can be done to hold the media to account? How can we establish an
effective system of media self-regulation especially in countries where
the media is deeply affected by political powers? How can media users
play a much more active role in media criticism? What can be learnt
from the different experiences with media accountability in northern
and southern, western and eastern Europe – as well as the Arab world?
Responsible journalism is our best bet and aim. According to the
MediaAcT survey, accountable media are essential for the future of
quality journalism. In this sense, articles in this magazine explore
four main debates: (1) the sometimes very complex line between press
freedom and state regulation, emphasising the outstanding differences
among countries; (2) the belief that new technologies are deeply
changing journalistic practices and accountability instruments, even
though traditional Media Accountability Instruments (MAIs) remain
valid; (3) our proposal for newsrooms to use easy-to-understand-andto-apply
accountability tools; (4) examples and experiences, through
which we are aiming to show you how important it is today to feel
concerned about journalism’s ethical issues.
Indeed, the discussion about media accountability is vital for the
future of quality journalism. The research you’re about to read may be
a starting point for further activity in this field.
Olivier Baisnée, Sandra Vera-Zambrano
and the MediaAcT team
A right royal tussle between
press freedom and
state-sanctioned self-regulation
By Mike JeMpSOn
Photograph: photocase/codswollop
Will a new UK model have anything to offer Europe?
As the MediaAcT project set about examining the different ways
in which European and Arabic journalism traditions handle issues of
accountability and transparency, an extraordinary saga was playing
out in the United Kingdom which could have global consequences.
Revelations that senior executives in one of the world’s biggest media
companies had allowed or ignored criminal activity in the pursuit
of sensational stories led to more than 100 arrests, mostly of journalists
and some in dawn police raids, and to serious charges being laid
against at least 30, some for multiple alleged offences. Global media
giant News International shut down one of Britain’s oldest and top selling
(circulation of 2.6m) weeklies, the News of the World (established
1843), when the scandal first erupted, only to find that its sister paper
The Sun (circulation of 2.4m) was also implicated.
At 12:33 on 13 July 2011 the UK Prime Minister David Cameron
announced to the House of Commons that he was setting up an
independent inquiry into what had become to be known as ‘the phone
hacking scandal’.
A foretaste of what was to come
Four years earlier Clive Goodman, Royal Editor at the News of the
World, and private investigator Glenn Mulcaire had been gaoled for
illegally intercepting phone messages of members of the Royal household.
At the time the Press Complaints Commission, set up by the newspaper
industry in 1991 as a form of self-regulation, had accepted assurances
that Goodman was ‘one rogue reporter‘ even though the UK’s
Information Commissioner had published two damning reports in
2006 indicating that 305 journalists from 32 newspapers and magazines
had employed the services of another private investigator to obtain
almost 4,000 items of personal information on their behalf. The
investigator was prosecuted but the journalists were not, and proposals
that in future they should face fines or imprisonment for breaking
Data Protection rules were dropped.
Nonetheless numerous prominent figures who discovered that
their phones had been hacked by the Murdoch-owned newspaper
received substantial, and initially undisclosed, compensatory da-
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mages. It was common knowledge within the trade that private
personal information was also being obtained by payments to
public servants and by illicit access to bank accounts, health and
telephone records.
Then in July 2011 The Guardian newspaper revealed that News of
the World reporters had intercepted messages on the mobile phone
of 13 year old Milly Dowler, who had been abducted and murdered
in 2002. It caused a public outcry and led directly to Cameron’s
statement during which he spoke of “accusations of widespread
lawbreaking by parts of our press; alleged
corruption by some police officers;
and ... the failure of our political system
over many, many years to tackle a problem
that has been getting worse.“ He
said that the police had 3,870 names,
and around 4,000 mobile and 5,000
landline phone numbers, of people who
may have been the subject of unlawful
interference by journalists, or private
investigators acting on their behalf.
Parliament intervenes
Plainly this was a massive scandal involving
criminal activity and the inquiry
he set up, under a senior high
court judge, Lord Justice Leveson,
was to have two parts. In the first he
would look into the culture, practices
and ethics of the press, its relationship
with the police and politicians, and the failure of the current system
of regulation, and the issue of cross-media ownership. He would
make recommendations for a more effective way of regulating the
press while supporting its freedom, plurality and independence
from Government. A second part would examine the unlawful or
improper conduct at the News of the World and other newspapers,
and examine the management and police failures, which allowed it
to happen.
Cameron would later say on television, BBC1, that he would “absolutely”
abide by Lord Justice Leveson’s recommendations, unless
as the interviewer suggested, they were ‘bonkers’. “The status quo is
not an option,” he said. He wanted a system that worked for ordinary
people without the state becoming involved.
An initial compromise using an ancient device called a Royal
Charter, was developed by a government minister in consultation
with the industry, and then revised in a late-night, all-party meeting
with campaigners for media reform who had originally been
reticent about this approach. It would create a Recognition Panel,
independent of the press and parliament, whose sole task would
be to ensure that any self-regulatory body set up by the industry
complied with the criteria proposed by Lord Justice Leveson. But
the deal done was instantly rejected by the industry, who have since
come up with a variant on the same theme, but this time with
the industry rather than the monarch’s advisors in charge. This in
itself posed an constitutional problem since the monarch could not
proceed to approve either Charter while controversy raged. If the
politicians‘ version gets the go ahead most newspapers have said
they will not comply. If the industry’s version is adopted, victims
and critics of the press will remain dissatisfied.
Open season on the press, police and politicans
Before conducting his 11 month long inquiry in the law courts, Leveson
had held a series of briefings for his team and then two days
of seminars with editors, academics and other media experts, to give
them a chance to suggest, which lines of inquiry he should follow.
Opening the Inquiry proper in November 2011 he said: “The
press provides an essential check on all aspects of public life. That
is why any failure within the media affects all of us. At the heart of
this Inquiry, therefore, may be one simple question: who guards the
guardians?”
His purpose was to make ‘recommendations
for a more effective policy
and regulation that supports the integrity
and freedom of the press while
encouraging the highest ethical standards’.
In seeking to determine an answer
to his own question he and his team
of assessors (former journalists, media
executives, a civil rights lawyer, a city
regulator and a former police chief)
heard from some 135 organisations and
474 individuals, in person or in writing.
He conducted a forensic examination of
complaints against the press, as well as
interrogating editors, journalists, police
officers and politicians.
The revelations about the journalistic
culture, and the damage caused
to individuals by intrusive or inaccurate coverage, kept the inquiry
high on the news agenda, and while many positive aspects of the
work of journalists were mentioned, most evidence did damage to
their reputation.
Lord Justice Leveson’s report on the first part of his Inquiry, published
in December 2012, runs to some 2,000 pages. The executive
summary is 46 pages long and contains 92 recommendations relating
to the press, self-regulation and the behaviour of the police and
politicians. The central challenge was to the newspaper industry – to
come up with a new system of self-regulation that would win back
public trust in journalism.
It would need to be led by an independently appointed Chair,
with a board clearly independent of the industry, with no dominance
by editors, and powers to impose heavy fines on those who
seriously transgressed an agreed Code of Practice. Significantly he
proposed the creation of a separate, independent ‘recognition body’
which would ‘guard the guardians’. It’s sole role would be to ensure
that the new system of self-regulation lived up to the required standards.
He suggested that the existing statutory regulator for broadcasting
and communications, Ofcom, might fulfil that role, unless a
new body was created with statutory backing to ensure it had sufficient
authority.
Neither the new self-regulators nor the recognition body could
force publishers to sign up to the new scheme, so Leveson proposed
an incentive. Those that joined a self-regulatory body – and he left
it open to the industry to decide how many such bodies might be
set up – would avoid the risk of exemplary damages being awarded
against them in the event of litigation. This too would require legislation,
following the Irish model.
Leveson’s plan caused an instant rift within the coalition government.
The Liberal Democrat Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg
welcomed the proposals. ”Lord Justice Leveson has considered these
issues at length,” he told Parliament. “He has found that changing
the law is the only way to guarantee a system of self-regulation which
seeks to cover all of the press. And he explains why the system of sticks
and carrots he proposes has to be recognised in statute in order to be
properly implemented by the courts.“
The Prime Minister took a different line, prompting suggestions
that he had been ‘got at’ by leading media executives. “The issue of
principle is that for the first time we would have crossed the rubicon of
writing elements of press regulation into the law of the land,“ Cameron
told Members of Parliamemts (MPs). “I‘m not convinced at this
stage that statute is necessary.“
The devil is in the detail
Analysis of the ‘Press Barons’ Charter’ by leading campaigners for regulatory
reform (see box below), all suggest that it is a reversion to a system
distinctly similar to the discredited Press Complaints Commission.
Far from being independent of press and parliament, this new proposal
allows industry representation throughout and even makes room for
members of the House of Lords to sit on the Recognition Panel.
“It is further away from what Leveson recommended than
anything that has gone before,” said Claire Enders, founder of the
media research company Enders Analysis. The Press Charter would
neither meet his primary purpose to ensure that self-regulation set up
by the industry was fit for purpose, she explained, nor the second – to
allow an arbitation service which should be included to be recognised
by the courts, in part to protect publishers from high costs.
At a Foundation for Law, Justice and Society workshop on media law
after Leveson held in April at the University of Oxford Law Faculty,
Eric Barendt, Emeritus Professor of Media Law at University College,
concluded that “the media’s objections to Leveson are not so much
philosophical as neurotic”.
Former broadcasting standards regulator Lara Fielden, author of a
recent international study of press councils, said that since the media
are granted special privileges in the public interest and in the interest
of democracy, “in return, we expect those who hold power to account,
to account for the powers granted them.”
Throughout the backroom negotiations about how best to proceed
– entirely against the spirit of transparency envisaged by Leveson
– and despite evident support for Leveson among politicians and the
public, as media lawyer and Hacked Off proponent chair Hugh Tomlinson
QC, told the gathering “the media have managed to conduct a
campaign of outrageous and barely believable misinformation to fight
the opposition forces to a standstill.” A non-stop battery of headlines
and stories vilifying their critics and suggesting that their real aim
was state control of the press was spearheaded by The Daily Mail, the
Telegraph Group and News International titles, leading proponents of
the ‘Press Barons’ Charter’.
A Free Speech Network (www.freespeechnetwork.org.uk) claiming
the support of 25 national and international media organisations,
campaigned with pamphlets and adverts as if those seeking a more
effective regulatory system were in favour of state control of the press.
Indeed MediaAcT was characterised as part of an European Union
conspiracy to take control of the press in The Telegraph in April 2013.
Only four, low circulation, national newspapers, The Financial
Times, The Guardian, The Independent and the Morning Star have
stood by Leveson’s
key principles.
Having sought
to present Leveson’s
recommendations
as the end of press
freedom in the UK
after 300 years,
the mainstream
newspaper groups
have now devised a
delaying tactic for
reform which can
“In rETUrn, wE
ExpEcT ThOsE
whO hOld pOwEr
TO AccOUnT, TO
AccOUnT fOr ThE
pOwErs grAnTEd
ThEM.“
only be resolved by negotiation on their terms.
While this may be understandable, since newspapers have a vested
interest in defending their territory, it also highlighted the difficulty
of obtaining any sort of balance or independent critical analysis on a
matter of supreme public interest, when the ‘agenda setters’ have their
own agenda.
Although there was some parliamentary debate, negotiations to
resolve the impasse over Leveson were conducted in secret – at first
amongst editors and proprietors, then between them and government
ministers, and finally between political party leaders and the Hacked
Off campaign. What had begun with one public scandal – the revelations
about the hacking of Milly Dowler’s phone – ended with another
– the almost total exclusion of the public from the debate about how
best to improve media accountability.
After one of the most comprehensive public analyses of journalistic
behaviour ever undertaken in the UK, or elsewhere, as we go to press
the UK is no nearer a resolution to the age old and vexed question asked
by Lord Justice Leveson, ‘Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?`
dEclArATIOn Of InTErEsT
Mike Jempson is director of the journalism ethics charity
MediaWise (www.mediawise.org.uk) which assists members
of the public with complaints about media misbehaviour,
and vice-chair of the Ethics Council of the National
Union of Journalism (Uk & Ireland). Both organisations
gave evidence to the leveson Inquiry favouring press
self-regulation but in a significantly strengthened form
underpinned by statute.
lInks
The leveson Inquiry: http://www.levesoninquiry.org.uk
Media standards Trust: Analysis: press coverage of leveson,
by gordon neil ramsay, May 2013: http://mediastandardstrust.org/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2013/05/MsTleveson-Analysis-090513-v2.pdf
leading campaigners for regulatory reform in the Uk:
Hacked Off: http://hackinginquiry.org/
The Media Standards Trust: http://mediastandardstrust.org
Media Reform Coalition: http://www.mediareform.org.uk
Media Policy Project, The London School of Economics and Political
Science: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/mediapolicyproject/
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let‘s talk to the newsroom!
Facts and figures of the MediaAcT research project
The international research project “Media Accountability and Transparency
in Europe“ (MediaAcT) has studied both media accountability
infrastructures and journalists’ attitudes towards media self-regulation in
14 countries. Within a 3 ½ year research process a distinguished team
of academics from across Europe has conducted a representative survey
among 1,762 journalists in European countries as well as two exemplary
Arab countries (Tunisia and Jordan). The international research project
has received funding from the European Union Seventh Framework Programme
FP7/2007-2013. The study had three core stages.
> International investigation
In a first stage, national desk studies were conducted to investigate the
status quo of media self-regulation and media accountability structures in
the participating countries.
> Into the field
In a second stage, qualitative interviews with around 90 US, European
and Arab experts in the field of online media accountability were conducted
in order to assess the impact of the Internet and the Social Web on
self-regulation and accountability structures and practices.
> Talk to the newsroom
In a third stage, 1,762 journalists in 14 European and Arab countries
were surveyed online on their attitudes towards and experiences with
media self-regulation and media accountability, making this study the
first comparative journalists’ survey on media self-regulation and media
accountability ever. Therefore, media scholars, media professionals, and
media policy-makers alike may use the data provided in the disseminated
processes in order to finally assess the impact of different Media Accountability
Instruments (MAIs) on media professionals – and show which
restrictions weaken their influence – on a sound empirical basis.
LINK
For further information and research results please visit:
http://www.mediaact.eu
Photograph: photocase/owik2
MediaAcT key publications:
Publication 1: The world of media accountability
The MediaAcT project‘s state-of-the-art reports on media accoun-tability
and transparency in Europe. It provides pioneer work
in analysing the development of established and emerging Media
Accountability Instruments in 14 countries in eastern and western
Europe as well as the Arab world.
Eberwein, Tobias et al. (eds.) (2011): Mapping Media Accountability
– in Europe and Beyond. Köln: Herbert von Halem Verlag.
Publication 2: Do-it-yourself accountability
This guidebook presents best practice examples in the field of innovative,
web-based media accountability from across Europe. Bichler,
Klaus et al. (2012): Best Practice Guidebook: Media Accountability
and Transparency across Europe.
http://www.mediaact.eu/fileadmin/user_upload/Guidebook/
Best_Practice_Guidebook_new.pdf
Publication 3: Digital Accountability
The Internet offers new opportunities and challenges for the
transparency of journalistic work and the responsiveness to audience
criticism. The working paper analyses how newsrooms and citizens
use the Internet for media accountability all around the globe.
Heikkilä, Heikki et al. (2012): Media Accountability Goes Online:
A Transnational Study of Emerging Practices and Innovations.
MediaAcT Working Paper. Dortmund: Media Accountability and
Transparency in Europe.
http://www.mediaact.eu/fileadmin/user_upload/WP4_Outcomes/WP4_Report.pdf
Publication 4: Results of the MediaAcT survey
For the latest scientific book “Journalists and Media Accountability.
An International Study of News People in the Digital Age”
edited by Susanne Fengler et al., New York: Peter Lang, published
Summer 2013 (in print), please visit: www.mediaact.eu
Photograph: photocase/pauliestroj
Media accountability in Europe
and beyond
By hAlliki hArrO-lOiT
The state of media accountability in different countries
After reading the first publication of the MediaAcT research project
“Mapping Media Accountability – in Europe and Beyond”, an
Estonian journalism student attending a seminar about the future
of journalism in Estonia commented: “It was enlightening to read
such a cross-national study. Previously, I had the feeling that we
have so many problems with media accountability and self-regulation
here, but now I can see that some countries have an even
worse situation, and in some countries the system functions much
better.”
This is certainly one way to think about media accountability:
comparison enables one to better evaluate the known environment.
Estonia is a small country with a very liberal media policy. Unlike
several of the post-communist countries of central and eastern
Europe, media policy does not suffer under political parallelism,
because market forces play the dominant role.
Comparison at the same time enables a broader perspective on
a topic that is hard to pin down easily. The cross-national view
helps us to see the complexity of self-regulatory instruments and
at the same time realise how tightly accountability is linked to
each particular journalism culture, the maturity of civic culture
and the state of the economy. The broader perspective also enables
us to get a clearer understanding about the fact that accountability
instruments exist in most European countries but differ from each
other with regard to their structure and daily practices. There-
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10
fore, the practical hands-on knowledge that is limited to media
accountability practices in each researcher’s or journalist’s country
only provides a limited understanding of the overall context of accountability
and the range and typology of instruments that could
support transparency and responsiveness – in summary: the quality
of journalism as a whole.
Hidden aspects of media accountability
The cross-country analysis, with its transnational view, brings to
light, for example, a hidden aspect of media accountability: that
the differences in the evaluation of accountability instruments and
journalistic values are determined by the type of media organisation.
Hence, journalists who work for public broadcasting companies
in different countries have, in some regards, more common values
than journalists who work, for example, for a public broadcasting
company and a tabloid publication in the same country.
Another way to look at the existing media accountability system
is to focus on the changes that have been taking place as online
media have developed. Many traditional Media Accountability Instruments
(MAIs) in Europe are universal: press and media councils,
codes of ethics, ombudsmen. These instruments have been more or
less adapted to the online world. However, in addition to the traditional
instruments an increasing number of European countries are
using innovative accountability instruments, which are tailor-made
for the digital world, for example, media-critical blogs, correction
buttons and interactive complaint systems. These responsive online
instruments have the potential to increase the dialogue between
journalists and lay members of the public, information sources and
active citizens.
The collapse of the business models of professional journalism
have brought an important question for the future of quality journalism
to the fore: if professional journalism is increasingly of a
poorer quality, who is in charge of the watchdog role in society?
Although the media should be free and autonomous it is necessary
to balance the media industry’s powerful corporate interests with
the public interest.
The corporate interest – from a rational point of view – is to
produce news content as cheaply as possible. Information overload
challenges journalists’ information selection and interpretation abilites;
strong public relations sectors provide new pressures for journalistic
autonomy. At the same time, society demands responsible
media.
However, societal and technological changes in the global political
economy have made balancing these contradicting interests
increasingly difficult. A simple question is this: what makes a news
organisation strong and motivated enough to keep an eye on its
own actions, particularly when the economic interests of the media
industry and other business sectors are inter-related? The answer is a
professional ideology and a developed accountability system. What
is the state of media accountability across Europe and in some Arab
countries at present?
Codes of ethics: easy to recognise
The most visible traditional accountability instruments across
countries are codes of ethics and codes of good conduct (codes of practice).
While ethical standards mostly apply at the national level,
in-house codes or media organisational codes are directed more
towards certain occupations or jobs (e.g. managing editors’ code
Photograph: photocase/Bastographie
of ethics). However, all the codes declare values and principles
that aim to regulate daily practices and protect the interests of
democratic and civic society. As an example, let’s have a look at
the principle of ‘objectivity‘, which is present in most of the codes
of ethics. The principle of ‘objectivity‘ and truth-telling is often
expressed as practical guidance, for example, “In the case of a
conflicting story a journalist should take all different opinions
into consideration,” or “a journalist should carefully check the
facts from various sources...”. In different countries the number
of such codes of standards varies. In Poland, for example, the
four professional organisations have different nationally applicable
codes: The Charter of Media Ethics; The Journalistic Code of
Conduct; The Code of Journalistic Ethics of The Association of Polish
Journalists (SDP) and The Code of Ethics of The Association of
Journalists of the Republic of Poland (SDRP). In contrast, Estonia
and Finland only have one national code of ethics for journalists
and journalism.
In addition to the national differences, many media organisations
across the countries surveyed have their own mission statements
and editorial statutes, and newsroom internal ethics codes
aimed at managing employees’ professional values as well as their
behaviour on social media like Twitter or Facebook (for exam-
ple, in the Netherlands). In Jordan the government adopted its
own code of ethics and many journalists perceived this as another
means of controlling the press. Al-Ghad (which is privately owned
and Jordan’s second largest daily newspaper) uses its own code of
ethics but only uses it for newsroom decisions for those cases that
need justifying. These few examples illustrate the problem: the
code of ethics seems to be such a clear and “basic” instrument for
ensuring media responsibility. However, our cross-national survey
shows that there is such a variety of codes and these differ so much
in importance that one should always ask the critical question: how
and by whom are these codes interpreted?
Press councils: differences in authority and status
Self-regulated press councils, which are groups of representatives
from the media and society who judge media behaviour on the
basis of complaints that are brought to the council, exist in 7 of
the 14 countries surveyed (Austria, Estonia, Finland, Germany,
the Netherlands, Switzerland and the UK). Their authority and
status are very different. The status of the press councils in Finland
and the Netherlands seems to be higher than in other countries.
The Press Complaints Commission (PCC) in the UK seems to have
the widest influence on general media literacy: in addition to dealing
with people’s complaints, the PCC holds public meetings and
hearings, provides in-house training for journalists and advises on
how to make complaints etc.
In addition to these “classical” press councils, some countries
have other types of bodies which interpret codes of conduct
and ethics. The efficiency of these bodies varies. For example,
the Romanian Press Club is one of the most prominent media
federations and it should observe and enforce the code of ethics.
However, members of this club have violated the code and the
Council of Honor did not penalise them. In Germany, in additition
to the press council, several other organisations take care of
the interpretation of quality and ethical principles, for example,
the Voluntary Self-regulation Authority of Cinematic Industry, The
German Advertising Standards Council and The German Council
for Public Relations.
Catalysts for the accountability dialogue
Accountability comprises media responsibility to society as well as
responsiveness. The latter refers to an ongoing dialogue and debate
between the media professionals and their audiences as well as to
their willingness to explain the principles and motives behind editorial
decisions. A variety of forms of responsiveness can be simultaneously
observed in the countries with a high level of journalistic
professionalism. Ombudsmen (for the press, broadcasting or both)
exist in Austria, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. There are
reader’s advisory boards or councils in Austria and Switzerland, and
correction corners or correction boxes in the newspapers in Germany
and the Netherlands. Regular media-critical pages appear
mostly in quality newspapers (in the UK, Germany, Switzerland
and the Netherlands). Nordic countries also have a strong professional
journalism tradition. Finland is a particular case where one
rather strong “instrument” dominates: The National Press Council,
with the powerful professional Union of Journalists, strongly adheres
to the “responsiveness ideology”.
In the countries where freedom of speech and the development
of the journalism culture has been interrupted (Estonia, Poland,
Romania, Jordan and Tunisia) responsiveness is weaker. One of
the reasons for this is that criticism of the media is only occasionally
discussed. Critical scrutiny is often taken as an attack from
a competitor, and admitting and excusing errors is considered to
damage an organisation’s reputation. Another reason is a weaker
professional culture and the dominance of commercial values.
As the Internet has generated many new possibilities for implementing
interactive instruments to strengthen the media’s responsiveness,
it is important to ask: how intensive is the use of
these instruments in various countries? One can find some fine
examples from different countries: journalists blogs, written by
journalists as individual authors; media blogs, written by journalists
as representatives of a media organisation; citizen blogs and
audience blogs; various interactive debates arranged by media
organisations (“readers’ or listeners’ clubs”); and media observatories
(e.g. www.media.cat). In spite of the wide range of responsive
instruments media organisations generally prefer traditional
instruments. “Responsiveness” based on dialogue and communication
with audiences is currently more of an exception than
a rule. Maybe the media managers just need to be encouraged
to use these innovative instruments to foster transparency, even
if their organisations have not developed specific accountability
mechanisms yet.
Responsiveness as journalistic value
Is accountability a luxury or a necessity? We do not yet have clear
answers but going back to the question: “who is watching the watchdog
in a democratic society?” one can imagine that a possible niche
for a media professional could be the role of a “trusted information
interpreter”. How is it possible to be trusted and trustworthy in an
environment where pressures from the public relations sector, as well
as from other interest groups and business interests, are increasing?
Responsiveness and transparency as journalistic values need mechanisms
in order for them to be rooted in daily practices. It would be
the worst solution if the media declared that these values are not
built into their day to day activities.
The results of the MediaAcT study provide a wide comparative
overview of how similar instruments function in different cultural
and political contexts. Some instruments are just brilliant ideas:
inexpensive and easy to implement (e.g. correction buttons). Other
instruments could provide journalists with more feedback from
the public or allow the audience to engage in debates about media
ethics. Media criticism seems to be more active in large media markets.
Looking at smaller media markets one could ask: could better
dialogue between academia and industry encourage consideration
of innovative Media Accountability Instruments that would allow
professional journalism to improve its accountability systems while,
at the same time, supporting professional journalists in the present
economically difficult situation?
fUrThEr rEAdIng
harro-loit, halliki (2010): from Media policy to Integrated
communications policy. how to Apply the paradigm shift
on a European and national level. In: klimkiewicz, Beata
(eds.). Media freedom and pluralism. Media policy challenges
in the Enlarged Europe, cEU press, pp. 45 - 58.
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Photograph: photocase/kallejipp
Up-to-date or out of touch?
By SAlVAdOr AlSiuS, MArcel MAuri-de lOS riOS & ruTh rOdrigueZ-MArTineZ
Traditional press councils and “readers’ letters”
It’s time to dip into the media’s laboratory. Let’s open the journalist’s
toolbox and take a closer look at the diverse traditional instruments
that journalists and the media have developed over the years to ensure
that they act within ethical norms and values: press councils and
readers’ letters. Are these traditional instruments already old-fashioned
and out of touch or are they still up-to-date and relevant?
Journalists monitor government action, political decisions and
investigate issues. However, guarding society is only one side of the
coin. Who monitors the media and journalists ensuring that they act
ethically? The government? Who else?
Press freedom in a democracy attracts only low levels of legal
government regulations, but something is out of kilter if the
government sets rules for journalists and narrows press freedom by
sanctioning their daily work. This can be seen in the annual Press
Freedom Index compiled by Reporters Without Borders. Neither is it
right that full responsibility should fall on the media companies and
media professionals, who may be tempted to act in line with personal
or corporate interests. In a democracy there is only one answer to this
delicate question: the public.
“Feedback”, an old concept
The term ‘participation‘ – recently replaced by ‘interaction‘ – has, for
decades, been used to overcome the idea of the one directional nature
of communication. In the mid twentieth century communication
theory incorporated the concept of ‘feedback‘ to refer to messages
which sent information back in the opposite direction from usual.
Feedback comprised messages sent to those who normally had the
role of sending out information, messages in which the recipients were
involved to some extent in the active process of communication.
Public feedback: voting with your feet
So, how has the public generally ‘fed back‘ to the communication
media? First, via a message, which while not explicit, is tremendously
effective – consumption. Clearly, it is somewhat dangerous
to make all decisions on the basis of audience figures; but neither
can the response of the public as consumers of media products be
ignored. It should be accepted that the public increasingly sanctions
what it considers to be good or bad quality by voting with its feet. To
ignore this entirely would be foolish.
Readers’ letters: the voice of the audience
There have been and still are specific procedures which allow the
public to express their views on media content. One very longstanding
way is the ‘letter to the editor‘. This letter format, which
has become a distinct journalistic genre in itself, emerged from the
British and American press. Today, given the proliferation of digital
means through which individuals can make their voices heard,
such emphasis on the importance of the ‘Letter to the editor‘ might
ring a little hollow. The fact is that this letter form has endured for
almost two centuries as the most natural way for individuals to
express themselves in the public arena. It is true that the expression
of ideas through this channel was conditioned by many factors:
space limitations, the tendency towards ‘soft‘ topics that permeates
much of the media, and last but not least, the criteria applied to the
selection of material. Despite this, as Brian Thornton, an expert on
readers’ letters, points out, they nonetheless express public feeling,
and especially the feelings of a sector of the public who know how to
express their opinions in writing.
The ‘letter to the editor’ was a mode of communication which
took off in the press in particular. The visual media have on occasion
tried to emulate the possibilities of this pseudo-genre. Sometimes
this is done through simply transposing the concept across media,
for example, when radio presenters read out letters sent in by some of
their listeners. However, radio, and later television, gradually took on
board the idea that listeners could express their feelings live, generally
using the telephone.
‘Letters to the editor‘ and other similar types of contribution have
been lauded by media companies as a way of making their content
more attractive. Without doubt some of the contributions have a
critical edge and, in their own way, these contributions have helped to
influence the quality of media content. A good example of this kind of
the contribution by the users can be found in Spain. Some years ago
the Spanish newspaper El Pais published in its Sunday supplement
only those Letters to the Editor where the readers referred to the
coverage made by the newspaper during the previous week.
Self-regulation as self-defence
The second major channel through which individuals have been able
to express their critical opinions about media content has been the
press councils. The press councils try to ensure that media ethics are
respected. They are entities which receive complaints from individuals
regarding the way in which the media handle the news. They have a
certain moral legitimacy in making judgments on the appropriateness
of how news is dealt with, although they have no actual legal clout to
impose any kind of sanction. Although the press councils are bodies
which are separate from the media companies, in many cases it was
the media companies themselves which promoted the councils as
means of self-regulating the content of their products.
In a number of countries the press councils were born out of
initiatives by media companies to protect themselves from attempts
by government or parliament to impose excessively rigid regulation.
They are the channel by which the media system self-regulates. A
substantial proportion of them are cross-party and are made up of
representatives from among editors and journalists‘ associations.
There are also some (as for example in Sweden, Denmark and
the United Kingdom) which include members of the public as
representatives, who are ultimately those who hold the right to
receive complete, verified information.
Challenges and reformulations
One of the main problems for press councils is incorporating a
reasonable degree of public representation. In a formal democracy
the only thing that truly guarantees such representation is universal
suffrage. However, at the same time, it is true that for public
representation to come via the parliamentary parties would be
problematic. The independence of information, with respect to the
established political powers, would be among those things at risk.
Other problems which have limited the councils‘ ability to act
have been: the lack of power to impose sanctions, as mentioned
earlier, the unwillingness of some companies to recognise the moral
authority of the verdicts, difficulties in obtaining funding, and
a lack of awareness of their role among the general public. The
UK was one of the first countries to have a press council but it
was the UK‘s Press Complaints Commission which had its role
questioned once again following the case of The News of the World
and the recommendation of Judge Leveson regarding the creation
of new laws to govern the press (for details see also the article by
Mike Jempson, page 5-7). This is still under discussion and as an
alternative there is talk of a possible reformulation of the press
council. The tension between regulation and self-regulation is at the
fore yet again. During recent decades many professional journalists
believed self-regulation could act as a palliative to limit the powers
that control media content, and also as a way to guarantee the
public the right to access true, complete and accurate information.
However, lately, many journalists, and also media users, recognise
that the system that gives out penalties to violators is too “soft“ and
cannot stop certain excesses of the tabloid press or garbage TV.
Press councils and readers’ editors still have validity
It is worth considering whether these two prongs of public
participation, letters to the editor and complaints to the press
councils, still have any validity. Based on the answers from the
professionals surveyed in the MediaAcT study it is important to
differentiate between the instruments: while the press council was
perceived as an accountability instrument with medium impact
among the professionals from the countries surveyed, it was at
the same time evaluated more positively than other traditional
instruments, such as ombudsmen or readers’ editors (for further
information regarding ombudsmen and other new forms of
“participative instruments” for more openness and transparency,
please see the article by Huub Evers and Harmen Groenhart, page
20-21). The digital age has clearly provided many new channels
which make the interaction between broadcasters and recipients (to
use the classic division of roles) more intense (for digital details
see page 14-17 and page 18-19). If we go back to the journalist
laboratory, basic tools, such as the traditional press council and the
reader‘s letter, continue to have their place in the toolbox, despite
their evident limitations.
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Online Example 2: Actor Transparency II
Another tool to foster actor transparency is a chat
box, as practiced by the Swedish newspaper Norran.
Their eEditor offers users the opportunity to get in
contact with the journalists in a live-chat (every day
from 6am to 9pm). It is featured on the front page
of the paper. Users can suggest topics or ideas
for stories, report mistakes, ask questions or give
feedback. The new tool has increased the number
of unique visitors, acts as an ombudsperson and a
correction button and it is also a way to encourage
user-generated content (http://norran.se/).
European
flagships
By MATThiAS kArMASin, dAnielA krAuS, Andy kAlTenBrunner & klAuS Bichler
Best practice examples of media accountability
After having introduced the “old ladies” of accountability to you – let’s
walk on the wild side and do a little cross-country accountability trip
through European newsrooms. It is astonishing to see the creative ways
in which the need for accountability is interpreted within international
newsrooms: Italian journalists record their editorial meetings for the
public, UK journalists reflect news decisions online in a blog, journalists
from the Netherlands critique their own profession in a weekly TV
show. The responses by journalists worldwide to the strong demand
for responsiveness and media accountability are manifold – online and
offline. A lot of media organisations use traditional offline tools to foster
Online Example 1: Actor Transparency I
Actor transparency includes the disclosure
of ownership, the publishing of company
guidelines and information about the
journalists themselves (contact, job position,
etc.). It reveals to the users those who produce
the news. The relevant information can easily
be published on the medium’s website, as a
byline underneath an article for example, or
via a range of social media tools. Examples can
be found on the Facebook pages of the Polish
news outlet money.pl (https://www.facebook.
com/ciszak.moneypl) or at the Spanish VilaWeb
(http://www.facebook.com/VilaWeb).
Online
Example 3: Production Transparency I
Production transparency deals with transparency of
sources and professional decision making. Journalists’ and
companies’ blogs are tools that can easily be implemented.
For example, in the Editors’ Blog of the BBc news (http://www.
bbc.co.uk/news/blogs/the_editors/) journalists comment
on the news production of the BBC news show. Other such
blogs are operated by single journalists or media managers
reflecting decisions or national journalism discussions. One
example is the Interna-blog of the Swiss local newspaper
Südostschweiz (http://www.suedostschweiz.ch/community/
blogs/interna).
media accountability, like readers’ letters, media journalism, ombudsmen
and codes of ethics. A lot of new possibilities for media accountability have
arisen as a result of the Internet. Ways to interact with the audience have
increased and the time gap has vanished. It’s a fact that accountability has
been and will continue to be transferred to the online world to use digital
possibilities to further media accountability. For example, journalists
create new digital contact points for users with a new interpretation of
the ombudsman. Others try to integrate their users into the process of
news selection and production. These digital instruments offer a couple
of economic advantages. They are easy to implement, cost-efficient
Online
OFFline
Example 4: Production Transparency II
A more expensive production transparency approach
is shown by the Italian newspaper La Repubblica. Their
open newsroom conference reveals news production
processes as the most important editorial meetings
are broadcasted online (not streamed live, but
available online). The users can see how journalists
justify their choices, comment on the news and
discuss the paper’s issues (http://video.repubblica.
it/rubriche/repubblica-domani).
and help in facilitating a trusting relationship with the audience by
creating a dialogue between the public and media organisations. In the
US and in Europe in recent years the media industry was characterised
by the consequences of the economic crisis: cost cuts for journalists and
newspaper deaths. At the same time new tools for discourse emerging
through the advent of the Internet show positive changes in journalism
(e.g. interaction with the users). The MediaAcT team collected examples
of accountability tools offline and online and selected and published them
in a “Best Practice Guidebook: Media Accountability and Transparency
across Europe”. This publication details a collection of innovative
Example 6: Production Transparency IV
An important instrument of media accountability
is media journalism. A successful example was the
TV show De Waan van de Dag from the Dutch public
service broadcaster. It was a 29 minute weekly media
journalism programme focusing on production
routines, editorial choices, must-haves and flaws
in journalism. One part of the show was a debate
among journalists, reporters and editors-in-chief
about specific issues moderated by a well-known and
experienced presenter. The show reached a market
share of 5.5%. Another example still being broadcast
is the German TV show Zapp – das Medienmagazin
(http://bit.ly/da9BNs).
Online
Example 5: Production Transparency III
Another major aspect of production
transparency is open error management. Many
tools that foster open and transparent error
management are available and in operation in
online publishing. Correction or error buttons
at the Berliner Morgenpost (“Leider falsch”
http://www.morgenpost.de/berlinaktuell/
article1077710/), the Swiss newspaper
Tagesanzeiger (http://www.tagesanzeiger.
ch) or the Swiss free newspaper 20Minuten
(http://www.20min.ch, http://www.20min.ch/
ro/) are just three examples. Similarly, there
exist correction boxes which make errors
transparent, e.g. at the Dutch public service
broadcaster NOS’ website (www.nos.nl/nos/
herstel/).
instruments dedicated to media accountability and quality assurance
in journalism. It targets media managers, journalists and practitioners
in the field of content production who are interested in high quality
and transparency. The tools in this guidebook include users and media
professionals involved in the processes of media production and media
self-regulation. The following overview is intended to help you to navigate
easily through the diverse world of transparency and media accountability.
By way of guidance, we distinguish between three different types of
transparency and media accountability: actor transparency, production
transparency and responsiveness. Let’s get started.
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OFFine
Example 10: Responsiveness IV
A good way to include the audience in the reflection and
production processes are readers’ advisory boards. Amongst
others, they are practiced by the German boulevard
newspaper BILD (http://bit.ly/MMsYPn), the Austrian local
newspaper Vorarlberger Nachrichten (http://bit.ly/OZ3dwT),
the Swiss boulevard newspaper Sonntagsblick (http://bit.
ly/Oo9MHG) and the Catalan newspaper El Punt (http://
bit.ly/QwmOVg). The advisory councils are composed of
readers representing the diversity of the audience. They
are elected once a year. Their “task” is to attend panels
in the newspaper’s headquarters and discuss their ideas,
share their opinions and give feedback. Such tools ensure
transparency, foster media literacy and have a high impact
on the loyalty of the users.
Online
Example 11: External Tools
Next to these company internal innovations one
can find new tools that empower the audience
in the process of media regulation and selfregulation.
Since the advent of the Internet,
it has been possible for the audience to get its
voice heard easily, inexpensively and with the
possibility of reaching a lot of other interested
people. Users can participate in the process of
media accountability, for example, by writing
their own media watch blogs. Examples can
be found in many countries: MediaBugs, USA
(http://mediabugs.org/), BildBLOG, Germany
(http://www.bildblog.de/), Merkintöjä mediasta,
Finland (http://outi.posterous.com/) or kobuk,
Austria (http://www.kobuk.at/).
Best practice examples online:
Online
Example 8: Responsiveness II
The open newsroom policy of The Guardian
is a remarkable concept. Next to many
other tools, they offer their newslist to all
users. On this website users are able to see
which stories are discussed or produced by
the newspaper’s staff or what the editors
think about their coverage. The readers get
a good idea of how the news is produced.
Furthermore, they can post what they think
of the stories or suggest ideas – all userfriendly
via Twitter or Email. The newslist
is a format which is easy and inexpensive
to establish as it can be an embedded
Google document (http://www.guardian.
co.uk/help/insideguardian/2011/oct/10/
guardian-newslist).
OFFline
Example 14:
Production Transparency IV
An internal offline practice is the
“early paper critique” as is done by
the Swiss Bieler Zeitung (http://www.
quajou.ch/downloads/medienaward/Dokumentation_Medien-
Award_2005.pdf). All articles
produced before 6pm (before
the newspaper goes into print)
are collectively analysed by the
editors involved. The articles are
always presented by the head of
the news division. At least one of
the chief editors, as well as the art
director, have to be present. This
instrument fosters a lively internal
debate on quality, accuracy and
decision-making.
OFFline
Example 12: External Tools
The Register Citizen Newsroom Cafe in Torrington,
Connecticut, USA (http://newsroomcafe.
wordpress.com/) is a combination of coffee
house and local newsroom. The local
newspaper is produced by professionals,
citizen journalists and lay people. People can
give feedback to stories, attend the planning
meetings or use the work space provided. To
date the physical presence in the newsroom
is not as great as the online contributions.
This innovative project strengthens the
error management process, creates actor,
newsroom and production transparency, and
contributes to responsiveness.
Example 9:
Responsiveness III
A sophisticated approach to
include users in the selection and
production processes has been
adopted by the Finnish public
broadcaster YLE2. One third (8
minutes) of their daily prime time
live current affairs programme
is completely focused on the
publics’ perspectives. Everybody
can suggest topics, comment
ideas and act as a contributor and
they use a range of platforms such
as Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and
Skype. The level of contributions
as well as the audience response is
a big success (http://yle.fi/uutiset/
puheenaiheet/).
Online
Online OFFline
Example 7: Responsiveness I
Responsiveness refers to an active and fair dialogue with users. This includes,
first of all, an open newsroom policy. There are many different tools helping
journalists to give insights into news making and news production. For
example, the weekly live chats with editors that are practiced by the French
online paper rue89 (http://www.rue89.com/participez-a-la-conference-deredaction-en-ligne)
are an effective and non-expensive tool. Journalists
and users can discuss current issues, ask for feedback or give insights into
their reporting routine.
Example 13: External Tools
An easy to implement offline tool is an open
critique session, as practiced by the Austrian
monthly magazine Datum (http://bit.ly/
OtaQJA) and by the Spanish El Periodico (http://
entretodos.elperiodico.com). This is an open
forum where the audience can discuss the
latest issue with either or both the editorial
team and an external expert from the media
or the arts. The resources needed are quite
low. These sessions strengthen reader loyalty
towards the medium and give an insight into
the production process.
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Preparing
for the future
By heikki heikkilÄ
Media accountability tools online
In recent years, there have not been many innovations in newspaper,
radio or television journalism to report. However, a number of new phenomena
in journalism and public communication have emerged on the
Internet: blogging and microblogging, citizen journalism and user-generated
content, data journalism and data leaks, for example.
Some observers argue that online communication can be instrumental
in democratizing societies in some parts of the world – for instance,
in Arab countries – while in western countries it is assumed that the Internet
is key in pulling the news industry out of its economic difficulties.
In the USA, a recent report on Post-Industrial Journalism predicts that
“journalism in this country will get worse before it gets better”. It will
get better, the report maintains, if news producers and users are able to
“take use of tools and techniques that were not possible ten years ago”.
While some of this optimism may be unwarranted, it is convincingly
pointed out that the online news environment is much more dynamic
than the offline environment.
One of the challenges for media organisations in the future is to
strengthen the public trust in news institutions and the legitimacy of
journalism. Two principles of media accountability are important in
this respect: transparency and responsiveness. Transparency refers to
practices that aim to shed light on the background to news production
by describing who the producers are and explaining what they are
doing. Responsiveness, in turn, refers to practices whereby media organisations
encourage users to give feedback and find ways to take users’
concerns into account.
Digital technologies seem to be well-suited for both purposes. On
the Internet, news organisations can break out from the scarcity of
publishing space and inform the audience at length about their ethical
standards and editorial policies. In addition, the Internet enables direct
interaction between producers and recipients of news. Thus, it is easier
for anyone to participate in the dialogue about the ethics and quality
of news.
In the MediaAcT project an explorative study was launched for mapping
the development of media accountability on the Internet in Western,
central and eastern Europe, the USA, and two Arab countries.
The analysis demonstrates that while the Internet tools and instruments
have spread to different parts of the world their prominence and efficacy
vary a great deal. These differences do not merely relate to the varying
standards of the Internet infrastructures. Even more importantly, the
differences suggest that transparency and responsiveness are not among
the top priorities in newsrooms.
Transparency: unless you have something to hide
When politicians refuse to give a statement, a normative argument for
transparency is often voiced by journalists: “If you have nothing to hide,
transparency is for your own good”. Our analysis suggests that journalists
do not always apply the same argument to themselves. This is de-
Photograph: photocase/ohneski
monstrated by the fact that only a few practices promoting transparency
are widespread among online news organisations. Where such practices
are introduced, the news organisations’ motive to implement them is
often commercial rather than ethical.
The simplest model of so called “actor transparency” is to tag news
items with the by-line and the e-mail address of the responsible author.
This is a widespread practice in the USA, western Europe and Poland,
but it is far less common in Bulgaria, Serbia or Arab countries. Even less
common is that online news services provide more detailed profiles of
journalists’ specific expertise on the themes they are reporting.
At the level of the media organisation, actor transparency can mean
shedding light on the ownership structures of media companies. Such
information is generally made available in western Europe and the USA,
but the financial reports and business strategies are separated from the
online news services. A similar separation can be found between news
websites and ethical guidelines. In news cultures where the codes of
ethics are approved collectively by journalists’ unions, the ethical guidelines,
as well as tools for filing a complaint to the press council, exist
outside online news platforms. In news cultures where the emphasis on
ethical conduct is on in-house guidelines, these codes are not always easily
accessible. These examples suggest that transparency is for some reason
toned down by news organisations, which undermines its efficacy.
While actor transparency casts light on practices before the act of
publication, transparency may also be enacted during it. News organisations
may allow users to compare the news items to the original
sources of information by attaching external hyperlinks to the news
story. This practice, however, is far from systematically applied. Instead
of this online news organisations prefer publishing the hyperlinks only
to their previously published news stories. This means that the hyperlinks
do not aim to help users to evaluate the veracity of the news item
in front of them, but rather they are treated as an implicit persuasion for
users to stay a bit longer on the given news website.
Another form of production transparency can be introduced by allowing
users to witness editorial meetings or submit their ideas for editorial
decision-making. Production transparency may also be pursued by
running newsroom blogs to explain editorial decisions or comment on
questions arising from the reporting. At the moment, only a few news
organisations are providing video streams from their editorial meetings
or providing newsroom blogs which systematically consult users about
the items they are covering. Even if some news organisations have run
newsroom blogs for a number of years, the practice in general seems to
be losing prominence.
Newsroom blogs may be regarded as outdated, as online news organisations
are interested in getting a foothold on social networking
sites. While Facebook users, groups and networks may be harnessed in
gathering sources and information, for online newsrooms Facebook is
predominantly a tool for promoting news stories and a promising strategy
for maximising incoming web traffic to their news service. While
this objective is legitimate, it is based on economic interests rather than
ethical principles.
Responsiveness: “Tell us where we went wrong”
News organisations depend on their audiences. This idea is very notice-able
in the variety of ways that newsrooms open themselves up
to users’ tip-offs and comments. Facebook and Twitter are clearly
gaining importance over discussion boards, news comments and
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) sections. Despite the fact that social
media enables more direct interaction with users, it seems that
journalists continue to keep their audiences at arm’s length. At the
end of 2010, only two editors-in-chief in th United Kingdom were
tweeting regularly, and their mode of communication was mainly
one-directional.
The area which online newsrooms have taken more seriously is
error management. Not only are news desks better prepared to receive
notification of errors; they are also proactively making error
management more transparent. One of the online tools, which is
gradually becoming more widespread, is the correction button. The
efficacy of error management needs contributions from active and
interested users. Some of this activity may not be directed back to
the news organisations through correction buttons, but it may give
rise to citizen-based media monitoring. These sorts of citizen blogs
can be found in different types of media and political cultures, such
as Germany, the USA and pre-revolutionary Tunisia.
New environment – new dynamics?
The development of online media accountability practices does not
depend so much on technology but on economic and commercial
interests within news organisations. At the moment, transparency
and responsiveness are not among the primary strategies in media
companies; many newsrooms are still experimenting with the idea.
Through experiments, new journalistic practices – and perhaps innovations
in media accountability – may emerge.
The flow of ideas about new online practices does not spread in
the same way as technologies. In journalism new influences traditionally
flow top-down and from the centre to the periphery. This
pattern highlights the role of western news cultures and national
flagship media corporations in each country.
While actors such as the New York Times, BBC and The Guardian
continue to be influential in the online environment, new practices
may emerge from elsewhere, too. Due to new online start-up organisations
in the USA, media bloggers in Europe, and online activism
in Arab countries, the news environment today is much more decentralised
and transnational than it used to be ten years ago.
fUrThEr rEAdIng
Anderson, wright; Bell, Emily; shirky, clay (2012): post-Industrial
Journalism: Adapting to the present. new york:
Tow center for digital Journalism, columbia Journalism
school. http://towcenter.org/research/post-industrialjournalism/
domingo, david et al. (2012): Media Accountability goes
Online: A Transnational study of Emerging practices
and Innovations. MediaAcT working paper. Available at:
http://www.mediaact.eu/fileadmin/user_upload/wp4_
Outcomes/wp4_report.pdf
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| Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
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Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
0
it’s transparency, stupid!
Journalism is increasingly faced with calls for more public accountability.
Empowerment of citizens, digitalisation, commercialisation
and increasing information flows pose new demands for journalistic
quality and professional legitimacy. Consequently, professional
organisations increasingly state the importance of being transparent
and responsive towards the audience. While both audience
interaction and transparency are indispensable in their own right,
we suggest that transparency deserves extra attention. Not only is
transparency believed to improve news media credibility, it also supports
audience interaction and, not insignificantly, it is relatively
easy to realise.
Serveral ways of transparency
Journalists and newsrooms can be transparent in several ways. In
the first place, journalists can be clear about their sources. Referring
to sources is a common journalistic practice; by attributing assertions
to others, a journalist explains how their claims are underpinned.
Increasingly, this ‘source transparency’ is provided by links to
original documents and raw material. It is less common, however,
to explain the authority, the expertise and the interests of a source.
Few journalists mention the specific conditions of news people
before appearing as a source. In the second place, journalists can
be transparent by sharing thoughts and decisions during the journalistic
process. Some call this ‘process journalism’, to emphasise
By huuB eVerS & hArMen grOenhArT
Photograph: photocase/MMchen
To what extent and how should journalists engage in audience participation?
that journalistic claims are never definitive, but constantly developing.
Admitting and correcting mistakes is part of the same deal.
Third, journalists can be transparent about themselves and their
organisations by means of mission statements, ethical standards,
responsibilities and backgrounds. A common practice is the use of
credit lines or the publication of short journalists’ biographies on
the news medium’s website. Apart from this, many journalists create
their own individual profile. They have their own website, or use
Twitter to express their thoughts or to ask followers for help. This
makes it easier for potential sources to find a journalist when they
want to provide them with information. In addition, many journalists
perceive transparency in terms of the accessibility of the news
organisation by means of a contact for complaints. Publication of
any form of audience interaction, like user comments, social media,
or participatory journalism may be called ‘interaction transparency’,
which symbolises the responsiveness of journalists.
Nevertheless, journalists have good reasons for secrecy as well. As
journalism is a discipline of verification, it is hazardous to publish
news that still needs to be checked. Unless journalists have doubtful
motives, they do not want to publish obvious inaccuracies. More
strategically, journalists may need to keep their projects secret from
their object of inquiry or from competing news media. The most
fundamental reason for secrecy, however, lies in source protection.
Absolute transparency silences criticism, and as such it functions
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.
1
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Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
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| Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
Photograph: photocase/hannesleitlein
Action!
By TOBiAS eBerwein
how media research can have a lasting
impact on journalists and the public
How can media research have a lasting impact on the behaviour of journalists
and other social actors? Why is it that so many newsrooms have
no discernible interest in any kind of academic analyses, while for many
researchers their main motivation is in initiating a wide social debate on
the quality of the media, thus contributing to journalism’s advancement?
There have been countless discussions on the question of the relevance of
academic research – and media studies in particular (see Fengler, Eberwein
and Jorch, 2012). Despite many attempts to bridge the gap between journalism
and academia, at best, the relationship between them still seems to
be ambivalent in most European countries. As the comparative survey by
the multinational MediaAcT consortium demonstrates, media research
hardly receives any attention from journalists across Europe (and the Arab
world). When asked what impact journalistic practitioners give to the academic
analysis of journalism, as compared to other Instruments of Media
Accountability (MAIs), such as press councils, ombudspersons or media
criticism on the social web, a mere 19% of respondents claimed that it had
at least some influence on their behaviour. Only few other MAIs received
worse ratings (for more details see Fengler, Eberwein, Mazzoleni, Porlezza
and Russ-Mohl, forthcoming). Do most initiatives by media scholars to
launch a public debate on media performance and correcting journalistic
mistakes simply vanish into thin air?
Transgress the academic boundaries
In order to cope with this problem, the MediaAcT project devised a way
to change this: major research results that have been generated over the
project’s life, the past 31/2 years, are not only being published in the traditional
form of academic papers, but also in other media formats that
can help to address all stakeholder groups with an interest in a free and
pluralistic media landscape – most notably media practitioners and the
public. The collection of articles and essays in this journal may serve as
one example – summarising the project’s findings and presenting them
in an easily accessible form, not the conventional mode of academic writing.
To illustrate the benefit of well-functioning Media Accountability
Instruments, the project also identified many international best-practice
examples and these are presented in a guidebook for journalists and newsrooms
(see box below).
Let’s start! Online and offline training
Moreover the project participants developed two online platforms that are
intended to highlight the societal relevance of the discussion about media
accountability and transparency: one of them, a web-based training tool
for journalists, is integrated in the project’s homepage on the web (http://
www.mediaact.eu); the other, a dynamic website for bloggers and other
interested citizens, is accessible under http://www.mediaspeak.org.
For the journalist’s training tool, the MediaAcT consortium developed
a seminar series on media accountability. It consists of 14 separate sessions
on topics ranging from theoretical perspectives and insights into the concepts
of media self-regulation and co-regulation, to a practical introduc-
tion to the functionality of different MAIs, such as press councils, codes of
ethics, ombudspersons, media journalism and the particular potential of
web-based accountability processes. Each session is accompanied by a set
of Powerpoint slides, ready to use in a classroom setting. In addition, the
training tool also includes a variety of flash cards for key terms, suggested
reading assignments, a collection of case studies on characteristic ethical
dilemmas in journalistic practice and multimedia elements (e.g. video interviews
with international experts in the field). All materials draw on the
research from the MediaAcT project, communicating key findings from
its studies that directly relate to everyday work in the newsroom.
The MediaAcT citizens’ platform is dynamic and interactive. It collects
critical blog posts by media users about journalistic misbehaviour
and offers room for public discussion. The site also presents different codes
of conduct for media professionals and provides simple instructions about
how to make complaints if these codes are disobeyed. Moreover, it also
works as a forum to connect other decentralised citizen initiatives on media
criticism and accountability.
Both the citizen platform and the training tool are unconventional
ways of presenting the findings of an academic survey. Nonetheless, they
not only serve their audiences in professional journalism and civil society
– but also media researchers in their long struggle to bridge the gap between
themselves and their objects of study.
lInks
website of the MediaAcT project: http://www.mediaact.eu
MediaAcT’s online platform for journalists and citizens:
http://www.mediaspeak.org
fUrThEr rEAdIng
Bichler, klaus; harro-loit, halliki; karmasin, Matthias; kraus,
daniela; lauk, Epp; loit, Urmas; fengler, susanne; schneider-
Mombaur, laura (2012): Best practice guidebook: Media
Accountability and Transparency across Europe. Url: http://
www.mediaact.eu/fileadmin/user_upload/guidebook/
Best_practice_guidebook_new.pdf
fengler, susanne; Eberwein, Tobias; Jorch, Julia (eds.)
(2012): Theoretisch praktisch!? Anwendungsoptionen
und gesellschaftliche relevanz der kommunikations- und
Medienforschung. konstanz: Uvk.
fengler, susanne; Eberwein, Tobias; Mazzoleni, gianpietro;
porlezza; colin; russ-Mohl, stephan (eds.) (forthcoming):
Journalists and Media Accountability. An International study
of news people in the digital Age. new york etc.: peter lang.
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| Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
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Photograph: photocase/spudnique
Critical or hypocritical
journalists?
By SuSAnne Fengler, TOBiAS eBerwein, JudiTh pieS, JuliA lönnendOnker &
lAurA Schneider-MOMBAur
results of a worldwide survey
How can we ensure a free and responsible press across Europe?
This question is currently debated heatedly, even aggressively, by
journalists, industry representatives, media policy-makers and
scholars across Europe. In late 2012, Lord Justice Leveson recommended
a fundamental reform of the traditional model of media
self-regulation in Britain – which has dominated other western
European journalism cultures since the 1950s. As a consequence
of the News of the World scandal, Leveson suggests a new, statutory
regulatory system. Obviously, the current self-regulation system
was not able to restrict the unethical and unlawful methods
of the Murdoch-owned tabloid.
Leveson has prompted an outcry among British news outlets.
Many of them consider such a form of state intervention to be
the end of press freedom. A similarly fierce response was given
by industry representatives and lobbyists across Europe to the
2013 report of the EU High-Level Group on Media Freedom
and Pluralism (HLG) (see also page 40). The committee was
set up by EU commissioner, Neelie Kroes, in 2011; at that time
the European parliament was concerned about a tightening of
media law in Hungary under the Orbán government. Among
other recommendations, the High-Level Group suggests drastically
expanding the sanctioning potential of existing press
councils. They also demand mandatory media councils in EU
states which, like France and Romania, do not have a press
council yet.
Journalists’ attitudes towards media self-regulation
The key question behind both the Leveson recommendations and
the High-Level Group report is obvious: does the traditional model
of media self-regulation dating back to the 1950s, with press
councils as its core institution, still suffice for today’s converging
media world – which is so much more competitive? Can new accountability
instruments emerging online – like newsroom blogs,
online ombudsmen and media criticism via the Web – successfully
support, or even replace these traditional instruments of media
self-regulation? Aren’t participative models of media accountability
a more promising and “healthy” option than co-regulation
models which foresee a greater role for the state?
These are also the key questions of the research project “Media
Accountability and Transparency in Europe“ (MediaAcT).
Our survey of 1,762 journalists in European as well as two Arab
countries (Tunisia and Jordan) reveals sharp contradictions: even
though journalists across countries unanimously support the
statement “Journalistic responsibility is a prerequisite for press
freedom”, journalists’ actual support for the concept of media
self-regulation is, at best, mediocre in most countries.
Lip service to media accountability?
Journalists only attribute a medium or even rather weak impact to press
councils, media criticism in the mass media, ombudsmen, media blogs,
and the other Media Accountability Instruments (MAIs). Obviously,
European journalists in many countries question the effectiveness of
the existing media self-regulation practices. The survey results also
reveal another telling fact: journalists perceive those MAIs that have
the potential to endanger their personal professional lives as much
more powerful than all of the instruments at the professional level.
In almost all of the 14 countries involved in the study, journalists see
ethical guidelines given out by their newsroom and media laws as the
most influential instruments of media accountability. In comparison,
traditional instruments of media self-control, such as press councils
and press codes, are perceived as considerably less influential. In most
countries journalists also attribute rather little impact to ombudsmen,
trade journals and media criticism in the mass media – let alone
external critics, such as media Non-governmental Organisations
(NGOs) or media scholars. Thus, from an empirical point of view,
it seems understandable that the European Union raises the question
of whether the current potential of sanctions that European press
councils have at their disposal is sufficient.
Journalists observe more audience criticism online
In the past few years, many new MAIs have emerged online – like blogs
run by journalists, online ombudsmen, media users’ blogs, and media
criticism via Twitter and Facebook. Obviously, these new instruments
already have some impact on the journalists. Many media professionals
across countries said in our study that they observe a notable increase of
critical audience feedback online. Younger journalists especially, and
those journalists who work for online media, are open-minded about
these innovative instruments. Among the new digital possibilities,
social media platforms are rated as the most important MAI: the
surveyed journalists state that they have received an increasing amount
of feedback and critique from their audiences via Facebook and Twitter.
Especially for journalists in the two Arab countries - affected by their
experiences with governmental censorship – the social media dialogue
with their audience is important. However, while digital MAIs have
obviously gained prominence, they still lag behind the – limited –
relevance of the traditional Media Accountability Instruments.
Criticism of colleagues is not common
In many countries there is hardly any culture of criticism within newsrooms:
just a third of all surveyed journalists stated that they criticise
their colleagues often or frequently. Only in a few countries, like Finland,
where newsrooms are less hierarchically organised (see further
down), are journalists criticised more often by their colleagues.
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| Media landscapes
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Media landscapes
External criticism by politicians, scientists or media users is even
less appreciated – and often perceived as unfair by journalists. Does
this attitude still fit in this day and age, where influential institutions
call for more media transparency? When journalism fails to initiate a
critical debate about its weaknesses and problems, it also misses the
chance to point out its strength and its essential role for an efficient
democracy in the era of Google & Co.
Not very welcome: the audience as media critic
In the digital age, it has become much easier for media users to become
media critics. They can get back to journalists and news outlets
via Facebook and Twitter, or use social media to network with other
citizen media critics. Many news websites offer comment functions
and a few are already experimenting with correction buttons. Is the
time ripe for a participatory approach towards media accountability?
Are journalists ready to give the public a significant role in holding
the media to account? Not yet, according to our data. Journalists
across countries observe increasing audience criticism online, but
they still do not take their public as seriously as they should. Even
though the future of quality journalism, at least, more than ever
depends on a stable trust relationship with the audience, journalists
seem to cling to their traditional gatekeeper role: they do not
consider the impact of user comments – be they offline and online
– on journalism as important. Less than half of the journalists across
countries support the statement that journalists are concerned about
audience criticism. While journalists strongly favour transparency
about media ownership and also support the idea of publishing a
journalistic code of ethics online, they are much less enthusiastic
about explaining everyday news decisions in a newsroom blog. They
also want to provide a contact for users’ complaints – but support
for ombudsmen, and the opportunity to communicate directly with
journalists, is considerably less intensive. Journalists are also quite
sceptical about allowing users to participate in the production of
stories online or provide links to original sources. Even though journalism
is a public service, the public is held in rather low esteem by
journalists.
Another item in our survey questionnaire may provide an explanation:
when we asked journalists who they feel responsible to,
journalists cited their own conscience and professional values in first
place. Moreover, the majority of journalists feel more responsible
to their sources than to their target audience or the public. To sum
up: even though the audience makes increasing use of online feedback
mechanisms, journalists are still reluctant to acknowledge the
public’s role in holding the media to account. Thus, participatory accountability
models cannot replace a strong organisational commitment
and a sophisticated system of incentives at all levels to promote
media accountability.
Scepticism in Spain, Italy, Romania and Poland
In central and eastern as well as southern Europe journalists are even
more sceptical about the concept of media transparency: many Spanish
and Italian journalists, as well as their colleagues from Romania and Poland,
believe that publishing corrections or making newsroom processes
transparent online will damage the bond of trust between journalism
and the audience. Journalists from these four countries as well as from
Jordan and Tunisia told us with higher than average frequency that they
worked for distinctly political media, and therefore felt constrained to a
specific political idea or pressured by the government.
Promoting media accountability – stick or carrot?
Given these rather sobering results – what can be done to promote media
accountability? Our data clearly show that journalists don’t want state
intervention – the statement “formal systems of media regulation are
open to political abuse” was widely supported by the 1,762 journalists
who responded to our survey. However, they view the existing instruments
as insufficient as well – in sharp contrast to the industry representatives
who, in reaction to the High-Level Group report, claimed that
the existing systems of media self-regulation work properly and well. For
example, while UK industry representatives were extremely against any
form of co-regulation, journalists in the UK gave highest support to the
statement “to be effective media self-regulation needs more sanctions.”
Towards a culture of accountability
Our survey shows that the newsroom makes the difference. Journalists
from news outlets who report being praised when they uphold standards
even under difficult circumstances, and who report that they would be
called in by their supervisors when media users challenge the integrity
of their work, value the impact of the different MAIs higher than their
peers who work in newsrooms without such a culture of accountability.
This means that the newsroom management plays a considerable
role when it comes to the ethical awareness of journalists. A series of
additional 100 interviews with international experts on media accountability
conducted by MediaAcT has confirmed this: “Only enacting
the instruments through practices, media accountability actually exists.
Instruments, therefore, cannot be taken for granted, and for them to
become established practices depends on actors‘ attitudes and positions
in the field” (Domingo & Heikkilä, 2011, p. 10).
We can also observe the strong influence of the organisation
on other issues: journalists from public broadcasting stations rate
the impact of MAIs higher than their colleagues from commercial
TV and radio. Across hierarchies, freelancers are most reluctant to
support the MAIs. Media organisations which have pushed towards
outsourcing in many European countries now carry a huge responsibility:
for their own interest they have to make sure that they do not
grow a ‘journalistic underclass’ without ethical awareness. There is
a second lesson here: it takes a pro-active media management to establish
a culture of accountability in the newsrooms – but it also requires
a certain amount of financial stability, both on the individual
and on the organisational level, to be able to ‘afford’ accountable
behaviour. This is quite a challenge in a time where journalists from
all MediaAcT survey countries consider economic pressure to be the
greatest threat to standards in journalism.
However, in the digital age, it is no longer costly to install accountability
and transparency mechanisms in the newsroom. Our survey
data also show that web-based MAIs are gaining prominence: albeit
at a low level of significance. Media blogs written by journalists are
already considered more influential than the traditional journalistic
trade magazines, and newsroom blogs – which can foster transparency
about newsroom-internal discussions about journalistic standards
– almost equal the significance of the ‘classic’ ombudsman.
The responsibility of media companies is even greater in southern
and central Europe, where journalists’ unions and federations are less
influential than in western and northern Europe. Here, journalists rate
the (potential) impact of a company code especially highly. If media
managers actively implement accountability and transparency mechanisms,
they clearly demonstrate that they care for media accountability,
and thus make any form of state intervention superfluous. Should
the High-Level Group – even though it is so sharply criticised
– succeed in increasing the pressure on media organisations to
pro-actively install MAIs, the report will already have served its
purpose.
A media policy perspective: incentives
Media policy-makers could encourage such activities by creating
strong incentives for media companies to become involved
in media accountability activities at both levels. The MediaAcT
project has applied an economic perspective to the study of media
accountability practices. Thus, we argue that reminding journalists
and media companies of their norma-tive duties ‘to behave
well’ may be less successful than offering concrete rewards for
accountability activities. These rewards can be both material and
immaterial, as the example of the Irish press council shows – here,
media companies enjoy legal advantages when they become
members of the press council and actively apply the Irish press
code in their newsrooms.
Lessons from Finland
While support for most MAIs is rather low across our survey
countries, some countries stick out as positive examples. Finnish
journalists, along with their colleagues from Switzerland, showed
the highest support for almost all MAIs. They also show considerably
more support for many other MAIs. These results contrast
notably even with neighbouring countries like Germany. What
is different in Finland, and also Switzerland, where the press
council is held in very high esteem as compared to many other
countries?
First of all, both are countries with a high level of education
and a high degree of media literacy. Also, a vivid civic engagement
fosters public surveillance of media institutions. We also find a
clue when we take a look at the responses interviewees provided to
the questions about how often they criticise colleagues, or how often
they are criticised by their peers. In both instances, journalists
Photograph: photocase/Mr. Nico
from these two countries reported criticising fellow journalists frequently,
and being frequently criticised by other journalists or supervisors as
well. The results stand in sharp contrast to countries like Germany,
where peer criticism is the exception rather than the rule. Obviously,
newsroom structures are an explanation, and they are rather flat and
informal in Finland, allowing constructive criticism. However, Finland
and Switzerland are also two countries which still have a relatively affluent
media industry, receiving considerable state subsidies – and thus
they might be in a better position to afford accountability, compared
to countries with stiff media competition. Finally, both countries have
small journalistic populations of 9,000 (Switzerland) respectively 8,000
(Finland). This might make peer surveillance and naming-and-shaming
in the journalistic community more effective than in large media systems
like Germany or the UK with journalistic populations of 50,000
to 70,000. Here, many more ethical dilemmas may occur, but simply
vanish from the professional radar without debate.
Education matters
Finally, our survey data also point out the crucial role that journalism
education plays in responsible journalism. Journalists across countries
consider journalism education as more relevant for upholding standards
in journalism than any MAIs. Thus, investing in journalism education
itself is an investment in a responsible press – this is also a message for
industry representatives, who are rather unwilling these days to finance
mid-career training. Our data show that journalists in central and eastern
Europe and the Arab countries in particular lament the inadequate
journalism education in their country. It would be a worthy investment
to provide long-term support to modernise journalism curricula in these
countries. The MediaAcT survey also shows that journalists who received
training in media ethics during their journalism education display a
somewhat greater sensitivity towards issues of media accountability (for
details see the following article). With our MediaAcT interactive online
training tool (see article page 22-23), we hope to encourage journalism
educators and their students to discuss journalistic responsibility – and
at the same time to teach journalists to deal with criticism.
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Media landscapes
Raluca Radu
at a MediaAcT
workshop in
Dortmund,
germany
photograph: EBI
"Training is a must"
By dAnielA pOpA & rAlucA rAdu
Journalism education fosters media accountability
Education has a particular importance in the demarcation of a profession
from a simple vocation. The more diverse the education provided
for a particular sector and the more specificity it implies, the easier it
is for professionals to acquire autonomy and recognition. Professional
autonomy means responsibility and accountability towards the public
and towards other stakeholders in society. This also holds true for journalism.
In most democratic and liberal systems, access into journalism is
free, as it is implied by the principles of freedom of speech and right to
information. “Press has been ‘free‘ for several centuries in UK. There is
no absolute pre-entry or post-entry requirement for a journalist to have
a journalism qualification in the UK. Being a journalist is an aspect of
freedom of expression”, explains Mike Jempson, MediaAcT UK expert.
Professional journalists’ status does not depend on a degree or on a type
of training, but on the simple exercise of the activity. Anyone can become
a journalist, if they meet the requirements of the editors.
Judith Pies, the MediaAcT expert on the Arab world offers a insight
into the Middle East: “In Jordan, there is an official restriction
concerning the right to practice journalism. The press laws say that only
journalists who are members of the Jordan Press Association are allowed
to work as journalists”.
Training in journalism is, nevertheless, a must, as the MediaAcT
study in 14 countries demonstrates. Education is an important factor
in the process of professionalisation of journalists. Through education,
journalists learn the practical skills of the job, along with the norms and
the values that derive from the public service mass-media renders to society.
As the age of the MediaAcT respondents decreases, the probability
that they have followed journalism at university level increases, in all
MediaAcT countries.
The educational offer in the MediaAcT countries
The way journalistic education is organised depends, in some regards,
on the period of undisturbed development, which the journalistic world
enjoyed under different national circumstances. The countries in the
MediaAcT panel can be grouped into three clusters: countries that did
not experience an authoritarian regime after World War II (western Europe),
countries that followed a transitional period towards democracy
in the last 20 to 40 years (Spain and central and eastern Europe) and
countries that have recently entered the democratic path (Tunisia and
Jordan).
The curriculum of the journalistic courses and the practical relevance
of these courses for a practising journalist also depend on the
degree of democratisation and liberalisation in each country. Moreover,
the way journalistic education is organised depends on the size
of the market (and the existence of public and commercial news organisations,
which have the capacity to hire the graduates) and on the
incentives future journalists are provided in following a journalistic
training or a university program.
Let’s have a look at the United Kingdom. Here the market is so
large, the employers demand course certificates to have a proof of
whether a candidate is suitable for the job. Complex accreditation
systems, accepted by the state, for recognised courses and programs
in journalism, have been developed since the 1950s. In the United
Kingdom, just as in the Netherlands, Germany or France, there are
several offers of training programs for journalists. In France, the oldest
vocational schools appeared at the beginning of the 20th century, according
to Olivier Baisnée, the French MediaAcT expert.
The educational offer at university level is, in some of these countries,
like Italy, less than 30 years old. A noticeable exception
according to Jari Väliverronen, the Finnish MediaAcT expert, is
Finland, which has had a journalism program at the state university
and an accreditation system since 1925. On the other side of the time
scale, one may find Austria, where journalistic programs started only
in 2002 (beforehand universities offered programs only in communication
studies). In Spain, the three former central and eastern European
countries of Estonia, Poland and Romania, in Tunisia and Jordan
the main journalism trainings are coordinated by universities.
In addition, organisations, foundations and associations in nearly
all countries offer a broad range of courses, internships and other kind
of actions, designed to increase journalists’ awareness towards accountability
issues.
Media accountability is linked to journalism education
Journalism education is ranked the fourth most important factor influencing
journalistic behaviour, after company editorial guidelines,
laws regulating the media and professional codes of ethics – this is one
of the most interesting results of the MediaAcT study.
The first group of countries, those that did not experience a totalitarian
regime after the Second World War, tend to have a smaller population
of journalists that followed university level courses, but more
journalists with a vocational diploma, as is the case of Germany, Austria
and Switzerland. In the countries that experienced a totalitarian
regime more recently, the main training is organised by universities,
and consequently, the percentage of journalists with university training
is, in some cases, several times higher, than the other countries
(see, for example, the Netherlands and Spain, in Fig. 1).
Fig. 1. The choice of “University training”, “Vocational diploma” and “In-house
training” for the question “What formal training have you had in journalism?”,
country by country. Formal university training is aggregated for: journalism
school, university degree in journalism and journalism-related postgraduate
degree.
Depending on the national educational offer in journalism and on
the age of the respondents, formal university training was followed by
more than half of the journalists in the Arab countries (Jordan and
Tunisia), in the former Communist countries (Poland, Estonia, and
Romania), but also in Finland, France, and Spain. More than 30%
identified vocational training as part of their journalism education
in the Netherlands, Switzerland, United Kingdom and Austria. Also,
more than 50% of the journalists recognised in-house training as a
form of socialisation with the norms of journalism in Poland, Germany,
Jordan and Italy (see Fig. 1).
Ethics courses are not compulsory in all journalistic programs.
When asked a specific question, on training in journalism ethics,
more than 80% of the respondents followed ethics courses in Italy
and Jordan, but less that 50% in Austria and Germany (see Fig. 2).
Fig. 2. The answer to the question “My training/education included instruc-
tion in journalism ethics”, country by country.
The subgroups of respondents, based on formal training in media
ethics, has different answers to questions related to interaction
with stakeholders, indicating that media ethics training fosters accountability.
Thus, 61.46% of the journalists trained in journalism
ethics (Group 1) agree and strongly agree with the idea of communicating
with the public through social media, as compared with
52.15% of journalists without such training (Group 2). Nevertheless,
a significant 6% more of Group 1 (67.98%) believe that media
institutions “Should respond to user comments and suggestions“.
Media ethics training explains the differences between the
journalists that consider that company editorial guidelines have a
strong impact on journalistic behaviour (Group 1: 62.97% versus
Group 2: 53.32%), just like the professional code of ethics (Group
1: 51.99% versus Group 2: 44.68%) or journalism trade journals,
in countries where these exist (Group 1: 59.86% versus Group 2:
51.75%).
Journalistic education in the future
The academic offer of journalism courses is a necessary issue, but
is insufficient to transform journalism into a profession, indicates
Mihai Coman, MediaAcT expert for Romania. Other necessary
aspects include: codes of ethics, imposed and implemented by a
designated body, a common journalists’ identity and a common
professional culture.
The MediaAcT study indicates that traditional Media Acountability
Instruments, like press councils and professional trade publications,
do not exist in all MediaAcT countries. At the same time,
innovative Media Accountability Instruments, based on the new
media (digital), appear all over the world. Journalists trained in
media ethics are more inclined to use them, in making their work
more transparent to the scrutiny of the stakeholders. Journalism
education has to acknowledge these transformations and to encourage
students to study and to understand them. Finally, this paves
the way for the future of accountable journalism.
fUrThEr rEAdIng
Josephi, Beate (2010): Journalism Education in countries
with limited Media freedom, peter lang: new york, ny.
EJTA - European Journalism Training Association
http://www.ejta.com
World Journalism Education Council
http://www.wjec.ou.edu
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Media landscapes
0
How to increase media accountability
By MATThiAS kArMASin, dAnielA krAuS, Andy kAlTenBrunner & klAuS Bichler
do journalists need more incentives or sanctions to use accountability tools?
Media accountability, defined as any non-state means of making
media responsible towards the public, is one key indicator for media
pluralism and media freedom in a country. Therefore, investments in
better media accountability systems mean investment in the quality
of democracy. The MediaAcT team, as part of its research, tried to
find ways to foster such investments. Two main target groups for
such measures are journalists and media companies. Especially today
in times of crisis (media, financial sectors, etc.) there should be
incentives for journalists and media companies to have fair and balanced
reporting. However, state intervention is out of the question.
The relevant standards should be developed in a joint process by the
media industry and its managers, journalists, the audience, NGOs,
media scholars etc.
Research shows that regulated self-regulation, also termed co-regulation,
is the best way to meet high media accountability standards.
This means that the state provides a framework that offers the media
incentives for self-regulation. The juggling act between guaranteeing
freedom of expression as well as media freedom on the one side and
censorship on the other side can be handled best by such measures.
High standards in media accountability guarantee a high level of
freedom of expression. Furthermore they raise the quality of discussion
within the public sphere.
The international MediaAcT research group has collected interesting
results within the research processes. One result of the Media-AcT
project consists of policy recommendations. Based on the
research outcomes, the team can recommend three major measures
to foster media accountability in the future at the supranational level:
1. Monitoring (EU focus on fundamental rights in the member
states).
2. A clear framework for subsidies (EU focus on fair competition).
3. Encouraging media literacy (EU focus on European public
sphere).
1. The first needs researchers’ actions: Continuous monitoring
helps to evaluate the state-of-the-art of media accountability in the
EU member states. The monitoring includes a regularly produced
(annual, bi-annual) and openly published index, which has been developed
by the MediaAcT project, which monitors the activities of
media professionals and media organisations in EU member states.
Such an index creates a ranking in order to find country-specific deficits.
Furthermore, it enables media policy makers to set incentives
to improve the situation. Moreover, the highlighted best practice
countries can act as benchmarks. In the long term, the monitoring
will apply important data to media and journalism and thereby raise
the quality of democracy. Therefore it strengthens fundamental
rights.
2. The second requires the involvement of politics: The media sector
is no longer simply a national issue, as concentration processes in
ownership in the EU accelerate. For the European Commission, the
protection of competition policies and the free movement provision
should also apply to the media industry. As a consequence, any kind
of subsidies should only be granted under clear premises. Transparent
frameworks should apply to direct subsidies (e.g. press subsidies
or public service broadcaster fees) as well as to indirect subsidies (e.g.
public advertising money).
Regarding direct subsidies, the national public broadcaster
services should play a major role in accountability processes.
Their major stakeholder is the audience. As they are (partly) financed
by public money or taxes, they should act as benchmarks in
balanced and high quality reporting or entertaining. Consequently,
public broadcasters should stick to clearly defined standards and
act as a reference point in internal media accountability systems.
This can be achieved by having an adapted internal code of ethics, a
fixed complaints procedure or by making news production processes
transparent.
Regarding indirect subsidies, clear rules are also needed. Government
departments, public bodies and institutions spend a huge amount of money
on advertising in all kinds of media. These institutions should oblige
themselves to spend advertising money only in a medium that maintains
certain accountability standards. These standards have to be defined in
advance and can range from membership in a (local) press council, accepting
the national code of conduct, having an ombudsman or having fixed
accountability procedures.
3. The third needs an informed public: Europe requires more initiatives
to promote and support media literacy in EU member states. The European
Commission already provides direct support to a number of media
organisations or media projects, e.g. EURANET, support for Euronews
and for the European Journalism Centre. As a consequence, the Commission
should also initiate and financially support a programme for media
literacy. Such a programme will raise the quality of discussion within the
European public sphere.
These three suggestions are based on the scientific results of the MediaAcT
project. They address three levels of media accountability, each
involving multiple stakeholders mutually developing media accountability
standards.
lInk
The MediaAcT policy recommendations can be
downloaded here: www.mediaact.eu/outcomes.html
Photograph: Lutz Kampert
1
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Media landscapes
in the pillary!
By STephAn ruSS-MOhl
errors in reasoning by media
management concerning newsroom
self-inspection
Media executives and journalists have a difficult time dealing with criticism.
Recent media scandals in the United Kingdom and the subsequent
discussion about media regulation in the British media have done
a fine job illustrating this point, as have large Swiss media conglomerates
like Tamedia or Ringier with the way they handle journalistic coverage
of media and media research. Despite the insistence with which they
demand accountability and transparency from others, they care little for
transparency when it comes to revealing their own procedures.
Let us assume that the media is powerful, and that power in democracy
needs to be controlled and counterbalanced. Let us suppose as
well that press freedom is a basic prerequisite to facilitate democracy
and to adequately inform citizens. The Leveson Report’s catalogue of
the News of the World transgressions (which includes hacking the private
phone messages of a murder victim and bribing the police) and
the BBC’s maneuvering to veil the pedophilic misconduct of one of
its most prominent TV moderators both exemplify a distinct lack of
media accountability. At the core, there are three highly interrelated
areas of media accountability to be mentioned. They are the “three Cs”:
corrections policies, complaints management and coverage of journalism
and media by the media.
Focusing on the US, the UK, Germany, Switzerland and Italy, we
will try to explain the extent to which “rational economic” behavior
can be found in this specific field of self-inspection, how “predictably
irrational” media owners, media managers and journalists make decisions,
and how cultural norms and behavior patterns influence media
accountability and the processing of “unethical” or unprofessional behavior.
As the Swiss partner within the framework of the large, EU-funded
MediaAcT project, we’ve spent more than three years analysing how
the media handles accountability. Recently, a booklet outlining ‘best
practice‘ examples has been published, and further empirical results
are in the process of evaluation. It can be stated in advance that media
owners, media managers and editors in chief pay little attention to the
“three Cs” – indeed such scant attention that it is worth probing why
this might be the case.
From a precursory business perspective, media executives should
invest in media accountability. Media accountability is not at all costly
– in fact, it is rather cheap. Corrections columns require the dedication
of a newsroom, but they don’t cost “real” money. Costs for press
councils usually are shared by many media companies, and they are
negligible in budgets. In most media outlets an ombudsman will hold
a part-time position, which might even be an honorary, unsalaried role.
Only media journalists are expensive. However, they need not necessarily
be added to an existing newsroom. Costs for media journalism
can be kept down if the beat is created by shifting resources within the
newsroom. Top editors might dedicate existing space, reporters and
editors to such a beat – thus reporting somewhat less about politics or
sports, for example.
Photograph: photocase/mr. QM
Media accountability also pays off, in that it promises returns:
Ombudsmen and press councils can be considered an excellent insurance
policy against more costly, time absorbing risks, reducing the
costs for legal advice and legal battles. If they communicate effectively
with the public, this should foster relationships with readers,
increase journalism’s credibility, and educate journalists and the
public about the media. With improved media literacy and quality
consciousness, recipients should therefore increase their willingness
to pay for high journalistic quality.
The upper and the lower quality segment
To understand why media executives don’t engage in more media accountability
a second glance is needed. We may have to differentiate
and add to the assumption that each media system can be divided into
a lower and an upper quality segment, concerning the journalism being
offered. Concerning media accountability, there exists a built-in conflict
of interest between the lower and the upper market segments: The
lower segment will serve audiences with low levels of education and
media literacy. It will be more advertiser-driven and less dependent on
generating revenues from the audience. By contrast, business success in
the upper segment depends on the public’s willingness to pay and on
increasing the share of the audience interested in credible, high quality
journalism.
As such, we may have to modify the initial statement: If media executives
in the upper quality segment were rational, self-interested actors
primarily concerned with the economic well-being of the media institutions
and newsrooms they are responsible for, they would “invest” considerably
more in media accountability than they have done so far. Still,
there remains the puzzling question of why such investments remain
rare. The following four answers may help solve the puzzle.
First, there is a second and potentially more intriguing conflict
of interest between the institutional and the personal self-interests of
media executives. For media companies, more accountability and
transparency may be essential, but top managers are frightened to be
put in the pillory by press councils, ombudsmen, and media journalists.
Media executives are certainly aware of what they are doing to
others when they scandalise politicians, CEOs and other members
of the celebrities’ club – and they simply may not want to become
victims of the same tortures.
Top managers and editors therefore mistrust press councils, ombudsmen,
and media journalists – it is the typical case of a principalagent
relationship. As “principals”, media executives depend on the
mediating skills and the expertise of ombudsmen, press councils or
media journalists serving the industry as “agents” but they never
know whether the agents might abuse their positions, power and
knowledge for bumbledom or self-serving interests.
Media executives also find themselves in a prisoner’s dilemma.
If they remain the only ones implementing the “three Cs“ because
competitors don’t follow suit, they risk compromising themselves.
The costs will be due immediately, while the full benefits of the more
costly accountability policies (ombudsmen, media journalists) will
only materialise if they are shared among other media operating in
the upper market segment. In particular, media journalism has a credibility
problem, if a journalist is dealing with his own employer or
immediate competitor. This is why it would be so important that all
media in the upper quality segment report fairly and continuously
about media and journalism.
Similarly, corrections policies fail due to the prisoners’ dilemma:
No journalist wants to find himself in the pillory – particularly not
if colleagues might successfully hide their errors and thus avoid such
treatment. This is why editors-in-chief must work hard to persuade
staffs that corrections columns are an important means to regain
credibility. Usually, they shy away from such efforts.
Most frequently, the sheer power of large media conglomerates
hinders media accountability. In many cases, the cash cows of these
companies are in the lower segment, perhaps even subsidising the
flagships in the upper market segment. The overarching institutional
interests of the conglomerate will outweigh the institutional
interests of the media in the upper market segment. Under such
conditions, it becomes difficult for the flagships to “independently”
support policies of media accountability.
Predictably irrational decisions
All these are plausible arguments and do partially explain the underinvestment
in media accountability. By rationalising indecisiveness
and underinvestment, media executives may also become victims of
errors in reasoning. According to insights from behavioral economics,
some of them are “predictably irrational,” as Dan Ariely points
out. Bestselling author Rolf Dobelli also describes these errors in a
most entertaining way.
In particular, selective perception and cognitive dissonance may be
the cause if the work of press councils or ombudsmen is impeded
or if media sections are abolished and if there are no longer specialised
media journalists in the newsrooms (as occurred at the Tages-
Anzeiger in Switzerland, Die Zeit in Germany and Il Sole-24 ore in
Italy). Media executives fear negative coverage and scandalisation,
and such anxieties are possibly based on neglect of probability: Very
few media magnates are as powerful as Rupert Murdoch or Silvio
Berlusconi – thus the risk of becoming the target of scandalisation
by well-functioning media journalism is drastically overrated.
The zero cost craze is another trap, into which media executives
may also fall prey – just like the rest of us. As behavioral economist
Dan Ariely points out, we all tend to behave irrationally if we can
get hold of a “freebie.” This is why marketing experts, as well as publishers,
seduce us again and again with “free” bargains or free newspapers.
This is also why media executives are lured into not investing
in media accountability, as this seemingly implies “zero cost.” Yet
there are hidden costs occurring in tandem with freebies, which only
become visible later – often in the form of expensive lawsuits and
long-term losses of credibility which can be difficult to measure, but
reduce the willingness of publics to pay for journalism.
If top editors resist the institutionalisation of ombudsmen and
press councils, they will also probably become victims of the overconfidence
effect. This infers that editors are unaware of their own
limits in handling errors and conflicts adequately and with a certain
“distance”, and that they underestimate the time needed for mediating
and problem solving instances of conflict about media coverage,
but also in coaching their own staff. Media executives may become
very lonely at the top of the hierarchy and become victims of the socalled
control illusion.
Cultural differences
Last but not least, media executives in journalism and in the media
industries can be caught in herd behavior. This may help explain significant
cultural differences existing even among highly developed
western countries in handling media accountability. For example,
the strongly institutionalised ombudsmen and the appearance of
corrections columns in the US may be explained in part by the New
York Times serving as a trailblazing cheerleader in the Anglo-Saxon
world.
Similarly, the negligible interest in media accountability in Italy
and in eastern and southeastern European countries needs to be seen
in a larger context: Wherever the legal system is rotten, where mafialike
activities surpass the government and penetrate the economic
system, where you find little appreciation for the public interest and
even less conscientiousness for public space, it is unlikely that media
executives will discover the benefits of media accountability.
Under the conditions of media convergence, with a wide array of
blogs and social media flaunting increased interactivity and linking
options, traditional mainstream media lost their “monopoly” over
news distribution and agenda setting, and are rapidly losing control
over media accountability procedures. Susanne Fengler, director
of the MediaAcT project, recently coined the term “crowd-sourced
media accountability.” As traditional mainstream media have stubbornly
failed to provide transparency, she believes that the Internet,
blogs and social networks will provide the necessary transparency.
Media executives working in high quality media are therefore well
advised to take care of media accountability before they lose complete
control over it.
fUrThEr rEAdIng
fengler, susanne; russ-Mohl, stephan (2008): Journalists
and Information-Attention-Markets. In: Journalism vol. 9
(6), pp. 667 - 690.
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Photograph: photocase/12frames
Culture club: shared values and
divergent practices
By giAnpieTrO MAZZOleni & SergiO SplendOre
Accountability cultures in europe – first assumptions
Why do reporters from Finland and Portugal, for eaxample, have
conflicting outlooks on the newsworthiness of a given event? Why
do reporters from Spain and Germany evaluate the importance
of social media for journalism differently? It is evident, that a
country’s history, religion, art, political traditions, and folk culture
are likely to be crucial explanatory factors for the ways in which
journalism is organised and acknowledged as a profession and the
ways in which journalists are trained to fulfil their informative
function and to relate to the public.
Journalism has often been investigated by comparative research,
that has had a clear preference for perspectives that focused on
journalism’s relations to media or political systems, to education
and training methods, to levels and the nature of professionalisation,
to employment issues and the like. What has been missing in
most studies is the “culturalist” approach.
The MediaAcT research intended to fill this gap by trying to
understand the evident dissimilarities between several European
countries and considered introducing some explaining factors that
are based on cultural determinants. The common output of this
research was mapping differences and similarities between countries.
The concept of accountability
Let’s start from the concept of accountability. Although it’s surely
the backbone of the Anglo-American philosophy of “media performance”,
it barely exists in most countries around the globe. The
word “accountability” is absent from many national vocabularies.
So, how can we explain why the journalists of our survey show
different attitudes regarding what we nicknamed the MAIs (Media
Accountability Instruments), i.e. the ombudsman, press council or
code of ethics?
We think that how they either or both perceive and espouse
these instruments closely depends on (and is to a certain extent
affected by) the dominant cultural forms of the social environment
where the journalists grew up, were educated and entered the
news profession. Our survey measured the journalists’ support for
available and unavailable instruments aimed enabling media to be
accountable and transparent towards their public.
Positive attitudes
Figure 1 shows how the journalists score country by country on
the first two factors, that is those referring to the perceived influence
of and to the support for the traditional MAIs, such as the
publication of codes of ethics, the disclosure of ownership and the
employment of an ombudsman.
Figure 1. Perceived impact of and support for traditional MAIs
What we see is that although there is a quite evident and positive
attitude among journalists in all countries favouring (supporting)
traditional MAIs (scores between .6 and .8) they differentiate significantly
from country to country in the extent of how they perceive
the possible impact (of MAIs) on their professional conduct. Some of
the countries rank particularly low: Italy is the lowest, followed by
Austria, Spain and Poland. We can envisage a broad “lip service” by
Europe’s journalists to the value of accountability; but when they
assess what principles of accountability guide their daily work, they
are split according to national idiosyncrasies found in the dominating
journalistic cultures.
Low enthusiasm for online instruments
Beside looking at the way journalists evaluate traditional MAIs,
the project revealed it was worthwhile investigating how journalists
considered the instruments that online technologies provide to increase
the accountability of the news profession. These instruments
are providing links to the original sources of a journalistic piece,
allowing users opportunities to participate in the production of news
stories, responding to users’ comments/suggestions or providing online
opportunities to communicate directly with journalists, for example
via Facebook and Twitter. The overall result from the data is
that the journalists don’t show much enthusiasm (perceived impact
or support) for these additional instruments (Figure 2), compared to
the amount of enthusiasm for the traditional instruments. Yet, if we
look more closely at the Figures we notice a “reverse behaviour” in a
group of countries: the lower the perceived impact the higher is the
support in Italy, Romania, Poland and France.
Figure 2. Perceived impact of and support for online MAIs
How to explain this? In some cases journalists were asked to assess
instruments that did not exist in their countries. For example, unsuccessful
or non-existent experiences with traditional instruments,
like that of the ombudsman, tend to negatively affect the attitudes
of the journalists towards these new opportunities to display more
accountable news production routines.
Even though the actual support for these accountability principles
and instruments varies from country to country, journalists
appear to acknowledge and share the recommendations to achieve
them. We went further in exploring our findings. Our assumption
was that the ways journalists react are rooted in the cultural environment
that surrounds them. To measure cultural factors with
statistical methods is still mostly wishful thinking. Here we do not
offer a conclusive cause-effect explanation, but simply suggest which
journalistic cultural aspects may partially explain our findings.
From the organisational (i.e. relationships with colleagues and
more senior staff) and professional perspectives, the survey provided
interesting evidence concerning the dimensions of the accountability
culture in different countries and the degree to which ethical
standards of the profession are influential.
Figure 3. Orientation toward professional values vs. orientation
toward the organisation
Figure 3 shows that journalists in Italy, Austria, Romania and
Po-land appear to be more affected by their organisational environment
than by professional values. This remarkable evidence shows
that these countries share a weaker connection to the principles (and
practice) of accountability culture and display lower levels of professionalisation.
In conclusion, in an ideal world accountability is a standard well
anchored in the value system that enlightens the journalistic profession
in democracies. However, our analysis indicates that, in many
cases, the cultural environment and the nature of the relationships
within organisational contexts can curtail the attainment of the accountability
that journalists say they aspire to.
Thus we can see the differences in journalistic accountability cultures.
Italy, Spain, Austria, Poland and Romania are countries where
this culture appears to be less well founded. Journalists who work
in these countries are more committed to their organisational employers
(i.e. loyalty and responsibility toward fellow journalists and
editors) than to issues of transparency.
Our glimpse of journalism relies on first-hand personal views of
hundreds of journalists, so some caution is needed. However, we
hold to the conviction that the idea of accountability is a culturally
charged concept and its use and implementation can be seen as
functions of a particular professional outlook enmeshed with the
dominating national culture. For example, it is hardly a coincidence
that the accountability of public officials, politicians and institutions
offering public services is written into the laws regulating these domains
in countries with a protestant socio-political historical background,
while it is only loosely present in the legislations of catholic
countries. Italy, Austria, Poland, Spain and Romania happen to be
countries with strong catholic or orthodox influence on their social
institutions.
We cannot pursue this interpretive line further as we do not
have appropriate survey data to establish clear correlations. Nevertheless,
we believe that to implement a “culturalist” approach,
that draws on historical, religious and anthropological determinants
of social behaviour – like that of journalists – can advance
the understanding of similarities and differences, proximities and
distances, in the journalism profession in our European countries
and beyond.
Index | Editorial | Birds-eye view | Opening the toolbox | Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
Index | Editorial | Birds-eye view | Opening the toolbox | Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
Media landscapes in transition:
Focus on central and eastern Europe
By BOguSłAwA dOBek-OSTrOwSkA
The collapse of communism at
the end of the 1980s opened
a new chapter in a history of
central and eastern European
countries, which were previously
a part of the ‘Soviet bloc’.
After 40 years of censorship
and strong political control
over media content, the “Round
Table” in Poland with the participation
of representatives of
both the Solidarity movement
and the communist government
in the Spring of 1989
made a strong impact on the
process of democratisation in
the whole region. The “Velvet
Photograph: Imago/Sven Simon
revolution” in Czechoslovakia,
peaceful changes of regime in
Hungary and Slovenia, the collapse of the symbolic Berlin Wall
further contributed to political and social transformations. More
dramatic ways towards democracy were observed in Romania –
the execution of Nicolae Ceausescu in December 1989 – and in
Bulgaria – the resignation of the Communist Party leader, Todor
Zhivkov, who was absolutely loyal to Moscow, in November 1989.
The dramatic events in Lithuania (the attack of the Soviet army
on the TV station in Vilnius which resulted in 15 victims in January
1991) and as a consequence of the “Singing Revolution” in
three Baltic states between 1987 and 1991 led to the restorations of
their independence. There is no doubt that the transition towards
democracy and installation of democracy in central and eastern
Europe had a huge impact on the journalism culture in this region,
where “press freedom replaced the Communist policy control and
censorship”, as the two experts on media accountability in Poland
Michał Głowacki and and Paweł Urbaniak recently stated. But the
main question is: Has media freedom helped to install a Media
Accountability Instruments (MAIs) and developed it? The answer
is not crystal clear.
Media Accountability Instruments and democracy
In 1993, Attila Agh presented four possible development scenarios
for the countries in Europe: Sleeping Beauty (easy westernisation),
Deepfreeze (return to the past), Latin Americanisation (falling back
to the Third World), and Fair Weather (central Europe joins the
European integration). The last of these is now becoming factual.
East Germany was welcomed into the European Union as part of
a reunited Germany in 1990. Eight countries – Estonia, Latvia,
Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and
Slovenia – joined in the ‘big bang’ enlargement on 1 May 2004
symbolising the unification of eastern and western Europe. Bulgaria
and Romania joined the European Union in 2007. Croatia will
be member of EU in July 2013. However, there are still some countries
in central and eastern Europe that remain outside the European
Union. This includes the Balkans countries such as Serbia,
Montenegro, Bosnia-Herzegovina, FYR Macedonia, and Albania,
as well as some post-soviet republics such as Moldova, Ukraine,
Russia and Belarus.
A way towards consolidated and mature democracy is not easy.
The process of the consolidation of democracy is linked not only
with political transformation, which includes political reforms and
the introduction of democratic institutions. Parts of this process
are, on the one hand, economic transformation with economic reforms
and free market conditions, as well as social changes and
civil society development, on the other.
The Democracy Index, which is based on the analysis of five fundamental
democracy indicators: electoral process and pluralism;
functioning of government; political participation; political culture;
and civil liberties, is a very useful tool which helps to evaluate
the condition of democracy in the world. The index published in
2011 indicates the erosion of democracy. Stagnation was noted in
the period 2006-2008 and from the 2010 onwards world wide recession.
Without doubt, the global financial crisis that started in
2008 also provoked some negative trends in political development
in central and eastern Europe. The region was classified in the fifth
position in the world (see Table 1).
Table 1: Democracy index average by region 2011
region 2006 2008 2010 2011
northern America 8.64 8.64 8.63 8.59
western Europe 8.60 8.61 8.45 8.40
latin America & carribean 6.37 6.43 6.37 6.35
Asia & Australasia 5.44 5.58 5.53 5.51
Central and Eastern Europe 5.76 5.67 5.55 5.50
sub-saharan Africa 4.24 4.28 4.23 4.32
Middle East & north Africa 3.53 3.54 3.43 3.62
Total 5.52 5.55 5.46 5.49
Source: Democracy index 2011 http://www.sida.se/Global/
About%20Sida/Så%20arbetar%20vi/EIU_Democracy_Index_Dec2011.pdf
What do these political, economic and social developments
mean for the media? For accountability?
The consolidation of democracy in central and eastern European
member states of the EU is a crucial factor in a context of press
freedom and the development of media systems. Figure 1 shows the
dramatic situation of press freedom in Bulgaria (87th position in
2013) and Hungary (56th position in 2013). The situation in Romania
(42nd position in 2013) is not satisfactory but better than
in the 2000s. Quite negative conditions of the media are noted in
Latvia (39th position in 2013), Slovenia (35th position in 2013) and
Lithuania (33rd position in 2013). Some positive trends are observed
in 2013 in the Czech Republic (16th position), Poland (22nd position),
and Slovakia (23rd position). Estonia (11th in 2013) still has
the highest position in the region. However, its rank is worse than in
comparison to the 3rd position in 2012.
Nowadays, after 24 years of the media system transformation
in ten countries – as members of the EU, we can observe some
common processes and similar features such as political and economic
instrumentalisation. Political instrumentalisation is present
in public media services everywhere. Party logic is observed with a
different intensification in each state of the region. It results in the
processes of public radio and television politicisation; and sometimes
journalism is a political profession. In the case of economic
instrumentalisation, profit is more important than quality, media
logic leads towards commercialisation and tabloidisation. In consequence
media look for scandals and sensation. They prefer a ‘horse
race’ coverage of politics, and escape from the political sphere.
Both instumentalisations are enemies of media accountability in
central and eastern Europe. A commentary-oriented journalism,
a weak journalistic culture and the limited role of the audience
are common features in the region and hinder the development of
MAIs. Hence, we can select four levels of media professionalism
and Media Accountability Instruments (MAIs) implementation in
the region. Estonia and the Czech Republic are leaders in the region,
they have the best position in many rankings (including Democracy
Index, Press Freedom Index). The second consists of Poland
and Slovakia which have eliminated many negative consequences
of instrumentalisation during recent years. Slovenia, Latvia and
Lithuania share some troubles, where the media feel the pressure
from political actors. The worst situation of media accountability
is traditionally observed in Bulgaria, Romania, and – from 2011
– also in Hungary.
Insufficient space for Media Accountability Instruments
The quality of democracy is a very important factor which determines
press freedom. Press freedom stimulates the development
of MAIs. Today we know that there is insufficient space
for MAIs in central and eastern Europe and that significant differences
between the countries might be observed. In general, all
the states, all EU members, introduced most of the traditional
MAIs as journalistic associations, codes of professional conduct,
charters of media ethics, etc. Moreover, many private media accepted
ethical standards, codes of ethics in advertising and public
relations. Unfortunately, traditional MAIs do not function
well or their role is limited as in Poland and Romania. Generally,
in some countries journalistic associations seem to be divided in
line with political ties (Poland and Serbia) and codes of journalistic
conduct have a rather low impact on journalism in practice.
In Estonia, “the collision of the different vision of functions
and implementation of self-regulation have effected two parallel
press councils”. Estonian scholars claim that the crucial issue is
not “the existence” of MAIs but “the efficiency” in their state.
We observe the same problem throughout the region, not only
in Estonia.
Hence, it is still difficult to estimate the impact on new media
and technologies on MAIs in central in eastern Europe. Innovative
MAIs do not exist at all or their influence is perceived as
very weak. Self-regulation in online media has begun to develop
slowly in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic,
and Slovakia. Romanian scholars underline the role of
blogs, and state that the blogger community is extremely critical
towards journalists. Furthermore, Internet users’ comments on
online news articles in Poland are increasingly visible in practice,
but are rarely dedicated to issues related to media performance.
Overall, MAIs in central and eastern Europe lack research
and publications dedicated to journalism ethics in the digital
age, as well as the role of managers and the public. The international
research project on media accountability can be seen as
an important first step. But the future of Media Accountability
Instruments in central and eastern Europe is still unclear. It is
difficult to predict their future development.
fUrThEr rEAdIng
dobek-Ostrowska, Boguslawa; glowacki, Michal; Jakubowicz,
karol; sükösd, Miklós (2010): comparative Media
systems. European and global perspectives. central
European Univ press, Budapest.
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Index | Editorial | Birds-eye view | Opening the toolbox | Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
Media landscapes in transition:
Perspectives from the Arab world
By JudiTh pieS & AMirOuche nedJAA
A taxi journey in Amman can introduce
you to the challenges and chances of media
accountability in Jordan and other
transitional Arab countries. Assume you
are traveling with Mohammed Abu Safieh,
a taxi driver and chairman of Balad
Radio’s listeners’ club. Balad Radio is the
first community radio station in Jordan. It
wants to include the audience in its daily
work and the listeners’ club is part of how
Balad Radio aims to do that. Originally,
Mr. Abu Safieh’s task was to collect listeners’
complaints and ideas and pass them
on to the journalists in the newsroom who
would then use them to improve their performance.
In reality, his job has become Photograph: Imago/Xihua
much more complex: journalists in the
newsrooms don’t necessarily want taxi drivers
to interfere in their work; citizens contributing to news gathering expression “phone calls from the mukhabarat” almost interchangeably
don’t reveal their sources to the radio staff; the mukhabarat (the secret with “soft containment”.
service) wants to make sure that Balad Radio is not too critical of the In Tunisia, any criticism of the government or the president was
local head of police.
subject to systematic censorship until the end of the Ben Ali regime in
While driving his taxi through Amman, Mohammed Abu Safieh 2011. The Tunisian Internet Agency, which was controlled by the go-
receives phone calls from officials, citizens and journalists. His five vernment, imposed heavy content filtering. Oppositional and regime
years of experience working with the listeners’ club has equipped him critical websites were blocked and even media outlets operating from
with the necessary tools to moderate between the differing claims: “The abroad, like Radio Kalima, were hacked. Journalists were constantly in
club has helped me to understand decision making mechanisms by the fear of being imprisoned. Even though a lot of reform initiatives have
state, members of parliament and media outlets. It has also helped me taken place since the revolution (see infobox), pressure from politicians,
to understand how credible or transparent they all are.” His represen- judges, media owners and security services remain. One example is the
tative role as chairman of the listeners’ club has shifted to a mediating arrest of Attounissia newspaper journalists for publishing a photograph
position, and the challenge is to answer some of the basic questions for showing the German-Tunisian football player Sami Khedira hugging
journalism in Jordan and other countries in transition: how can journa- a naked top model.
lism become more independent of regimes? Can audience involvement Long standing practices of control and pressure do not change within a
make journalism more responsible towards the needs of society? How few years and journalists need to learn to live up to their new freedoms
much transparency is needed to evaluate the quality and independence and growth in independence. In theory, journalists strongly reject “soft
of journalists’ work?
containment” and state interference, but how can they get rid of it in
practice?
Regimes still hold journalists to account
A big challenge is the remaining impact of the regime’s various means
for directing journalists to act in the regime’s own interest. In Jordan,
censorship was banned from print journalism in 1989, when martial
law was also lifted. However, direct content control through radio and
TV licensing procedures, and less explicit forms of control, so-called
“soft containment”, are still present. Politicians, businessmen, religious
leaders and others, who want to influence journalists’ reporting, threaten
journalists with prison or offer them money. In a survey by the Jordanian
Al-Quds Research Center, 43% of the Jordanian journalists surveyed
said that they had been exposed to such attempts, mostly because
they were reporting on security issues. So, journalists in Jordan use the
Journalists are skeptical about self-regulation
Journalistic codes of ethics are the oldest form of journalistic self-regulation
and have been adopted in countries all over the world. However,
many authoritarian regimes have misused them, using them as another
means of state control. In the case of Jordan, the code of ethics, issued
by the Jordanian Press Association in 2003, became a legally binding part
of the press and publications law, completely contradicting the idea of
voluntary and independent journalistic self-regulation. This cynically
explains why, in the MediaAcT survey, Jordanian journalists consider
codes of ethics as highly influential for their journalistic performance.
In many European countries, professional organisations have been
playing an active role in fighting for journalists’ interests and their
independence from the state. However, in Tunisia and Jordan, they
have not been of great help over the last thirty years because the regimes
had tightly controlled them. Only recently have they started to struggle
for independence, as in the case of the National Syndicate of Tunisian
Journalists (SNJT), which has rejected plans to exclude journalists from
the future regulatory body for radio and television (HAICA).
Independent press or media councils, which might also help to keep
the state out of the profession, have not yet been established in Tunisia
or Jordan. Journalists from these countries still hesitate to support initiatives
to form press councils and other bodies regulating the media for
fear of being co-opted by the regimes again. The majority of Jordanian
and Tunisian journalists in the MediaAcT survey say that such “formal
systems of media regulation are open to abuse for political purposes.”
Nevertheless, according to the same survey, they are convinced that
“responsible media are a pre-condition for independent media”.
The audience as a potential ally for more independence
The audience seems to agree with the journalists’ conviction and has
become active in holding the media to account. They criticise articles
in their comments on news websites, upload their own content in special
sections and contribute to news gathering via Facebook and the
telephone. Some projects outside newsrooms encourage journalists and
the public to produce their own news. Their aim is “to hold the media
to account for what they don’t cover” as expressed by Lina Ejeilat, cofounder
of the Jordanian project 7iber.com. In Tunisia, the organisation
Nawaat has founded a news website, to which bloggers and journalists
contribute in order to adjust the news agenda to the real needs of society.
Due to the late liberation of a strictly censored online environment
under Ben Ali, such practices are not yet as well established in
Tunisia as in Jordan. However, journalists in both countries are equally
willing to accept audience involvement, to a greater extent than most
of their European colleagues, as the results of the MediaAcT survey
demonstrate. It seems that they have found support for their fight for
independence in the audience: listeners and readers provide newsrooms
with information that journalists would not otherwise get due to lack
of access to official information; the audience addresses social problems
better than the minister of development; criticism from the audience is
not as threatening as from the secret service.
Transparency is still a controversial issue
Internet technology helps to strengthen the relationship between newsrooms
and the audience, but it also helps politicians to spread their
viewpoints or false information more efficiently through Facebook accounts
and comments. Therefore, it becomes even more important for
journalists to be transparent about their work and their networks. A
recent – yet unpublished – study by one of the authors on transparency
in Tunisian news websites found that only 40% display their chief
editor’s name. Giving information on media owners is even less common.
During the dictatorship journalists were forced by law to clearly
publish their names on articles. Now, they have the freedom to refrain
from that practice of transparency. Naming sources and giving clear
references or links to information could have been dangerous for them
and their sources: that is why they preferred to stay vague and still often
stick to that habit today. Because of these authoritarian experiences
Tunisian and Jordanian journalists are still hesitant about transparency
though this is changing. Today, the majority of Jordanian journalists
support the disclosure of ownership of media organisations, the pu-
blication of mission statements, the provision of links to sources and explanations
about news decisions to the audience. For their part, Tunisian
journalists do not agree amongst themselves about these practices
because they have only recently started to consider and introduce more
radical changes. In addition, a growing number of organisations and
projects are trying to shed light behind the scenes of news production,
by critically observing the media’s performance. One of them is the
Arab Working Group for Media Monitoring (AWGMM). Its main activity
is the monitoring of media coverage in order to determine whether
fair and balanced reporting is taking place. Extended monitoring and
greater transparency would not only give a clearer picture of the media’s
performance during important transitions, but might also improve the
audience’s ability to judge media quality and independence.
Hard job, but promising
The described attitudes, initiatives and developments prove that Mohammed
Abu Safieh’s job is a hard, but promising one. If he managed
to convince the citizen contributors to reveal their sources to the newsroom
journalists; if the journalists double checked the information and
agreed to withhold the source’s name in return; if he was then able to
silence the mukhabarat with bulletproof facts; Mohammed Abu Safieh
would probably call it a successful day for media independence.
BAckgrOUnd
legal and regulatory steps for (partly)
liberalizing the media
jordan since King Abdallah ii (1999-2013)
- 2001 Abolishing the Ministry of Information
- 2003 Implementing the audio-visual law allowing private
radio and television stations
- 2003 Establishing two regulatory bodies for radio and television,
Avc & Tcr
- 2007 passing of an access to information law
- 2007 & 2010 passing revisions of the press and publications
law
Post-revolutionary Tunisia (2011-2013)
- 2011 Abolishing the Ministry of Information
- 2011 freezing of the two main censor institutions, ATcE and
ATI
- 2011 creation of a national body for information and communication
reform, InrIc
- 2011 passing revisions of the press and media law
- 2011 licensing twelve new radio and five Tv channels
- 2011 passing a law for access to information
- 2012 drafting regulations for an audiovisual regulatory
body, hAIcA
lInks
Jordanian Balad Radio: http://www.balad.fm
Jordanian citizen journalism website: http://www.7iber.com
Tunisian Bloggers’ platform Nawaat: http://www.nawaat.org
Arab Working Group for Media Monitoring: http://www.awgmm.
org
fUrThEr rEAdIng
Judith pies (2013): Media Accountability in Transition: survey
results from Jordan and Tunisia. Journalists and Media
Accountability. An International study of news people in the
digital Age” edited by susanne fengler et al., new york: peter
lang, published summer 2013 (in print)
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Index | Editorial | Birds-eye view | Opening the toolbox | Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
0
Hot debate: who controls the med
The involvement of the EU −
highly disputed, highly praised
gueST eSSAy By herTA dÄuBler-gMelin
From the outset, the Report on Freedom and Plurality of Media in the
EU by the High-Level Expert Group (HLG) – installed by EU-Commissioner
Neelie Kroes, published in January 2013 after hearings and
conferences with media houses, journalists and lots of media and legal
university experts – was and is the object of discussions and disputes.
This is exactly what the EU-Commissioner and the HLG intended.
The current discussions show just how necessary are the report and
its 30 recommendations, addressed to the EU’s member states, parliaments,
media enterprises and journalists.
Most of the member states and especially the Irish presidency
highly praised the broad concept of the report and the recommendations,
emphazising that media are more than economic services under
EU competence to set and monitor competition laws. The Presidency
underlined the paramount importance of free and pluralistic media
as a basic right to every European citizen, guaranteed in the European
Convention of Human Rights and in the EU Charter of Fundamental
Rights. Accordingly the EU includes the principle of free and pluralistic
media, as pillars of the EU’s free and democratic society, as an
important element into the EU’s foreign policy and into the EU ‘aquis
communitaire‘ to be accepted by countries wishing to join the EU as
member states. Furthermore, these values commit the EU to monitor
the freedom and plurality of media as preconditions to free and fair
European Parliament elections.
The report addresses concerns on free and pluralistic quality journalism
that exist in most of EU member states. A quite widespread
problem is that of mostly print media in the era of increasing Internet
use, which leads to economic problems and threats the quality journalism
by poor pay and bad working conditions, especially less time for
thorough research and mature editorial comments. Throughout the
EU there is increasing concern that the exponential growth of individual
use of the Internet may confer additional importance on free and
pluralistic media (private or public interest, print or digital) as the sole
platform enabling collective information on important issues as well
The report of the high-level group (hlg) on Media Freedom and pluralism was published
on January 21, 2013, by the european commission. The report presents recommendations
on media freedom, pluralism and the role of the eu. The group was established
in October 2011 by neelie kroes, the Vice-president of the european commission,
and is chaired by professor Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga, the former president of latvia.
Members of the consortium are professor herta däubler-gmelin, former german Federal
Minister of Justice, luís Miguel poiares pessoa Maduro, professor of european
law at the european university institute and Ben hammersley, Journalist and editor at
large at Wired uk.
as open discussions, between the interests and opinions of individuals
and groups constituting society.
The report additionally mentions the variety of dangerous threats
to media freedom and pluralism that exists in some member states (e.g.
political or economic interference by the state, interference by powerful
advertising customers and companies, misuse of journalism by the
media). Consequently, depending on each state’s degree of interest in
guaranteeing the freedom and plurality of media, the EU involvement
is either highly disputed or highly praised. A key issue is the question
of media self-regulation vs. intervention of legal instruments. Media
companies claiming real or imaginary capabilities of self-correction,
under the pretext of undue political influence (state censorship) fight
against the imposition of national laws, European regulation or public
‘watchdog’ institutions.
The report and the recommendations by the HLG emphasise selfregulation
as the most important guarantor of free media, but insist
that constitutional state laws are important to preserve the standards
when self-regulation does not work. That is why member states and
the EU are bound to monitor and, if necessary, intervene if standards
required are not adequately met. The report recommends the use of
soft law: media oriented self-regulation instruments, such as transparent
codes of ethics and independent media councils (comprising
representatives of media enterprises, journalists, ombudsmen and citizens)
with sanctioning powers.
The report doesn’t dictate instruments but further suggests that national
parliaments should, as prerequisites for making public subsidies
(EU or national) to media and grants to journalists, publicly discuss
annual reports on the situation of freedom and plurality of media,
which would in turn be monitored by EU institutions, mainly the
European Parliament, in a regular overview.
In the near future, the European Parliament will publish its own
report, including the HLG recommendations. Both aim to secure, by
European law, the freedom and pluralism of media in the EU.
ia? Self-regulation vs. co-regulation
not appropriate
we are concerned by some aspects of the report dealing with an increased role of media councils
which could ‘impose fines, order apologies and remove journalistic status’ following complaints
by citizens. The right of reply could be obtained by ‘simple request of citizens [and] published with
the same relevance as the original coverage’. we are surprised by such a proposal because it is an
unclear extension of the competence of the media councils. As you know, there is no single ‘journalistic
status’ in the EU, so how could it be removed? furthermore, media councils are a matter of
self-regulation: they do not exist in all European countries and we wonder how and why the European
commission would ‘monitor’ such bodies ‘to ensure that they comply with European values’
– which need to be better defined anyway. such a strong stand may have been generated by the
cases of spectacular misbehavior of a small group of journalists in the Uk last year, however we do
not find appropriate to make the ‘leveson’ issue an EU issue because there is no ground for it. The
report’s wording on the role of media councils makes us think of the hungarian Media Authority,
which is – in the mind of EfJ – an authoritarian system set up to serve the government in fighting
freedom of the media. These are sensitive and controversial points that are not accepted by many
journalists‘ organisations in Europe.
Arne König, President, European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) http://europe.ifj.org/en
From left to right: Herta Däubler-Gmelin, former German Federal Minister
for Justice and Member of the High-Level Group on Media Freedom and
Pluralism, Neelie Kroes, Vice President of the EC in charge of the Digital
Agenda, and Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga, former President of Latvia and Chair of
the High-Level Group on Media Freedom and Pluralism .
The report and its recommendations on media and journalism were
discussed controversially in blogs, by journalists’ federations and in international
media. As quoted on the website of the Commission, “The
mandate of the group was to draw up a report for the Commission with
recommendations for the respect, protection, support and promotion of
pluralism and freedom of the media in Europe.”
(Photo: EC)
Report of the High-Level Group: https://ec.europa.eu/digital-agenda/
sites/digital-agenda/files/HLG%20Final%20Report.pdf
We don’t need new media regulation
The high-level group has missed a
golden opportunity to address the real
challenges and to support an independent
press that promotes democracy and
cultural diversity throughout the world.
we are quite taken aback by the report’s
recommendations. The EU does not have
legal competence under the treaties to
harmonise substantive media laws such
as defamation. Any notion of harmonised
rules of the game, monitored by the EU,
is anathema to press freedom – the very
thing the group was to protect.
Independent press councils and self-regulatory
bodies or press ombudsmen exist
already in most EU countries and operate
according to national cultural and social
mores. Journalists follow codes of ethics
and high professional standards are already
adapted to the digital environment.
we don’t need new media regulation,
however; what we need are the right conditions
for the long term viability of quality
journalism and professional media.
Angela Mills Wade, Executive Director, European
Publishers Council (EPC) http://epceurope.eu/
1
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landscapes
Huub Evers, netherlands
What is media accountability for you?
Media do play an important role in the daily
life of most people. They have a lot of influence
and therefore responsibility. The audience
wants journalists to legitimate their choices and
decisions. People want to learn how media work
and why journalists write or broadcast things in a
certain way. They want journalists to react to their
remarks and complaints. Because: if journalists
call everything and everybody to account, they
must be able to practice openness and transparency themselves.
Why is it so important to do research on media accountability?
Media accountability is one of the leading topics in journalism studies. Editorial
staffs need to be pushed to get in touch with their audience. Journalists can use
‘best practices‘ from all over the world for their own newsroom. Exploration of
accountability and transparency examples is useful for journalists and audience.
What was the funniest/most interesting moment in the project?
The funniest moment was our mosquito meeting in Tartu, Estonia. We had
Mike jempson, UK
What is media accountability
for you?
It means that journalists
respect their sources and their audiences. They cannot always get at the
whole truth, so the humility to acknowledge mistakes adds to rather than
diminishes credibility, in my view. My team and I at the MediaWise Trust
believe that Press Freedom is a responsibility exercised by journalists on
behalf of the public. That says it all for me.
Why is it so important to do research on media accountability?
Changing technology, the changing political economy of the media, and the
varieties of journalistic traditions mean that different systems may be required
under different circumstances. As always we must be alert to change, and
adapt accordingly. The value of research (if it is not too long drawn out, and
the results can be translated into normal language) is that it helps everyone
to understand the landscape and their place in it, and how best to respond to
the consequences of changes that research has identified.
What was the biggest task in the international project?
Trying to get working journalists in the UK to complete a complex
questionnaire.
What was the funniest/most interesting moment in the project?
Funniest (after the event) trying to enjoy a mean al fresco in Tartu without
being bitten alive by forty million mosquitoes.
What did you learn from the MediaAcT project?
That it is really interesting to learn about the complexities of different
journalistic traditions. That devising questionnaires by committee is a
nightmare. That we still have a long way to go before journalists and
academics can find the right way to communicate with each other effectively.
That despite all our different cultural influences, preferences and constraints,
we all share a desire for accurate, responsible and responsive journalism
that holds power to account and is free from corporate or governmental
interference.
our MediaAcT conference there in the hot summer of 2010. During the
conference we had to take great pains to keep the mosquitoes at arm‘s
length. Every few minutes a hard blow was to be heard in the small and
broiling conference room. It influenced the decision taking processes and
caused laughter.
There were a lot of interesting moments: meeting colleagues from
abroad, listening to presentations and discussing new developments in the
conference rooms and outside. A very important consequence of the project
is the international network each participant built.
What did you learn from the MediaAcT project?
The most important thing I learned from the project is about the important
role media watchblogs and social media play in media criticism. In my
opinion, modern mediawatch and criticism will come from blogs and social
media (Facebook and Twitter). Every journalist should be aware of this
development and go along with it.
Do you think international media is on the right track?
Difficult to answer. Depends on where you live and what your experience
about it is. Press freedom is not everywhere an established asset. A debate
on topics like responsibility, accountability and transparency presupposes a
certain level of freedom.
Accountability and
mosquito meetings in Tartu
personal views on MediaAcT by the international research team
Raluca Radu, Romania
Why is it so important to do research on
media accountability?
Research on media accountability may
help journalists, media managers and
journalism educators to understand the
phenomenon better, identify strategic
actors, key resources and key processes, in
the short term, and ensure the survival of
media companies, alongside other fields
of media research, in the long term.
What was the funniest/ most interesting
moment in the project?
The most interesting moment for me was to discover that the Romanian
journalistic sample is the youngest and one of the most religious. It is now an
intellectual challenge for the team of the University of Bucharest to find out the
reasons and the effects of these facts.
What did you learn from the MediaAcT project?
I was motivated by the excellent MediaAcT team to overcome my fears related
to quantitative research and to statistical analysis.
Do you think international media is on the right track?
At the moment, in my opinion, media companies are trying to find new
business models and new revenue models. Different media stakeholders
pressure the industry to use a cleaner line of conduct, and to stand up against
political and maybe against economic pressures. There are multiple roads
international media may take from this point.
Boguslawa Dobek-Ostrowska, Poland
What is media accountability for
you?
Media accountability is a must
– not a luxury – for contemporary
media organisations, it is a challenge,
an important way to look at
contemporary media.
What was the biggest task in the
international project?
The biggest task was to understand
media accountability processes
in new media and extend, reorganise, redefine traditional
conceptualisations of media accountability in the digital age.
What was the funniest/most interesting moment in the project?
The most interesting moments were discussions amongst
MediaAcT people, especially those in which we discovered, that
despite cultural and linguistic differences we share the same
values, ideas and academic ethos.
What did you learn from the MediaAcT project?
We learnt that in modern academic life, administration and
logistics and research are almost of the same importance.
Do you think international media is on the right track?
For the moment, we don‘t think so, but there is a place for
improvement, because many interesting ideas are growing.
stephan Russ-Mohl, switzerland
What is media accountability for you?
The willingness of journalists and newsrooms,
to behave in an accountable and
transparent way, for example to express
doubts if they are unsure about their
reporting, and to correct errors.
Why is it so important to do research on
media accountability?
Because journalists might learn from
each other and from ‘best practices‘ elsewhere. However, firstly, somebody
has to identify and systematically analyse existing accountability – and make
newsrooms aware that they demand daily accountability from others. They have
to apply similar rules to their own work!
What was the biggest task in the international project?
I assume to assure that the participating researchers apply the same methodology
and the same standards to our common research. We are fully aware that not only
do journalism cultures differ in Europe – research cultures differ, too!
What was the funniest/most interesting moment in the project?
Difficult to recall. There were many such moments, as Susanne Fengler created
from the very first moment a “working climate” which was based on mutual
friendship, trust and all of us shared a certain sense of humour. Possibly a summer
evening in Estonia when all of us wanted to enjoy some beers outside and an
invasion of mosquitoes forced all of us to “donate” our blood and to escape…
What did you learn from the MediaAcT project?
Much about the different journalism and research cultures in Europe – and how
important it is that journalists and media researchers get to know each other
across cultural and language barriers.
Do you think international media is on the right track?
We definitely need more “international” or even “European” media. By the way,
the EU might also invest some more money in training for journalists.
dear reader,
this magazine is about media responsibility
– at a time when the future of quality
journalism is probably less clear than
ever before. Many new sources of information
compete for people’s attention in
the web. More than ever, the trademark
of professional journalism will be transparency about the way
stories are being made – and accountability for what is being
published in today’s media societies.
we hope that this magazine has inspired you to become
involved in media accountability: As a journalist, our research
shows that there are so many easy and cost-effective new ways
for the media to demonstrate accountability and transparency
online. As a media user, we want to encourage you to make
yourself heard – and to make an informed choice. we want
you to encourage those newsrooms that do pay attention to
ethical standards, and do take the risk to be transparent and
to admit mistakes. As a policy-maker, we encourage you to
put the issue of media accountability on the political agenda.
we, as a research consortium, pledge for a media policy that
promotes accountability in journalism – by setting clear
incentives, not by sanctions and interventions. It is the ultimate
goal of the more than 30 international researchers involved
in the MediaAcT project to preserve media independence in
a time of rapid change. lively democracies need a free and
responsible press.
finally, we hope we can encourage fellow scholars and journalism
educators to be aware of our crucial role in the creation
of a ‘culture of media accountability’. Journalists everywhere
consider journalism education as one of the most relevant factors
for upholding standards in journalism. Investing in journalism
education is an investment in a responsible press – this
is a message also for industry representatives, who are rather
unwilling these days to finance mid-career trainings.
The MediaAcT survey shows that journalists who received
training in media ethics during their journalistic education
are more sensitive towards issues of media accountability. we
hope that journalism educators will make use of this magazine
(and our accompanying online tool, see www.mediaact.eu) to
promote seminars and lectures on media accountability. sensitising
aspiring journalists about what they owe to the public
is surely a task as important as any professional technique to
be taught in journalism schools and journalism programs.
Our survey data show that this is a prevalent need: Even today,
journalists still feel more responsible towards their sources
than either their target audience or the public. In order to fill
the concept of media accountability with life – and open the
door for a participative approach to holding the media to account,
journalists need to be more aware than they are now
that the public is the prime stakeholder of the “fourth estate”.
It needs a joint effort from all of us to ensure quality journalism
in the future.
yours
prof. dr. susanne fengler
director of the MediaAcT research project
Index | Editorial | Birds-eye view | Opening the toolbox | Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
Index | Editorial | Birds-eye view | Opening the toolbox | Zoom-in on the newsroom | Media landscapes
Authors
Salvador Alsius, PhD,
Head of Journalism Studies
at Universitat Pompeu Fabra
(UPF) and senior researcher
of GRP (Journalism Research
Group), Spain.
Olivier Baisnée, PhD,
works as an associate
professor in political science
at the Institut d’Etudes
Politiques de Toulouse,
France.
Photgraph: Walter Henisch
klaus Bichler, MMag.,
researcher at Medienhaus
Wien, lecturer at the
University of Vienna and
at the University of Krems,
Austria.
prof. dr. herta däublergmelin
is a former German
Minister of Justice and is
member of the Consortium
of the High-Level Group
on Media Freedom and
Pluralism (HLG).
Bogusława dobek-
Ostrowska, PhD, she is
professor at the University
of Wroclaw, Poland and the
head of the Department of
Journalism and Communication.
Tobias eberwein, PhD,
professor at the Institute
of Journalism and acting
academic director, Erich
Brost Institute, TU Dortmund.
Scientific coordinator
of the MediaAcT project.
huub evers, PhD, is a
freelance media ethics
expert. Till 2011, he was a
professor of media, ethics
and diversity at Fontys
University of Applied
Sciences, Tilburg, NL.
Susanne Fengler, PhD,
professor of international
journalism, director of the
Erich Brost Institute for int.
Journalism, TU Dortmund
University. Director of the
MediaAcT project.
drs. harmen p. groenhart
is lecturer for Journalism
Studies at the School
of Journalism, Fontys
University of Applied
Sciences, Tilburg, NL.
heikki heikkilä, PhD, is
senior research fellow, University
of Tampere, Finland.
He is the MediaAcT
Work Package leader focusing
on innovations in online
media accountability.
halliki harro-loit, PhD,
professor of journalism,Institute
of Journalism and Communication,
University of
Tartu, Estonia. Research
group leader, Centre of Excellence
in Cultural Theory.
Mike Jempson, PhD, Senior
Lecturer in Journalism at
the University of the West
of England. He has been
Director of the journalism
ethics charity The Media
Wise Trust since 1996.
Photgraph: Walter Henisch
Andy kaltenbrunner, PhD,
media consultant and
lecturer (Austria, Spain,
Germany), executive
director of Medienhaus
Wien, Austria.
Photgraph: Walter Henisch
Matthias karmasin, PhD,
full professor at the Department
of Media and Communication
Sciences, University
of Klagenfurt, ombudsman
of the MediaAcT
project.
Photgraph: Walter Henisch
daniela kraus, PhD,
executive director of
fjum_forum for journalism
and media Vienna, Austria.
Her research interests are
journalism research, journalism
education, web 2.0.
Julia lönnendonker, M.A.
(USA), Dipl.-Geogr., is
a senior researcher at the
Erich Brost Institute for
international journalism and
coordination officer of
the MediaAcT project.
Marcel Mauri, PhD,
Lecturer in Journalism
History and Media Ethics
at the Communication
Department, Universitat
Pompeu Fabra (UPF), Spain.
prof. gianpietro Mazzoleni
Professor of Sociology of
Communication and Director
of the Master‘s Program
in Public & Corporate Communication
at the Università
degli Studi di Milano, Italy.
Amirouche nedjaa, executive
director of the “Arab
Working Group for Media
Monitoring”. He has specialised
in monitoring the
media coverage during
electoral campaigns.
Judith pies is a lecturer and
research assistant at the
Erich Brost Institute for
International Journalism
and the Institute for
Journalism, TU Dortmund
University, Germany.
daniela popa, PhD student,
teaching assistant at the
Faculty of Communication
and International Studies,
Danubius University of
Galati, Romania.
raluca-nicoleta radu, PhD,
is an associate professor at
the Journalism Department,
Faculty of Journalism and
Communication Studies,
University of Bucharest,
Romania.
ruth rodríguez-Martínez,
has a PhD in Journalism
from the Universidad
Complutense in Madrid.
Her main research interests
are specialised journalism
and cultural journalism.
Stephan russ-Mohl, PhD,
professor of journalism and
media management, Università
della Svizzera italiana,
Lugano, Switzerland and
director of EJO, European
Journalism Observatory.
laura Schneider-Mombaur,
Dipl. Journ., is scientific
assistant at the Erich Brost
Institute for int. journalism
and works as administrative
officer at the MediaAcT
project. Freelance journalist.
Sergio Splendore, PhD in
sociology at the “Graduate
School in Social, Economic
and Political Sciences”,
Department of Social and
Political Science, University
of Milan. Italy.
Sandra Vera-Zambrano,
PhD, currently works as
research assistant for the
Institut d‘Etudes Politiques
in Toulouse, France.
lEgAl nOTIcE
MediaAcT - Final Report
Publisher
Erich Brost Institute for
International Journalism
Technische Universität dortmund
germany
prof. dr. susanne fengler
dr. Tobias Eberwein
Editors
Tobias Eberwein, laura schneider-
Mombaur
Editorial assistance: Mariella Trilling &
Johannes hoffmann
Circulation
10.000
layout and Production
susanne Janecke
language Editing
Marcus denton, Alison Ansell
Print
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co kg
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Contact
Erich Brost Institute
Otto-hahn-straße 2
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germany
Tel. +49 (0)234-755-6976
E-Mail: info@brost.org
Title
photographer: photocase/jUliE:p
The research leading to these
results has received funding from
the european union Seventh
Framework programme (Fp7/2007-
2013) under grant agreement n°
244147. The information in this
document is the outcome of the
eu project “Media Accountability
and Transparency in europe“
(MediaAcT). The research reflects
only the authors’ views and the
european union is not liable for
any use that may be made of the
information contained therein. The
user thereof uses the information at
their sole risk and liability.
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