tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/uk-media-5750/articlesUK media – The Conversation2024-03-20T13:59:04Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2260692024-03-20T13:59:04Z2024-03-20T13:59:04ZOfcom has rules on broadcaster impartiality – so why is GB News getting away with breaking them?<p>The UK’s media regulator has found GB News guilty of breaching the UK’s “due impartiality” code in <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/news-centre/2024/politicians-acting-as-news-presenters-on-gb-news-broke-broadcasting-rules">five separate programmes</a>. This brings the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2024/mar/18/gb-news-breached-impartiality-rules-says-ofcom-but-will-face-no-sanctions#:%7E:text=This%20is%20the%2012th%20time,Eight%20other%20investigations%20are%20ongoing.">total violations</a> for the news channel to 12 in the last 18 months, with eight investigations underway. </p>
<p>Despite repeated infringements, Ofcom has not <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2024/mar/18/gb-news-breached-impartiality-rules-says-ofcom-but-will-face-no-sanctions">sanctioned the channel</a> or threatened to revoke its broadcast licence. </p>
<p>GB News immediately <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/the-wire/newspaper-corrections-media-mistakes-errors-legal/gb-news-ofcom-politicians-presenters-jacob-rees-mogg/">rebuked</a> Ofcom’s judgment. They argued that the regulator was limiting “alternative voices” and represented a “chilling development” in the freedom of UK broadcasting. </p>
<p>Ofcom ruled that shows presented by Conservative MPs Jacob Rees-Mogg, Esther McVey and Phillip Davies broke its <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/tv-radio-and-on-demand/broadcast-codes/broadcast-code">code</a> about politicians presenting “news” programming. While politicians can anchor current affairs programming, once they step into the role of newsreader, news interviewer or reporter Ofcom considers this a <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/news-centre/2023/ofcoms-rules-on-politicians-on-tv-and-radio">breach of impartiality</a>. </p>
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<p>Needless to say, Ofcom’s rules do not mean that we never hear directly from politicians about their views. MPs and government ministers have long been free to write partisan columns in newspapers, angrily tweet their ideological opinions or blog polemically about their perspectives. </p>
<p>But until very recently, regulators would not have tolerated politicians routinely presenting political programmes on radio and television. This now appears to be changing, without any formal changes in legislation or public debate.</p>
<h2>Changing regulations</h2>
<p>Over the last decade, Ofcom has taken a more flexible approach when interpreting “due impartiality”. Broadcasters have been given the freedom to deliver more partisan perspectives, with presenters and guests voicing their opinions more vociferously. </p>
<p>They are still required to air “alternative viewpoints”, with presenters posing critical questions, challenging or rebutting perspectives. But the prominence and robustness of these counterbalancing views are often <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-uk-broadcastings-key-principle-of-impartiality-has-been-eroded-over-the-years-202762">limited</a>. </p>
<p>This was first evident on radio, with stations such as talkRadio and LBC <a href="https://theconversation.com/news-uk-tv-and-gb-news-new-channels-stoke-fears-of-more-partisan-journalism-154514">featuring</a> more partisan presenters, including senior politicians. Television channels, such as GB News and News UK, soon followed this approach, without the media regulator intervening. </p>
<p>But, over time, GB News has allowed politicians to not just host current affairs shows, but either present, report or break news programming. This pushed the boundaries of the UK’s impartiality code, prompting Ofcom’s latest judgment that found the channel had breached its code in five programmes involving politicians.</p>
<p>Ofcom has <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0033/99177/broadcast-code-guidance-section-5-march-2017.pdf">stressed</a> the importance of granting broadcasters freedom of expression and responding to new audience expectations. But how far this represents public opinion is open to question, since Ofcom has not consulted audiences on their expectations.</p>
<p>In July 2023, Ofcom’s chief executive, Dame Melanie Dawes, revealed that the regulator was <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/news-centre/2023/the-other-side">conducting research</a> to better understand audience attitudes about current affairs programmes presented by politicians. But the remit for any study, the methodology, or findings have not surfaced yet. </p>
<p><a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/digital-news-report/2021/impartiality-unpacked-study-four-countries">Academic research</a>, including <a href="https://theconversation.com/bbc-why-enhancing-the-public-broadcasters-fact-checking-would-strengthen-its-impartiality-170891">my own</a> at Cardiff University, has long found that the public values and trusts impartial journalism. </p>
<p>Rather than politicians presenting shows, audiences want them held to account more effectively, with journalists robustly challenging misleading or false claims. In other words, the public’s agenda appears at odds with Ofcom’s current, light-touch approach to impartiality.</p>
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<p>Ofcom’s approach has effectively created what some view as a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/13/ofcom-gb-news-media-regulator">double standard</a>. Citing <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0033/99177/broadcast-code-guidance-section-5-march-2017.pdf">“audience expectations”</a>, Ofcom now appears to hold public service broadcasters, such as the BBC, with far greater <a href="https://inews.co.uk/news/media/gb-news-gets-away-more-bbc-ofcom-boss-2938731">scrutiny</a> than new partisan channels. The media regulator’s oversight of BBC impartiality has now also been <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/reforms-to-boost-confidence-in-the-bbcs-impartiality-and-complaints-system-set-out-in-mid-term-review">extended</a> to its online news services. But no other news websites produced by broadcasters are being regulated.</p>
<h2>Why impartiality still matters</h2>
<p>Senior figures in the industry have <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/nov/11/uk-news-channels-should-not-have-to-be-impartial">claimed</a> that the current impartiality rules aren’t suitable for the digital world. After all, the public has instant access to a wide range of opinionated online and social media sites. There are hundreds of channels and plenty of other places where people can get their news and current affairs.</p>
<p>Despite this, most people in the UK <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0024/264651/news-consumption-2023.pdf">still rely on television news</a> to understand what is happening in the world. This power and influence has led to successive UK governments ruling that broadcasters should remain impartial on politics and public affairs. </p>
<p>The example of the US shows us what happens when these regulations do not exist. In the 1980s, US rules on impartial broadcasting were repealed, in part because they were seen as undermining freedom of expression at a time of media expansion and choice. Since then, partisan news channels have had an increasingly <a href="https://academic.oup.com/book/35132">divisive influence</a> on its political and media environment.</p>
<p>If the UK’s code on broadcast impartiality is eroded further on the grounds of freedom of expression and new audience expectations, we need to debate the merits of these arguments. But this should be driven by hard evidence about how the public want the media regulated.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/226069/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stephen Cushion has received funding from the BBC Trust, Ofcom, AHRC, BA and ESRC.</span></em></p>Evidence shows the public still want impartiality from broadcasters.Stephen Cushion, Chair Professor, Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Culture, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2227972024-02-08T13:21:29Z2024-02-08T13:21:29ZSix Nations future on terrestrial TV uncertain – what are the implications for rugby and its fans?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574016/original/file-20240207-20-835kh3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=38%2C0%2C4252%2C2813&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Six Nations Championship is classified as a 'category B' tournament by the UK government. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/rome-italy-0502-olympic-stadium-guinness-2258290119">Marco Iacobucci Epp/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Six Nations Championship always serves plenty to excite stadium and television audiences. But the high-octane drama risks being overshadowed by off-field events that could also threaten the principles of public service broadcasting.</p>
<p>As a televisual event, rugby is thriving. <a href="https://www.digitaltveurope.com/2024/02/01/rugby-world-cup-2023-most-viewed-rugby-event-ever-with-1-33bn-viewing-hours/">Viewing figures</a> for the Rugby World Cup in 2023 were 19% higher than the 2019 tournament, and 30% higher than in 2015. Free-to-air Six Nations games <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/1441433/tv-viewers-six-nations-uk/">regularly draw</a> between 3 and 4.5 million viewers in the UK. Globally, an estimated <a href="https://www.sixnationsrugby.com/en/m6n/news/get-set-for-championships-biggest-year-yet">121 million</a> people tuned in to the 2023 tournament. </p>
<p>So, it’s surprising that the Six Nations is classified by the UK government’s Department for Culture, Media and Sport as a <a href="https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN00802/SN00802.pdf">“category B”</a> tournament. This means it can be sold to anyone, providing that free-to-air broadcasters are given access to highlights or delayed coverage. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, for “category A” events like the FA Cup final and the Olympic and Paralympic Games, full live coverage must be offered by free-to-air terrestrial broadcasters. Recently, a bid to move the Six Nations into category A was <a href="https://www.itv.com/news/wales/2024-01-23/bid-to-make-six-nations-free-to-air-rejected-by-uk-government">rejected</a> by the UK government.</p>
<p>The BBC and ITV have had the rights for the Six Nations since 2003, but that could change. Rugby’s governing bodies need more money, and free-to-air channels are feeling the financial pinch. On top of that, more and more people are opting for streaming services in general. So, when the current broadcasting deal ends in 2025, the Six Nations could very well end up behind a paywall. </p>
<h2>Financial woes</h2>
<p>Money – or the lack of it – is the important factor here and Welsh rugby especially is experiencing the effects more than most. It faces a <a href="https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rugby/rugby-news/raft-wales-internationals-face-huge-28239366">stark future</a> both on and off the field, with players leaving Wales for more money and salary caps being introduced for those who stay. </p>
<p>While there’s a <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-68152933">consensus in the Senedd</a> (Welsh parliament) for the Six Nations to remain free-to-air, the Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) has warned it would <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-68168728">“struggle to survive”</a> without a competitive bidding scenario involving Sky, Amazon Prime and others. </p>
<p>Some Scottish politicians concur with the Senedd, adding a further constitutional dimension. The <a href="https://www.thenational.scot/news/24093322.six-nations-paywall-threat-sparks-calls-broadcast-powers-scotland/">SNP’s Gavin Newlands</a> recently reiterated calls for broadcasting to be devolved so that the Six Nations remains free-to-air. </p>
<p>There are precedents for rugby moving to a subscription service too. The 2023 Autumn Internationals were only accessible on Amazon Prime, and between 1997 and 2002, England’s home games were shown exclusively on Sky Sports. </p>
<p>But that raises concerns about affordability, especially for those fans already finding attending matches too expensive. For stay-at-home supporters, even the “home comfort” option of watching on TV might become too costly.</p>
<p>According to former BBC executive and now WRU executive director of rugby, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-68168728">Nigel Walker</a>, this “tension and competition at the market” is essential for rugby’s survival. The Irish Rugby Union has also previously warned about the <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/irfu-tackles-minister-over-six-nations-on-free-to-air-tv-s3ssx5lcp">“substantial financial damage”</a> to rugby if the Six Nations was classified as free-to-air.</p>
<h2>Lessons from cricket</h2>
<p>Free market proponents point, for example, to how Sky’s long-lasting commitment to cricket has led to <a href="https://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/broadcasting/the-tech-being-used-by-sky-sports-at-the-ashes/5183118.article">innovation and technical advances</a> such as multiple cameras and data-rich, TV-friendly statistical analysis. It results in a quality of coverage that the BBC or ITV might struggle to match with more meagre budgets. </p>
<p>But test cricket offers a cautionary tale. It found a surge of new fans during Channel 4’s captivating coverage of the epic 2005 Ashes, with the final day of the fourth test drawing <a href="https://www.isportconnect.com/the-house-view-why-cricket-needs-free-to-air-tv-to-make-the-most-of-the-ashes/#:%7E:text=The%20last%20time%20the%20England,Fourth%20Test%20at%208.4%20million.">8.4 million viewers</a>. When Sky secured the rights a year later, this fresh audience vanished. </p>
<p>The 2023 Ashes saw <a href="https://www.skysports.com/cricket/news/12123/12907082/the-ashes-2023-sky-sports-breaks-records-in-edgbaston-opener-with-highest-viewing-figures-for-a-test-match">peak viewing figures</a> of just 2.12 million. Having hauled in millions of new enthusiasts, <a href="https://theconversation.com/england-win-mens-cricket-world-cup-in-a-last-ball-thriller-now-will-the-country-see-more-matches-on-free-tv-120302">cricket</a> failed to keep them watching.</p>
<p>If rugby does succumb to the paywall, there are serious implications. Perhaps as an inevitable consequence of a captive audience, subscription prices might increase as “market forces” prevail. </p>
<p>And if televised rugby lit a fire in the belly of an emerging generation of players, there’s a chance a paywall could just as easily extinguish it. This is especially relevant in Wales, where <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/1445179/six-nations-popularity-countries/">51% of the population</a> stated that they had an interest in the tournament, versus only 26% in England.</p>
<p>For Wales, where rugby players are often revered as heroes, the cultural implications are also considerable. The players are role models who help cement a common sense of nationhood and cultural identity. Will their power to inspire future generations fade if fans can’t afford to watch them? Possibly not, but making rugby less accessible may stifle the enthusiasm of emerging talent.</p>
<p>And there is a further conundrum regarding the very nature of public service broadcasting. According to legislation, one <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/21/section/264/2011-06-15">principle</a> of broadcasting in the public interest is that it should “satisfy a wide range of different sporting and other leisure interests”. </p>
<p>For many, public service broadcasting principles might seem a dispensable fragment of an increasingly complex jigsaw, but they should not be dismissed lightly. The protective standards and quality they provide, and the inclusivity they ensure, were not necessarily conceived with rugby in mind. But losing them to the pursuit of bigger paydays would be a significant blow to the cultural and social fabric that sport weaves within society.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/222797/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>When Six Nations’ broadcasting deal with the BBC and ITV ends in 2025, there are fears the tournament could move to a subscription service.Richard Thomas, Professor of Journalism, Swansea UniversityIwan Williams, Senior Lecturer in Media, Swansea UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2185652024-02-07T17:30:24Z2024-02-07T17:30:24ZRwanda deal: why the media should focus more on the policy and less on the politics of immigration<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/573081/original/file-20240202-21-98f0ov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=36%2C13%2C985%2C668&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Rishi Sunak visited Border Force in Dover in June 2023.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/number10gov/52952776228/in/photolist-2oFmJfL-2oFgrm7-2oFfPwu-2oFe9na-2oFdn34-2oFe4w3-2oFfEHc-2oFdmWs-2oFah5A-2oFdmRc-2oFfjpd-2oFdmKf-2oFdmJo-2oFe4fg-2oFfEkJ-2oFfEkU-2omiC1T-2okZCzg-2okSGRh-2okPW93-2okP7Ab-2okK9kK-2okMPHY-2okPVnD-2okQhN2-2okHxnF-2okMv9X-2okN8ed-2okN8ce-2okL2qK-2okL2oA-2okN879-2okL2kK-2okNv8G-2okL2Ju-2okLpN2-2okL2xT-2okHWfo-2okKdj3-2okBJwL-2okD2jQ-2okBJdu-2okEcmF-2o5BKMx-2o5Fzgm-2o5GtBe-2o5Fze2-2o5FzcJ-2o5Fzb1-2jNg6Fi">Number 10/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Heading into an election year, the government’s handling of migration continues to dominate headlines. Much of the coverage has been about the plan to send those who enter the UK without legal paperwork to Rwanda. </p>
<p>This plan was enshrined in law in July 2023 through the Illegal Migration Act. However, after the UK Supreme Court deemed the plan unlawful, <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/14737795231206156">its future remains uncertain</a>. </p>
<p>Despite this law’s significant effects on the lives of thousands of people – and wider UK society – the media coverage of its passage appeared to focus primarily on the politics of the issue and consequences for the government. As we found while analysing television news reports from when the bill was being debated in parliament, less focus was given to the substance of the policy and its implications for asylum seekers and human rights.</p>
<p>We argue that the media ought to take note of this issue as it continues to cover the government’s Rwanda policy.</p>
<p>News audiences have come to expect horse race coverage of politics ahead of elections. But this should not come at the expense of in-depth scrutiny of policy. When it does, it can have detrimental effects on the <a href="https://journalistsresource.org/politics-and-government/horse-race-reporting-election/">public’s understanding of important issues,</a> leading to political polarisation and more partisan views.</p>
<p>The human and legal consequences of immigration rules are too important to be distilled to political infighting. To fulfil their obligations as public service broadcasters, the UK’s TV media outlets in particular should focus more on the policy, not the politics.</p>
<h2>Party politics over scrutiny</h2>
<p>Working with research assistant Ellie Baskerville at the School of Journalism, Media and Culture at Cardiff University, <a href="https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/resources/curated-playlists/immigration-bill">we examined</a> 1,250 news items from the UK’s flagship evening television news bulletins (BBC News at Ten, ITV News at Ten, Channel 4 News, 5 News at 5 and Sky News at Ten) between March and July 2023. We looked specifically at weeks when the bill was being discussed in parliament.</p>
<p>The vast majority – 72% of stories – discussed the bill in relation to Westminster party politics. Specifically, how it would affect politicians’ reputations and prospects in the next election. Coverage was often more concerned with how the bill would fulfil Sunak’s pledge to “stop the boats”, than whether it would actually work or be implemented.</p>
<p>For example, when describing the legislative process, a Channel 4 reporter said that the government wanted to get the bill “done and dusted” before the election. While this is important context for understanding why the government was so focused on the policy, this overshadows reporting on the practicalities of the legislation. </p>
<p>Throughout the legislative process, critics of the bill (including <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-66168280">MPs</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/mar/08/what-are-the-legal-obstacles-faced-by-the-uks-migration-bill-suella-braverman">legal experts</a> and <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/uk/news/speeches-and-statements/uk-illegal-migration-bill-un-refugee-agency-and-un-human-rights-office">international organisations</a>) raised concerns about how it could violate the UK’s legal obligations. But while most of the news items we examined referenced these obligations, they did not include a robust scrutiny of the legislation. In 30% of news items, journalists did not question whether the bill was legal. </p>
<p>Political sources accounted for 54% of the voices speaking in the news items reporting on the bill. Legal experts made up only 6%. </p>
<p>Channel 4 News stood out for including sources expressing open criticism of the legislation most often. This included, in March 2023, an asylum law expert who dismissed the bill as “a really impractical idea” emphasising the “completely unworkable” logistics associated with mass detention of asylum seekers pending removal.</p>
<p>The majority of criticism was not of the bill’s supposed human rights shortcomings, but of the legislation’s electoral implications. For example, on ITV News on July 3: “The prime minister wanted immigration to be an election battleground. What he’s got is a battle in his own party too.”</p>
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<h2>Personality over policy</h2>
<p>The bill faced <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-66229585">many challenges</a> from peers in the House of Lords. These were largely to do with humanitarian concerns about treatment of child migrants and modern slavery victims. </p>
<p>But instead of detailing the substance of the amendments (or indeed the constitutional value of the legislative process), news coverage in our sample framed this as a power play between the two houses. Broadcasters focused on how the Conservatives were determined to vote against these recommendations to “send a message” to the Lords.</p>
<p>More time was given to stories with high entertainment value, such as a summit between Rishi Sunak and French president Emmanuel Macron that was described by all broadcasters as a “bromance”. This approach was more common than giving an informed analysis of the Franco-UK deal worth over €500 million to stop Channel crossings.</p>
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<p>About 23% of the bulletins included asylum seekers’ perspectives about the impact that the legislation would have on their life prospects. Limited airtime, however, was given to humanitarian organisations. </p>
<p>Groups like the UN Refugee Agency or the Refugee Council accounted for only 9% of the total sources in our sample. We also found that most of the bulletins lacked wider context about Channel crossings, including the root causes of migration more broadly.</p>
<h2>What is the media’s responsibility?</h2>
<p><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0267323113478522?casa_token=yFk9SPLrO44AAAAA%3AXptylt-IvuPPPHlCiuIfAauccfi01BdkVOG0ut5vDRoJDIFezG7LlS3MErjuKhaXIRsAcqcy2415ig&journalCode=ejc">Research shows</a> that news coverage of elections tends to focus on political personalities and horse race reporting about who is pulling ahead in the polls. Our analysis suggests that broadcasters used this same logic when reporting on regular government activity outside of an election cycle.</p>
<p>UK public service broadcasters <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/tv-radio-and-on-demand/information-for-industry/psb#:%7E:text=Public%20service%20broadcasting%20(PSB)%20has,5%2C%20S4C%20and%20the%20BBC">have a responsibility</a> to provide the public with accurate, impartial and informative reporting. This should mean in-depth scrutiny of policy and holding the government accountable for any breach in law, domestic or international.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218565/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Expert analysis shows most stories about the migration bill have been about party politics, not the substance of the policy.Marina Morani, Lecturer, School of Journalism, Media and Culture, Cardiff UniversityLizzy Willmington, Lecturer in Law, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2126402023-09-01T12:51:45Z2023-09-01T12:51:45ZLocal journalism: why a tiny news operation could inspire a different approach and is attracting big name support<p>It started as a one-person operation, funded by personal savings and based in a bedroom, with a mission to provide a new format for local news in Manchester, and now The Mill is attracting £350,000 of <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/publishers/regional-newspapers/the-mill-invesment/">funding</a> from some big names in journalism including the former BBC director general Sir Mark Thompson.</p>
<p>The sums involved aren’t huge, but the significance for local journalism in the UK should not be underestimated. The Mill is expanding as local newspapers around the UK, <a href="https://www.cjr.org/local_news/local_reporters_decline_coverage_density.php">and the world</a>, <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/publishers/nationals/reach-to-make-200-redundancies/">are closing down or shedding staff</a>, creating <a href="https://www.usnewsdeserts.com/states-main/">news deserts</a> where local issues go unreported. So what is the Mill doing right and could it be a model for a new type of local journalism? </p>
<p>As someone who has worked in local journalism, including the much-missed Liverpool Daily Post, I have watched as newspapers have shut their local offices, <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/news/most-reach-journalists-work-home-after-covid-19-mail-online-prepares-return-newsroom/">contracted newsrooms</a> and in some cases stopped printing and turned to web-only operations, so the success of The Mill as part of this climate is worth noting. </p>
<p><a href="https://manchestermill.co.uk">The Mill</a> was founded by journalist Joshi Herrmann in 2020, beginning as a local news newsletter for Manchester before expanding into Liverpool with The Post and The Tribune in Sheffield. It has plans to add Birmingham coverage soon.</p>
<p>I have been interested in The Mill from the beginning. When it first launched I invited Herrmann to talk to my journalism students about the project, then very much in its infancy. We spoke on Zoom during the height of the pandemic, my students at home and Herrmann from a motorway service station where he had stopped on his travels.</p>
<p>He outlined the inspiration, the plans he had, the style of journalism he wanted to revive. He was clearly driven and committed.</p>
<p>He also explained the beginnings of The Mill when interviewed on <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001812m">BBC Radio 4’s You and Yours</a>, and why he thought there was a gap in the market. He had found himself back in his hometown of Manchester during lockdown and noticed that his <a href="https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk">local newspaper, the Manchester Evening News</a>, owned by <a href="https://www.reachplc.com">the UK’s largest commercial news publisher</a> Reach, had shifted away from the “traditional” news and features he remembered from when he was growing up. </p>
<p>He wondered if there was a market for the type of news and features that the UK’s regional press were once so famous for and which they did so well.</p>
<p>So he created a daily newsletter paid for by subscribers who might get only one story a day but it would be detailed, and well researched and something they weren’t reading elsewhere, and worth – he hoped – their time and money.</p>
<p>Latest pieces in <a href="https://www.livpost.co.uk">The Post</a> include an article on Liverpool’s litter problem approached from the perspective of a volunteer litter picker, while another article explains why the city isn’t in the middle of a knife-crime epidemic despite “nine stabbings in five days”.</p>
<p>What started as a one-man operation is now a team of nine and it is advertising <a href="https://millmediaco.uk">three new staff positions at the moment</a>. The Mill has 5,000 paying subscribers and thousands more who read the open-access stories.</p>
<p>The list of investors attracted to The Mill’s model of local journalism is impressive: Nicholas Johnston of <a href="https://www.axios.com">Axios, which operates local news sites in the US</a>, Turi Munthe, founder of photojournalism network Demotix, and David Rosenberg of Snap Inc.</p>
<p>The backer who really stands out is Thompson, former CEO of Channel 4 and CEO of the New York Times and former director general of the BBC. It is a big win for The Mill.</p>
<h2>Change or die</h2>
<p>In the rush to digital and to find an alternative to advertising revenues and physical sales, local newspapers had to adapt or die.</p>
<p>Five years ago, the UK government – with Theresa May as prime minister – commissioned an independent review into UK journalism and in 2019 published <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-cairncross-review-a-sustainable-future-for-journalism">The Cairncross Review: a sustainable future for journalism</a>, expressing concerns about the future of national and local newsgathering. </p>
<p>It made for difficult reading. Print sales had halved between 2007 and 2017; print advertising revenues had fallen by 69% and only one in ten people was reading a regional or local printed paper each week.</p>
<p>It also made a number of recommendations, including that online platforms should have a “news quality obligation” to improve trust in the news.</p>
<p>Recently, <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk">the Reuters Digital News Report 2023</a> found that trust in news has fallen, reversing gains made at the height of the pandemic, suggesting this is a continuing problem, but that increasing numbers of people, of all ages, were taking steps to actively find “reliable news”, rather than content sent to them by an algorithm.</p>
<p>The Reuters research also found that only a fifth of respondents said they started their “news journeys” with a website or app, down from 2018, preferring social media as a route.</p>
<p>So, here is the opportunity for news innovators. If apps or websites aren’t working, what can? Once it was a paper boy –- or girl –- now local news can be delivered straight into the inbox, reliably and efficiently, via a newsletter, as The Mill does. Other news operations have since decided <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/publishers/regional-newspapers/why-the-future-of-digital-only-local-news-may-be-small-focused-and-based-on-email/">the newsletter model</a> is one that has an audience, and followed Herrmann down that route.</p>
<p>Investment into companies such as The Mill could be the start of a new financial model for wider local journalism. So far, it seems to show that there are still people who want to find out what is going on where they live, and some are prepared to pay for it.</p>
<p>If new players like The Mill continue to grow and thrive, demonstrating that vital online “news quality obligation”, they could help to rebuild trust in local news.</p>
<p>It’s good news for people like me who believe in local journalism, however it is delivered.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212640/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kate Heathman is affiliated with The Labour Party. </span></em></p>A Manchester-based local news company is turning heads and attracting a new readership.Kate Heathman, Senior Lecturer, Journalism, Liverpool John Moores UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2046462023-05-10T15:46:14Z2023-05-10T15:46:14ZHow the British press covered the establishment of Israel – I looked into the newspaper archives to find out<p>On the evening of May 14 1948, the People’s Council of the Jewish Community in Tel Aviv did not wait for the midnight expiry of Britain’s League of Nations <a href="https://ecf.org.il/issues/issue/232">mandate in Palestine</a>. The mandate had given Britain administration of the territories of Palestine and Transjordan after the end of the first world war.</p>
<p>Asserting its “natural and historic right” to a homeland and recognition by the United Nations, the council declared <a href="https://www.gov.il/en/departments/general/declaration-of-establishment-state-of-israel">the establishment of Israel</a>. </p>
<p>As you’d expect, the declaration of Israel’s statehood made huge headlines around the world. As a <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/reporting-the-second-world-war-9781350149489/#">researcher of newspaper history</a>, I’ve spent time in the archives of most of the UK’s mass circulation papers of the era. Unfortunately much of this material is behind paywalls, but I’ve been able to see how UK newspapers covered the event at the time.</p>
<h2>Eyewitness account</h2>
<p>Britain’s Daily Mirror proclaimed the “birth of the first Jewish state for nearly 2,000 years”. The Mirror ran a front-page story on May 15, headlined “Jews Set Up the State of Israel”, which noted the country’s promise of “full and equal” status for Jewish and Arab citizens, and its appeal to the UN for recognition and assistance.</p>
<p>The Manchester Guardian’s eyewitness account, which it ran on page five on May 15 under the headline “Natural and Historic Right”, explained why such support was needed. The proclamation of statehood had taken place “in a subdued atmosphere caused by Jewish military reverses”.</p>
<p>Beneath the banner headline “Israel is born: Arabs Attack”, the Daily Worker’s Derek Kartun reported that the Transjordanian “Arab legion was in action against Jewish settlements south of Jerusalem”. Kartun predicted: “After midnight tonight, armed forces of other Arab states will carry out their promise to join the fight.” Israel had taken its first step towards independence against a “highly dangerous military setting”.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525358/original/file-20230510-15-ucshcc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525358/original/file-20230510-15-ucshcc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525358/original/file-20230510-15-ucshcc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525358/original/file-20230510-15-ucshcc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525358/original/file-20230510-15-ucshcc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525358/original/file-20230510-15-ucshcc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525358/original/file-20230510-15-ucshcc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<h2><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/israel-1948-138054">Expert analysis</a> of the birth of the state of Israel and the plight of the Palestinian people.</em></h2>
<p>US president <a href="https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/us-israel">Harry Truman granted Israel</a> and its provisional government immediate recognition. The USSR granted recognition just three days later. Britain’s Labour government did not.</p>
<p>The Daily Telegraph reported that “Britain does not intend, for some time, to grant recognition to the Jewish State of Israel. Such recognition will depend on developments”. The Conservative broadsheet explained that these would include “definition of its boundaries and the establishment of a government clearly in control”. It believed the French government would “adopt a similar stance”.</p>
<p>The Times knew its sophisticated readers wanted to <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/archive/article/1948-05-18/4/6.html#start%3D1948-05-18%26end%3D1948-05-19%26terms%3Disrael%26back%3D/tto/archive/find/israel/w:1948-05-18%7E1948-05-19/1%26prev%3D/tto/archive/frame/goto/israel/w:1948-05-18%7E1948-05-19/1%26next%3D/tto/archive/frame/goto/israel/w:1948-05-18%7E1948-05-19/3">understand this crisis</a>, and reported it from both sides. On May 18 1948, its special correspondent who was accompanying the Arab Legion reported that “Arab irregulars this morning completed the occupation of Neve Jakob [Neve Yaakov], five miles north of Jerusalem”. The correspondent noted that Israeli forces held Mount Scopus, and that this “still makes movement towards Jerusalem difficult”.</p>
<p>The UK’s foreign secretary, Ernest Bevin, thought Britain’s duty was to balance US enthusiasm for Israel with diplomatic sympathy for the Arab case. Bevin’s position was supported by Foreign Office officials who believed friendship with the Arab world was essential to Britain’s economic and strategic interests.</p>
<p>Before the mandate expired, the UK government had hoped to leave in Palestine a majority Arab state in which the Jewish population would be a tolerated minority. <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/4326611">The Attlee government</a> believed that immediate recognition of Israel by the US was unfair and encouraged by American Jewish opinion.</p>
<h2>Reports from the US</h2>
<p>From Lake Success on Long Island, then headquarters of the UN, the Manchester Guardian’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/usa/page/0,14439,1181132,00.html">Alistair Cooke</a> described the dangerous complexities facing Israel. “The Security Council was called into emergency session last night,” he wrote, a few hours after the Egyptian delegation had dutifully reported that its forces had entered Palestine “to restore order against Zionist terrorism”.</p>
<p>Moments later, the Jewish Agency for Palestine appealed to the security council to call on the Arab states to “desist from aggression”. It was, Cooke reminded his readers, “the UN Security Council’s first experience with an open and admitted war”. He described Andrei Gromyko, the Russian representative to the UN, sitting in “unflurried silence”, while Dr T.F. Tsiang of <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13537120412331321441?journalCode=fisa20">China </a> asked how the US could “recognise a Jewish State and, at the same time, seriously ask the Arabs to stop fighting”.</p>
<p>The Labour government’s view was that post mandate, Palestine belonged legally to nobody. For the Foreign Office, a satisfactory solution would see Arab armies establish a state in which a minority Jewish population might live as equals <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.1080/13537120412331321441?needAccess=true&role=button">with a Muslim Arab</a> majority. Anxious to keep this option open, Labour argued that Israel’s frontiers were not defined and the Israeli government did not control all the territory it claimed to administer. For the Conservative opposition, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/4326611">Winston Churchill pointed out</a> that Britain recognised several European states whose frontiers were not fixed – Poland among them. </p>
<p>1948 ended with the government of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Ben-Gurion">David Ben-Gurion</a>, Israel’s first prime minister, firmly in control. Britain’s objections to recognition became hard to justify. In January 1949, the Daily Mail reported from Israel that “for the first time since the last British soldier left, the Union Jack was seen here today. It was on the car of the British Consul in Haifa, who drove through to tell the Foreign Minister, Mr Moshe Shertok, of Britain’s de facto recognition”.</p>
<p>The Times reported that recognition had been “formally accorded” when “the Israeli Representative in London called on Mr Bevin at the Foreign Office”. Criticism of Britain’s delayed recognition was unfair, it argued. As the important British dominions of India, Pakistan and Ceylon continued to withhold recognition, “the process of prior consultation must have been far from easy”, the Times added.</p>
<p>The press coverage I have studied reflects a British perspective, but this still offers a historic snapshot of global, and national, reactions as a new state was born.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204646/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tim Luckhurst has received funding from News UK and Ireland Ltd. He is a member of the Free Speech Union and the Society of Editors . </span></em></p>British media coverage of the creation of the state of Israel reflected the concerns of the government at the time.Tim Luckhurst, Principal of South College, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1971502023-05-02T15:00:01Z2023-05-02T15:00:01ZCrimestoppers: the charity providing an anonymous link between the public and the police for 35 years<p>Crimestoppers, the crime-fighting charity, has been an anonymous link between the UK public and the police for 35 years. From everyday concerns about drug dealing and dangerous driving to taking critical information on murders, Crimestoppers receives more than half a million reports each year. </p>
<p>But despite its ongoing success, there has been very little research into the inner workings of the charity. <a href="https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa63087">My own study</a> found the anonymity offered by Crimestoppers enables people to come forward with information about violent or organised crime. In fact, this can be more of a motivating factor than a reward.</p>
<p>Originating in the US in the mid-1970s and replicated across the globe, Crimestoppers programmes often offer cash rewards for tip offs. The UK charity <a href="https://crimestoppers-uk.org/about-the-charity/our-story">was originally established</a> as the Community Action Trust in 1988. </p>
<p>It was largely in response to the death of <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-34433752">PC Keith Blakelock</a> during the Broadwater Farm estate riots in London in 1985. At the time, police said that someone knew who was responsible for his murder, but were too afraid to come forward.</p>
<p>While in England Crimestoppers was set up to address community mistrust and loss of confidence in policing, it was advertised differently across the rest of the UK. In Northern Ireland, residents were told to phone “<a href="https://cain.ulster.ac.uk/issues/police/docs/CC_2006_Annual_Report_05-06.pdf">without fear and without involvement</a>”. And in Wales and Scotland, Crimestoppers has been framed as a friendly community service.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ta49SKAKeFE?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A Crimestoppers advert from 1989.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Embracing television reconstructions has been critical to the growth of Crimestoppers <a href="https://csiworld.org/about-us">across the world</a>. <a href="https://academic.oup.com/bjc/article/39/2/269/363351">Research suggests</a> that media appeals in general can assist with solving crime in a small number of the most serious cases. </p>
<p>Contributions from appeals for information are thought to have helped bring some notorious criminals to justice. Serial killer, Peter Moore, came to the police’s attention in 1995, following an <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-53934380">anonymous tip off</a>. </p>
<p>And a Crimestoppers reward was offered for a violent robbery carried out by <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-65374137">John Cooper</a> in 1996. In 2011, he was eventually convicted of murdering four people in Pembrokeshire, Wales, as well as many other serious offences. Evidence from a string of burglaries and robberies had led police to suspect he was responsible for more serious crimes.</p>
<p>However, the extent of Crimestoppers’ support in solving such crimes is largely unknown due to the organisation’s guaranteed promise of anonymity. <a href="https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/evaluating-impact-crimestoppers">A study by the Home Office</a> 20 years ago outlined the benefits of the UK scheme, showing 17% of actionable information resulted in an arrest. </p>
<p>Nowadays, some insight is detailed in Crimestoppers’ <a href="https://crimestoppers-uk.org/news-campaigns/our-publications/impact-report">annual reports</a> which include outcomes of awareness campaigns and “most wanted” appeals.</p>
<p>During the course of <a href="https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa63087">my research</a>, I discovered the charity has a strong relationship with the police, unlike the people who contact Crimestoppers. </p>
<p>Due to being unable to speak to anonymous callers themselves, I interviewed contact centre staff to gather their views and experiences. I also spoke with police officers who deal with Crimestoppers reports, as well as community-based officers who are often faced with people unwilling to report crime. </p>
<p>Participants suggested perceptions of fear and injustice impact on whether crimes are reported, especially in some close-knit communities. For example, a neighbourhood officer told me that sometimes generations of people are unlikely to go to the police, including members of his own family: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>My grandmother, she’s the font of knowledge in the village where she lives, she wouldn’t be going to the police as a first port of call.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>An <a href="https://www.policingreview.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/srpew_final_report.pdf">independent policing review</a> last year found that public confidence in the police has declined while the fear of crime continues to be a rising concern. </p>
<p>This is particularly true for those living in deprived areas and for people from minority ethnic backgrounds. <a href="https://crimestoppers-uk.org/getmedia/dfdff682-3152-478b-8beb-728d50f85048/Impact-Report-2022.pdf">Crimestoppers’ own survey</a> also suggests those groups are the most likely to contact them. </p>
<h2>The digital age</h2>
<p>One of the biggest changes over the past 35 years has been the move to online crime reporting. According to its own figures, Crimestoppers states <a href="https://crimestoppers-uk.org/getmedia/dfdff682-3152-478b-8beb-728d50f85048/Impact-Report-2022.pdf">75% of information</a> passed to the police now comes via its website.</p>
<p>There are often confidential police helplines for specific crimes (for example, domestic violence and hate crime), but Crimestoppers remains the primary anonymous crime reporting mechanism. <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1477370820916439">One study suggests</a> Crimestoppers supports crowdsourcing of so-called “collective intelligence” through social networks, and this acts as a driver to online reporting. </p>
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<img alt="The website of Crimestoppers and its phone number 0800555111." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523022/original/file-20230426-1743-28deg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C39%2C6560%2C4331&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523022/original/file-20230426-1743-28deg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523022/original/file-20230426-1743-28deg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523022/original/file-20230426-1743-28deg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523022/original/file-20230426-1743-28deg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523022/original/file-20230426-1743-28deg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523022/original/file-20230426-1743-28deg4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Crimestoppers was set up in the late 1980s and has since adapted to the digital age.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/london-uk-november-17th-2017-homepage-758975134">chrisdorney/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>In 2019, Crimestoppers was <a href="https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2019/10/crimestoppers-scoop-investigation/">criticised</a> for using cookies on its website, which allow for users to be tracked. But the charity maintained that it does not monitor individuals either online or offline. </p>
<h2>Rewards</h2>
<p>It also remains unclear whether Crimestoppers’ offer of cash rewards has stood the test of time. My research has <a href="https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/evaluating-impact-crimestoppers">mirrored previous studies</a> demonstrating that while police officers see a use in rewards, their availability is a motivating factor in only a minority of cases. </p>
<p>Perhaps the greatest value of rewards is in raising public interest within a busy media landscape. Crimestoppers recently offered its <a href="https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/crimestoppers-gives-update-200k-olivia-26623561">biggest reward of £200,000</a> in connection with the murder of Olivia Pratt-Korbel, the 9-year old girl who was shot in Liverpool in September 2022. </p>
<p>Ultimately though, it is the reassurance offered by Crimestoppers’ anonymity guarantee and fuss-free participation which supports people in making reports, and enables the police to receive information they may otherwise have not received.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/197150/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ella Rabaiotti is a former Probation Officer and worked for Crimestoppers Trust between 2016 and 2021.</span></em></p>Crimestoppers was originally founded in 1988 and now receives more than half a million reports each year.Ella Rabaiotti, Lecturer in Criminology, Swansea UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2020592023-04-11T11:24:37Z2023-04-11T11:24:37ZJournalists needs to be more critical of the way governments use ‘nudging’ to change our behaviour – here’s why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519567/original/file-20230405-1688-ujwzkl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/beer-glass-his-hand-illuminated-by-439134271">Oleg Shakirov/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Suppose you are in a pub with friends. You drink a few beers, have a good time, and head home. The following morning you realise your headache is milder than usual. You then discover that you were part of an experiment where the glasses at the pub were 25% smaller. </p>
<p>In their <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2008-03730-000">landmark 2008 book</a>, Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness, behavioural economist Richard Thaler and legal scholar Cass Sunstein defined a “nudge” as an intervention “that alters people’s behaviour in a predictable way without forbidding any options or significantly changing their economic incentives”. </p>
<p>Imposing higher alcohol taxes is not nudging, because it changes the costs to the drinker. Offering smaller glasses, by contrast, is. It does not forbid alcohol. And since prices are adjusted for glass size, people still only pay for what they consume. </p>
<p>But, as a 2018 <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/add.14228">study</a> led by psychologist Inge Kersbergen <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/sifting-the-evidence/2018/may/18/how-smaller-drinks-could-reduce-the-uks-alcohol-consumption">shows</a>, it does encourage less drinking: 30% less, to be precise, when the glasses are a quarter smaller. This, Kersbergen’s team estimated, could lead to 1,400 fewer deaths and 73,000 fewer hospital admissions annually in the UK alone – the very definition of a successful nudge.</p>
<p>More than <a href="https://www.oecd.org/gov/regulatory-policy/behavioural-insights.htm">200</a> institutions (including the <a href="https://www.un.org/en/content/behaviouralscience/">United Nations</a> and the <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/programs/embed">World Bank</a>) and governments (from <a href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/behavioural-insights-unit/">Australia</a> to <a href="https://b4development.org/about/">Qatar</a>) use nudging to get us to behave in ways that – according to them, at least – are more beneficial.</p>
<p>But the question of who stands to benefit is where nudging courts controversy. If you’d spent the evening drinking out of smaller glasses, you might feel psychologically manipulated – even if, physically, you felt good. </p>
<p>So, given the popularity nudging has gained as a public policy tool, gauging how the media – whose remit is to hold authority to account – evaluates it, then, is crucial. <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/puar.13584">My research shows</a> that if governments like to nudge us in all spheres of public life, journalists largely applaud them for doing so. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Someone reaches for a pack of cigarettes from a large shop display." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519569/original/file-20230405-24-7en400.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519569/original/file-20230405-24-7en400.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519569/original/file-20230405-24-7en400.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519569/original/file-20230405-24-7en400.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519569/original/file-20230405-24-7en400.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519569/original/file-20230405-24-7en400.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519569/original/file-20230405-24-7en400.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The warnings on cigarette packs are a good nudge.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/meppen-germany-february-27-cigarette-packages-256658419">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>How the media views nudges</h2>
<p>The US and the UK are frontrunners in using nudging in policy-making. To gauge how the British and American press evaluate this, from 2008 to 2020, I analysed 443 newspaper articles (opinion pieces, editorials, news articles, reports) from major broadsheets, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Sunday Times, The Guardian and the Financial Times. </p>
<p>Of the 1,186 quotes I identified, 65% scored as positive coverage and 35% as negative. Positive coverage cut across partisan lines. Left-leaning newspapers had more positive than negative quotes (a 1.6 ratio: for every eight positive quotes, there are five negative ones). For rightwing outlets, the distribution was even more skewed (a 2.2 ratio: 11 positive quotes for every five negative ones).</p>
<p>When Thaler was awarded the 2017 Nobel prize for his contributions to behavioural economics, coverage was largely positive. Journalists highlighted nudge initiatives inspired by Thaler’s insights, including <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/richard-thaler-nobel-prize-winner-and-the-man-behind-david-camerons-nudge-agenda-vxhws65mk">text messages</a> sent to university students’ families on how they might help them succeed in their studies and <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/richard-thaler-nobel-prize-in-economics-winner-2017-behavioural-economics-nudge-theory-a7990291.html">a 2012 British policy</a> that auto-enrolled workers in pensions-saving programmes.</p>
<p>I found that the media often highlighted nudge victories. Writing in the Observer in 2018, journalist Ben Quinn <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/nov/10/nudge-unit-pushed-way-private-sector-behavioural-insights-team">described</a> some physicians cutting unnecessary antibiotic prescriptions by 3.3%, after they received a letter showing that they prescribe more than their peers. This, to Quinn’s mind, showcased the value of “social norm nudges”.</p>
<p>I also found the media often argued that both citizens and politicians favour nudging. Writing in The New York Times in 2018, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/06/opinion/sunday/behavioral-economics.html">about behavioural economics as a growing trend</a>, marketing expert David Gal noted: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The popularity of such low-cost psychological interventions, or ‘nudges’, under the label of behavioral economics is in part a triumph of marketing. It reflects the widespread perception that behavioral economics combines the cleverness and fun of pop psychology with the rigor and relevance of economics.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure>
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</figure>
<h2>Political faultlines</h2>
<p>I found that when journalists did <a href="https://theconversation.com/nudges-four-reasons-to-doubt-popular-technique-to-shape-peoples-behaviour-174359">criticise nudging</a>, their political leanings became apparent. Early on, critics feared that governments would use nudges to their advantage. In his <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nudge-improving-decisions-about-wealth-and-happiness-by-richard-h-thaler-and-cass-r-sunstein-hbqq9kt3r3p">review</a> of Thaler and Sunstein’s 2008 book, the Sunday Times’s Bryan Appelyard argued that “we are going to be manipulated all the time”. </p>
<p>In a New York Times magazine report from 2010, meanwhile, US political journalist Benjamin Wallace-Wells <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/16/magazine/16Sunstein-t.html">highlighted</a> that conservatives tended to see something nefarious – “a Big Brother strain” – in behavioural economics. He referred to rightwing political commentator Glenn Beck <a href="https://www.glennbeck.com/content/articles/article/198/30255/">calling</a> Sunstein “the most dangerous guy out there” because Sunstein’s expertise was, to Beck’s mind, making some things, such as buying a gun, more difficult. </p>
<p>In the UK, the <a href="https://www.bi.team/">Behavioural Insights Team</a> (BIT) – nicknamed the <a href="https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/article/explainer/nudge-unit">“Nudge Unit”</a> – was set up in 2010 as part of the UK Cabinet Office, before becoming an independent advisory body in 2014. In October 2017, BIT issued guidance for parents that said that praising children might stunt their progress. It was roundly criticised, with the conservative Scottish Daily Mail <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4979438/Government-asks-parents-not-tell-kids-clever.html">running a piece</a>, under the subhead (in the print version) “Nanny state tells us how to praise kids”.</p>
<p>Progressives, by contrast, attacked nudges for being too laissez-faire and inadequate as a tool for tackling deep-rooted problems such as poverty. As economics reporter Eduardo Porter <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/24/business/economy/nudges-arent-enough-to-solve-societys-problems.html">put it</a> in a 2016 New York Times report:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It’s great to know that there are promising ways to improve society by developing a smarter email or changing the default choice on an application form. But if the question is whether policy makers can cheaply nudge Americans out of destitution onto a path to prosperity, the answer must be no.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Even as Thaler received the Nobel prize, The New York Times’s Aaron E Carroll <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/06/upshot/dont-nudge-me-the-limits-of-behavioral-economics-in-medicine.html">discussed</a> the limits of behavioural economics as made clear by healthcare. Researchers had used several techniques, including what they termed “social support nudges”, to get people to take their pills. All had failed. Carroll said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The problem is that health has so many moving parts. The health care system has even more. Trying to improve any one aspect can make others worse. Behavioural economics may offer us some fascinating theories to test in controlled trials, but we have a long way to go before we can assume it’s a cure for what ails Americans.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It should be noted that many of the media proponents of nudging are actually academic experts. Those critical of the practice, however, get less exposure. </p>
<p>Nudging can be effective. It will not, however, fix all societal ills. And sometimes it can backfire. If the press is to fulfil its crucial role in holding politicians to account, it should be critically assessing how our governments are using this subtle tool to influence our behaviour.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/202059/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The author acknowledges funding from the Dutch Research Council (NWO), Grant 016.VIDI.185.017. </span></em></p>Instead of simply applauding nudges, journalists should critically assess when and why governments use this tool.Lars Tummers, Professor of Public Administration and Organizational Science, Utrecht UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2016882023-03-17T15:54:30Z2023-03-17T15:54:30ZWales Broadcast Archive: UK’s first national archive shows importance of preserving our audiovisual history<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516021/original/file-20230317-2393-28331k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=44%2C0%2C5000%2C3308&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Hundreds of thousands of hours of broadcasting history are available for the first time. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">National Library of Wales</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>This month’s launch of the <a href="https://www.library.wales/national-broadcast-archive">Wales Broadcast Archive</a> marks a major step forward in the curation of our collective audiovisual heritage. Housed at the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth, the archive features a cornucopia of material dating back to the early days of broadcasting in Wales, including film, radio and video. That it is the first of its kind in the UK, however, raises important questions about access to our audiovisual history. </p>
<p>As Unesco <a href="https://www.unesco.org/en/days/audiovisual-heritage?TSPD_101_R0=080713870fab2000502fe465bc04f6b27c52c9a0193e80a672ab1f5e21b1a4c85415302e3aabbd9b0810cf430e143000feeb184c026bc21a1537bc94124a8c96ed03ccb6d0f06a7ece1443260cacbf0531925b304c6ee161f47d82620e01e8ca">remarked</a> on the World Day for Audiovisual Heritage last October:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Audiovisual archives tell us stories about people’s lives and cultures from all over the world. They represent a priceless heritage which is an affirmation of our collective memory and a valuable source of knowledge, since they reflect the cultural, social and linguistic diversity of our communities.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>More often than not, access to broadcast archives has been restricted to those working within the industry or academic researchers. Last year, though, the <a href="https://bbcrewind.co.uk/">BBC opened up</a> part of its digitised archive online, allowing the public to access some of its hidden gems.</p>
<p>However, the new Wales archive is unique in that it brings together the archives of its three major broadcasters - BBC, ITV and S4C. It contains material reflecting all aspects of life in both the English and Welsh languages. It is a unique source of information which will give historians and others an insight into the history of the nation.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1636005548112871427"}"></div></p>
<p>As well as preserving our broadcast heritage in its original and digitised form in Aberystwyth, people around Wales will be able to access around 500,000 hours of archive footage in dedicated “clip centres” housed across the nation. For the first time, members of the public will be able to see historical footage of their local areas and hear voices from years gone by.</p>
<p>Although the Wales Broadcast Archive is unique within the UK, there are similar institutions further afield. One such organisation is the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision, <a href="https://www.beeldengeluid.nl/en">Beeld en Geluid</a>, which opened in 1997. It provided a useful model for the establishment of the Welsh archive. As a heritage institute, it preserves the audiovisual material of the Netherlands, with material from the country’s various broadcasters under one roof.</p>
<h2>Technology and storage challenges</h2>
<p>Of course, archives are not without their problems or their gaps. Very early television programmes, for example, are now lost forever. The technology simply didn’t exist to record in the pre-war and immediate post-war period. Nothing survives from the BBC’s pre-war television service at <a href="https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/100-voices/birth-of-tv/ally-pally/">Alexandra Palace</a> – apart, that is, from some fascinating film shot on a home movie camera by one of the corporation’s engineers, Desmond Campbell, which is held by the <a href="http://bufvc.ac.uk/archives/index.php/collection/857">Alexandra Palace Television Society</a>.</p>
<p>As Dick Fiddy, a consultant at the British Film Institute, <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/_/m6AMngEACAAJ?hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi3q4GL5t79AhWFRkEAHY32DVMQre8FegQIDRAD">noted</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The early technical difficulties associated with the recording of live television programmes, and the later injudicious wiping and junking policies of the major British broadcasters, has meant that hundreds of thousands of hours of precious television material is missing from the official UK television archives.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Over the years, many broadcasters have had to dispense with their audiovisual material simply for storage reasons. Film and videotape can take up a lot of floor space, let alone audio recordings. When one considers the huge amount of broadcasting hours that are chewed up every week, it is easy to see how physical material can mount up over time.</p>
<p>So, broadcasters have had to adopt selection policies, making decisions on what material or programmes might be historically important in the future. As you can imagine, this has not been an easy task. Often, entertainment programmes such as quiz shows, variety or local chat shows were deemed to have no intrinsic value and were overlooked for archival purposes. </p>
<p>Archivists are also faced with an ongoing dilemma. They need to be preserving material for future generations while also ensuring that the producers of current programmes have the necessary audiovisual archives at their disposal. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A man in a wheelchair and a man standing wear sets of headphones. Both are in a large room and are looking at a screen." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516023/original/file-20230317-1658-1a8ot7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/516023/original/file-20230317-1658-1a8ot7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516023/original/file-20230317-1658-1a8ot7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516023/original/file-20230317-1658-1a8ot7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516023/original/file-20230317-1658-1a8ot7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516023/original/file-20230317-1658-1a8ot7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/516023/original/file-20230317-1658-1a8ot7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The public can also access the new archive in dedicated ‘clip centres’ throughout Wales.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">National Library of Wales</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The question now is whether the other UK nations should follow suit. While a similar model could be adopted in Scotland, in England the issue of whether the archives should house an English or British archive would need to be overcome.</p>
<p>Our collective audiovisual heritage provides a key to understanding ourselves as a society. It provides an additional access route into our past which complements that provided by the written record. </p>
<p>After all, archives are witnesses to history. They allow us to see how we lived, how we dressed, how we talked, how we were entertained, and how and when we watched or listened together. They also allow us to reflect and to learn. The Wales Broadcast Archive will do this and I, for one, am celebrating its arrival.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201688/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jamie Medhurst has received funding from the AHRC, The Leverhulme Trust, and the British Academy in the past</span></em></p>The Wales Broadcast Archive in Aberystwyth brings together the archives of the BBC, ITV and S4C under one roof.Jamie Medhurst, Professor of Media and Communication, Aberystwyth UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1987142023-02-14T17:39:49Z2023-02-14T17:39:49ZLocal journalism is under threat at a time when communities need more inclusive reporting<p>The future of local newspapers is under threat, according to parliament’s <a href="https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/378/digital-culture-media-and-sport-committee/news/175585/more-support-needed-to-halt-damaging-decline-of-local-journalism-dcms-committee-warns/">digital, culture, media & sport committee (DCMS) report</a> released in early 2023. </p>
<p>This report into the sustainability of local journalism comes at a time when <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/news/trust-in-news-uk/">public trust</a> in the national media is falling, while <a href="https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/52789">online disinformation, polarisation and hatred</a> towards minorities continues to rise.</p>
<p>But my research shows <a href="https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/studentTheses/how-a-society-tells-a-story-about-itself">local journalism</a> is capable of providing an important antidote to this. And therefore it should be recognised as an essential element for nurturing our diverse, civic communities. </p>
<p><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1748048516656305?journalCode=gazb">Research shows</a> how the media can portray Muslims in disproportionately negative ways. They are often represented as the <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/discourse-analysis-and-media-attitudes/8305B860E5CCFFE9918986B21FCAD15D">problematic outsider of British society</a>, often portrayed using stereotypes or as “a menace to the west”.</p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/documents/college-artslaw/ptr/90172-univ73-islamophobia-in-the-uk-report-final.pdf">recent survey</a> on Islamophobia in Britain found Muslims were perceived as the second “least liked” group in the UK, according to polling. <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/hate-crime-england-and-wales-2021-to-2022/hate-crime-england-and-wales-2021-to-2022">Home Office figures</a> released in October 2022 show how Muslims are much more likely to be the victims of religious hate crimes than any other religious group.</p>
<h2>Local journalists and community spirit</h2>
<p><a href="https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/studentTheses/how-a-society-tells-a-story-about-itself">My research</a> has shown that the local media, in particular, has the potential to provide more inclusive ways of reporting on stories involving Muslims.</p>
<p>I conducted interviews with local journalists working for newspapers in areas with relatively large Muslim populations including London and Blackburn. The results showed there were conscious efforts to ensure their reporting did not cause harm to the Muslims within the communities they served. I found that local journalists saw Muslims as an integral part of their local community rather than outsiders.</p>
<p>Muslim celebrations and festivals were covered by local journalists. Stories about terrorist incidents were featured as well as concerns of Islamophobic attacks on local Muslims. And contributions of Muslims to civic life were reported in the same way as anyone else, as were crimes or wrongdoings.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I attempt to go the extra mile in my reporting to get a more truthful picture of where the community is and the real lives of the people within it,” one local journalist told me. “For me, it’s about pushing back against the atomised bullshit that we do see coming back at us online. The reason it’s important to tell stories truthfully and accurately is to push back against this dehumanising narrative that is out there.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Of course, it would be an oversimplification if we took the experiences learned from these particular journalists and applied them to local media as a whole. But <a href="https://iupress.org/9780253221261/the-anthropology-of-news-and-journalism/">other studies</a> of local journalism have also highlighted their often distinctive newsroom cultures. Journalists and their readers are seen to be part of a <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Local-Journalism-and-Local-Media-Making-the-Local-News/Franklin/p/book/9780415379540">single community</a> with common values and goals. This closeness to the communities they serve can often translate to a more considered approach to reporting, as well as a greater reluctance to sensationalise or demonise. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781003178217-3/trust-ethics-local-journalism-julie-firmstone-john-steel-martin-conboy-charlotte-elliott-harvey-carl-fox-jane-mulderrig-joe-saunders-paul-wragg">Research</a> also points to the commitment of local journalists to create a sense of community and to defend it. </p>
<h2>Threats ahead</h2>
<p>However, as the <a href="https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/378/digital-culture-media-and-sport-committee/news/175585/more-support-needed-to-halt-damaging-decline-of-local-journalism-dcms-committee-warns/">DCMS committee report</a> highlights, the landscape of local journalism is changing and not in a good way. Between 2009 and 2019, more than 300 regional newspaper titles were shut down. During the week of February 6 2023, <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-64581579">it was announced</a> that three hundred employees at publisher DC Thomson will be made redundant. The company publishes newspapers including Aberdeen’s Press & Journal and The Courier in Dundee.</p>
<p>There are serious concerns in the same report that without considerable government intervention, the decline in local journalism will have a harmful impact on civic life. Communities in the most deprived areas of the UK are most likely to be affected. </p>
<p>The DCMS report shows local publishers are struggling to keep up with larger media organisations in the move towards online news services. This is leading to losses in revenues and resources. To combat this, the DCMS committee has called on the government to help local news organisations gain charitable status while providing funding to support innovation, startups and new technology. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A selection of different newspaper brands are stacked in a display." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/509138/original/file-20230209-20-dn1h0z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/509138/original/file-20230209-20-dn1h0z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509138/original/file-20230209-20-dn1h0z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509138/original/file-20230209-20-dn1h0z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509138/original/file-20230209-20-dn1h0z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509138/original/file-20230209-20-dn1h0z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509138/original/file-20230209-20-dn1h0z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=518&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/dolgellau-gwynedd-wales-uk-august-8-1474678949">Wozzie/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The upcoming <a href="https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/365/business-energy-and-industrial-strategy-committee/news/173840/report-consumers-at-risk-if-digital-markets-unit-not-given-teeth-say-mps/">digital markets, competition and consumer bill</a> in Westminster will be closely watched by media experts to see how it affects smaller publishers. </p>
<p>Concerns for local journalism are not just about its survival in an increasingly digital news market, however. It is more a case of recognising that nurturing a community spirit is one solution to countering wider hatred, disinformation and polarisation. </p>
<p>Research by campaigning group <a href="https://www.mediareform.org.uk/media-ownership/who-owns-the-uk-media">the Media Reform Coalition</a> shows how nearly 84% of local newspapers are now owned by just six companies. And while consolidation has been a lifeline for some newspapers, for others it risks extinguishing the close community connection that appears to be vital for the inclusive and balanced civic journalism we need.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198714/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nadia Haq receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)</span></em></p>Local journalism should be recognised as an essential element for nurturing the UK’s diverse, civic communities.Nadia Haq, ESRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1978282023-02-13T16:37:25Z2023-02-13T16:37:25Z100 years of the BBC in Wales: an uneasy start and unclear future<p>Three months after the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/timelines/">BBC’s first transmission from London</a>, public service broadcasting in Wales began at 5.00pm on February 13 1923. The small studio above a cinema in the centre of Cardiff also served audiences in the west of England. This may explain the very limited amount of Welsh language material broadcast at the outset.</p>
<p>To ensure the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/British-Broadcasting-Corporation">British Broadcasting Company</a>, as it was then known, was in no doubt about the existence of the native language and culture of Wales, <a href="https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/search/archives/755550d6-e5e4-3448-a161-d220d4a48103">Cylch Dewi</a> (a group of cultural nationalists) <a href="https://academic.oup.com/manchester-scholarship-online/book/24026/chapter-abstract/185414557?redirectedFrom=fulltext">arranged</a> the first wireless broadcast of a Welsh-language religious service from Swansea on February 22 1925. By the mid-1920s, they were producing programmes of their own for the BBC, following consultations with E.R. Appleton, Cardiff’s station director. </p>
<p>Concerns about the effect of the wireless on life in Wales, however, were widespread in the early years of broadcasting. In 1927, a report commissioned by the Welsh Board of Education, entitled <a href="http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/wales1927/index.html#03%E2%80%8B">Welsh in Education and Life</a>, was published. It contained a damning attack on the BBC:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Wireless is achieving the complete Anglicisation of the intellectual life of the nation. We regard the present policy of the British Broadcasting Corporation as one of the most serious menaces to the life of the Welsh language.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The BBC’s regional scheme had been devised by Peter Eckersley, the BBC’s chief engineer and Sir John Reith, the corporation’s director general. It included Wales as part of the so-called “west region”. This uneasy marriage with Bristol and the west of England from 1930 onward resulted in increased pressure from many parts of Welsh society (most notably the University of Wales and local authorities) for the BBC to recognise Wales as a nation with its own cultural and linguistic needs. </p>
<p>In 1932, one correspondent writing in the Plaid Cymru newsletter, Y Ddraig Goch, <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=mb2rDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT37&lpg=PT37&dq=%22The+majority+of+the+material+broadcast+is+alien+to+our+traditions,+damaging+to+our+culture,+and+is+a+grave+danger+to+everything+special+in+our+civilisation%22&source=bl&ots=t6XNYhV1im&sig=ACfU3U1Ew_mrw0xyThoW3AbtD9uKBU3SAA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiJnYHkx5L9AhX6QUEAHSueDlkQ6AF6BAgJEAM#v=onepage&q=%22The%20majority%20of%20the%20material%20broadcast%20is%20alien%20to%20our%20traditions%2C%20damaging%20to%20our%20culture%2C%20and%20is%20a%20grave%20danger%20to%20everything%20special%20in%20our%20civilisation%22&f=false">stated</a>: “The majority of the material broadcast is alien to our traditions, damaging to our culture, and is a grave danger to everything special in our civilisation.”</p>
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<p>With the opening of the Penmon transmitter on Anglesey in the north of Wales in February 1937, the corporation fully acknowledged Wales as a separate “region”. The <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Broadcasting_and_the_BBC_in_Wales/R7kVAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0&bsq=broadcasting%20and%20the%20bbc%20in%20wales">historian John Davies argued</a> the establishment of the “Welsh region” was an important concession to nationalist sentiment. He compared it with the <a href="https://law.gov.wales/ecclesiastical-law-and-church-wales">disestablishment of the Church in Wales</a> from the Church of England in 1920. These events enhanced a sense of nationhood and a belonging to an entity called “Wales”.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="A graphic featuring the text " src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/509749/original/file-20230213-3390-uhtmw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/509749/original/file-20230213-3390-uhtmw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509749/original/file-20230213-3390-uhtmw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509749/original/file-20230213-3390-uhtmw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509749/original/file-20230213-3390-uhtmw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509749/original/file-20230213-3390-uhtmw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/509749/original/file-20230213-3390-uhtmw5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Amgueddfa Cymru/National Museum Wales</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>John Davies <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Broadcasting_and_the_BBC_in_Wales/R7kVAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0&bsq=broadcasting%20and%20the%20bbc%20in%20wales">also argued</a> the establishment of the Welsh region had wider repercussions: “In the history of BBC broadcasting in Wales, the importance of the victory won in sound radio can scarcely be exaggerated. All the subsequent recognition of Wales in the field of broadcasting (and, it could be argued, in other fields also) stemmed from that victory.” </p>
<p>From this point onward, the BBC played a major part in Welsh life. It informed, educated and entertained in Welsh and English, initially on radio and then, from 1952, on television. </p>
<p>The creation of BBC Cymru Wales came in February 1964 as a result of the <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/37146240_%27You_Say_A_Minority_Sir_We_Say_A_Nation%27_The_Pilkington_Committee_on_Broadcasting_1960-2_and_Wales">report of the Pilkington committee</a> on broadcasting. This was a government-appointed committee that considered the future of broadcasting in the UK. It laid the foundation for a regular television service in Wales. Ultimately, it led to the creation of national radio stations Radio Wales and Radio Cymru in the late 1970s, which continue to broadcast to this day. </p>
<h2>Future</h2>
<p>In December 2022, the <a href="https://museum.wales/cardiff/whatson/11771/BBC-100-in-Wales/">BBC 100 in Wales exhibition</a> opened at the National Museum Cardiff and will run until April. The exhibition to celebrate the corporation’s 100th anniversary was developed in conjunction with a group of young people to examine how the future may look for the corporation. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">BBC 100 in Wales opened at the National Museum Cardiff in December 2022.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/bbc-at-100-the-future-for-global-news-and-challenges-facing-the-world-service-192296">global</a> broadcasting landscape is ever-changing and the BBC is having to adapt to this. Challenges come from streaming services, other broadcasters and, not least, from a government that has called the very nature of <a href="https://theconversation.com/bbc-licence-fee-could-scrapping-it-be-the-end-of-public-service-broadcasting-in-the-uk-175292">public service broadcasting and the licence fee</a> into question. </p>
<p>In December 2021, the Welsh Labour government and Plaid Cymru announced a new <a href="https://www.gov.wales/co-operation-agreement-full-policy-programme-html">co-operation agreement</a>, which outlined several policy commitments over the next three years. Among them was the creation of a new shadow broadcasting and communications authority, which would draw up plans for the devolution of broadcasting and communications powers to the Senedd. A <a href="https://www.gov.wales/expert-panel-devolution-broadcasting-announced">panel</a> has been established to consider the way forward in this area. </p>
<p>How this might work in reality is, as yet, undetermined. Which aspects of broadcasting would be devolved remains unclear, as are the possible implications for the BBC and other broadcasters. There is also uncertainty over whether the Welsh government would even be able to persuade the UK government’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport to devolve such powers.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1625072297156677634"}"></div></p>
<p>There are many factors which have played a part in creating, defining and maintaining a feeling of “Welshness” in Wales, as well as a sense of belonging. There is no doubt about the part the BBC has played. </p>
<p>Penblwydd hapus, BBC Cymru.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/197828/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jamie Medhurst receives funding from Arts and Humanities Research Council; The Leverhulme Trust</span></em></p>The BBC is celebrating 100 years of broadcasting in Wales.Jamie Medhurst, Professor of Media and Communication, Aberystwyth UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1982632023-02-07T12:00:03Z2023-02-07T12:00:03ZData bombing and dead cats – how PR uses practices of secrecy to influence media and society<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507849/original/file-20230202-7117-g7bczh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=49%2C41%2C5278%2C3513&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/interviewing-business-man-on-press-conference-461773729">Microgen/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>More than 100 years ago, sociologist Georg Simmel wrote that secrecy is a core part of all human relationships. The ratio of secrecy to openness in a society, he argued, can tell us much about that society. I explore this in <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Secrecy-in-Public-Relations-Mediation-and-News-Cultures-The-Shadow-World/Cronin/p/book/9781032434100">my new book</a>, examining how public relations secrecy techniques interact (and clash) with the transparency and openness of media.</p>
<p>The public relations (PR) industry is made up of professionals in public affairs, lobbying and events management, among others. Their role is to manage a client’s relationship (and reputation) with the general public, investors and regulators. Media relations is the sub-field of PR that attempts to secure positive coverage and suppress negative issues in the media. This includes newspapers and television news, but also social media.</p>
<p>In recent decades, PR in the UK has had a detrimental impact on the public’s access to objective information, skewing media reporting and attempting to conceal important issues. This is compounded by the <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/779882/021919_DCMS_Cairncross_Review_.pdf">financial pressures</a> facing journalism, which are hampering investigative reporting.</p>
<p>It’s generally understood that what appears in the media has been selected and shaped by various interests, reflecting corporate goals or governmental priorities. But just as important is what we don’t see in the headlines – and how those issues are obscured. </p>
<p>In my research, I look at both sides of these secrecy operations. I interviewed PR professionals who work to influence media content and conceal certain issues. I also spoke with journalists, news editors and transparency campaigners. These groups are interested in investigating and revealing the very issues that PR hopes to obscure.</p>
<p>The PR industry is particularly adept at orchestrating this range of “shadowy practices” of secrecy, but these practices are not well-understood by the public. Everyday PR practice tends to be mundane, focusing on securing positive coverage for clients and downplaying or obscuring negative coverage. But there are a number of subtle techniques that PR practitioners use to manipulate information.</p>
<h2>Data bombing or snowing</h2>
<p>One striking technique is the practice of hiding significant information in a vast release of unimportant material. Journalists using Freedom of Information requests told me how organisations would use this technique to appear to align with principles of transparency, but in reality were hiding potentially damaging information in plain sight. </p>
<p>For example, the requested information may be released in thousands of pages of documents that journalists do not have adequate time to analyse. Important information may be couched in highly technical language that obscures key elements, or may released in a format that is not easy to electronically search (such as scanned documents).</p>
<h2>Dead catting and distraction</h2>
<p>PR can use distraction techniques, misdirecting public attention by releasing alternative, eye-catching stories to the media. One recent example was Boris Johnson’s claim that he relaxed by making model buses out of old crates. This drew much <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-48766451">amused media coverage</a> but also affected Johnson’s reputation online. </p>
<p>Search engine optimisation (SEO) is a media management technique of strategically using keywords to push certain stories to the top of search engine results. Whether it was intentional or not, the bus story had the <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/boris-johnson-google-search-results-bad-news/">opposite effect</a>, hiding a different, damaging story. Searches for “Johnson” and “bus” would previously have led users to read about the discredited claims that the NHS would receive £350 million a day if the UK left the EU, which appeared <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48445430">on the sides of the Brexit buses</a>. Now, they would direct to reports about Johnson’s crafting hobby.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A young woman sits at a desk in a newsroom, taking notes and looking intently at a computer." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507851/original/file-20230202-7157-hi8om7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507851/original/file-20230202-7157-hi8om7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507851/original/file-20230202-7157-hi8om7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507851/original/file-20230202-7157-hi8om7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507851/original/file-20230202-7157-hi8om7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507851/original/file-20230202-7157-hi8om7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507851/original/file-20230202-7157-hi8om7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Freedom of information requests are not a guarantee that investigative journalists will be given easy-to-understand information.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/experienced-female-administrative-manager-trendy-eyewear-670210717">GaudiLab/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When an announcement is particularly shocking or sensational, it can be known as a “dead cat” strategy. For example, as Johnson was being investigated over the Partygate scandal, he accused Labour leader Keir Starmer of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/feb/02/why-is-boris-johnson-making-false-claims-about-starmer-and-savile">failing to prosecute sex offender Jimmy Savile</a> when Starmer was head of the Crown Prosecution Service. These rumours were false, but (briefly) drew attention away from Partygate.</p>
<h2>Astroturfing</h2>
<p>PR can also create fake public opinion in order to exert influence. A media editor of a national paper explained to me in my research: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Say a billionaire wanted to stop houses being developed next to his country retreat … He’d set up [a] “Friends of the Chiltern Hills” pressure group and basically pay some PR [firm] to run it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In early 2021, gambling company Ladbrokes’ owner was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/feb/16/betting-firm-accused-of-astroturfing-customer-lobby-group-entain-players-panel">accused of this tactic</a> after launching the Players’ Panel, an online group where customers wrote pro-betting articles. This group appeared to be a grassroots effort, but was being operated with the help of a political consultancy. Such a technique conceals both the vested interests involved and the power that they can deploy. This example shows the impact of PR, but also how journalism can push back and reveal these practices.</p>
<h2>Secrecy and society</h2>
<p>Put together, these PR secrecy efforts can impact how the public understands power dynamics and social change. By offering disconnected units of information in press releases or on client websites, PR can impede joined-up thinking – a collective understanding, putting together many bits of information into one full picture – about society.</p>
<p>The dynamic between secrecy and transparency is also shifting on a wider level. Secrecy practices are becoming more widespread and legally sanctioned. For example, the corporate sphere’s use of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/feb/10/former-channel-4-news-employee-traumatised-after-signing-nda">non-disclosure agreements</a> which PR practitioners themselves are often required to sign. </p>
<p>The government is also pushing for more legal powers that enhance government secrecy and restrict transparency. The <a href="https://bills.parliament.uk/bills/3154">national security bill</a> working its way through parliament may criminalise certain aspects of investigative reporting and <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/73e39ffd-b146-4fea-9500-358dcae5dd52">reform the Official Secrets Act</a>. This could further impede public access to information through the media.</p>
<p>But understanding these practices can help average media consumers and members of the public think more critically about the power dynamics and interests that may be obscured by the headlines.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198263/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anne M. Cronin received funding for this project from the Leverhulme Trust in the form of a Research Fellowship.</span></em></p>What’s kept out of the news is just as, if not more, important than what is included.Anne M. Cronin, Professor of Cultural Sociology, Lancaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1906332022-10-03T09:58:57Z2022-10-03T09:58:57ZIs Scotland’s media ready for the next independence referendum?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/487058/original/file-20220928-26-k3142k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C7%2C4985%2C3315&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.alamy.com/PDDMR4">Sergio Azenha / Alamy</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Amid some of the most challenging political and economic circumstances for decades, another even greater disruption to people in one part of the UK could be upon us soon. Liz Truss may have dismissed Scotland’s democratically elected leader as an “attention seeker”, but Nicola Sturgeon continues to claim she is entirely serious about putting a refreshed case for independence to her country next October.</p>
<p>Whether the people are ready is one question. But my colleagues and I, in our new <a href="http://eprints.gla.ac.uk/276125/">report</a> drawing on consultations with the media industries, government and regulatory bodies, are asking another: is Scotland’s media ready?</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-61798553">referendum of 2014</a> nurtured a flowering of what is sometimes called “<a href="https://bellacaledonia.org.uk/2021/02/25/bella-caledonia-poor-things-and-the-fifth-estate/">the fifth estate</a>”: a collection of independence-oriented blogs which offered a diversity of perspectives on what constitutional change might bring, capturing the energy of the <a href="https://www.yes.scot/news/">Yes campaign</a> as it played out on the ground.</p>
<p>This developed in part as a response to what was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/sep/19/scottish-referendum-campaign-media">widely seen</a> as the failure of the traditional media to adapt to the disruption in power and authority that independence represented. Only one national paper, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/may/04/sunday-herald-declares-yes-for-scottish-independence">Sunday Herald</a> (now closed down), aligned itself with the growing campaign for independence. The lack of diversity across the media landscape was starkly exposed.</p>
<p>Some of this reflects historic problems with the Scottish media. The establishment of the <a href="https://www.gov.uk/guidance/devolution-settlement-scotland">devolved parliament</a> in 1999 represented one of the most significant constitutional changes in more than a hundred years, offering a brand new mechanism for democratic politics. But what the referendum of 2014 illuminated was how little had changed in what should be a key part of any democracy: its communication system.</p>
<p>What’s more, it showed Scotland’s continued struggle with its “<a href="https://www.centreonconstitutionalchange.ac.uk/news-and-opinion/scotlands-media-politics-and-digital-revolution">dual public sphere</a>”, an uncomfortable hybrid of UK-rooted media institutions and both established and emerging Scottish news titles with very different perspectives and priorities.</p>
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<p>One of the key institutions of British life, the BBC, is ideologically rooted to a form of unionism and day to day it orbits around business in Westminster. A key irritant to many Scots viewers is the broadcaster’s tendency to use the word “we” when referring to purely English issues such as sporting success or exam results, for example.</p>
<p>The BBC has, of course, its own broadcasting arm in Scotland, and in 2019 launched its <a href="https://theconversation.com/bbc-scotlands-new-channel-a-fresh-start-that-reflects-a-devolved-uk-112790">own TV channel</a> to <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2019/bbc-scotland-launch-audience-figures">record viewers</a> for a digital channel. BBC Scotland is now struggling to sustain audiences, although it is producing a distinctively Scottish output and some high-quality local journalism. Overall, the BBC has been <a href="https://www.gold.ac.uk/news/losing-its-aura/">weakened by successive UK governments</a> and even the survival of the new channel cannot be assumed.</p>
<h2>Media scrutiny of public figures</h2>
<p>A <a href="https://theconversation.com/people-trust-tv-journalists-and-want-them-to-scrutinise-government-coronavirus-policy-new-research-137620">common criticism</a> of the British media in recent times is that it doesn’t provide enough scrutiny of political leaders. Equally, politicians are seen as increasingly hostile and censorious towards the media, and this extends to Scotland too.</p>
<p>It was noted in our consultation that the Scottish government has acquired a <a href="https://www.holyrood.com/news/view,secret-scotland-scrutiny-accountability-and-the-media">reputation</a> for intense media management and a distrust of journalists. A <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/figures-reveal-scottish-government-more-likely-to-reject-journalists-foi-requests/">resistance</a> to <a href="https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-freedom-of-information/what-is-the-foi-act/#5">freedom of information</a> (FOI) requests has created obstacles to investigative journalism which aims to expose abuses of power and corruption. </p>
<p>Some felt an insider class in Scotland’s media has emerged: a group of politicians, commentators, corporate actors and public bodies which is returned to again and again for comment, but which operates to limit dissent.</p>
<p>This reflects the broader problem of a lack of diversity of views which extends beyond political commentary to prioritising the agendas of Scotland’s two biggest cities and under-representing minority groups.</p>
<h2>Other voices, other interests</h2>
<p>Directly countering this is a flourishing independent media sector – headed up by titles such as investigative journalism outlet <a href="https://theferret.scot/">The Ferret</a> and pro-independence blog <a href="https://bellacaledonia.org.uk/">Bella Caledonia</a> – which showcases alternative models for community-embedded journalism using social media as a new democratic space. </p>
<p>But funding of quality journalism remains a problem. Scotland’s media now operate in a largely digital culture and face the <a href="https://ijnet.org/en/story/nine-challenges-facing-future-journalism">same issues</a> as the industry globally. The transition from print to digital and the challenge of sustainable funding models has inevitably led to job cuts and an increase in low-paid, precarious work. The extent of the losses to quality journalism in Scotland is not fully known. </p>
<p>A Scottish government <a href="https://www.gov.scot/groups/public-interest-journalism-working-group/">working group</a> was set up in 2021 to respond to these challenges. But no significant funding was provided, unlike in other territories such as Quebec and Denmark where state funding, on the promise of independence, has helped to sustain domestic media industries.</p>
<p>Media operating across a series of digital platforms face battles over ownership of ideas, as content is republished without clear branding on streaming channels such as YouTube. </p>
<p>There is also the issue of the influence of external agents. Tech companies with AI and human moderators, as well as organised and disorganised forms of propaganda and foreign and domestic bots, all shape the debate online. Which means the next referendum will not simply be a conversation between Scottish politicians, the Scottish media and the Scottish public, but also with the many other parties and interests at play. </p>
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<p>The battle to keep things civil will perhaps be the greatest obstacle of all. A key priority of media employers must be putting mechanisms in place such as awareness-raising, training and support to protect journalists who are exposed to a debate that could turn toxic. The <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-62576062">recent verbal attack</a> on BBC Scotland reporter James Cook by protesters demonstrated the kind of abuse to which journalists are being exposed.</p>
<p>Historically, Scotland has always had a big appetite for news. Media contributes hugely to the economy and is essential to our national identity and supporting an informed electorate.</p>
<p>There is no shortage of talent and energy. This new report is a way to open up a dialogue about ways in which media might be supported to produce quality Scottish journalism, and to facilitate referendum debate which does not have to rely on misinformation, half-truths and personality-led rhetoric.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/190633/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Catherine Happer receives funding from the UKRI research councils, Glasgow City Council and the Avatar Alliance Foundation, but this work was funded by the University of Glasgow </span></em></p>Scotland needs to facilitate referendum debate which doesn’t rely on misinformation, half-truths and personality-led rhetoric fed by a toxic social media environment.Catherine Happer, Senior Lecturer in Sociology, Director, Glasgow University Media Group, University of GlasgowLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1857072022-06-23T14:49:18Z2022-06-23T14:49:18ZRail strikes: words used to describe unions misrepresent the truth about how they work<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/470544/original/file-20220623-51670-se1dqn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=15%2C22%2C5097%2C2851&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The UK could be facing a summer of strikes, but inaccurate language affects public understanding of how unions work.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/multicultural-diverse-office-managers-business-people-1707947452">Gorodenkoff/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Public discussion of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global/video/2022/jun/22/marxist-the-hood-rmt-mick-lynch-asked-bizarre-questions-rail-strikes-video">pickets, politics and even profile pictures</a>, have been a daily occurrence this week for Mick Lynch, the general secretary of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT). As England, Scotland and Wales face severe transport disruption due to industrial action by the RMT, Lynch has appeared on multiple news programmes and has been quoted across the papers. As general secretary – or “union boss” – part of his job is to represent members by explaining that the strikes relate to a dispute over pay, conditions and proposed redundancies on the railway network. </p>
<p>Many of these media mentions discuss the “<a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rail-strike-to-last-a-very-very-long-time-says-union-baron-mick-lynch-kw3rx5vmn">union barons</a>” that are “<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10930117/Hard-left-RMT-rail-union-boss-Mick-Lynch-asks-Keir-Starmer-ahead-strike.html">behind the strike</a>” action, however. Such language not only denies railway workers their agency, it is an inaccurate characterisation of how strikes work in practice. It shows a lack of knowledge about trade unions within the media, perhaps due to the marked decline in <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/collegeofjournalism/entries/747059e4-22e4-3488-ab92-377a6f7639a6">industrial and labour correspondents</a> since the 1970s.</p>
<p>Let’s start with the words commonly used to describe trade union general secretaries. A baron is a recognised grade of the <a href="https://www.parliament.uk/site-information/glossary/baron/">British peerage system</a> and has historical connotations of nobility. Describing trade union general secretaries as barons could insinuate that they belong to a separate strata of society with a different social and economic status than their members or the general public. </p>
<p>This is true in a sense. The salaries of union officers often <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/629448/Appendix_5_Cert_Off_Ann_Rep_2016-2017.pdf">dwarf</a> those of the workers they represent. There are some notable exceptions – the assistant general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services trade union, for example, announced on his election that he would <a href="https://pcsindependentleft.com/2019/07/01/a-workers-wage/">donate nearly £25,000</a> of his £70,000 annual salary back into the union’s strike fund. </p>
<p>It is important to note the democratic accountability behind these salaries, however. Members attending their union’s annual general meeting vote on the financial report, which includes staff salary packages. RMT members voted to cut the salary of their officers, including the general secretary, at the union’s 2021 AGM – a motion <a href="https://www.workersliberty.org/story/2021-11-02/steps-forward-rmt-agm#:%7E:text=the%202021%20AGM%20overwhelmingly%20endorsed%20a%20proposal%20to%20reduce%20the%20general%20secretary%20and%20assistant%20general%20secretary%20salaries%20by%2020%25%20and%2010%25%20respectively.%20To%20his%20credit%2C%20this%20proposal%20originated%20with%20Mick%20Lynch%20himself.">proposed by Lynch</a> himself. This level of accountability is quite different to the pay committees and shareholder meetings that often wave through <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jun/11/what-cost-of-living-crisis-bumper-executive-bonuses-make-a-comeback">three-figure bonuses</a> in private sector firms. </p>
<p>And while trade union general secretaries are “bosses” in the sense that they are the head of the organisation, they are elected to their role by the workers they represent. Do service users of train companies or railway staff vote for the boss of the train operating company? If they are unhappy with their performance, are there democratic mechanisms in place to be able to ensure they do not carry out another term? </p>
<p>Trade union democracy is certainly a contested term and there is a wealth of research on the dynamics between union leadership and the rank and file, including on the <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0959680112452693">RMT specifically</a>. But the model of democratic accountability practised within trade unions is not typically seen in the private sector.</p>
<h2>Understanding union action</h2>
<p>Descriptions of general secretaries’ actions, both in reporting and general public discourse on industrial action, are often similarly inaccurate. General secretaries cannot “drive” their members to take strike action, as Grant Shapps <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-61825019">suggested last week</a>. They organise an independently conducted postal ballot, as required by the <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2016/15/notes/division/6/index.htm#:%7E:text=In%20order%20for%20a%20ballot,to%20vote%20in%20the%20ballot.">Trade Union Act</a> passed by David Cameron’s Conservative government in 2016. Members are polled on whether they are willing to strike if all other means of negotiation have been tried, refused or failed. </p>
<p>In the most recent example of RMT action, the workers involved <a href="https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/rmt-declares-overwhelming-mandate-for-national-strike-action-on/#:%7E:text=71%25%20of%20those%20balloted%20took,over%20pay%2C%20jobs%20and%20safety.">decided overwhelmingly</a> that they would be willing to strike. Any other description of this process denies workers agency in expressing their grievances and choosing to act collectively in an attempt to find a resolution. </p>
<p>Recent <a href="https://equalitytrust.org.uk/news/7-out-10-people-uk-want-government-action-soaring-executive-pay">research</a> by the Equality Trust shows significant public support for action on executive pay and for more equitable pay distribution within companies. But at the same time, as the government is urging the public sector to demonstrate pay restraint, it is also planning to <a href="https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/tories-want-cut-pay-limits-27286568">remove restrictions</a> on remuneration packages for company directors. The CEO of Network Rail <a href="https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/rail-chief-earns-18-times-27295928">earns £593,000</a>, compared to the Office of National Statistics average of £33,310 for a <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/rail-strikes-train-workers-wage-b2105285.html">train guard</a> or station staff member. So where is the press coverage of the “railway barons”?</p>
<h2>Improving coverage of strikes</h2>
<p>Research has also shown that the language used to <a href="https://theconversation.com/war-on-the-picket-line-how-the-british-press-made-a-battle-out-of-the-miners-strike-60470">discuss strike action</a> in the public sphere is likely to have a significant impact on the course of a strike, and that even metaphors shape and influence public opinion. During the miners’ strikes of the 1980s, the Sun newspaper tried to print a front page that compared Arthur Scargill, leader of the National Union of Mineworkers, to Hitler. Print workers in the National Union of Journalists <a href="https://student.londonmet.ac.uk/media/london-metropolitan-university/london-met-documents/professional-service-departments/library-services/tuc-library-collections/TUC-Library-Solidarity-and-the-Miners-Strike.pdf">refused to print</a> the content.</p>
<p>Thankfully, press coverage of the current transport strikes hasn’t plumbed those depths. But framing the current dispute as being “driven” by union “barons” fails to recognise how unions work and the agency their members have to decide to take action.</p>
<p>Understanding of trade unions and industrial relations has <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/10301763.2021.1953225">declined</a> in the media, within academia and among the general public. With the likelihood of continued industrial action this summer if <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jun/22/largest-teaching-union-threatens-to-ballot-members-in-england-on-strike-action">teachers</a>, <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/barristers-become-latest-group-to-vote-for-strike-action-as-disruption-looms-12637273">criminal barristers</a> and other workers are balloted for strike action, developing a greater understanding of how unions work and of employment relations more broadly could help people get a more balanced and informed view.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/185707/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Holly Smith is a member of the British Universities Industrial Relations Association (BUIRA), a member of the UCU trade union, and worked on the railway and was a member of the RMT before entering academia. </span></em></p>Inaccurate language in media reports about strike action misrepresents how unions work and denies members’ agency.Holly Smith, Research Associate at the Work and Equalities Institute, University of ManchesterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1785862022-03-09T15:48:57Z2022-03-09T15:48:57ZThe BBC’s Ukraine coverage may be changing government attitudes to the public service broadcaster<p>As Russian tanks rolled into a foreign capital city, a BBC commentator captured the anguish of the moment: “And now must we stand by impotent and guilty watching the destruction of a nation … I think the feeling must be one of shame at this.” The year was 1956, the country Hungary.</p>
<p>It marked the start of a new era for Europe - much as many suggest the invasion of Ukraine does now – and it clarified the purpose of the BBC’s international services in the <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-349-27082-8_10">wake of the Suez crisis</a>. The events in Hungary resolved, for a time, disagreement between the British government and the BBC about the nature of its external broadcasts. </p>
<p>In 1956 the UK Foreign Office had been arguing the BBC’s services should assertively push a British perspective. The BBC’s executives argued that engaging listeners relied on a more subtle approach through cultural programmes as well as politics. In the face of the Soviet crackdown it was obvious to both that impartial news was the priority. The formidable reputation of the BBC’s World Service was built in the years that followed. </p>
<p>Might a new war in Europe again resolve tensions over the purpose and value of the BBC? As ever these days, it’s complicated. </p>
<p>In January this year, Culture Secretary <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvlogLdqhIs">Nadine Dorries told the House of Commons</a>, “The BBC needs to address issues around impartiality and group think,” and announced a freeze to the licence fee saying it would be the last such settlement. </p>
<p>Yet in March, her voice catching with emotion, she <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/nadine-dorries-bbc-ukraine-russia-b2027695.html">praised the performance</a> of the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/russian">BBC Russian</a> service (which <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/2022/millions-of-russians-turn-to-bbc-news">tripled its audience in a week</a>) and thanked British journalists – including those at Sky and ITN - risking their lives to bring unbiased news from Ukraine.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/intelligence-information-warfare-cyber-warfare-electronic-warfare-what-they-are-and-how-russia-is-using-them-in-ukraine-177899">Intelligence, information warfare, cyber warfare, electronic warfare – what they are and how Russia is using them in Ukraine</a>
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</em>
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<p>In the face of massive <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/19401612211045221">Russian disinformation</a>, the government is recognising the importance of trusted news and the value of the BBC World Service and the “<a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/08/20/the-rise-and-fall-of-soft-power/">soft power”</a> it confers on the UK.</p>
<p>General Sir Nick Carter, former chief of the defence staff, <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/be9cd012-9d46-489d-8f05-972ab2379037">told the Financial Times</a> recently that the most important way to regain the initiative over Putin was an information manoeuvre reaching out to the Russian people. “The BBC World Service has always managed to reach people the world over,” he said.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">BBC coverage of the war in Ukraine.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The BBC’s international role has not always been so clearly recognised. </p>
<p>Until 2014, the World Service was funded directly by the Foreign Office through grant in aid. The Conservative-led coalition government, seeking public spending savings, determined that cost (some £250 million per year) should in future <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/77800/Lyons_BBC.pdf">be borne by UK licence fee payers</a> – in effect imposing cuts on the domestic BBC to fund international services. </p>
<p>One consequence of this was that the Foreign Office lost some of its influence over service priorities as the BBC determined funding choices. In 2015, the government provided an <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/government-invests-ps85m-in-bbc-world-service-in-soft-power-uturn-a6745736.html">additional £85 million</a> for the World Service. This was a U-turn brought about by the recognition of the BBC’s value in the growing battle for information set against greater investment by Russia and China in international broadcasting and information.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A sign with the BBC's name on it, outside their headquarters." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/450949/original/file-20220309-1729-84hjhm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/450949/original/file-20220309-1729-84hjhm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450949/original/file-20220309-1729-84hjhm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450949/original/file-20220309-1729-84hjhm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450949/original/file-20220309-1729-84hjhm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450949/original/file-20220309-1729-84hjhm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/450949/original/file-20220309-1729-84hjhm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The BBC is now advising viewers in countries where the news may be blocked how to access its news on the dark web via Tor.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">William Barton/Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>However, it means the strength of the World Service is now inherently tied into the strength of the BBC’s core funding – which has been cut by <a href="https://www.vlv.org.uk/news/vlv-research-shows-a-30-decline-in-bbc-public-funding-since-2010/">30% in real terms</a> over the last decade. With integrated newsrooms and newsgathering, as a consequence of the 2014 agreement, it is no longer coherent to praise the international arm of the BBC while decrying its UK news services.</p>
<p>As was obvious from the first two weeks of coverage of Ukraine, the BBC’s UK and language services have never been <a href="https://www.instagram.com/bbc_ua/?hl=en">more integrated</a>. And the internet has collapsed many of the differences between international and domestic audiences.</p>
<h2>Russian blockades</h2>
<p>As Russia stepped in to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/mar/04/bbc-website-blocked-in-russia-as-shortwave-radio-brought-back-to-cover-ukraine-war">block BBC broadcasts</a> and <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-60667770?fbclid=IwAR1KfXT6LLV801KFmac6SNqLyr7YY7xXIGasyiVNJ0vEm_3JrtuDLlBz2u0">undermine journalists</a>, the BBC revived shortwave broadcasting and offered international audiences advice on how to circumvent online blocks <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-50150981">via the dark web</a>. For UK audiences, the expertise of the BBC’s language services and its <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/60554910">monitoring</a> of news sources globally were front and centre, not marginalised as they often have been in the past. </p>
<p>The BBC’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/jan/25/a-giant-what-other-countries-make-of-the-bbc-and-how-their-media-compare">reputation and expertise</a>, in digital as well as in broadcasting, remains the UK’s greatest strength in the information war. This matters as a new iron curtain descends. </p>
<p>In today’s digital age, information is more important than ever in managing public opinion, whether it is the plethora of international channels, online news sites, or the darker arts of <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-43093390">Russian troll farms</a> (where teams spin out false information) and social media manipulation. </p>
<p>As Putin’s aggression forces European leaders to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/germany-hike-defense-spending-scholz-says-further-policy-shift-2022-02-27/">reassess priorities</a>, the UK government may find – as they did in 1956 – that for all their reservations about the BBC it is one of their most powerful tools in the new cold war.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178586/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Sambrook is a former Director of BBC Global News and the World Service.</span></em></p>A cold war - and the importance of trusted information - is pushing the UK government to revise its attitude to the BBC.Richard Sambrook, Emeritus Professor of Journalism, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1751282022-01-18T16:51:52Z2022-01-18T16:51:52ZBBC funding: licence fee debate risks overlooking value of UK’s public broadcasters<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441339/original/file-20220118-21-pupmgr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=17%2C0%2C5723%2C3821&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Value for money? The BBC's funding model is under review.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Willy Barton</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The proposed <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/tv-licence-fee-frozen-for-two-years">two-year freeze in the TV licence fee</a> has prompted a lively debate about BBC funding. The move puts huge pressure on the Corporation’s finances, which have taken an <a href="https://www.vlv.org.uk/news/vlv-research-shows-a-30-decline-in-bbc-public-funding-since-2010/">estimated 30% real-term cut</a> since 2010. The National Audit Office suggested in its December 2021 report that further budget reductions may lead to <a href="https://www.nao.org.uk/report/bbc-savings-and-reform/">more repeats and fewer original high-end programmes</a>.</p>
<p>Conflicting claims about the “<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10408173/Nadine-Dorries-signals-BBC-licence-fee-SCRAPPED-2027.html">end of the licence fee</a>” have also focused concerns on the future viability of the BBC. Many praise its range of services currently provided for what amounts to 43p a day. But others dispute the need for public funding, given the abundance and popularity of commercial streaming services and online media.</p>
<p>Added to this is the issue of the licence fee model itself. The debate, announced by the UK culture secretary, Nadine Dorries, in parliament this week, <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/nadine-dorries-backtracks-from-threat-to-ditch-bbc-licence-fee-7zhv2jx9b">now centres</a> on whether this is an <a href="https://theconversation.com/bbc-the-licence-fee-is-a-small-price-to-pay-for-a-service-that-unites-the-uk-132114">essential tool</a> for funding a universal public good or a <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/former-bbc-lobby-correspondent-why-corporation-should-ditch-the-licence-fee/">regressive and anachronistic tax</a>.</p>
<p>These discussions highlight the significance of the BBC in the UK’s unique model of public service broadcasting, which includes Channel 4, ITV, Channel 5 and the Welsh language broadcaster S4C. This is <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0013/192100/psb-five-year-review.pdf">defined by Ofcom</a> as catering to “people’s needs as citizens and their interests as individuals”. </p>
<p>Yet in a modern media landscape experiencing a <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2019-09/The_audience_of_public_service_news_FINAL.pdf">widening generation gap</a> in news audiences, a <a href="https://www.ebiquity.com/news-insights/blog/is-tv-approaching-a-tipping-point-for-reach/">declining TV advertising market</a>, <a href="https://inews.co.uk/news/bbc-facing-super-inflation-threat-from-netflix-drama-spending-934512">rising production costs</a> and rampant global competition from Netflix and Amazon, deeper questions are emerging about the purpose and value of public service broadcasting. </p>
<p>Are the traditional ideals of public service broadcasting still relevant in the “multi-screen” era? How should its value be assessed to ensure maximum possible benefit to the public?</p>
<h2>Recognising public good</h2>
<p>This is central to <a href="https://www.pec.ac.uk/discussion-papers/what-is-the-public-value-of-public-service-broadcasting">our recently published research</a> by Cardiff University and the AHRC-funded <a href="https://www.pec.ac.uk/">Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre</a>. Through analysing regulatory documents and related industry studies from the last two decades, we have developed a typology of six different types of value: social, cultural, economic, industrial, representational and civic. They reflect the various principles and obligations of public service broadcasting, as well as emerging risks and opportunities, that shape the UK’s current model.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441318/original/file-20220118-13-xg1s6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Graphic showing the six different values of public broadcasting" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441318/original/file-20220118-13-xg1s6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441318/original/file-20220118-13-xg1s6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=355&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441318/original/file-20220118-13-xg1s6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=355&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441318/original/file-20220118-13-xg1s6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=355&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441318/original/file-20220118-13-xg1s6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441318/original/file-20220118-13-xg1s6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/441318/original/file-20220118-13-xg1s6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The six core values of public service
broadcasting.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Cardiff University and the Policy and Evidence Centre</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The social value of public service broadcasting stems from free-to-air broadcasters providing equitable access to universal content that helps build a shared national conversation. But the rapid growth of audience choice challenges the relevance of public service broadcasters offering “something for everyone”. And regulations designed for a handful of fixed-schedule TV channels need updating to ensure public service broadcasting content is still widely accessible <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/consultations-and-statements/category-1/epg-code-prominence-regime">across new platforms and devices</a>.</p>
<p>The cultural value of high-quality, original UK content in news, arts and music, education, religious and children’s programming – featuring <a href="https://www.endersanalysis.com/reports/outsourcing-culture-when-british-shows-arent-british">the lives and experiences</a> of British audiences – distinguishes these public service broadcasters from the wider marketplace.</p>
<p>In 2020 they produced <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0023/222890/media-nations-report-2021.pdf">29,800 hours of “UK-originated” content</a>, compared to just 571 hours on streaming on-demand services such as Netflix. Arts, education and children’s programming provided by the broadcasters <a href="https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5801/cmselect/cmcumeds/156/15605.htm#_idTextAnchor016">throughout the pandemic</a> further highlights the cultural value of investment in genres not usually provided by the market. Further funding cuts will jeopardise this and make it increasingly difficult to provide high-quality specialist programming.</p>
<h2>Value for money</h2>
<p>As the response to the latest licence fee announcement has demonstrated, discussions on the economic value of public service broadcasting typically focus on consumer “value for money”. Recent <a href="https://yougov.co.uk/topics/media/trackers/is-the-bbc-licence-fee-good-value-for-money">YouGov polling</a> suggests increasing ambivalence about continuing to support public investment in broadcasting.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sBGxkgDJXgQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The UK culture secretary, Nadine Dorries, announces plans to freeze the BBC licence fee.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Yet in recent years public service broadcasters have increasingly sought to emphasise the positive economic value created by employment and investment in the creative industries. <a href="http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/reports/reports/kpmg-economic-impact.pdf">A KPMG study for the BBC</a>, for example, estimates that every £1 of BBC spending generated a further £1.63 of economic activity.</p>
<p>There is also considerable “industrial value” generated by public service broadcasters through investment in infrastructure, skills and technological innovation that help to grow the media sector. Commissioning quotas and favourable “terms of trade” for independent production companies have been a big part of the <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0017/218042/Pact-SSBD.pdf">global success</a> of the UK’s media sector, while public service broadcasting’s regional activities have helped establish <a href="https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/public-purpose/sites/public-purpose/files/final-bbc-report-6_jan.pdf">new regional centres of investment</a> in the creative industries around the UK.</p>
<p>The representational value of public service broadcasting comes from ensuring that all voices, identities and lifestyles that make up life in modern Britain are reflected in the national conversation. This is epitomised in Channel 4’s mission to reflect “the tastes and interests of a culturally diverse society” – similar to services such as S4C, BBC’s Asian Network and ITV’s regional news networks. </p>
<p>But <a href="https://www.smallscreenbigdebate.co.uk/what-is-ssbd/ssbd-five-year-review">only half of UK audiences</a> feel that public service broadcasters accurately portray their own nation or region. And, despite important new initiatives in recent years, the broadcasters have yet to tackle <a href="https://www.pec.ac.uk/assets/publications/PEC-Screened-Out-Report.pdf">long-standing inequalities</a> across ethnicity, gender, class and sexual orientation in the screen industries.</p>
<p>Finally, public service broadcasting creates civic value by empowering audiences to actively participate as citizens in the wider democratic process. Research from <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0025/199105/psb-omnibus-survey-findings.pdf">Ofcom</a> and the <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2020-06/DNR_2020_FINAL.pdf">Reuters Institute</a> confirms the status of free-to-air public service broadcasters as the most used and most trusted sources of news for audiences. Still, chronic issues of mistrust, perceptions of bias and younger audiences’ shifting media habits raise systemic challenges for the future support and loyalty for public service broadcasting news outlets.</p>
<p>Taken together, these six values recognise the public’s distinct interests and needs as viewers and listeners, citizens, “investors” and consumers. In taking a wider perspective on crucial policy issues such as the BBC licence fee, Channel 4’s potential privatisation and future regulation of streaming platforms, we invite policymakers, industry stakeholders, audience groups and others to test the usefulness of <a href="https://www.pec.ac.uk/discussion-papers/what-is-the-public-value-of-public-service-broadcasting">our typology</a> for examining the future of public service broadcasting.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>This article is based on research published by the Creative Industries Policy & Evidence Centre and carried out by Cardiff University. The research is entitled ‘<a href="https://www.pec.ac.uk/discussion-papers/what-is-the-public-value-of-public-service-broadcasting">What is the Public Value of Public Service Broadcasting?</a>’.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/175128/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tom Chivers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stuart Allan receives funding from the AHRC to support this research. </span></em></p>New research identifies the many ways public service broadcasting benefits people.Tom Chivers, Research Associate, School of Journalism, Media and Culture, Cardiff UniversityStuart Allan, Professor of Journalism and Communication, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1717142021-11-17T15:15:47Z2021-11-17T15:15:47ZMedia scandals: sound and fury, but in the end, little changes<p>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-handling-of-the-owen-paterson-case-is-a-danger-to-the-entire-fabric-of-british-politics-171324">recent political scandal</a> in the UK involving Owen Paterson, a Conservative MP who was found to have broken parliamentary standards by repeatedly lobbying the government on behalf of two companies which paid him a large regular monthly fee, presents a classic case of a media scandal.</p>
<p>Paterson’s lobbying work was revealed by an <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/nov/05/lobbying-for-naked-bacon-how-the-owen-paterson-scandal-began">investigation in The Guardian newspaper</a> in 2019. Allegations of wrongdoing were followed by an inquiry by the parliamentary standards commissioner, Kathryn Stone, and a damning report from the House of Commons committee on standards, which recommended a 30-day suspension for the MP. </p>
<p>The Johnson government then tried to overturn the process, leading to a political and public furore, forcing a U-turn. Paterson subsequently resigned as an MP and opprobrium was heaped on the prime minister, Boris Johnson, with allegations in the media of sleaze and corruption about him and his government. </p>
<p>Spurred on by this episode, journalists dug for stories about other Conservative MPs who may have broken the rules. These included the former attorney general Geoffrey Cox, whose work for the British Virgin Islands, among other clients, has reportedly brought him <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/nov/10/6m-in-16-years-geoffrey-coxs-outside-earnings-while-sitting-as-mp">more than £6 million</a> in his 16 years as an MP.</p>
<p>The episode played out with daily revelations in the press at a time when all eyes were on the UK as the host of the COP26 climate summit.</p>
<h2>Symbiotic relationship</h2>
<p>It is hard to imagine scandals existing without news coverage. Media attention provides the oxygen that fuels scandals. No matter if they happen in politics (<a href="https://www.history.com/topics/watergate-scandal-timeline-nixon">the Watergate Affair</a>), business (<a href="https://www.investopedia.com/updates/enron-scandal-summary/">Enron and fraud</a>), entertainment (<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41594672">Harvey Weinstein and #Me Too</a>), sports (<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/mar/09/lance-armstrong-cycling-doping-scandal">Lance Armstrong’s doping scandal</a>), science <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02989-9">Andrew Wakefield and the MMR vaccine</a>, or religion (<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-44209971">the Catholic Church and sexual abuse</a>), scandals pry open gaps between expected and actual behaviour. This is why virtually no part of society is exempt.</p>
<p>But if scandals need the media to provide oxygen, it the media also benefits from scandals, which illustrates the multiple motivations for press coverage. There are a number of reasons a news organisation might go after a scandal. Exposing wrongdoing by the powerful bolsters the credentials of the press as a public watchdog. Scandals attract eyeballs, increasing audience ratings and circulation and boosting revenues. They can also help reinforce the ideological positions of news organisations. </p>
<p>So, for instance, while the left/liberal Guardian was part of the team that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/nov/08/key-revelations-from-the-paradise-papers">exposed tax-avoidance practices</a> of the powerful elites, the conservative Daily Telegraph vigorously pursued <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/10462871/Its-no-coincidence-the-MPs-found-guilty-of-fiddling-are-all-Labour.html">MPs’ expenses</a>, trumpeting of Labour transgressors: “The party may take the moral high ground, but lying and cheating are deep in its DNA.”</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A montage of UK newspaper front pages reporting on the Owen Paterson scandal." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/431564/original/file-20211111-21-111iejd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/431564/original/file-20211111-21-111iejd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/431564/original/file-20211111-21-111iejd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/431564/original/file-20211111-21-111iejd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/431564/original/file-20211111-21-111iejd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/431564/original/file-20211111-21-111iejd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/431564/original/file-20211111-21-111iejd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">What the papers said.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Sometimes the news media itself becomes the centre of a scandal, engaging in dubious practices such as deception and invasion of privacy to “get the story”. The <a href="https://theconversation.com/journalism-in-the-dock-first-month-of-phone-hacking-trial-20737">phone-hacking case</a> in the UK was a prime example of this. </p>
<h2>Changing media</h2>
<p>The mainstream media remain important in breaking scandalous news and further documenting wrongdoing. But they aren’t the only gatekeepers now. “Legacy” media has been joined by specialist investigative sites, such as the <a href="https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/">Bureau of Investigative Journalism</a> and social media where people can share tips and stories.</p>
<p>As these new sources of information have added their voices, the dynamics of reporting and gatekeeping scandal stories have become more complex and fluid and the unfolding of scandals has become far more unpredictable. The pace and the content of scandals can rapidly and unexpectedly shift as various different voices introduce new revelations and broadcast to large new and motivated audiences, sending stories “viral” when people pass them on to their friends. </p>
<p>Accordingly, scandal management has had to change. People and institutions implicated in scandals have to confront a more chaotic information ecology to control messages and provide tight, well-managed responses. </p>
<p>The digital revolution has also brought with it new ways of finding, processing and reporting sensitive information with scandalous potential. Journalists and citizens have learned to explore digital data to reveal wrongdoing. As digital footprints can be traced and reconstructed, professional and citizen reporters can scrutinise people and institutions to shed light on their political and financial records as well as their behaviour and statements. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/432368/original/file-20211117-17-1vj8sqt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Front page of The Guardian with revelations about the Edward Snowden affair." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/432368/original/file-20211117-17-1vj8sqt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/432368/original/file-20211117-17-1vj8sqt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432368/original/file-20211117-17-1vj8sqt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432368/original/file-20211117-17-1vj8sqt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=855&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432368/original/file-20211117-17-1vj8sqt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1074&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432368/original/file-20211117-17-1vj8sqt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1074&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432368/original/file-20211117-17-1vj8sqt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1074&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Guardian was one of several news organisations around the world that collaborated on the Snowden revelations.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Often they set up collaborative platforms to pool their resources in researching stories. The emergence of new types of journalistic collaboration led to the revelations about the surveillance state by former NSA employee <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/edward-snowden-6189">Edward Snowden</a> and the <a href="https://theconversation.com/six-things-a-tax-haven-expert-learned-from-the-panama-papers-57308">Panama papers</a> exposure, which were investigated by an international group of newspapers and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.</p>
<p>But while their newsmaking power continues to grow, revelations by these non-traditional platforms need support from established news organisations and digital platforms with large followings. </p>
<p>The big media organisations are more likely to have the resources, expertise and social prominence to get the stories in front of large audiences. This in turn will spark further revelations as a story gathers pace.</p>
<h2>Heroes and villains</h2>
<p>Media scandals overwhelmingly focus on flawed people, rather than on the structural forces that allow, foster and condone their transgressions. Individual peccadilloes are more likely to attract attention than systemic social problems: corruption, wrongdoing, institutional racism, violence, sexism and corporate abuses. </p>
<p>Media narratives tend to accentuate this problem as they tend to offer simplified stories about heroes and villains instead of deeper examination of social problems that have led to the scandal and all-too often remain after the noise has died down.</p>
<p>The Paterson scandal is following this classic path. Inevitably as soon as the people portrayed as villains are taken down, it will be back to business as usual. The scandal may lead to minor changes in the way the standards committee investigates MPs. But if major structural changes had taken place following the <a href="https://www.britpolitics.co.uk/uk-parliament-cash-for-questions-1994/">1994 cash for questions scandal</a>, this latest scandal would not have occurred. </p>
<p>But it didn’t, so decades later the watchword for public officials remains: don’t get caught.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/171714/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Owen Paterson affair was typical of a media scandal,Howard Tumber, Professor of Journalism and Communication, City, University of LondonSilvio Waisbord, Director and Professor School of Media and Public Affairs, George Washington UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1680392021-10-19T16:42:24Z2021-10-19T16:42:24ZThe antidote to Trump: how ‘anti-celebrity’ politicians can still thrive in a world driven by stardom<p>Celebrity met statesmanship in the form of Arnold “the Governator” Schwarzenegger, and more recently, in the presidency of former reality star Donald Trump.</p>
<p>Celebrities entering politics is an international pasttime. Brazilian footballer-turned-senator <a href="https://cris.brighton.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/360777/Rom%C3%A1rio+and+Football+Politics+in+Brazil+-+Final+Submission.pdf">Romário de Souza Faria</a>, singer <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-55689665">Bobi Wine</a> as runner-up in the (contested) Ugandan presidential elections, and comedian <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Volodymyr-Zelensky">Volodymyr Zelensky</a> as Ukrainian president are all examples.</p>
<p>The ceaseless struggle for media attention in our modern political environment has given rise to another phenomenon: politicians who become celebrities themselves. These politicians style themselves as appealing public personae, and constantly seek publicity through social appearances and proactive engagement with media.</p>
<p>The charismatic Barack Obama and <a href="https://theconversation.com/boris-johnson-fails-the-showman-to-statesman-test-in-party-conference-speech-169150">clownesque Boris Johnson</a> have both successfully converted the resulting media attention into political power. US congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez regularly goes viral on social media, and recently attempted to promote progressive policymaking by flaunting a “Tax the Rich” dress at the Met Gala.</p>
<p>Amid the Trumps and Johnsons of the world, can “traditional” politicians still compete for power? This is where the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19392397.2021.1968918">anti-celebrity politician</a> comes in. Dressing and behaving inconspicuously, and ostensibly lacking media savviness, the anti-celebrity politician embodies the opposite qualities to celebrity stardom. He or she avoids the limelight, and flourishes when fatigue with celebrity figures sets in.</p>
<p>The recent German election gives us two examples. The Social Democratic election winner <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/09/world/europe/olaf-scholz-merkel-germany-election.html?action=click&module=RelatedLinks&pgtype=Article">Olaf Scholz</a> displayed an uncharismatic and technocratic air that earned him the nickname “Scholz machine”. </p>
<p>Scholz carefully copied the image of stability projected by Chancellor <a href="https://www.springer.com/de/book/9783658075996">Angela Merkel</a> – the quintessential anti-celebrity. Merkel’s politics appeared nonstaged and she was known for her apparent sincerity, neutral appearance, avoidance of media show and controversy, and lack of emotion and impulsiveness.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wZi-HsXKbMw?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>The histories of celebrity politicians and their anti-celebrity counterparts are intertwined. Anti-celebrity politics only appeals in contrast to celebrity politics. </p>
<p>Celebrity culture, in which media showcase public figures’ personalities and private lives to an expanding consumerist audience of “fans”, emerged in the late eighteenth century. Politicians like the first American president <a href="https://www.wiley.com/en-us/The+Invention+of+Celebrity-p-9781509508747">George Washington</a> bolstered their popularity by avoiding celebrity stardom, seeking strategic publicity instead. </p>
<p>A century later, the emerging modern press industrialised this culture, with stories about celebrities now reaching a mass audience. Photography and film meant that this audience could now “see” these celebrities, making the relationship between idol and fan more intimate. </p>
<p>This translated to politics as well. International newspapers heralded Paul Kruger, president of the South African Republic during the Boer War, as a simple, devout and traditional man – in stark contrast to the obsession with a new “modernity” around 1900. This was in comparison to his British celebrity nemeses, the colonial secretary Joseph Chamberlain and mining magnate Cecil Rhodes. </p>
<p>In the 20th century, new forms of mass media such as radio, television and the internet further bolstered celebrity politics. However, this reinforcement also contributed to a saturation with celebrity politicians, and demand for “authentic” alternatives. </p>
<h2>Comparisons and contrasts</h2>
<p>Anti-celebrity politicians are often defined in contrast to their predecessors and contemporaries. Following the media frenzy surrounding <a href="https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.898.4068&rep=rep1&type=pdf">Nicolas Sarkozy</a>, the mediagenic and attention-seeking French president, the public welcomed his dull successor François Hollande as a return to normality (though he quickly became <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/29/francois-hollande-most-unpopular-president">incredibly unpopular</a>).</p>
<p>This also occurs in international politics. John F. Kennedy’s glamorous “Camelot” presidency enabled Hồ Chí Minh to adopt the role of the anti-celebrity leader during the Vietnam War. Merkel has appeared favourably in media in contrast with both her celebrity predecessor <a href="https://www.springer.com/de/book/9783658075996">Gerhard Schröder</a> within Germany, and her contemporary Donald Trump on the world stage.</p>
<p>The effect of anti-celebrity politics depends on the local political and media system. In a presidential system with a highly commercialised media market, like the US, there is a strong focus on individual politicians and celebrity culture. While this situation initially favours celebrity politicians, it can also create a backlash and consequent demand for anti-celebrities. </p>
<p>Media loved the saxophone-playing Bill Clinton, but their overexposure of his scandals paved the way for George W. Bush, who, despite his well-known family name, constituted a rather nondescript politician. </p>
<p>In a parliamentary system with a more regulated media environment, like the UK, the public votes for a party rather than an individual, and broadcasters must adhere to stricter regulations on political coverage. This system enables the less showy to climb the political ranks relatively protected from a commercial media logic. </p>
<p>The British system thus enabled the uncharismatic Gordon Brown to take over the premiership from the celebrity Tony Blair in 2007 through the “internal route” of winning the Labour Party leadership. Brown admired the anti-celebrity prime minister Clement Attlee, who succeeded the larger-than-life Winston Churchill. However, Brown’s lack of media appeal prevented him from winning a second term in the 2010 general election. </p>
<h2>Rising stars</h2>
<p>Recent weeks have brought the fall of one celebrity politician and the rise of another. Austrian Chancellor <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/17/world/europe/austria-sebastian-kurz-scandal-chancellor.html?searchResultPosition=2">Sebastian Kurz</a> resigned following allegations that he financed his media glitz with tax money. Meanwhile, French writer and pundit <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/12/world/europe/eric-zemmour-macron-france-election.html">Éric Zemmour has surged</a> in the polls, fashioning himself as a Trump-like outsider who may trade TV stardom for a presidency. </p>
<hr>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/eric-zemmour-the-far-right-polemicists-ideas-have-a-long-history-in-france-169430">Éric Zemmour: the far-right polemicist’s ideas have a long history in France</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The anti-celebrity image offers traditional politicians an attractive path to power amid the media savvy methods of many populists. Yet constructing and maintaining this image actually requires great media skill, navigating carefully measured media exposure to claim political successes and avoid publicity of failures.</p>
<p>Aided by a loyal team of PR advisors, Merkel sustained her anti-celebrity reputation for 16 years, but will her successor? And rather than a glitzy Kurz or Zemmour, another anti-celebrity might yet shake up the Austrian and French elections.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/168039/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Betto van Waarden does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Anti-celebrity politicians succeed by styling themselves as authentic alternatives to more showy statesmen.Betto van Waarden, Historian of media and politics, Lund UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1627262021-06-15T14:53:19Z2021-06-15T14:53:19ZChristian Eriksen broadcast, the BBC and the question of public interest<p>Football spectators around the world watched in horror as 29-year-old Danish footballer Christian Eriksen lay prone on the field in cardiac arrest, his teammates running to his aid. Cameras focused in and lingered, framing the player as he received chest compressions, his life hanging in the balance.</p>
<p>As medical staff delivered CPR, the camera – aerial shots and close-ups – continued to linger. When Eriksen’s teammates formed a protective circle around him, the cameras moved on to his visibly distressed partner, showing close-ups of her crying. And so it went on until finally, a full quarter of an hour later, coverage returned to commentators in the studio.</p>
<p>This dramatic scene was the reality of the Denmark-Finland Euros 2020 match, but according to many critics, it might as well have been a detective drama or reality police show. “CUT TO THE STUDIO!” <a href="https://twitter.com/IanWright0/status/1403757184933142532">tweeted</a> former footballer and analyst Ian Wright, speaking for many.</p>
<p>From an ethical point of view, this situation raises one simple question: Why did broadcasters show these prolonged, distressing images? The answer is far less simple, and may be an unpalatable one to digest.</p>
<p>Responding to complaints, the BBC, who were streaming the match in Britain, <a href="https://www.standard.co.uk/sport/football/christian-eriksen-bbc-apology-denmark-collapse-euro-2021-b940293.html">apologised</a> for showing the the upsetting images, but placed the blame on host broadcaster UEFA.</p>
<p>While it is certainly true that UEFA was responsible for the content of the broadcast, this sidesteps the issue that the BBC and other networks could have cut the feed and returned to the studio earlier. </p>
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<p>Could it be that the people making the key broadcasting decisions, whether that was UEFA as the provider, or the BBC as the UK rights holder, decided to stay with the on-field images for 15 minutes because they knew it made fascinating television? Was this therefore just another instance of “giving the people what they want”? At this time there is no data or empirical evidence to indicate that, despite the outcry, millions turned off their television sets in protest at what was being beamed into their living rooms. </p>
<h2>Public interest v interested public</h2>
<p>This case highlights one of the key journalistic ethical dilemmas. The concept of “public interest” has been a longstanding defence of publishing or broadcasting controversial material which many think should not be in the public domain. Something being “in the public interest” can be prioritised over editorial codes and guidelines which are in place to protect people.</p>
<p>Such guidelines apply to areas such as privacy and intrusion into grief, both of which are obviously pertinent to the Eriksen situation.</p>
<p>The BBC is legally obliged to adhere to the Ofcom (Office of Communications) <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/tv-radio-and-on-demand/broadcast-codes/broadcast-code">regulatory set of codes</a>, which includes sections on privacy as well as harm and offence. The former section sets out to “ensure that broadcasters avoid any unwarranted infringement of privacy”, and clarifies: “Broadcasters should not take or broadcast footage … of people caught up in emergencies, victims of accidents or those suffering a personal tragedy, even in a public place … unless it is warranted”. </p>
<p>It is that final word that makes this such an interesting ethical dilemma. The broadcasting code goes into detail about how it defines “warranted”, stating that an invasion of privacy is warranted if the broadcaster can demonstrate it is “in the public interest”. </p>
<p>As uncomfortable as some people may find the fact, a section of the viewing public were interested and certainly did not switch off (and of course, it is surely fair to suggest that many of those who complained continued to watch). So, accepting that the images originated with UEFA, could we make the claim that the BBC was giving the people what they wanted? Is this an inconvenient truth in the field of journalistic ethics?</p>
<p>Just as many people slow down to look at a car crash, is the outcry at the BBC’s coverage formed out of a hypocritical position and if so, how do regulatory bodies such as Ofcom legislate for such a situation? </p>
<p>As is so often the case, this case falls within a grey area of the regulatory codes and will inevitably lead to calls for the codes to be tightened, rewritten or even for a new clause to be added. While this is understandable, there is often a reluctance to amend codes relating to privacy for the fear of negative consequences such as a reduction in the press’s ability to use the public interest defence to shine a light into society’s dark corners.</p>
<p>Ethically, there is a key distinction to be made between, on the one hand, what public interest actually means in practice (exposing wrongdoing, holding the powerful to account), and on the other, what interests the public. </p>
<p>The coverage of Christian Eriksen offended many – and the BBC quickly offered an apology – but the decision to continue with the broadcast, and the way cameras focused in with voyeuristic intensity, raises a rather unpalatable truth: broadcasters may well be providing what at least some of us want.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/162726/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Whitworth does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The BBC apologised for broadcasting images of Christian Eriksen’s collapse, but were they just giving the public what it wants?James Whitworth, University Teacher, Department of Journalism Studies, University of SheffieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1608412021-05-14T11:36:53Z2021-05-14T11:36:53ZRacism in football: new research shows media treats black men differently to white men<p>On BBC Sport, Match of the Day pundits Ian Wright and Alan Shearer recently had a conversation about racism in football. Shearer, the white ex-England international striker asked his black ex-teammate Wright: “Do you believe a black guy gets treated differently to a white guy?” <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/football/56949360">Wright’s response</a> was unequivocal: “Without a doubt, Al!”</p>
<p>Black players face discrimination on every level: public (anti-black racism from fans <a href="https://theconversation.com/football-and-race-relations-have-progressed-a-lot-since-cyrille-regiss-day-but-not-enough-90274">in stadiums</a>), private (abusive DMs on <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/apr/24/footballers-to-boycott-social-media-in-mass-protest-over-racist-abuse">social media</a>) and institutional (lack of management and coaching <a href="https://theconversation.com/frank-lampards-talk-about-hard-work-will-not-help-football-tackle-black-under-representation-141653">opportunities</a>). Wright, however, also pointed to the disparate treatment players receive in the press, referencing recent reports on similar property investments by strikers Marcus Rashford and Phil Foden. </p>
<p>Rashford, who plays for Manchester United and is black, was framed an extravagant, cash-rich, <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8949391/Campaigning-football-star-Marcus-Rashford-bought-five-luxury-homes-worth-2million.html">cash-loose footballer</a>. Foden, meanwhile, who plays for City and is white, was described as the local Stockport boy <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-6241313/Manchester-City-starlet-Phil-Foden-buys-new-2m-home-mum.html">looking after his family</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17430437.2020.1777102">A recent study</a> on racial stereotyping in football match commentary, which I co-authored with Louis Bebb, backs up this observation. The findings show how differently black and white footballers are talked about within the very TV studios where Wright and Shearer work.</p>
<h2>Considerable differences</h2>
<p>The study focused on commentary during the FIFA World Cup in 2018. It analysed 1,009 comments of praise given to footballers during 30 hours of BBC and ITV coverage, across 20 matches (between 19 of the 32 competing teams). We found that black players were overwhelmingly praised for their perceived physical prowess and natural athleticism, and white players for their intelligence and character. </p>
<p>We sorted the comments by attribute. The percentage breakdown of 281 praise comments given to visibly black players centred on physical (69.8%), natural (10.7%), learned (10.3%), character (5%) and cognitive (4%) attributes. Of the 448 praise comments given to white players, 47.9% were for their learned attributes, followed by physical (18.3%), character (13.8%), cognition (11.4%) and natural (8.6%) attributes. </p>
<p>The data indicated that this was not simply a case of commentators reporting objectively on what they had seen in the match. Instead, certain attributes, such as power and pace, were more likely to be noticed or overlooked depending on the player’s race. </p>
<h2>Racialised stereotypes</h2>
<p>Many of the racial stereotypes in sport are traceable back to the pseudo race sciences that emerged in the 1800s, and particularly to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00948705.1999.9714583?journalCode=rjps20">social Darwinism</a>. This held that white people were the most evolved race in terms of intellect, morality and character, and as such, did not require physical prowess. Black people were considered to be the least evolved, inherently violent, lazy, intellectually limited and lacking in character – they conversely needed greater physical strength than white people. </p>
<p>This facilitated the view that black people were inherently suited to physical activities rather than cognitive tasks. It was seen as making them natural athletes. </p>
<p>As <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/25/sports/perspective-a-special-bond-between-champions.html">Dean Cromwell</a>, coach to the University of Southern California track and US Olympic sprint teams, wrote in 1941: “It was not long ago that [the African Americans athlete’s] ability to sprint and jump was a life-and-death matter to him in the jungle.” </p>
<h2>Damaging impact</h2>
<p>The near blanket praise by football commentators for black physiology in our study reinforces the idea of the “natural” black athlete. </p>
<p>This has a detrimental effect on how we see and value black talent, in that it is celebrated while simultaneously reduced to being about physical attributes. By this logic, black players are only professional footballers because they are supremely strong, or can run fast, or jump high. </p>
<p>This is how Manchester City’s Raheem Sterling was characterised during the 2018 tournament on UK radio station, talkSPORT. Here, the commentator, white ex-Wales international midfielder Vinnie Jones (ironically a player of very limited technical ability) asserted that if Sterling didn’t have pace he would not even be playing for England or any team in the English Premier League. </p>
<p>He would instead, <a href="https://talksport.com/football/397018/raheem-sterling-exeter-vinnie-jones-england-world-cup/">said Jones</a>, “be playing for Exeter”, that is, in the lowest professional division in English football. </p>
<h2>Beyond sport</h2>
<p>Ideas of black people as natural athletes contribute to wider social myths of black people as hyperphysical, uncontrollably strong and cognitively challenged. These ideas have very real consequences for black communities in Britain. </p>
<p>This perception often legitimises brutality by the state. In 2020 black-heritage young people were <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/16/bame-children-three-times-more-likely-to-have-taser-used-on-them-by-police">three times more likely</a> to be tasered by police for the same crimes as white criminals. And black people with mental health conditions were more likely to be detained <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1454134/Patients-death-reveals-festering-NHS-racism.html">when compared</a> to all other ethnic-groups. </p>
<p>Black children, meanwhile, were more likely to be predicted grades <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/coronavirus-schools-gcse-level-universities-predicted-grades-a9418471.html">below their intellectual talent</a>, and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/education/2021/mar/24/exclusion-rates-black-caribbean-pupils-england">five times more likely</a> to be excluded for similar misbehaviour as white peers.</p>
<h2>Necessary changes</h2>
<p>We need to expand our definition of what constitutes racist behaviour and attitudes. Instead of <a href="https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/i-didn-t-mean-to-be-racist-claims-boris-6648542.html">focusing only</a> on those forms of discrimination and abuse that require intent, we need to understand that unintentional practices also contribute to racism.</p>
<p>Our study shows that racism includes the match commentary of sports broadcasters who – arguably unwittingly – treat black and white players differently. As shown here, these practices may not be intentional, but they contribute to racism in society more broadly, and so need to be unlearned. </p>
<p>We recommend that those within the sport media industry undertake more robust and meaningful education programmes. Doing reflexive tallying exercises like that employed in our study would help them identify racial stereotyping and discrimination within their own journalistic practice. </p>
<p>We also argue that media and journalism degrees - where we train producers and journalists of the future - also have an integral role to play. Unless this happens, we will continue to see black people being treated differently on the pitch, in commentary boxes and in wider society.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/160841/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Ian Campbell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>To tackle the racial stereotyping rife within football commentary, robust education – and uncomfortable conversation – is criticalPaul Ian Campbell, Lecturer in Sociology (Race, Ethnicity and Leisure), University of LeicesterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1569922021-03-12T09:20:42Z2021-03-12T09:20:42ZMeghan Markle, the UK press and the problem of diversity<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/389043/original/file-20210311-17-1j7tptc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C54%2C6038%2C3796&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Women of colour are under-represented both on and behind the camera in the UK media.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Image courtesy of ITV Pictures</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-56355274">resignation</a> of the executive director of the Society of Editors, Ian Murray, represents a welcome step in the long battle to tackle structural racism in the UK media. Murray stepped down after his assertion that the “<a href="https://www.societyofeditors.org/soe_news/uk-media-not-bigoted-soe-responds-to-sussexes-claims-of-racism/">UK media is not bigoted</a>” caused an outcry in the industry. </p>
<p>His comment came in response to Oprah Winfrey’s interview with the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, where they spoke of being subjected to racist treatment by the tabloids. During the interview, headlines were shown highlighting the different way Meghan Markle had been treated by the UK press compared with her sister-in-law, Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge. Buzzfeed pulled together <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ellievhall/meghan-markle-kate-middleton-double-standards-royal">20 headlines</a> to compare the way they are treated. </p>
<p>Journalists across the industry <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2021/mar/10/society-of-editors-chief-quits-after-row-over-meghan-racism-statement">came together</a> in a show of allyship to counter Murray’s assertion. ITV News anchor Charlene White pulled out of the Society’s National Press Awards, due to be held on March 31. White, the first Black woman to present ITV News at Ten, <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/charlene-white-quits-national-press-awards-society-of-editors_uk_6048cb55c5b65bed87d7874a">wrote</a>: “Perhaps it’s best for you to look elsewhere for a host for your awards this year. Perhaps someone whose views align with yours.”</p>
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<p>Among many senior journalists to comment on the issue of race and diversity in the media, <a href="https://twitter.com/GuardianComms/status/1369279171143294976">Katherine Viner</a>, the editor-in-chief of The Guardian said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Every institution in the United Kingdom is currently examining its own position on vital issues of race and the treatment of people of colour … the media must do the same. It must be much more representative and more self-aware.“</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Murray’s insistence that, "The UK media has a proud record of calling out racism … If sometimes the questions asked are awkward and embarrassing, then so be it, but the press is most certainly not racist,” bears no relation to my experience as a woman of colour and experienced journalist. But there is a growing body of research to demonstrate how the media fails to represent the voices people from diverse ethnic backgrounds people and women.</p>
<p>In 18 years as a journalist I have seen more and more “dog whistling” on race, ethnicity and immigration issues by the UK press, something that became hugely pronounced during the Brexit campaign. Coverage of Eastern European migration <a href="https://migration.blogs.bristol.ac.uk/2019/03/13/brexit-and-migration-our-new-research-highlights-fact-free-news-coverage/">using language</a> emphasising “floods” and “hordes” of migrants to a country under “siege” was followed by an increase in hate crime. Home Office data showed a <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-37640982">41% increase</a> in race and religious hate crimes in 2016 after the Brexit vote. Language has consequences.</p>
<h2>Diversity problem</h2>
<p>According to a <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/research/files/Journalists%2520in%2520the%2520UK.pdf">Reuters Institute report (2015)</a> UK journalism has a “significant” diversity problem with Black Britons underrepresented by a “factor of more than ten”. A 2017 report from the National Council for the Training of Journalists <a href="https://www.nctj.com/downloadlibrary/DIVERSITY%20JOURNALISM%204WEB.pdf">found that</a> 94% of journalists in the UK are white. When you consider that most news organisations are based in London, where 2011 census data shows the population is 60% white, that suggests a considerable shortfall in people from diverse ethnic backgrounds in those newsrooms.</p>
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<p>A <a href="http://womeninjournalism.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/WIJ-2020-full-report.pdf">Women in Journalism</a> snapshot analysis in September 2020 analysing a week of news coverage on TV, radio and newspaper front pages found that, of 111 voices quoted, just one belonged to a Black person. </p>
<p>More important than the race for numbers is the lack of inclusion. Inclusion means you are included in the workplace team and not made to feel like an “outsider” for being “different”. Being on the outside, with a constant feeling of being undermined and misunderstood, has a cumulative and damaging effect. </p>
<p>My colleague Marverine Duffy, head of undergraduate journalism at Birmingham City University (BCU), has called out what she sees as a “culture of fear and cliquiness” in some newsrooms. This sense of non-inclusion often leads to people of colour prematurely leaving the profession. So an overemphasis on entry-level diversity schemes in media organisations is the wrong approach.</p>
<h2>Who are the gatekeepers?</h2>
<p>My research project for the <a href="https://www.bcu.ac.uk/media/research/sir-lenny-henry-centre-for-media-diversity">Sir Lenny Henry Centre for Media Diversity</a> is looking at the “gatekeepers” of radio news, collating data on the ethnic background of senior managers in the sector to look at how power is distributed in the industry.</p>
<p>It’s the senior managers who determine hiring and firing, support and sponsorship. They decide which stories to cover and how. A story I worked on with a Black colleague about immigration to the UK was supposed to look positively at the improvement of Eastern European children’s language skills as they settled into Britain. One of the senior editors stepped in and changed the focus of the piece to emphasise a “flood” of families overwhelming schools. We were powerless to do anything about it. </p>
<p>The BBC’s <a href="http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/reports/annualreport/2019-20.pdf">Annual Report for 2019-20</a> admitted it was “a long way from our leadership target for BAME representation”, adding that “there is still a lot more … to do to increase the percentages of women and people from ethnic minority backgrounds at the highest levels of the BBC”.</p>
<h2>Media matters</h2>
<p>An <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0022/159421/diversity-in-radio-2019-report.pdf">Ofcom report</a> from 2019 found there serious diversity issues in the UK’s radio broadcasting industry, with only 7% of employees from BAME backgrounds compared to 12% in the wider population. This matters because the media amplifies and projects a narrative to the whole of the UK. It is a reflection of the nation and if we are putting out a one-sided picture where people of colour are portrayed with (often negative) stereotypes, it breeds division and hostility in the wider community. </p>
<p>In their 2021 book Access All Areas, Marcus Ryder, a visiting professor at BCU’s Centre for Media Diversity, and Sir Lenny Henry argue that representation of “minorities” in the media industry is the wrong way to view the data. They make the point that the group that holds the most power in the UK media still tends to be white, able-bodied, heterosexual men from London and the south-east – who actually only <a href="https://metro.co.uk/2021/01/09/we-are-not-minorities-we-are-the-majority-13869502/">make up 3%</a> of the UK’s population. </p>
<p>Women – who are also <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/women-and-leadership-news-media-2020-evidence-ten-markets">woefully under-represented</a> in the top echelons of the media – people of colour, the LGBTQ+ community, people who are disabled or live outside London and the south-east make up the vast majority of the UK population. </p>
<p>Their voices must be heard and represented fully in the media for any well-functioning democracy. Anyone who doesn’t recognise this – or worse still, denies there’s even a problem – should not be speaking on our behalf.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/156992/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nina Robinson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A large body of research shows the lack of diversity in the UK news media.Nina Robinson, Lecturer, Sir Lenny Henry Centre for Media Diversity, School of Journalism, Birmingham City UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1554232021-02-17T14:48:28Z2021-02-17T14:48:28ZBritain’s right-wing tabloids have turned to ‘green nationalism’ to sell climate action<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/384743/original/file-20210217-13-hr1ugk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lenscap Photography / shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Britain’s right-wing tabloids have historically not been champions of action on climate change and other environmental issues. In fact they have prominently opposed such action, regularly providing space for <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4503006/global-warming-sums-experts-bullies-james-delingpole-opinion/">climate scepticism</a> and running frontpage stories that <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/comment/columnists/leo-mckinstry/370670/Global-warming-is-nothing-more-than-an-expensive-con">challenged the existence of global warming</a> and <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/146138/100-reasons-why-climate-change-is-natural">its relationship to human activity</a>. </p>
<p>In this context, the recent launch of a “major new” environmental campaign by the Daily Express for a “<a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/nature/1394652/Green-Britain-campaign-daily-express-pollution-wildlife-nature-boris-johnson">Green Britain Revolution</a>” has generated an understandable mix of surprise, distrust and <a href="https://twitter.com/LeoHickman/status/1358724099179167744">wary welcome</a> from long-term supporters of environmental change.</p>
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<p>The Sun has also launched a less prominent but similarly focused “Green Team” campaign encouraging its readers to make “<a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/12904172/green-team-campaign-changes-save-money-planet/#comments">small lifestyle changes to help save the planet</a>”. The paper has also <a href="https://www.news-future.com/p/as-environmental-concerns-grow-the">appointed a dedicated correspondent</a> to provide sustained coverage of the run up to the UN’s COP26 climate change conference in Glasgow in November 2021.</p>
<p>Whatever the reason for their <a href="https://www.pressgazette.co.uk/gary-jones-express-long-way-as-paper-surprises-with-climate-change-campaign/">new-found concern for environmental action</a> (and it’s still not clear how much the <a href="https://twitter.com/ColinBaines1/status/1360604961755852801">overall editorial line</a> has changed), UK tabloids require new kinds of storytelling. Climate change is a notoriously difficult story to tell. Many of the existing frames have been seen as too negative, too reliant on doom and gloom and apocalyptic scenarios, or perceived as elitist and “holier-than-thou”, too eager to blame unthinking ignorant consumers. </p>
<p>I have researched environmental storytelling in <a href="https://www.keele.ac.uk/humanities/study/mcc/ourpeople/pawasbisht/">my work</a> for the past ten years. So, how have historically right-wing tabloids, that in the past denied and belittled climate change, framed the issue so that it is relevant to their largely conservative readerships?</p>
<h2>Framing environmentalism as patriotic duty</h2>
<p>The campaigns – and the reporting accompanying them – demonstrate astute understanding of the need to make environmentalism resonant with the moral and emotional values of their readership. Nationalism, invoking a history of global leadership on the part of the UK, and green entrepreneurialism, the promise of a prosperous future for the nation powered by a green economy, are two key components of the storytelling. </p>
<p>The Daily Express campaign for instance is presented as a national mission, a “green crusade”. The headline accompanying the launch invites readers to <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/nature/1394685/green-britain-dale-vince-ecotricity-daily-express-campaign">get behind the “Green Industrial Revolution”</a> positioning the industrial revolution as a glorious heritage of “ingenuity and ambition” that will engender the new green future.</p>
<p>The narrative is further personified in the choice of “green entrepreneur” <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/comment/expresscomment/1397855/Green-Britain-campaign-plant-trees">Dale Vince</a> as a key spokesperson for the campaign. Vince is a former hippy who now owns the electricity company Ecotricity, and his life story of making millions from green energy companies emphasises a “can do” optimism and a focus on technological solutions to environmental crises. The pandemic is also used as part of the narrative. Britain’s role in the development of the COVID vaccine is cited to strengthen the claim the country should lead the global environmental challenge. </p>
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<p>Overall, the climate crisis is presented as a problem that is eminently solvable through green energy technologies and entrepreneurial innovation. These are areas where Britain has existing global strengths, and therefore it is seen as an opportunity for a glorious national revival that is both morally sound and materially prosperous.</p>
<h2>Limits and dangers of green nationalism</h2>
<p>What we are seeing is the development of a story about environmentalism informed by nationalistic pride and the promise of a materially better future. If successful, this kind of storytelling would allow an older and more conservative readership to feel part of the wider environmentalism narrative, and as a result they might even put their weight behind demands for urgently required policy action. </p>
<p>In the long term, it may help to gradually shift some established conservative political orthodoxies that have prevented climate action. For instance, a key demand of the Daily Express campaign is for the UK government to <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/nature/1394662/green-britain-zero-for-zero-explained-sign-express-petition">actively intervene in the economy</a> – using taxes, subsidies and regulations to favour greener enterprises and penalise those that harm the environment. This idea of active intervention from the state in the market in favour of a green economy is a significant shift in conservative political values. </p>
<p>On the other hand there remain significant problems. The invocation of the national frame, here presented as global leadership motivated by ecological concerns, could easily slip into a more problematic and exclusionary vision of <a href="https://theconversation.com/green-nationalism-how-the-far-right-could-learn-to-love-the-environment-76035">preserving “a green and pleasant land”</a>. A linked problem of a retreat into the local, already evident in the Sun’s urge to “<a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/JS-Graphic-ECO-Part4.jpg">go local, buy local</a>”, is that it removes focus from the systemic and global issues underpinning climate change and pollution. </p>
<p>Finally, the uncritical narrative of a glorious national past and prosperous green future silences issues around inequalities in the experiences and effects of environmental degradation both <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1361920919300392#!">within the UK</a> and <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/climate-change-reinforces-inequalities-even-in-developed-countries/a-50596957">globally</a>. Neither the Express nor the Sun afford much space to global climate justice and the narratives and demands of <a href="https://www.redpepper.org.uk/an-open-letter-to-extinction-rebellion/">environmental movements from the global south</a>. Ultimately, these are significant limitations that should temper our enthusiasm.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/155423/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pawas Bisht receives funding from the British Academy's Humanities and Social Sciences’ Tackling Global Challenges Programme, supported under the UK Government's Global Challenges Research Fund.</span></em></p>An academic expert in environmental storytelling reads the Sun and the Express.Pawas Bisht, Lecturer in Media, Communications and Culture, Keele UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1514482020-12-08T15:12:06Z2020-12-08T15:12:06ZCoronavirus: people turn to their local news sites in record numbers during pandemic<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/373594/original/file-20201208-13-h0hsq5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=164%2C272%2C4240%2C2893&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wozzie via Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Local newspapers have seen sales of their print copies <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/dizzying-decline-britain-s-local-newspapers-do-you-want-bad-news-or-good-news-9702684.html">in decline for decades</a> and, with regional newspaper groups regularly <a href="https://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/2020/news/redundancies-in-store-at-newsquest-as-ceo-admits-staffing-cannot-return-to-pre-covid-levels/">cutting staff</a>, it has felt like UK local news journalism might be on the way out – to be replaced by WhatsApp groups or Facebook chat.</p>
<p>But interest in news from people’s own neighbourhoods has prompted a significant digital spike this year. Hundreds of thousands of people have turned to their local newspaper websites during the pandemic for a clearer understanding of the local implications of this national crisis.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.nottinghampost.com/">Nottinghamshire Live</a> site, run by Reach Plc, has just seen its highest numbers ever in a single month, 25 million page views, in October this year. The second-highest month ever was in April 2020.</p>
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<p>At the <a href="https://www.bishopsstortfordindependent.co.uk/">Bishop’s Stortford Independent</a>, a weekly paper in Hertfordshire, the monthly web audience increased from 260,000 in January to 360,000 in October. The newspaper team was adding more stories to the website than previously, and also launched an app as a reaction to the demand for stories.</p>
<p>Newsquest, one of the biggest owners of regional UK media, announced in early December it is to turn its <a href="https://www.newsquest.co.uk/news/oldham-times">weekly paper in Oldham into a daily</a>, the company said one of the reasons was that “the title has seen record audience numbers online over the last six months”.</p>
<h2>Local voices</h2>
<p>With millions confined to their homes during lockdowns, where do you turn to during the pandemic if you want to find out whether the local surgeries are open or where you can buy a toilet roll? Day-to-day details about where to find a COVID testing centre or council grants were at the heart of local news over the past nine months.</p>
<p>“The restrictions are so local that the only place you can find out the information you need for where you live is from your local publisher. It is affecting peoples’ lives in an extreme way,” said Natalie Fahy, editor of Nottinghamshire Live and the Nottingham Post newspaper.</p>
<p>Alastair Machray, editor-in-chief of the <a href="https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/">Liverpool Echo</a>, told me: “We saw it very much as our responsibility to lift the clouds of confusion by writing explanatory content.”</p>
<p>Tracey Bagshaw, group editor of the <a href="http://www.justregional.co.uk/">Just Regional group</a>, which includes local news magazines in north Norfolk, said that a lot of what was published at the beginning of the pandemic was “very much in the information mode.</p>
<p>"And it just seemed important, because a lot of people were saying we don’t know, and it was an uncertain time”, she said, adding that: “people wanted news immediately. They don’t want to wait until Friday, to find out what was happening. They wanted to know, on Tuesday morning.”</p>
<p>An upside from the past few months has been more interaction with readers – which has allowed news sites to learn more about their readers wanted, who they were, and what sort of stories they were searching for. “So you’d know exactly sort of how a post was doing, what stories were – and we’re actually picking up comments from readers,” said Bagshaw.</p>
<h2>A matter of trust</h2>
<p>When it comes to the vital issue of trusting information, there is still an important point of difference between local papers and WhatsApp groups. Newspapers and sites run by trained journalists have a commitment to fact-checking, asking challenging questions of local authorities and digging into a local issue. </p>
<p>During the pandemic, most local news sites published a mix of detail about how hospitals were coping and case numbers, but also focused on how people were helping each other. The positive stories about communities started to attract significant numbers of readers, too. Said Bagshaw: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>There were lots of pictures of people painting rainbows and delivering food and, you know, just helping others. Alongside the stories about how local buildings are being turned into temporary mortuaries or being turned into temporary accommodation for the homeless.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Local news companies also <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/risj-review/innovation-and-sharper-focus-how-local-news-weathering-coronavirus-storm">tried out new ideas during the pandemic</a>, some offering print subscriptions as gifts, others trying out technology to record interviews without leaving home or new software to keep reporters in touch with each other.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Shetland Times newspaper sits on a pile of UK national papers." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/373597/original/file-20201208-15-111e4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/373597/original/file-20201208-15-111e4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/373597/original/file-20201208-15-111e4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/373597/original/file-20201208-15-111e4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/373597/original/file-20201208-15-111e4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/373597/original/file-20201208-15-111e4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/373597/original/file-20201208-15-111e4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Local papers: sometimes they provide all the news you need to know.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Andrew J Shearer via Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Whether this rise in digital traffic signals a new era for UK local news is unclear. Certainly, it could just be a reaction to the crisis, and reader numbers could slip back to previous levels. But with more of the population likely to work <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/a2fd84a8-172e-4c9d-9824-0504e86f2da1">from home in years to come</a>, interest in the local community may become increasingly important to people who no longer spend significant parts of their week on long commutes.</p>
<p>Machray believes that the audience will continue to grow. “My sense is that the reputation of the regional media has been enhanced massively through COVID due to the <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/calendar/future-local-and-regional-news">efforts and expertise</a>, they’ve expended on behalf of their readership.”</p>
<h2>Generating revenue</h2>
<p>But as well as holding on to their bigger online audiences, companies still need <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/risj-review/innovation-and-sharper-focus-how-local-news-weathering-coronavirus-storm">to find new revenue streams</a> to replace levels of advertising in their print copies. For most digital advertising has not delivered this, and print sales continue to fall.</p>
<p>One inspiration is Mark Thompson, who stepped down as chief executive of the New York Times this summer after turning around the newspaper’s finances. During his time there, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/jul/22/mark-thompson-steps-down-as-chief-executive-of-new-york-times">paying subscribers rose to five million</a> and it added more journalists, going against the industry trend.</p>
<p>Closer to home is another model, the family-owned news business <a href="https://www.iliffemedia.co.uk">Iliffe</a>, which added four new local papers to its portfolio in the last 18 months. The company’s chief executive, Edward Iliffe, said the key to their success is a focus on the <a href="https://www.pressgazette.co.uk/iliffe-media-done-expanding-focus-on-local/">“parochial”</a>.</p>
<p>His newspapers have drawn on old-style journalism with council reports, local football results – and, before the pandemic struck, were even providing a slice of cake for readers who popped into their town centre offices.</p>
<p>Finding the right balance of news may help local news teams work out what their future needs to look like.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/151448/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rachael Jolley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Local news websites have offered essential details on how to understand COVID rules and where to buy toilet rolls.Rachael Jolley, Research Fellow at the Centre for Freedom of the Media and Visiting Fellow in Journalism, University of SheffieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1508092020-11-26T11:59:35Z2020-11-26T11:59:35ZIPSO: press regulator’s ‘guidance’ for reporting on Muslims is not fit for purpose<p>It shouldn’t be controversial to say journalists have failed in reporting on Muslims and Islam in the UK. Inaccurate use of terms and frequently negative constructions can make the religion seem strange, dangerous, or simply not British. Scholars <a href="http://orca.cf.ac.uk/53005/">have shown how</a> journalists frequently associate Islam with terrorism and extremism. Though the news is often “bad”, it is exceptionally so when it concerns Muslims.</p>
<p>This is not a new phenomenon. Postcolonial literary critic Edward Said, writing about news coverage in the 1970s and 1980s, <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/159777/covering-islam-by-edward-w-said/">argued that</a> as far as most news reports are concerned: “Islam is a threat to Western civilisation.” This assessment came two decades before 9/11, which steeply ramped up the media interest in and suspicion of Muslims in the UK. </p>
<p>This has endured, leading to a double standard evident in the contrasting reporting of the murder of MP Jo Cox by a white man with far-right views, and that of soldier Lee Rigby. Cox’s killer was described as a <a href="https://www.pressreader.com/uk/daily-mail/20160617/281599534784997">“timid gardener”</a> while the men who killed Rigby were branded <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/indiahome/indianews/article-2329791/Blood-hands-hatred-inside-London-terror-suspect-obsessed-Islam-schoolboy.html">“Islamic fanatics”</a>.</p>
<p>For British Muslims, this has led to a feeling of unease in the country where they live and where most were born. Islamophobia monitoring group <a href="https://tellmamauk.org/">TellMAMA</a> has argued there is a link between <a href="https://tellmamauk.org/tell-mama-annual-report-2018-_-normalising-hate/">media narratives and hate crimes</a> in Britain. Individuals at the centre of high-profile news stories can lose <a href="https://pressgazette.co.uk/times-apologises-and-pays-libel-damages-to-imam-who-appeared-on-bbc-debate/">their reputations</a>, <a href="https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/governors-moseley-trojan-horse-school-9593307">their jobs</a>, or even <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/jun/11/shamima-begums-uk-citizenship-should-be-restored-court-told">their citizenship</a>.</p>
<p>Knowing this, scholars have advocated for improved reporting practices. Civil society groups <a href="https://cfmm.org.uk/">monitor the press</a> and can equip communities to <a href="https://www.mend.org.uk/resources-and-publications/media-toolkit/">manage press queries and complain about poor coverage</a>. But the private press isn’t answerable to such groups but to regulators. </p>
<p>The Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) was created following the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/leveson-2804">Leveson Inquiry</a> to replace the Press Complaints Commission. To the dismay of groups such as <a href="https://hackinginquiry.org/a-response-to-the-leveson-consultation-part-5-the-public-benefits-of-section-40/">victims’ rights advocates</a>, government regulation of the press was not adopted. </p>
<p>Instead, <a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/medialse/2016/10/25/press-regulation-post-leveson-where-are-we-now/">a new voluntary regime was established</a>. News organisations chose their regulator, agreed to follow their code of practice, and faced penalties for breaches. IPSO was the biggest and, for critics, <a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/medialse/2015/03/16/moses-theory-for-ipso-less-independence-not-more/">the friendliest to publishers</a>.</p>
<p>IPSO has just published its long-promised <a href="https://www.ipso.co.uk/member-publishers/guidance-for-journalists-and-editors/guidance-on-reporting-of-muslims-and-islam/">guidance for reporting on Muslims and Islam</a>. The document discusses how to apply the Editors’ Code of Practice to articles on these subjects, with a focus on accuracy and discrimination. </p>
<p>This effort has been mounting for a couple of years. In autumn 2018, I joined a working group that was consulted as IPSO drafted the guidance. I’ll keep the text of draft documents and group conversations confidential, as requested, but I will contrast the form I hoped the document would take with what was eventually published. </p>
<p>IPSO’s Code is what binds the members. Bespoke guidance doesn’t add to or supersede the code. Rather, it highlights with specific examples where journalists might trip up in reporting a complex, sensitive and newsworthy topic. For IPSO to provide guidance on Muslims and Islam is a sensible response to a social fact.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ruling-on-fatima-manji-is-further-proof-that-ipso-fails-as-a-press-regulator-64923">Ruling on Fatima Manji is further proof that IPSO fails as a press regulator</a>
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<p>But in September 2019, the thinktank Policy Exchange, which had obtained a copy of the guidance, <a href="https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/eroding-the-free-press/">published a report</a> calling it an erosion of press freedom. IPSO <a href="https://www.ipso.co.uk/news-press-releases/news/responses-to-spectator-and-telegraph-articles-on-draft-guidance-on-reporting-of-islam/">defended its decision</a> to prepare guidance and rejected the claim it was setting new rules for reporting on Muslims.</p>
<p>But at that point, the work seemed to stop. IPSO had planned to publish its guidance in 2019. Instead, 2020 came with no further news. A new chair took over at the regulator. And of course, COVID-19 disrupted everything. Yet I believe the attack from Policy Exchange also disrupted this work, delaying it and contributing to a significantly different product. The “chilling effect” that Policy Exchange worried would bind journalists has instead bound the regulator.</p>
<h2>Toothless tiger</h2>
<p>The guidance provides basic demographic details on Muslims in Britain and explains key terms. It identifies questions for journalists to consider as they prepare their stories. This is welcome.</p>
<p>But it says little about sourcing practices, and given a lack of familiarity with Islam for both journalists and their readers, <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0163443716686941">the choice of sources</a> has a big impact on the story. Journalists are reminded of diversity among Muslims and encouraged to consider a source’s track record in public statements. But the guidance doesn’t ask journalists to consider a source’s claim to authority or how representative their views might be – and these are essential questions for reporting a complex topic such as Islam.</p>
<p>What the guidance does offer, and in abundance, are soothing statements that journalists are free to write what they wish, so long as it’s accurate and doesn’t discriminate against an individual. The right to shock and offend is noted several times in different ways. Journalists are reminded that the code “does not prohibit prejudicial and pejorative references to a particular religion” and that they are free to publish comment and even conjecture – so long as it is distinguished from fact.</p>
<p>The substance of this is to say: “Don’t worry – you can still be nasty to Muslims in general.” And this has been baked into a document intended to provide guidance for what IPSO’s CEO <a href="https://www.ipso.co.uk/news-press-releases/news/responses-to-spectator-and-telegraph-articles-on-draft-guidance-on-reporting-of-islam/">Matt Tee described as</a> “local papers, often produced with a small, less experienced staff who may value such assistance”.</p>
<p>In his foreword to the Policy Exchange report, <a href="https://policyexchange.org.uk/author/trevor-phillips/">Sir Trevor Phillips</a> – a former journalist and chair of the Runnymede Trust when it prepared its <a href="https://www.runnymedetrust.org/companies/17/74/Islamophobia-A-Challenge-for-Us-All.html">1997 report on Islamophobia</a> – worries that IPSO “is well on the way to becoming a servant of a small, unrepresentative element of Muslim opinion”. </p>
<p>On the contrary, the regulator is once again behaving like the servant of private news organisations, taking pains to assure them they can continue the business-as-usual practice of reporting on Muslims. The kind of reporting that <a href="https://theconversation.com/ruling-on-fatima-manji-is-further-proof-that-ipso-fails-as-a-press-regulator-64923">left Channel 4 presenter Fatima Manji without satisfaction</a> when she complained about a column in The Sun she alleged was discriminatory.</p>
<p>Deference to the news industry is what led <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17228561">to the abolition of the PCC</a> and was a key question for the Leveson Inquiry. Those reforms are still wanting – and wanted.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/150809/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Munnik receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council. </span></em></p>Press reports about Islam have often been misleading or discriminatory. This new advice does little to help journalists avoid that.Michael Munnik, Lecturer in Social Science Theories and Methods, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1485912020-10-22T15:38:07Z2020-10-22T15:38:07ZUS election 2020: a toolkit for ‘democracy-worthy’ coverage for journalists<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364985/original/file-20201022-14-10xpss1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=258%2C97%2C3179%2C2198&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Larry W Smith</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>As election day approaches in the US, journalists around the world are working in the most challenging environment of their lifetimes. This will be no ordinary election, not only because COVID-19 has changed the way Americans vote, with <a href="https://electproject.github.io/Early-Vote-2020G/index.html">45 million ballots already cast by mail</a>, but also because the US president, Donald Trump, has repeatedly challenged the validity of the vote and declined to commit to a peaceful transition of power if he loses.</p>
<p>While his Republican party <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/09/28/the-legal-fight-awaiting-us-after-the-election">prepares blanket legal challenges</a> anticipating an election loss, a bitter political battle is brewing in the Supreme Court, the country’s highest legal institution, which played a key role in adjudicating the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Bush-v-Gore">2000 election</a>.</p>
<p>All of which means that how journalists cover the run-up and, especially, the aftermath of the election will be crucial for American democracy – and the ideal of democracy around the world. What we demand of journalists, and what news we decide to read and share, will be essential as well. Both the press and the public must answer hard questions: how to discuss controversies around the vote and what to do if the result is unclear, or a candidate does not concede? And what if civil unrest ensues after the vote? </p>
<p>Thankfully, decades of research and expertise can help guide decisions in these unprecedented times.</p>
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<p>British media are very popular and influential in the US and they can play an important role in shaping how the American public will interpret the election and its aftermath. The BBC could well play a big role. <a href="http://www.digitalnewsreport.org/survey/2020/united-states-2020/">Research has shown</a> that 58% of Americans say they trust the broadcaster and 12% get at least some of their news from it each week.</p>
<p>UK newspapers also have the potential to be influential players: in March 2020 <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/guardian-us-press-office/2020/apr/09/guardian-us-records-highest-ever-traffic-in-march-reaching-more-than-114-million-browsers#:%7E:text=Guardian%20US%20recorded%20its%20highest,to%20this%20time%20last%20year.">the Guardian US recorded more than 114 million unique visits</a> while the Daily Mail online <a>attracts an estimated 73 million monthly unique visits in the US</a>. Meanwhile, most readers of The Economist <a href="http://www.abc.org.uk/Certificates/49547182.pdf">are in North America</a>. And the influence won’t stop there – given their international prestige and recognition, British media are likely to shape news coverage of the US election all around the world.</p>
<h2>Democracy at stake</h2>
<p>Whether the 2020 elections strengthen or weaken American democracy is not only crucial for the US, but for the cause of democracy. With all its quirks and flaws, America is still the world’s leading and most powerful democracy, but its institutions are under strain. For instance, the Economist Intelligence Unit now <a href="https://www.eiu.com/topic/democracy-index">classifies the US</a> as a “flawed democracy. If American democracy falters, the ideal of democracy will suffer elsewhere in the world – not least in the UK.</p>
<p>We are already seeing issues with UK reporting of the US election. The press is extensively covering statements that are largely unfounded but challenge the legitimacy of the election, such as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/22/trump-mail-in-voting-fraud-claims">Trump’s denunciation of mail-in ballots</a>. To be fair, this reporting often (<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-us-canada-53901877">though not always</a>) includes <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/54562611">disclaimers and fact-checks</a>, but research shows that false statements that are repeated often <a href="https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/10/5/16410912/illusory-truth-fake-news-las-vegas-google-facebook">can be seen as truthful by audiences</a>. </p>
<p>Journalists tend to consider conflict as newsworthy, and therefore are keen to cover even the wildest allegations that a party throws against the other – and the electoral process itself. Yet, this means airing baseless accusations that weaken democratic legitimacy. News that depicts democracy as a no-holds-barred competition for power <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0093650218808691?casa_token=CtI4KRZua88AAAAA%3Ao15IpHwtllZPi7zCTFLJYy0v4YlK7PNpwU0CBhXlwFRJgPf987efz1w57E84nqse9zhpzq_gkqvA&journalCode=crxa">increases cynicism and reduces political knowledge</a> among citizens. To protect the integrity of the electoral process, journalists should instead adopt a ”<a href="https://uk.sagepub.com/en-gb/eur/mediated-democracy/book268900">democracy-worthy</a>“ frame.</p>
<p>Making democracy central to news coverage also requires understanding and preparing for the likely legal battles that lie ahead. The mechanisms of a US presidential election are by and large defined at the state rather than the federal level (remember <a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/11/12/666812854/the-florida-recount-of-2000-a-nightmare-that-goes-on-haunting">the "hanging chads” battle</a> in Florida in 2000?) Journalists need to develop knowledge about and credible sources on state electoral regulation – particularly for states where the vote is likely to be close. If coverage of these legal battles turns into a litany of complaints from partisan lawyers, democracy will lose out.</p>
<p>Readers and viewers have important roles to play as well. More than three-quarters of the UK population <a href="http://www.digitalnewsreport.org/survey/2020/united-kingdom-2020/">get their news online and nearly 40% on social media</a>. The news that people choose to read on websites and news apps shapes the rankings that journalists and news executives use as indicators of what the public wants. The news they choose to share on social media influences the content that others discover on these platforms.</p>
<h2>What can be done?</h2>
<p>In response to these challenges, the <a href="https://mediafordemocracy.org/">Election Coverage and Democracy Network</a> brings together over 60 experts from around the world to help newsrooms cover this election with evidence-based best practices that uphold journalistic and democratic values and address the needs of the audience.</p>
<p>We have developed some <a href="https://mediafordemocracy.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/ECAD-Recommendations.pdf">recommendations</a>, a <a href="https://mediafordemocracy.org/resources/">curated list of resources</a> and a <a href="https://mediafordemocracy.org/media-inquiry-expert-list/">roster of experts journalists can tap into</a>.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://mediafordemocracy.org/">recommendations</a> focus on three areas.</p>
<p><strong>1. During the campaign, we recommend that journalists</strong> deny a platform to anyone making unfounded claims while putting voters and election administrators at the centre. They should strive for equity in news coverage and make quality coverage more widely accessible, by temporarily bringing down paywalls for it.</p>
<p><strong>2. In case of a contested election, we recommend that journalists</strong> publicise their plans for how they will cover results and avoid making premature declarations on who won. They should develop and use state and local-level expertise to provide locally relevant information on electoral rules and distinguish between legitimate, evidence-based challenges to vote counts and illegitimate ones that are intended to delay or call into question accepted procedures.</p>
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<p>They must avoid using social media as substitutes for institutionally credible and reliable election information, while recognising that technology platforms have an important role to play. Importantly, they should embrace existing democratic institutions, by explaining how elections work and emphasising that the increased availability of mail-in ballots is an effective response to the COVID crisis.</p>
<p><strong>3. In the eventuality of civil unrest, we recommend that journalists</strong> help their audiences understand the roots of unrest by explaining the sources of social and political divisions in the country. They must also uphold democratic norms that prescribe that the candidate who gains most <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/electoral-college">Electoral College</a> votes is elected president, that the loser should promptly concede, and that all citizens have the right to speak, write and assemble peacefully.</p>
<p>Journalists must use clear definitions for actions and actors (for instance, distinguishing between paramilitary groups and citizen protesters) and deny a platform to those who call for violence, spread disinformation, or foment racist ideas.</p>
<p>There are many excellent examples of “democracy-worthy” news coverage of the US election, as we highlight via <a href="https://twitter.com/ecademocracy">our Twitter account</a>. If UK journalists take notice – and their readers reward these best practices, more are likely to follow.</p>
<p>American democracy, and the ideal of democracy itself, are at stake in 2020. Journalists and readers must rise to the task – it’s that important.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/148591/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Cristian Vaccari receives funding from the Leverhulme Trust, the Norwegian Research Council, and Facebook, Inc.</span></em></p>The future of democracy could depend on how the forthcoming election plays out – so the way in which it is covered will be crucial.Cristian Vaccari, Professor of Political Communication and Co-Director of the Centre for Research in Communication and Culture., Loughborough UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1468682020-09-24T14:10:48Z2020-09-24T14:10:48ZHarold Evans was a titan among the greats of British journalism<p>Among the select band of truly great editors who have led British newspapers with sovereign authority, Harold Evans – <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-54275941">who has passed away, aged 92</a> – stood out as a titan. The working-class boy who left his local state school at the age of 16 to learn his trade on the Ashton-under-Lyne Weekly Reporter first occupied an editor’s chair as an undergraduate at Durham University. </p>
<p>While studying politics, Evans edited <a href="https://www.palatinate.org.uk/">Palatinate</a>, the independent student newspaper, at a time before television challenged the authority of printed news. Subsequent experience on the Manchester Evening News and <a href="https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/opinion/letters/18140645.harold-evans---man-put-fuel-northern-echos-rocket/">Northern Echo</a> gave him a taste of the power and responsibility exercised by newspapers in an era when British national dailies achieved their peak circulations. </p>
<p>The achievements that earned him national attention came during his editorship of The Sunday Times between 1967 and 1980. His determination to investigate, expose and explain <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2012/sep/01/thalidomide-scandal-timeline">the Thalidomide scandal</a> set a courageous example of a newspaper speaking truth to power in the public interest and in the teeth of ferocious opposition. For this achievement, Evans deserves as much credit as a less well-known but equally brave predecessor.</p>
<p><a href="https://kar.kent.ac.uk/57595/">Arthur Mann</a>, who was editor of the Yorkshire Post between 1919 and 1940, had the courage to oppose appeasement consistently and boldly despite leading a newspaper owned and financed by Conservative interests. For this, Mann was heartily despised by then prime minister, Neville Chamberlain, who made no secret of his contempt. Despite huge pressure from his proprietors, Mann maintained intelligent <a href="http://communicationethics.net/sub-journals/abstract.php?id=00108">opposition to appeasement</a> throughout Chamberlain’s premiership.</p>
<h2>Things they don’t want you to read</h2>
<p>Evans faced at least as much pressure when he took on the legal and political power of The Distillers Company, the <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-54275941">makers of thalidomide in the UK</a> and his newspaper’s most lucrative advertiser. Standing by the work of the Insight investigative team he had founded – and showing no sign of faltering despite colossal financial and reputational risks – Evans fought for his story all the way to the European Court of Human Rights. When, in 1979, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1979/04/27/archives/european-court-rules-britain-violated-press-freedom-editor-halls.html">the court ruled</a> that the Sunday Times could publish without restraint, the British government was obliged to change the law of contempt of court.</p>
<p>That victory was celebrated as a triumph of truth established through investigative reporting. It was also evidence of Evans’ strength as an inspiring leader. Dennis Griffiths, the leading historian of Fleet Street, <a href="https://www.bookdepository.com/Century-Journalism-1900-2000-Dennis-Griffiths/9780957223202">recognises</a> that among Evans’ great skills was his ability to bring together excellent reporters and coordinate their efforts to superb effect. </p>
<p>He led his team’s efforts to <a href="https://www.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/1974LONDON04783_b.html">expose sanctions-busting</a> by supporters of the apartheid regime in Rhodesia. Evans also <a href="https://www.pressgazette.co.uk/top-scoops-british-journalism-all-time-philby-i-spied-russia-1933-sunday-times-1967/">indentified Kim Philby</a> as a member of the Cambridge Five spy ring, which passed information to the Soviet Union during the second world war and at the beginning of the cold war. </p>
<p>In a campaign to <a href="https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/opinion/leader/4650878.righting-wrongs/">prove the innocence of Timothy Evans</a> (1924-1950, no relation), wrongfully convicted and hanged for the murder of his wife and infant daughter, Harold Evans demanded an official inquiry while editor of the Northern Echo. At the Sunday Times, his persistent focus on this egregious miscarriage of justice helped to bring about abolition of the death penalty. </p>
<h2>Giant of the craft</h2>
<p>Evans deserves our respect because he never wavered from the view that a newspaper is much more than a commercial product designed to generate profits by selling a commodity called news. He treated the newspapers he led as flawed but valuable agents of democracy, using them to achieve the outcomes the leading media academic <a href="https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/582">Professor Michael Schudson</a>, in his widely respected 2008 study: Why Democracies Need an Unlovable Press, calls “things news can do for democracy”.</p>
<p>Throughout his career, Evans proved through his deeds that painstaking, accurate reporting can expose wrongdoing and help to correct the balance of power between citizens and those who govern in their name.</p>
<p>There have been few like him. For this author, Mann came closest, followed by <a href="https://www.attackingthedevil.co.uk/bio.php">WT Stead</a> who, as editor of the Pall Mall Gazette in July 1885, published “The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon” a pungent expose of child prostitution in London and the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13507486.2010.497306">first true example of investigative journalism</a>. Paul Dacre of the Daily Mail showed courage by <a href="https://www.pressgazette.co.uk/paul-dacre-says-there-was-deathly-silence-on-daily-mail-back-bench-as-they-laid-out-stephen-lawrence-murderers-splash-just-before-deadline/">identifying in 1997</a> the men he believed to be guilty of the murder of Stephen Lawrence.</p>
<p>However, one other British editor, <a href="https://www.arusbridger.com/">Alan Rusbridger</a>, who was editor-in-chief of The Guardian between 1995 and 2015, deserves mention. Rusbridger displayed real courage and skill when in August 2013 he published information <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-24466802">leaked to the Guardian by Edward Snowden</a>, the American whistleblower who copied highly classified information from the National Security Agency. </p>
<p>It is telling that Rusbridger <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/sep/24/harold-evans-journalism-news-editor-death-facts">paid tribute to Evans</a>, writing that he “invariably turned to Harry for advice”, because Evans had “been there, done it” and “got the campaign medals”.</p>
<p>True greats recognise their peers. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/in-conversation-with-journalist-author-and-thalidomide-campaigner-harold-evans-48322">In Conversation with journalist, author and thalidomide campaigner, Harold Evans</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/146868/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tim Luckhurst has received research funding from News UK and Ireland Ltd. He is a member of the Society of Editors and the Free Speech Union. His current work in progress, is a book for Bloomsbury Academic under the provisional title Reporting the Second World War: Newspapers and the Public in Wartime Britain.</span></em></p>Evans is admired for his fearless leadership and tireless campaigning journalism.Tim Luckhurst, Principal of South College, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.