Journalism: News Access And Source Power

give-and-take show media News Access And Source PowerIn the study of mass communication, in that respect has been a free burning debate about the to a greater extent or little(prenominal) powerful pictures of the media on the usual. This power is non restricted to the influence of the media on their earshots, but as well as involves the map of the media at heart the broader frame achievement of the aff adapted, heathen, semi policy-making or economic power structures of rescript. Ideally, a media system suit sufficient for a democracy ought to provide its readers with well-nigh legitimate sense of the broader social forces that affect the conditions of e preciseday manners. However, it is difficult to find anyone who even remotely approaches this ideal (Gamson et al, 1992). The everyplacewhelm conclusion is that the media generally operate in ways that promote apathy, cynicism and quiescence, rather than active citizenship and participation.This essay exit e xplore the evidence that is offered that suggests why the nature of stemma/media traffic matters in environmental retail stores and non-g all overnmental organisations. It will to a fault look at why communications and media researchers continue to check out the topic and why seeded player/media relations ar important.Media discourse compendium has traditionally focused on the password harvest-home. These studies have not exclusively yielded important insights into the structure (Bell 1991, 1998), function (Jaworski, Fitzgerald and Morris, 2003 Khalil, 2006) and tack (Fairclough, 1995 van Dijk, 1998) of media language, but have excessively described small level aspects such as the mechanics of turn-taking, repair and pause length in news interviews (Clayman and Heritage, 2002). Recently, however, the cranial orbit of media discourse analytic thinking has started to broaden to include the complex discursive practices that lie at the heart of the news production process . Additionally, with the advent of new technologies, crucial ingredients of the news production process argon outright creation opened up to researchers, with corporate websites parading massive press release archives and internet based news agencies and e-mail distribution services spreading breaking news in actually time to whoever is interest in it (Geert, 1999).News advance and news selection are the yin and yang of news production studies (Geert, 1999). Cottle (2000b) distinguishes the socio system of logical and a culturalist paradigm in theories of news coming. While the former investigates news access in scathe of strategical and definitional power, examining patterns of news access, routines of news production and processes of source intervention the latter theorises news access in foothold of cultural and ritual power, sensitive, to the symbolic mapping of news actors and how they perform/enact indoors the conventions and textual structures of news representatio n ritual, story, narrative (pp. 28-9).News sociology has a long standing tradition. Early, seminal studies of deviance (Becker, 1963), newsworthiness (Galtung and Ruge, 1973), news management (Schudson, 1978), hegemony (Hall et al, 1978) paved the way for governmental economy views of corporate control (Herman and Chomsky, 1988) and mediatisation (Thompson, 1995) on the one hand, and social constructionist approaches to news production (Gitlin, 1980) on the other. The classic newsroom ethnographies of the 1970s and 1980s (Tunstall, 1971 Tuchman, 1972, 1978 Gans, 1979 Golding and Elliot, 1979 Fishman, 1980 Erickson, Baranek and Chan, 1987) crystallised a radical piece in the historical mountment of news study. Taken together these studies forced worry to the geomorphological and institutional forces at play in newsrooms, focusing on how news is an organisational and bureaucratic accomplishment of routine (Cottle, 2000a, p. 21). For example, Tuchman (1972) sees source dependence as a strategic ritual, borne out of a professional ideology allowing journalists to frame their work as objective accounts of news events.According to Geert (1999), while this early generation of social scientists drove position the importance of professional routines, norms and settings of news production, other scholars have foretelled to theoretical blind spots. With new technologies beingness introduced in newsrooms (Pavlik, 2000), come new concepts of journalistic practice (Carlson, 2007), leading to questions of continued theoretical validity and calls for updating newsroom descriptive anthropology (Cottle, 2000a Zelizer, 2004). Schudson (2005) has warned a pre tiltst the dangers of a reductionist or determinist approach to the media in which the news production process is seen as the direct result of underlying economic and semi semipolitical forces. such an approach does not account for the room of journalists as social actors, which, given in todays changing news ec ology, is especially pressing. Indeed, it could be argued that, from an analytical point of view, media sociology has largely disregarded journalistic agency in favour of organisational and institutional levels of analysis. Recently, however, many scholars have pointed their attention to alternative theories of cultural production, to the highest degree prominently, Bourdieus field theory (Couldry, 2003 Benson, 2006 Hesmondhalgh, 2006 Neveu, 2007).In contradistinction of grand sociological debates, cultural and anthropological studies of news production such as Peterson (2001) and Sthlberg (2002) expend notions of social mediation, cultural production and reflexivity in analysing the determine practices of media production and consumption. This burgeoning field which has come to be identified as media anthropology (Askew and Wilk, 2002 Ginsburg, Abulughod and Larkin, 2002 Peterson, 2003 Rothenbuhler and Coman, 2005 Boyer and Hannerz, 2006) theorises the ethnography of media prod uction as an emergent effort, to talk about the agency of media producers within a cultural system while dumb recognising their embeddedness in larger structures of power, (Peterson, 2003, p. 164).van Dijk (1990) notes that a brief conceptual analysis is needed in pronounce to specify what notions of power are involved in such an approach to the role of the news media. tender power as van Dijk explains is summarily defined as a social relation amid(prenominal)st groups or institutions, involving the control by a ( more(prenominal)) powerful group or institution (and its members) of the actions and the musical themes of (the members) a less powerful group. Such power generally presupposes privileged access to socially determine resources, such as force, wealth, income, acquaintance or status. van Dijk goes on to explain that media power is generally symbolic and persuasive, the sense that the media in the first place have the potential to control to some extent the minds of r eaders or viewers, but not directly their actions. chuck out in cases of physical, coercive force, the control of action, which is usually the ultimate aim of the exercise of power, is generally indirect, whereas the control of intentions, plans, knowledge, beliefs or scenes that is mental representations that monitor overt activities is presupposed.Also, van Dijk (1990) notes that given the presence of other sources of information, and because the media usually lack access to the sanctions that other such as legal or bureaucratic-institutions whitethorn apply in cases on noncompliance, mind control by the media bear never be complete. On the contrary, psychological and sociological evidence suggests that disdain the pervasive symbolic power of the media, the audience will generally retain a minimum of autonomy and independence and engage more or less actively, instead of purely passively, in the use of the marrow of mass communication. In other words, whatever the symbolic power of the news media, at least some media exploiters will generally be able to resist such persuasion.Another notion in the analysis of media power is that of access. According to van Dijk (1990), it has been shown that power is generally based on special access to valued social resources.Thus, controlling the means of mass communication is one of the crucial conditions of social power in contemporary information societies. Indeed, besides economic or other social conditions of power, social groups may be attributed social power by their active or passive access to various forms of man, other important or consequential discourse, such as those of the mass media, scholarship or political and corporate last making (p. 12).Although ordinary people may make use of the news media, they generally have no direct influence on news content, nor are they usually the major news actors of news reports (van Dijk, 1990). elite groups or institutions, on the other hand, may be defined by their broader range and scope of patterns of access to earth or other important discourses and communicative events. Leading politicians, managers, scholars or other professionals have more or less controlled access to many antithetic forms of text and talk, such as meetings, reports, press conferences or press releases.This is especially true for their access to media discourse. Journalist will seek to interview them, ask their opinion, and frankincense introduce them as major news actors or speakers in news reports. If such elites are able to control these patterns of media access, they are by definition more powerful than the media. On the other hand, those media that are able to control access to elite discourse, in such a way that elites become dependent on them in order to exercise their own power, may in turn play their own role in the power structure. In other words, major news media may themselves be institutions of power and authorisation, with obeisance not only to th e public at large, but besides to other elite institutions. (van Dijk, 1990, p. 12).For some areas equal risk and the environment as well as ignores like trade pairings which are non-governmental organisations, media discourse is to a world-shaking extent, a discourse dependent upon the partings of official experts. Environmental organisations, non-governmental organisations, industry, scientists, and government offer their own particular competing accounts of the reality of the situation. Issues concerning differential access to the news media are crucial when considering who comes to define the event. Accordingly, the following examines news/source media relations as it relates to 1) environmental upshots and 2) non-governmental and the various news sources involved in influencing the symbolic representation of public dos.News/Source Media Relations and Environmental IssuesOver recent decades a growing environmental promotional material industry has emerged, alongside an increasing emphasis upon environmental advocacy. A number of information crises (eg. The Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989) have forced sections of industry to take a more proactive approach to environmental communications as potent imagery has directed contradicted assurances that environment protection is not compromised by their activities (Anderson, 1991). At the analogous time, the public exhibit a growing sense of distrust of scientists (Beck, 1992). The sense of distrust has partly emerged from news media formats that favour bearational dialogue among experts and offer the public little means of evaluating opposing viewpoints. There has been a tendency to display the debates in dramatic, sensational headlines rather than a considered approach that furthers public understanding of the issues (Anderson, 1991). The curve complexity of many environmental issues acts as a major constraint, oddly considering that relatively few journalists coverage on these matters possess a scie ntific background (Anderson, 1997 Nelkin, 1995 Peters, 1995).The news media possess a great obligation in relaying scientific issues to the public, since they contribute a major source of information about acquaintance within our society (Adam, 1991).Through their mediation, interpretation and translation of otherwise in accessible knowledge into a publically accessible form, news workers are not only prime sources of public information but also the principal social theorists of contemporary industrial societies. As such, they carry a heavy burden, a responsibleness they are poorly equipped to provide and that does not sit comfortably with their own self-perception. That is their understanding of themselves as harbingers of news, disseminators of matter of human interest and providers of a critical perspective on the more shady aspects of socio-political and socio-economic life (p. 125). office news media reporting of environmental issues is often mediated through the expert as the voice of authority. However, it is important to note the ways in which the news media present certain expert voices as being self-evidently authoritative whilst competing views are frequently portrayed as non-credible, irrational and partisan. This can have the effect of discouraging critical thinking and the brushing aside of lay views. However, as Beck (1992) observes there are some grounds for optimism since the media also potentially play a part of opening up the critique of science and exposing conflicts of opinion and ideological standpoints. At the same time research suggests that while official news sources may not automatically enjoy the most statistically prominent level of news coverage, they are remote more likely to appear in news formats where they enjoy a larger degree of tower control. Also they tend to provide analytical knowledge as opposed to subjective/experiential knowledge (Cottle, 1999).It has been frequently observed that the news media representation o f environmental issues is pre-occupied with bad news. Much environmental coverage is centred on events rather than issues (Hansen, 1990, 1999 Molotch and Lester, 1975 Singer and Endreny, 1987). This partly reflects the fact that much news coverage is based on a 24 hour cycle and especially applies to television news (Anderson, 1997). This orientation towards events may encourage audience members to place blame upon particular companies or individuals within a company, rather than see this in name of broader structural problems. One such example is the Exxon Valdez disaster with event-centred coverage. Coverage of the inunct spill tended to be frame around the allegation that it was caused by the drunken verbalise of the Captain, Joseph Hazelwood. This played down other possible angles concerning cutbacks in maritime safety standards or the cover industrys poor capacity to clean up large oil spills in areas such as the Prince William Sound (Dyer et al, 1991 Hannigan, 1995).News m edia representations of the environment are also influenced by socio-political and cultural factors. Particular issues or events that capture attention tend to be mediagenic and can be easily situated within the established institutional framework. Often these resonate with deeply held cultural beliefs and values that operate at a powerful symbolic level. Another key aspect of news discourse, which particularly applies to television, is the reliance upon ironlike visual images to capture the audiences interest. In many cases the availability and quality of pictures becomes a central factor poignant broadcasters judgements about the news worthiness of a given environmental issue and is especially salient for soon news bulletins. Political agendas and the perceived importance that politicians place upon particular issues also influence news values. Routine reporting on environmental issues is to a significant extent based around the voices of official experts, particularly individu als within government departments who are more likely to gain extended news actor debut through, for example, appearing in live interviews (Cottle, 1999).Since the late 1970s environmental drag groups in countries such as Britain and the United States (US) have become increasingly in their approaches to the news media. Particularly, they have become more happy at packaging their material in media friendly ways. Some groups have enjoyed some notable successes in manipulating news values to their own ends, but this has imposed significant constraints in terms of how they have been able to frame issues (Gramson and Modigliani, 1989). Issue sponsors, such as environmental tweet groups, play a key role in communicating environmental affairs. These competing sources have differing levels of information subsidies in terms of resources such as hail and time, which affects how far the media rely upon them on as routine basis. Ericson et al (1989) noteNews is a product of transactions a mid journalists and their sources. The primary source of reality for news is not what is displayed or what happens in the real world. The reality of news is embedded in the nature and type of social and cultural relations that develop between journalists and their sources (p. 189).Many studies of environmental reporting have order a tendency for official sources to gain the most privileged access to the media (Anderson, 1997). Molotch and Lesters (1975) seminal study of the press coverage of the Santa Barbara Oil Spill build that federal officials and industry spokespersons gained more access to the media, compared with local officials or conservationists. However, they note that initially an accident may bypass the usual routine bias towards official frames due to its unexpected nature. This suggests that non-routine environmental reporting may, in some instances, open up new channels to groups who may often be marginalised within the media. This was found to be the case in the U nited Kingdom (UK) national press coverage of the seal pestilence a virus, which killed a large number of common seals of the Norfolk coast in the UK during the summer of 1988 (Anderson, 1991, 1997). The way in which the seal plague came to serve as an icon for an environment in crisis shares some striking similarities to the Exxon Valdez oil spill. The seal plague, with its emotive, visual appeal came to mark an issue threshold for environmental issues in the late 1980s. This was potently linked to the cultural and political climate at the time. It generated much media coverage and one national mid market newspaper The Daily Mail launched a sustained campaign Save our Seals, which ran over several(prenominal) months. As such it can be seen that the reporting of environmental issues within the news media cannot be split from socio-political values regarding the environment.News/Source Media Relations and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs)Just like environmental issues seek t he piece of the pie when it comes to the media, NGOs also seek to have their stories told in the media. However, in discussing news/source media relations, it must be noted that over generalising when discussing NGOs must be avoided. As Deacon (2001) notes the relative importance of profile, resource and motives in the communications strategies of different NGOs is to some extent dictated by the specific context of their operations. Additionally, there are also structural variations, reflecting the different political and economic roles of various NGO sectors. Deacon address source/media relations as it relates to three types of NGOs namely, trade sum of moneys, the military volunteer sector and quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations (quangos). He points out the first broad acceptance that these disparate groups, organisations and movements have proliferated in many political systems over recent decades, and in doing so have fictive greater social and political significa nce (Deacon, 2001, p. 8). However, where there is disagreement is whether these represent haughty developments. Some commentators envision them as revitalising pluralist democracy, or challenging centuries of elite control. Others see this change as more of a mixed blessing. In Berrys assessment interest groups are no less a threat than they are an expression of freedom (1984, p. 2). The second point of consensus relates to the reasons for the proliferation of these organisations. Various commentators point to, on the one hand, the widening of educational opportunities and concomitant rise of sophisticated citizenry (Mazzolena and Schultz, 1999), and on the other, emergent environmental, material, social and ideological conflicts both within, and between, pass on capitalist nation states (Blumler and Gurevitch, 1996, p. 126-7) These have produced a shift away from party-based politics, towards other forms of political engagements and the rise of issue politics. Thirdly, theorists from all perspectives acknowledge variation in these processes across different political systems, due to historical, cultural, structural and political factors (Eyerman and Jamison, 1991, p. 36). Additionally most accept that the influence of specific types of interest groups/pressure groups/social movements/ or NGOs tend to fluctuate over time (Deacon, 2001). The final point of agreement is that public communications are now integral to the operations of these political sources, and that the media have particular significance. Blumler (1989) labels this as the emergence of a media-centric model of pressure group activity.Deacon (1991) explains as the social and political roles of many NGOs expand so do the pressure and expectations upon them which in turn create a range of specific communications imperatives to do with establishing a political presence and attracting resources among others. For some NGOs, increased investment in strategic communication represents a defensive sol vent to harsh political realities, in which they can no longer assume their views will have political resonance. Additionally, as a consequence of broader political, social and fiscal uncertainties, a diverse range of private and public institutions are becoming ever more concerned with image maintenance and achieving a prominent and positive public presence. In this new and competitive promotional environment (Wernik, 1991), media engagement has become a significant prerequisite for effective political engagement, particularly for those without direct access to the levers of political and economic power (McNair, 1998, p. 156). In what Blumler and Gurevitch label a communication dependent society certain organisations and institutions enjoy distinct competitive advantages in promoting their views and values. In particular, those with the greatest material resources at their disposal most notably state and big vocation can launch and sustain the most expensive and extensive paid m edia access. However, free media access can disrupt this market logic, providing opportunities for the resource-poor agencies to achieve levels of national and international exposure that even the best resource could not fund directly. Additionally there are also other considerations such as profile, resource and issue to be taken into account.However, as Deacon (2001) points out these various communications considerations will not apply uniformly across NGOs. For example, the precise blend of resource, profile and issue motives will vary depending on a range of factors, some of which will be highly context specific. The relative importance of profile, resource and issue motives in the communications strategies of different NGOs is to some extent dictated by the specific context of their operations. However, there are also structural variations, reflecting the different political and economic roles of various NGO sectors. For example, Deacon highlights that most quangos receive dire ct statutory funding, they will tend to place less emphasis on financial resourcing motives than voluntary organisations, where dependency on public and corporate giving is high, and their financial state is generally more parlous. On another level, trade unions will tend to be more comfortable with open issue campaigning than voluntary organisations and quangos, partly because of their primary political function, but also because they are not articled by conventions and regulations governing neutral public management and non-party-political charitable activity. Davis (1995) suggests that the salience of communications media strategies can also depend upon the nature and political context of the matter at hand. They are most crucial in policy struggles that are highly ideological and involve (at least for one participant) non-material, non-distributive goodsPolicy battles that range over intangible goals and values, such as the abortion issue, tend to evolve into virulently zero s um affairs. Such zero-sum politics, because of the heated struggle for competitive advantage that often marks it, relies heavily on pre-decisional, communication point efforts to frame or construct issues (p. 28).Another significant factor can be the relationship between an organisation and the dominant institutions of state. In an influential categorisation, Grant suggests that pressure groups can be placed along a continuum that reflects their relationship to government.However as Deacon (1991), warns if media prominence can deliver advantages to NGOs, there are associated risks. The most obvious of which is receiving negative and hostile apportionment, which can compromise an organisations reputation. In this respect some NGOs are more valuable than others. A trade union for instance, that can depend on the complete solidarity of its members has less immediate grounds for fearing the spate of media opprobrium than a charity that is entirely dependent upon public donations. On a less obvious level, there is the possibility that courting media attention, and playing the media game, can have an effect upon organisations core values.Miller (1997) suggests that this can be particularly threatening for radical organisations, there The suspicion within the organisation that newly visible spokespersons might become infatuated with their own celebrity and have sell out is never far from the surface. But this observation about the potentially corrupting influence of media logic also applies to organisations operating in the political mainstream. Blumler (1989) terms the risk of spurious amplification, a process by which inflammatory rhetoric and extravagant demands to make stories more arresting, distort what groups stand for, (p. 352).Until recently, evaluations of media coverage of trade union sector in the UK tended to fall into two camps the critical research position which enjoyed considerable theoretical dominance during the 1970s and the revisionist critiqu e which emerged during the 1980s (Manning, 1998). More recently a third position has started to form which conforms to what Curran (1997) labels a radical pluralist perspective. The latter negotiates a position between the extremes of critical outrage and revisionist sanguinity (Manning, 1998 Davies, 1999 Negrine 1996). Although these studies also psychoanalyze the quantitative and qualitative dimensions of news coverage of industrial disputes, their main contribution has been to go beyond the texts to investigate the dynamics of news production directly by examining the links between journalistic practices and trade unions communications strategies. Such insights have been largely absent from most critical and revisionist accounts (Cottle, 1993).The value of this new perspective is illustrated by Davies (1999) case study of media reporting of the British governments proposal in 1992 for privatising the postal service. These plans were strongly opposed by the Union of Communication Workers (UCW), who instituted a carefully orchestrated public relations (PR) campaign against the privatisation programme. Davies content analysis revealed that although UCW sources came to be treated more positively or neutrally that either government or management sources as the dispute unfolded, the union received considerably less coverage than their political opponents. These results suggest that the recruitment of mainstream, media nourish to the anti-privatisation cause was due to elite divisions within the party of government and the vehemence of public antipathy. The union benefitted from wider political developments, it did not instigate them. However, by linking analysis of media reporting to an analysis of the unions communication system, Davies shows the error of this interpretation. The unions PR strategy played a key role in galvanising public, party political, professional and expert opinion against the privatisation proposals, which in turn had significant effect on media framing. In particular, by commissioning polls and lobbying influential opinion leaders, the union bypassed the need for institutional legitimacy and direct access. Instead they gained a voice by using the legitimacy and access possessed by other sources the public, economic experts, politicians and assorted neutral user groups, (p. 182). Mannings research also provides an overview of contemporary abridges in media relations and identifies two ideals of union structure. On the one hand, there are unions where press and publicity functions are marginalised and rigidly trapped within a civil society service style hierarchy , and on the other, organisations that permit a higher degree of integration for their media and PR operations with their organisational leadership. These differences can in part be explained by the dilemma of incorporation unions have had to confront in their response to the harsh political realities they face. In this period of his research, Manning fou nd a stubborn ease of suspicion within certain unions towards the media that readily characterised journalists as inevitable class enemies, working at the behest of state and capitalist interests. Thus, the embrace of promotionalism in this context is not an act of assertion, but of defence attempting to avoid marginalisation in a changing political and economic context (Deacon, 2001). It is also clear from Mannings work that journalists perceptions of the political role and characteristics of trade unions frames their utilisation as news sources, and helps account for the predominant emphasis on their incarnate rather than constructive roles. A distinction developed by Peter Golding and Deacon (1994), identifies trade unions as advocates by journalists. As news discourse is inherently conflictive this can enhance their news value in political disputes. However, this clear perception of unions political role prevents their deployment as arbiters in news coverage. Therefore, to inf luence the terms of media debate at this level, Davies demonstrates in his case study, that trade unions often have to recruit the support of out-of-door experts to validate their arguments. Additionally, for such a strategy to work, it is often necessary to maintain a degree of public dissociation between the union and the expert, for fear that any links may erode the perceived authoritativeness of the latters proclamations.This trend contrasts with common strategies deployed within the voluntary sector, where publicists strive to encourage a situation of association between the work of a voluntary organisation and the views of significant public figures. The main studies thus far into reporting of the voluntary sector suggests that there is limited but indulgent treatment, based on an antiquated impression of the sector. As Brindle (1999) notes It is as if the media do not want the sector to grow up. Coverage remains very much stuck in the 1950s charity time warp of good cause fu ndraising, lifeboats, guide dogs and back up sick children. Even on the broadsheet national newspapers, there is a clear antipathy to stories that treat the leading charities as the big businesses they have become, (p. 44). Looking at trends in media reporting towards communications and media strategies in the sector, Deacon notes an increasing emphasis on public communication similar to that noted in the union sector is evident. However, the embrace of promotionalism appears more uneven. As Davies suggests, it is tempting to simply conclude that in free media entirely as in paid media, financial resources deliver insurmountable competitive advantages to those who hath. The fact that the media