Abstract
Background: Journalism as a profession or craft dates back to Roman times but has progressed through many stages over two millennia. Journalists today should follow basic principles to practice their profession.
Objectives: This study endeavours to analyse the requirements for trusted, reliable journalism. This article investigates the building blocks on which journalism is based, an analysis that looks at the watchdog and guardian functions, the role truth-telling plays in modern-day reporting of news, how news media are providers of a forum of debate and critical thinking, why the independence of journalists to fulfil their guardian role is important, and how journalists’ credibility and trust in them by the public are closely linked to ethical codes in which the social responsibility of reporters is paramount.
Method: The analysis is based on research studies about, firstly, journalism as a profession, and, secondly, mass communication and practical guidelines that have become embedded in journalism.
Results: The study shows how journalism has progressed from Roman times, through print, radio, television and other forms to the technologically based frameworks so characteristic of 21st century journalism, as reflected in social media and e-news platforms.
Conclusion: The study may contribute to enhancing the perspectives on modern journalism and the dire need for trusted news amidst fake news rife on social media platforms and how it may be acquired and fulfilled.
Contribution: The study may contribute to enhancing the perspectives on modern journalism and the dire need for trusted news and how it may be acquired and fulfilled.
Keywords: journalism; watchdog; truth-telling; media ethics; independence; accountability; social responsibility; scepticism; critical thinking.
Introduction
Journalism is not a recently established profession; the Roman historian Suetonius wrote in 59 BCE that Julius Caesar determined that an official record of the daily proceedings of the Roman senate, the Acta diurna, must be put up in public: inito honore primus omnium instituit ut tarn senatus quam populi diurna acta confierent et publicarentur1 (Baldwin 1979:189). It was similar to the Hansard of today (De Beer & Diederichs 1998:86), and as Baldwin observes, the daily reports may be called ‘(perhaps a trifle romantically) Rome’s daily newspaper’ (1979:189).
Since then, journalism has undergone numerous stages of development with one common thread: that journalism is the ‘first rough draft of history’ (Barth 1943; Graham 1953), and through objective reporting it forms a bulwark ‘against authoritarianism and obscurantism’ (Ward 2004:318), thus being a pillar in a democratic society.
These stages of development were – and still are – closely linked to historical factors such as technological discoveries and innovation (Gutenberg’s printing press, the development of radio and television, the internet, social media, and lately, artificial intelligence), and often steered in specific directions by cultural and political forces. When and where journalism was freed from the shackles of authoritarianism and autocracy, it became an integral part of the growth of democracy (Maras 2013:161–162).
This study will analyse how the building blocks of journalism are constructed through the architecture of journalism. Le Corbusier defined architecture as ‘the learned game, correct and magnificent, of forms assembled in the light’ (MCH 2022). This is also applicable to journalism as a craft and profession, which is not only practised in the light, but also that the work of journalists is to bring light to where darkness reigns, ‘to shine light into dark holes’ (Harber 2020:271).
In this regard, the English journalist, essayist and co-founder of the quarterly National Review, Walter Bagehot, described journalism’s role as ‘letting in daylight upon magic’ (Hitchens 2011:170). To allow this ‘daylight’ to illuminate society’s activities, journalism rests on fundamental building blocks.
Kovach and Rosenstiel (2021:22) describe ‘the purpose of journalism’ as providing ‘people with the information they need to be free and self-governing’. To fulfil this task, they identify 10 elements of journalism (Kovach & Rosenstiel 2021:22–23): Journalism’s first obligation is to the truth; its first loyalty is to citizens; its essence is a discipline of verification; its practitioners must maintain an independence from those they cover; journalism must serve as a monitor of power; it must provide a forum for public criticism and compromise; it must strive to make the significant interesting and relevant; it must present the news in a way that is comprehensive and proportional; journalism’s practitioners have an obligation to exercise their personal conscience; and citizens have rights and responsibilities when it comes to the news as well – even more so as they become producers and editors themselves.
These 10 elements will, as part of this study, be aligned and incorporated in the building blocks of journalism set out next. It will endeavour to analyse five of the most important requirements any journalist needs to enable the reporter to function in a challenging world where fake news and conspiracy theories thrive on social media platforms. These requirements are mostly absent in citizen journalism. Rumours spreading on social media are usually not verified until it is too late when refuting fake news becomes an exercise of closing the barn door when the horse has already bolted and is running far down the field.
The watchdog and guardian
In the Aegimios, a fragmentary epic poem from the Ancient Greek attributed to Hesiod, the Argos Panoptes is described as a highly effective guardian and watchman (Burkert 1983):
And set a watcher upon her, great and strong Argus, who with four eyes looks every way. And the goddess stirred in him unwearying strength: sleep never fell upon his eyes; but he kept sure watch always. (p. 166 [authors own emphasis])
This guardian role of journalism was summarised by Winston Churchill in 1949, 4 years after the end of one of the darkest periods of humankind when freedom of speech and the free flow of information were repressed by Hitler’s propaganda machine (Ingelhart 1998):
A free press is the unsleeping guardian of every other right that free men prize; it is the most dangerous foe of tyranny. Where men have the habit of liberty, the Press will continue to be the vigilant guardian of the rights of the ordinary citizen. (p. 188)
Journalism’s guardian role is perhaps the cornerstone of the profession, a building block that stands between authoritarianism and democracy. ‘The watchdog function is, in fact, the news media’s main role in the political system …’ (Sparrow 1999:4). This guardian function should ‘serve the “general welfare” by informing people and enabling them to make judgments about contemporary issues’, as Sparrow (1999:173) refers to the ethical code of the American Society of Newspaper Editors.
A watchdog uses all senses to scan the environment not only by visual observation (the camera lens in modern-day journalism), but also by listening (audio recordings), smelling (journalists are fond of saying they ‘smell a rat’ when they are led up the garden path), touching (testing the waters of claims by asking incisive questions) and tasting (distinguishing between poisonous lies and the truth).
When these senses pick up danger lurking, the watchdog warns by barking because, as a former editor of The New York Times, A.M. Rosenthal, observed, ‘[S]ilence is a lie. Silence has a loud voice. It shouts, nothing important is happening, don’t worry. So when something important is going on, silence is a lie’ (Rosenthal 1991).
This watchdog role is not without danger and when journalists act as watchdogs on government, threats to their safety are common and attempts to curb the freedom of the media often lead to journalists being killed or incarcerated or media institutions being closed down (Rønning 2005:157, 168). Africa is a specific vulnerable place to be a functioning watchdog on government (Rønning 2005:157–180).
The news media are ‘public guardians, able to protect the national interest against government corruption’ (Sparrow 1999:2). Examples of how this guardian role plays out to expose government and other illegalities and failures are overwhelming. To mention examples from just three countries where the media’s role as watchdogs was vital should suffice:
- McCarthyism, Watergate, the Pentagon Papers, Iran-Contra in the USA, also the Stormy Daniels-Donald Trump scandal; in South Africa, the Information scandal of the 1970s, state capture, the Tembisa hospital corruption, Bosasa, Life Esidimeni hospital deaths, Eskom corruption, and the Thabo Bester escape from prison, opened by GroundUp, a small journalism organisation with very limited resources; in the United Kingdom, the Profumo scandal, Windrush, Partygate, Jeffrey Archer’s incarceration.
In all these cases, the watchdog building block cemented the principle of the news media acting in the interest of the ‘public good’ and to ‘expose those who [are] dishonest or who violate[d] a trust’ (Stovall 2005:417).
Another aspect of the media’s watchdog-protector role is to ‘serve society’ and the provision ‘for independent scrutiny of the forces that shape society’, as the South African Press Code sets it out in its preamble (Press Council of South Africa 2020). ‘It enables citizens to make informed judgments on the issues of the day, a role whose centrality is recognised in the South African Constitution’.
In serving society, the news media are also protectors and guardians of democratic values, and ‘serve as powerful guardians of political norms’ (Graber 1997:3). This democracy protectionist role is aptly described by a Brazilian Midia NINJA journalist, Bruno Torturra (as quoted by Russell 2016):
Our main role is to reclaim for journalism and communications their activist role as the public’s eyes and to offer information that is increasingly qualified to defend democracy. (p. 102)
Muzzling the watchdog leads to the limitation of democracy. ‘The ability of journalists to report freely on matters of public interest is a crucial indicator of democracy. A free press can inform citizens of their leaders’ successes or failures, convey the people’s needs and desires to government bodies, and provide a platform for the open exchange of information and ideas. When media freedom is restricted, these vital functions break down, leading to poor decision-making and harmful outcomes for leaders and citizens alike’, Freedom House, the oldest American organisation devoted to the support and defence of democracy around the world, reports (Freedom House 2023).
The truthteller
The news media’s ethical codes and principles emphasise that journalists should take care ‘to report news truthfully, accurately and fairly’, as, for example, stated by the South African Press Code (Press Council of South Africa 2020).
This striving for the truth is also subject to a level playing field and marketplace where truth can eventually triumph, as Milton (ed. Brooks 1950) wrote, somewhat idealistically, about truth as anathema to censorship:
And though all the windes of doctrin were let loose to play upon the earth, so Truth be in the field, we do injuriously by licensing and prohibiting to misdoubt her strength. Let her and Falshood grapple; whoever knew Truth put to the wors, in a free and open encounter? (p. 719)
As pointed out in the introduction, Kovach and Rosenstiel (2021:22) called journalism’s ‘first obligation’ as to being to ‘the truth’. This search for truth is a basic building block of journalism, ‘working for the good of society as a whole’ (Altschull 1990:232), but indeed very idealistic, sometimes even a tantalusian endeavour. As Zelizer (2017:150) observes, ‘[J]ournalism prides itself on a respect for the facts, truth and reality … god-terms for the most kinds of journalism’.
The reality is that facts often do not exist ‘externally and independently of the observer’ (Maras 2013:10) as they are duelling with forces such as the subjectivity of journalists themselves, censorship by governments and other sources, self-censorship by journalists because of commercial, market and socio-cultural realities (Zelizer 2017:151), confirmation bias of journalists and their sources, religious pressure, and the growing influence of social media where fakehoods thrive without any ethical gates to hinder and curtail untruths (Ronson 2015:84–85). As Dennis and Merrill (1984:106) note about the subjectivity of communication, all stories that journalists write or report are always ‘judgemental, value-loaded, incomplete, and distorted as to reality. That is the nature of journalism. That is the nature of any kind of communication’.
Without going into questions arising about the subjectivity or objectivity of any observer, whether it is the journalist or the source giving the information, truth-seeking remains one of the building block cornerstones of journalism (Carey 1982, 1999; Gans 1979; Maras 2013; Schiller 1979, 1981; Schudson 2001; Schudson & Anderson 2009; Tuchman 1972).
The process to determine the truth remains one of the most enduring challenges for journalists, and in ethical codes, verification of doubtful information and fact-checking are usually standard principles (SA Press Code:1.7; Harber 2020:312). Kovach and Rosenstiel (2021:22) call journalism’s ‘essence … a discipline of verification’.
How important fact-checking has become in the second decade of 21st-century journalism is emphasised by the growth in fact-checking organisations.
In 2014, the Poynter Institute launched a global fact-checking map, counting 44 such sites globally. Within 5 years, this number has risen to 188, according to the Duke Reporters’ Lab keeping track of active and inactive fact-checking projects (Stencel 2019). The International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) at Poynter ‘was launched in 2015 to bring together the growing community of fact-checkers around the world and advocates of factual information in the global fight against misinformation’ (Poynter 2015):
We believe truth and transparency can help people be better informed and equipped to navigate harmful misinformation. (n.p.)
Truth-telling by credible and trustworthy journalists has over the past four decades become seriously under the cosh because of the internet and specifically the rise of social media, where the phenomenon of fake news and disinformation has grown, especially during the United States (US) presidential terms of Donald Trump.
Two examples: The COVID-19 pandemic gave rise to serious challenges for journalists, who since 2020 have been bombarded with conspiracy theories about the origin of the killer virus, how it is spread and how it can be countered (Claassen 2021a). Furthermore, in January 2025, after the inauguration of Trump’s second term, the social media giant Meta announced that it would end its fact-checking facilities and replace it with a ‘community-note feature similar to X’, a serious blow to the trustworthiness of news as spread on social media platforms (Wall Street Journal 2025).
Fake news and conspiracy theories thrive on social media and an infodemic of anti-vaccination against the virus led to severe pressure on editors and science journalists to give a platform to these non-evidence-based claims (Claassen 2021b; GroundUp Staff 2020; Press Council of South Africa 2020; Stent 2021). It also created serious challenges for virologists who had to defend their peer-reviewed science (Hakim 2021; Hernandez et al. 2021; Muric, Wu & Ferrara 2021).
The pursuit of truth in news stories is bedevilled by fake news spreading on social media (Lazer et al. 2018); specifically, the speed with which disinformation spreads and erodes the building block of truth-telling by credible and trustworthy journalists. According to Dizikes (2018), referring to a study by Vosoughi, Roy and Aral (2018):
[F]alse news stories are 70 percent more likely to be retweeted than true stories are. It also takes true stories about six times as long to reach 1,500 people as it does for false stories to reach the same number of people. When it comes to Twitter’s “cascades,” or unbroken retweet chains, falsehoods reach a cascade depth of 10 about 20 times faster than facts. And falsehoods are retweeted by unique users more broadly than true statements at every depth of cascade. (n.p.)
The independent – News media as the Fourth Estate
Describing the news media – or press in 1841 – as the Fourth Estate, the Anglo-Irish politician Edmund Burke made a distinction between the ‘Three Estates in Parliament’ and journalists in the ‘Reporters’ Gallery yonder’, as summarised by the essayist Thomas Carlyle (Bartlett 1977:577). Although Burke coined it as a term of abuse for the scurrilous and ill-principled scribes of the press gallery at the Palace of Westminster (The Conversation 2013), today the term refers to the role of journalists to act in the public interest independent from politicians and commercial interests.
A vital building block of journalism is that its daily operation of reporting the news is not only independent but also clearly seen as being independent. This is emphasised in most media’s ethical codes. The South African Press Code (Sect. 2.1) determines that journalists should be independent from ‘commercial, political, personal or other non-professional considerations to influence reporting’ and should ‘avoid conflicts of interest as well as practices that could lead readers to doubt the media’s independence and professionalism’.
The statement of principles of the American Society of Newspaper Editors also emphasises this independence of journalists: ‘Freedom from all obligations except that of fidelity to the public interest is vital’ (American Society of Newspaper Editors 1975:Article III).
Similarly, the American Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) sets out this independence of journalists (2014):
- The highest and primaryobligation of ethical journalism is to serve the public. Journalists should:
- Avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived and disclose unavoidable conflicts.
- Refuse gifts, favours, fees, free travel and special treatment, and avoid political and other outside activities that may compromise integrity or impartiality, or may damage credibility.
- Be wary of sources offering information for favours or money; do not pay for access to news. Identify content provided by outside sources, whether paid or not.
- Deny favoured treatment to advertisers, donors or any other special interests, and resist internal and external pressure to influence coverage.
The European Federation of Journalists’ rules also point out the importance of their journalists’ independence (Sect.3 [c]), ‘to promote and defend freedom of information, media freedom and pluralism and independence of journalism’.
According to the American Press Institute (API), ‘independence is a cornerstone of reliability’ (2023), setting out the elements of journalism as defined by Kovach and Rosenstiel (2021):
On one level, it means not becoming seduced by sources, intimidated by power, or compromised by self-interest. On a deeper level it speaks to an independence of spirit and an open-mindedness and intellectual curiosity that helps the journalist see beyond his or her own class or economic status, race, ethnicity, religion, gender or ego. (API 2023:n.p.)
Kovach and Rosenstiel (2021) argue that journalistic independence is vitally linked to serving society and its citizens:
Allegiance to citizens is the meaning of what we have come to call journalistic independence … the phrase has often been used as a synonym for other ideas, including disengagement, disinterestedness, detachment, or neutrality. These other terms, ironically, have tended to create confusion and to reflect a fuzzy understanding of what the intellectual independence of journalism really means. Professional journalists contributed to their woes by passing that confusion on to the public, and citizens have understandably become skeptical, even cynical and angry, as a result.
That journalists’ primary commitment is to the public is a deeply felt tradition among both journalists and citizens. (pp. 79–80)
Kovach and Rosenstiel (2021:80) refer to research by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press and the Committee of Concerned Journalists, which found that more than 80% listed ‘making the reader/listener/viewer your first obligation’ as a ‘core principle of journalism’ (Pew Research Center 1999:n.p.).
Commercial and personal interests of media owners and journalists often threaten this independence of journalists; the Wall Street Journal rewrote its ethical code of conduct in the 1980s after one of its columnists engaged in insider trading (Lewin 1986:n.p.). The redrafted code emphasised (Kovach & Rosenstiel 2021):
[T]he central premise of this code is that Dow Jones’ reputation for quality and for the independence and integrity of our publications is the heart and soul of our enterprise … Dow Jones cannot prosper if our customers cannot assume that … our analyses represent our best independent judgments rather than our preference, or those of our sources, advertisers or information providers. (p. 83)
Traditionally, a wall exists ‘between advertising and the news side of media organizations’ (Craig 2004:233) but sustaining this wall to prevent commercial interests from interfering with independent editorial decision-making and reporting has become increasingly difficult with the growth of the internet as news media platform and subsequent establishment of social media eating advertising revenue from traditional media (Underwood 1993). As Soley and Craig (1992) and Soley (1997) have determined in surveys, ‘businesses do use their advertising dollars to threaten media and do withdraw advertising to respond to content they do not like’ (Craig 2004:233–234).
The independence building block of journalism is summarised by Bob Woodward, one of the reporters whose investigation into the Watergate burglary in 1972 led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon 2 years later: ‘Good work is always done in defiance of management’ (AZ Quotes n.d.a; Smith 2019). This independence also means that journalists should have no conflicts of interest when reporting, as bluntly illustrated by Rosenthal: ‘OK, the rule is, you can [make love to] an elephant if you want to, but if you do you can’t cover the circus’ (AZ Quotes n.d.b).
In summary, as the Civil Liberties Union for Europe (2021) defines it:
Independent journalism, also called independent media, refers to any news media that is free from influence by the government or other external sources like corporations or influential people. This includes television, newspapers, radio and online journalism. It means that journalists feel no pressure to shape or sanitize their reporting, even if it may negatively portray the government or other power entities, even the owner of the news outlet or other individuals. Independent journalism allows unvarnished facts to be shared with the public so that it may use the information to help them decide on important issues, like which politicians or policies to support or which companies are acting ethically and thus deserve their business. (n.p.)
The sceptic public forum provider and critical thinker
The Hutchins Commission (as referenced in Nordenstreng 1997 and Blevins 1997) emphasised the role of the news media nearly three-quarters of a century ago ‘as common carriers of public discussion’, by providing ‘a forum for the exchange of comment and criticism’ (Blevins 1997:n.p.). This building block of journalism is based on an essential obligation for the news media to provide a platform for debate in society:
The news media have undergone radical changes since the last decades of the 20th century, especially after social media entered the public arena of news and information, as Kovach and Rosenstiel (2021:196) sets out the idea of the media as providers of a public forum of debate. With the reporting of details of events, the disclosure of wrongdoing, or the outlining of a developing trend, news sets people to wondering. A modern media culture re-creates over long distances something similar to the face-to-face forum in the Athenian agora and the Roman markets where the world’s earliest democracies were formed.
Kovach and Rosenstiel point out that ‘[N]ew technology has made the forum more robust and journalism less paternal’, and because of this, has taken on an asynchronous nature (2021):
In many ways the notion that there is something that can be called a general news cycle has become impossible. The real issue is not that the news cycle is continuous but that it is asynchronous. We do not learn at the same time. Each of us has a personal news cycle, and it may change day to day, based on our own behavior, our personal community of friends, the network of people we follow, and some element of randomness. And while that was to a lesser degree always true, now the speed and variation of our digital media culture mean we never catch up. The concept of taking stock, of determining what facts are in evidence, established and vetted, is complex to the point of seeming obsolete. Everything is in motion, since each of us is learning in a different individualized space and at a different time. Any stock taking must be personal and individualized as well. Our asynchrony is constant. (p. 197)
In this regard, the news media advance debate as part of the ‘public sphere’ as formulated by Habermas (1989):
The bourgeois public sphere may be conceived above all as the sphere of private people come together as a public; they soon claimed the public sphere regulated from above against the public authorities themselves, to engage them in a debate over the general rules governing relations in the basically privatized but publicly relevant sphere of commodity exchange and social labour. (p. 305)
Journalists do not stand outside this debate but are often leading it, expressing views on the facts, acting as facilitators and interpreters of public issues. This brings the question of the three key aims of objectivity in journalism to the fore, as Dennis (Dennis & Merrill 1984) formulate it:
- Separating facts from opinion.
- Presenting an emotionally detached view of the news.
- Striving for fairness and balance. (p. 111).
The aim of this study is not to analyse whether journalists are objective, as part of one building block of journalism, by their provision of a public forum; objectivity, as pointed out by Maras (2013:8) ‘is clearly multi-faceted. It is, as a result, often articulated in a cluster of terms such as impartiality, neutrality, accuracy, fairness, honesty, commitment to the truth, depersonalization and balance’. Maras (2013:9) refers to Schiller’s terms about objectivity (1981:196), that it is ‘“polysemic” or has many possible meanings, and, furthermore, is open to different activations’, also that its transparency makes objectivity not easy to understand. Schiller refers to the ‘universality’ of objectivity ‘as an ideal’ which ‘might shield open disparities in its application and interpretation’ (p. 196).
Summarising, Maras (2013:9) states that ‘perhaps [this] accounts for why it is difficult to have a final word on objectivity, and why discussion of it is on-going’; also, that ‘[I]f objectivity in journalism was a river, it would have many tributaries’ (Maras 2013:56).
Kovach and Rosenstiel (2021:23) describe the last three elements of journalism as the craft that must provide a forum for public criticism and compromise; it must strive to make the significant interesting and relevant; and it must report news in a way that is comprehensive. For journalism to assemble these building blocks, their practitioners need to have knowledge gluttons and distributors, as aptly described by Benjamin Franklin as far back as 1729 (Poynter Report, Spring 1998):
[A]n editor should be qualified with an extensive acquaintance with languages, a great easiness and command of writing and relating things clearly and intelligibly, and in a few words; he should be able to speak of war both by land and by sea; be well acquainted with geography, with the history of the time, with the several interests of princes and states, the secrets of courts, and the manners and customs of all nations. (p. 4)
For journalism to fulfil this function of providing a channel to knowledge, its reporters need to be critical thinkers who can separate the wheat from the chaff, to recognise what is significant, and to give context so that news is presented in a comprehensive way. In this way, journalism acts as agents of cultural and political socialisation, supplementing and adding to the role the medium of books can play as socialisation agents, as set out in the early 20th century by A.H. Thorndike and F.T. Baker. They published a series of Everyday Classics to expose young children to cultural literacy, as quoted by Hirsch (1987):
The educational worth of such materials calls for no defence. In an age when the need of socializing and unifying our people is keenly felt, the value of a common stock of knowledge, a common set of ideals is obvious. (pp. 131–132)
This ‘common stock of knowledge’ that journalism should provide in its daily reporting, requires that journalists should be critical thinkers who understand the world and the environment in which they operate, to have a framework of cultural and historical reference about the people and issues that are the focus of their reporting. Referring to foreign correspondents, Starck and Villanueva (1993) emphasise that journalism needs correct cultural framing:
Background, education, understanding, fairness, depth, sensitivity – all these elements … figure in cultural framing. As the world continues to implode, it is incumbent that we try to understand better than we do know what happens in the cultural framing process and suggest ways that those who interpret other cultures for us may do so with greater care and concern. (p. 28)
A broad general knowledge is required for the practitioners of journalism to report about what is becoming a world ever-growing in complexity, summarised by the evolutionary scientist Phillip Tobias (pers. comm., 07 September 2006) that ‘[J]ournalists must be amphibious people, able to swim in the sciences and walk in the arts. Only by reading enough can they fulfil this goal’.
Journalism’s ‘first rough draft of history’ (Barth 1943; Graham 1953) cannot be a stable building block; the building block is strengthened when its practitioners are students of history, studying what ‘man has done to discover what man is’ (Schama 1992:65). This requires critical thinking by journalists, to interpret their times considering the past, a never-ending curiosity to want to know, scepticism about any claim, and a driving desire to find out what is going on in the world, applying the words of Bertrand Russell, ‘what is wanted is not the will-to-believe but the wish to find out, which is the exact opposite’ (1922:n.p.)
This building block of journalism consists of all the attributes and components of science; journalists and scientists have much in common (Colón-Ramos, Kirschner & Rather 2018):
Both disciplines are about observing the world, questioning the unknown and collecting facts. Both scientists and journalists know their work is built on the work of others and they must find a way to share their discoveries. Scientists may tell their stories in papers they publish to share with their colleagues in the field. Journalists may tell their stories in print, radio or film, often trying to reach as wide an audience as possible. But the mission is the same. Knowledge can only have an impact if others hear about it. (n.p.)
Furthermore, journalists ‘play an important role in disseminating scientific information, often acting as a bridge between the scientific community and the general public’ (Faburrieta 2017:n.p.). Unfortunately, science writers in the media are seldom given the same status as, for example, other fields in the profession. As Stewart (1991:4) points out, ‘… the science writer should be elevated to the same status as the political correspondent’.
Science and journalism are both built on scepticism to question, to weigh evidence, and this sceptic building block is accompanied by a switched-on ‘baloney detection kit’ (Sagan 1997:196).
Altschull (1990) describes the chief task of the sceptic as being:
[D]efined in terms of asking questions. Only by posing questions can one approach the truth about the facts. The image of the investigative journalist is that of the sceptical watchdog par excellence. He or she trust no one who cannot document his case with verifiable evidence. Truth can be arrived at only by empirical – that is to say, verifiable – proof. Facts are sacred, but first they must be verified. (p. 335)
Finally, Sagan’s (1997) description of science can just as much be applicable to journalism’s building block of truth-telling:
[… A]t the heart of science is an essential balance between two seemingly contradictory attitudes – an openness to new ideas, no matter how bizarre or counterintuitive, and the most ruthlessly sceptical scrutiny of all ideas, old and new. This is how deep truths are winnowed from deep nonsense. (p. 287)
The socially responsible communicator
Journalists are often accused, because of their Fourth Estate role in society, as standing outside of their social environment, as aloof and objective observers, practicing a form of moral spectatorship (Stoker 1995:11). Ryan (2001) contests this, commenting that:
[O]bjective journalists are not moral spectators, unless one defines objective only as uncritically presenting two sides of a story. In fact, it is the moral duty of objective journalists to collect and to disseminate the in-formation a community needs to make sound decisions. Objective journalists evaluate the veracity of all information, and they do reveal the superior sides of issues (when one side is, in fact, superior) by disseminating objective reports. It is a cliché, but the facts do speak for themselves. If one side is more compelling, that is apparent from the objective journalist’s report. It is not necessary or desirable for the journalist to become an advocate for that position. Objective journalists do not permit their employers to assume responsibility for their news reports or actions, as the Commission on Freedom of the Press (1947) asserted. They feel an ethical obligation to disseminate stories that describe reality as accurately as possible, and they are true to the highest standards of objective journalism – regardless of their employers’ “views”. (pp. 7–8)
Over the past century, the role of the media in society has been extensively researched. In their Four Theories of the Press, Siebert, Peterson and Schramm (1956) formulated the social responsibility concept of the media. Nordenstreng (1997, [author’s added emphasis]) refers to the social responsibility paradigm of journalists as being part of active citizenship, first proposed by the Hutchins Commission (1947), as follows:
[T]hat freedom of expression was not an inalienable natural right but an earned moral right, with obligations beyond self-interest […] Thus news becomes an agent of community formation, the goal of reporting being active citizenship, instead of abundant information. (p. 108)
In the discussion earlier about the basic building block of journalism as providing a public forum for debate, reference was made to the Hutchins Commission’s fifth recommendation that ‘agencies of mass communication accept the responsibility of common carriers of information and discussion’ (Blevins 1997:n.p.). This ‘became the basis of the concept of social responsibility’ (Rantanen 2017:3465). Rantanen (2017:3465) observes that the commission ‘indirectly introduces here, in the form of social responsibility theory, the role of the press as a kind of a public sphere’.
The South African Press Code emphasises the media as serving society, journalists’ ‘work … guided at all times by the public interest’ (Press Code of Ethics and Conduct for South African Print and Online Media 2020; Press Council of South Africa 2020). This social responsibility of the media is embedded in their ethical codes in which journalists accept accountability for their reporting. Referring to Section 16 of the South African Constitution’s Bill of Rights, the Press Code lists the freedom of expression rights, and then describes the media as striving ‘to hold these rights in trust for the country’s citizens’ (Press Code of Ethics and Conduct for South African Print and Online Media 2020; Press Council of South Africa 2020), thereby enforcing its social responsibility role in society.
The social responsibility of the news media also entails that reporting should be fair, ‘avoiding unnecessary harm, reflecting a multiplicity of voices in [their] coverage of events, showing a special concern for children and other vulnerable groups, and exhibiting sensitivity to the cultural customs of their readers and the subjects of their reportage…’ (Press Code of Ethics and Conduct for South African Print and Online Media 2020; Press Council of South Africa 2020). This is set out in detail in section 3 of the South African Press Code under the heading ‘Privacy, Dignity and Reputation’.
The news media’s social responsibility role in society is integrally linked to the trust citizens have in journalists to report the news accurately, truthfully and fairly, but ‘the public’s low level of trust in the mainstream media is of deep concern for the future of journalism’ (Salamone 2021:n.p.).
The news media’s ethical codes have been one way for the public to trust journalists’ reporting, mainly through an ombudsman/public editor/readers’ editor system. Unfortunately, this accountability mechanism to apply the principles of these codes has been scaled down (Salamone 2021:n.p.), even disappearing at some news media where previously such positions of accountability were part of the channel through which the public could communicate to editors about their distrust or dissatisfaction with reporting. As Dvorkin (n.d.) emphasises:
Trust is the essential lubricant that allows citizens to believe that their medium of choice is credible and reliable, even when they may disagree with the journalism. Trust is the common currency that media organizations require for their continued credibility. (p. 21)
The self-regulating system of the news media in countries where a free media environment forms part of democratic governments is part and parcel of the social responsibility function of the news media to create trust in the news media.
This trust in the media is challenged by high exposure of disinformation, and in Africa, for example, ‘trust in social and national media is low’ (Madrid-Morales et al. 2021; Wasserman & Madrid-Morales 2019:107). To keep the public informed with trusted and correct information is mainly the responsibility of the news media, as various research polls have shown: 53% of respondents in a Pew Research Center poll, said journalists have the most responsibility to counter disinformation (Mitchell et al. 2019:n.p.). Similarly, a poll by NPR, PBS NewsHour and the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion (Tardáguila, Funke & Benkelman 2020:n.p.) found that the main responsibility for countering disinformation lies with the news media (39%), technology companies (18%), the government (15%) and the public (12%).
By introducing and applying an ombud system, the news media should apply their socially responsible commitment ‘to making journalism better by letting the public inside the process of information gathering, editing and distribution. There can be no finer goal’ (Dvorkin n.d.:7). Their first loyalty to citizens (Kovach & Rosenstiel 2021:22) can hereby be fulfilled.
Conclusion
The building blocks of journalism identified in this study are five fundamental parts of the structure on which the profession rests: the watchdog (guardian) block, the truth-telling block, the independent reporter block, the block of a sceptic public forum provider and critical thinking channel, and the socially responsible communicator block. These blocks don’t exist in isolation and fit together as a unit, cemented by ethical practices; when the latter is absent or neglected as building material, journalism fails to be trusted by the public and the building faces collapse.
Finally, the words of the American architect Frank Lloyd Wright that ‘form and function should be one, joined in a spiritual union’ (Guggenheim.org n.d.), are also very applicable to journalism and its architecture.
Acknowledgements
Competing interests
The author declares that they have no financial or personal relationships that may have inappropriately influenced them in writing this article.
Author’s contributions
G.C. is the sole author of this research article.
Ethical considerations
This article followed all ethical standards for research without direct contact with human or animal subjects.
Funding information
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or non-profit sectors.
Data availability
Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no new data were created or analysed in this study.
Disclaimer
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and are the product of professional research. It does not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any affiliated institution, funder, agency or that of the publisher. The authors are responsible for this article’s results, findings and content.
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Footnote
1. Having entered upon the honour, he first of all instituted that the daily acts of both the senate and the people should be recorded and published.
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