Selling out to the market

Abstract

Trust in the media is beginning to occupy journalists more than it did, writes commentator and press critic Lloyd. For a long time - and even now - we have been more concerned about our independence. We should be concerned to maintain independence, but in settled, rich democracies it's not fundamentally at issue. We can have it if we want it: though it may entail some sacrifices. What is more urgent is the power of the media, and the effect of media on society. In the news business - the part of the media often seen as its moral and social edge - we haven't thought much about, or debated, that. There is growing in Europe, and there is already in the United States, a determination to examine the practices of the media by the practitioners themselves - in alliance with those outside the profession who are interested in its future. That will mean, I believe, the creation of institutes or departments which, rather than teach journalism in a normative way in order to fit students for a career in broadcasting or public relations, study and argue about the role of journalism in societies, and how it can fulfil that role.