Almost 200 journalism outlets closed, decreased their service, ended print editions, or merged with other newsrooms between January 2019 and Februrary 2021, accelerated by the COVID-19 crisis. Regional news outlets were among the hardest hit, intensifying calls for effective government policy and industry interventions to bolster the sector. Although there is a well-established tradition of local and regional journalistic role performance scholarship, few studies in an Australian context have taken a multiplatform approach, investigating the perceptions of TV, radio, online news, and print journalists. To help address this gap, this paper draws on survey data of 307 regional Australian journalists and 31 in-depth interviews. Our analysis reveals differences in the way regional reporters understand and narrate their roles, highlighting important distinctions between media platforms that need to be considered in contemporary debates about the sustainability of Australian regional journalism.
AbernathyPM (2018) The Expanding News Desert. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
2.
ACCC (2019) Digital Platforms Inquiry: Final Report. Australian Competition and Consumer Commission: Sydney.
3.
BourdieuP (1986) The forms of capital. In: JRichardson (ed) Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education. New York: Greenwood Press:241–258.
4.
BowdK (2007) A voice for the community: local newspaper as local campaigner. Australian Journalism Review29(2): 77–89.
5.
BowdK (2011) Reflecting regional life: localness and social capital in Australian country newspapers. Pacific Journalism Review17(2): 72–91.
6.
BowdK (2017) Keeping it local: News themes on regional newspaper front pages. Australian Journalism Review39(1): 63–76.
7.
BowdK (2021) Re-focusing on the local: news start-ups, community engagement and social capital. Australian Journalism Review43(1): 63–79.
8.
CarsonAMullerDMartinJ, et al. (2016) A new symbiosis? Opportunities and challenges to hyperlocal journalism in the digital age. Media International Australia161(1): 132–146.
9.
CohenBC (1963) The Press and Foreign Policy. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
10.
DawsonNMolitoriszSRizoiuMA, et al. (2021) Layoffs, inequity and COVID-19: A longitudinal study of the journalism jobs crisis in Australia from 2012 to 2020. Journalism.February(Online First): 1–19. DOI: 1464884921996286.
11.
EwartJ (2000) Capturing the heart of the region: How regional media define a community. Transformations1(1): 1.
12.
EwartJMasseyBL (2005) ‘Local (people) mean the world to US’: Australia’s regional newspapers and the ‘closer to Readers’ assumption. Media International Australia Incorporating Culture and Policy115(1): 94–108.
13.
FentonNMetykovaMScholsbergJ, Freedman D. (2010) Meeting the Needs of Local Communities. Media Trust: Millbank, London
14.
FranklinB (2006) Local Journalism and Local Media: Making the Local News. London and New York: Routledge.
15.
FrayPGiotisC (2019) Regional News Media: State of Play. University of Technology Sydney. Centre for Media Transition.
16.
GaoPLeeCMurphyD (2020) Financing dies in darkness? The impact of newspaper closures on public finance. Journal of Financial Economics135(2): 445–467.
17.
HanitzschTHanuschFRamaprasadJ, et al. (2019) Worlds of Journalism: Journalistic Cultures Around the Globe. New York: Columbia University Press.
18.
HanitzschTVosTP (2017) Journalistic roles and the struggle over institutional identity: The discursive constitution of journalism. Communication Theory27(2): 115–135.
19.
HanitzschTVosTP (2018) Journalism beyond democracy: A new look into journalistic roles in political and everyday life. Journalism19(2): 146–164.
20.
HanuschF (2013) Journalists in times of change: evidence from a new survey of Australia’s journalistic workforce. Australian Journalism Review35(1): 29–42.
21.
HanuschF (2015) A different breed altogether? Distinctions between local and metropolitan journalism cultures. Journalism Studies16(6): 816–833.
HarteDHowellsRWilliamsA (2019) Hyperlocal Journalism: The Decline of Local Newspapers and the Rise of Online Community News. Abingdon, UK; New York: Routledge.
24.
HellmuellerLMelladoC (2015). Professional roles and news construction: A media sociology conceptualization of journalists’ role conception and performance. Communication and Society28(3): 1–11.
25.
HessK (2016) Power to the virtuous? Civic culture in the changing digital terrain. Journalism Studies17(7): 925–934.
26.
HessK (2020) New approach needed to save rural and regional news providers in Australia. Alfred Deakin Institute Policy Briefing Papers, 1.
27.
HessKWallerL (2014) Geo-social journalism: reorienting the study of small commercial newspapers in a digital environment. Journalism Practice8(2): 121–136.
28.
HessKWallerL (2017) Local Journalism in a Digital World. London and New York: Palgrave MacMillan.
29.
HessKWallerL (2019) Hyperlocal journalism. In T Vos and F Hanusch (Eds) The International Encyclopedia of Journalism Studies. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Chichester: 1–6. DOI:10.1002/9781118841570.iejs0136
30.
HessKWallerLJ (2021) Local newspapers and coronavirus: Conceptualising connections, comparisons and cures. Media International Australia178(1): 21–35.
31.
JenkinsJJeronimoP (2021) Changing the beat? local online newsmaking in Finland, France, Germany, Portugal, and the UK. Journalism Practice, 15(9): 1222-123.
32.
JenkinsJNielsenR (2020) Proximity, public service, and popularity: A comparative study of how local journalists view quality news. Journalism Studies, 21(2): 236–253.
33.
KirkpatrickR (1998) Shield of the people? The provincial press and the fourth estate. Australian Journalism Review20(1): 82–101.
34.
MagasicMHessK (2021) Mining a news desert: The impacts of a local newspaper’s closure on political participation and engagement in the rural Australian town of lightning ridge. Australian Journalism Review43(1): 99–114.
35.
MelladoCVan DalenA (2014) Between rhetoric and practice: explaining the gap between role conception and performance in journalism. Journalism Studies15(6): 859–878.
36.
O’HaraS (2020) What can we learn from independent family-owned local media groups?Ch 22, In: AGulyasDBaines (eds) The Routledge Companion to Local Media and Journalism. Abingdon, UK; New York: Routledge: 226–234.
37.
ParkSFisherCMcGuinnessK, et al. (2021) Digital News Report: Australia 2021. News and Media Research Centre, University of Canberra, Australia.
38.
PetersonE (2019) Not dead yet: political learning from newspapers in a changing media landscape. Political Behavior43(1): 1–23.
39.
PIJI (2021) The Australian newsroom mapping project. Public Interest Journalism Initiative, Melbourne, Australia. https://piji.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/anmp-report-feb-2021.pdf
40.
PutnamR (2000) Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. New York; London: Simon & Schuster.
41.
RichardsI (2013) Beyond city limits: regional journalism and social capital. Journalism14(5): 627–642.
42.
RossALesterLKonkesC (2021) Audience perspectives on paying for local news: A regional qualitative case study. Journalism Studies22(8): 1066–1082.
43.
SchiffrinA (2021) Media Capture: How Money, Digital Platforms, and Governments Control the News. New York; Chichester, West Sussex: Columbia University Press.
44.
SimonsMBoslandJ (2019) From journal of record to the 24/7 news cycle: perspectives on the changing nature of court reporting in Australia. In: The Routledge Companion to Local Media and Journalism. Abingdon, UK; New York: Routledge, 1–10.
45.
WeaverDHWilhoitGC (1986) The American Journalist: A Portrait of U.S. News People and Their Work. Bloomington, Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
46.
WeaverDHWilhoitGC (1996) The American Journalist in the 1990s: U.S. News People at the End of an Era. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum.
47.
ZionLSherwoodMO’DonnellP, et al. (2016) ‘It has a bleak future’: The effects of job loss on regional and rural journalism in Australia. Australian Journalism Review38(2): 115–128.
