The production of a newspaper interview: Following the story at the business desk of a Dutch daily

Abstract

Based on 4 years of work experience in a newsroom, this article analyses in detail how news interviews are produced at the business desk of a Dutch daily newspaper. It focuses on the power dynamics, multiple social interactions and reciprocal exchanges which govern its production. The main case is an interview conducted with the president of the European Central Bank. Decomposing the production process in three stages (arranging an interview, conducting and publishing it), the article ‘follows the story’ from the beginning to end. In particular, it shows how the power balance between journalist and source shifts during the production process, how the outcome of the interview is governed by a range of relations other than the one between interviewer and interviewee and how conflicts over interview authorization are solved and social ties reproduced through opportunistic reciprocity between the journalist and his source.