Chapter Outline

Introduction

1. American news organizations seek to make a profit, which leads them to prefer news stories that will attract and hold an audience.
2. The press or the news media consists of news organizations and journalists of either the print media (newspapers and magazines) or the broadcast media (radio and television).
3. Like political parties and interest groups, the press is a key link between the public and its leaders.
4. The chapter begins with a review of the news media's historical development and current tendencies in reporting. It concludes with an analysis of the roles the news media can and cannot perform adequately in the American political system.

The Development of the News Media: From Partisanship to Objective Journalism

1. Early American newspapers were openly partisan, printing party propaganda and being accessible to a small, literate segment of the population.
2. Technological changes such as the invention of the telegraph (1837) and the rotary press (1815) increased circulation and revenues, which gradually freed newspapers from their dependence on government and parties.
3. Yellow journalism, which emphasized disasters, scandals, violence and sensationalism, drew the press away from public responsibility.

The second stage was characterized by objective journalism.

1. Objective journalism was based on reporting "facts" rather than opinions and was "fair" in that it presented both sides of partisan debates.
2. Papers sought to report the news more responsibly and took steps to reduce advertisers' influence on news content.
3. The interpretative style of reporting, in which journalists analyze and explain developments rather than merely report them, enables journalists to shape the news to fit their own views.
4. Development of the broadcast media created a national communication medium. Television followed radio, adding a visual dimension to news and encouraging an interpretive style of reporting. Cable news and radio talk shows have increased the choices available to politically interested members of the public.
5. The Communications Act (1934) requires broadcasters to be licensed by the government and meet certain performance standards. The Federal Communications Commission was established to regulate signal strength, advertising rates and access, and political coverage. Broadcasters have been required to allot political candidates equal opportunities ("equal time") to get on the air.
6. The emergence of the Internet has encouraged political communication among ordinary citizens broadening freedom of the press.

Freedom and Conformity in the U.S. News Media

1. A major contributor to this uniformity is the lack of partisan coverage with the emphasis on objective journalism.
2. Another reason for news uniformity is the small number of news organizations that generate most of the news.
3. Competitive pressures lead producers of news to report the same stories in order to not miss a story covered by others.
4. Shared professional values guide journalists in their search for news, leading them to develop a common understanding of what the news is.
5. Concentration of media ownership may threaten diversity of news coverage and diminish the quality of news content.

The News Media as Link: Roles the Press Can and Cannot Perform

There are three roles the media can play successfully and one for which it is unsuited.

1. The media performs the signaler role when it alerts the public to important developments soon after they happen. Through its agenda setting function the media determines what events will receive the most coverage.
2. The common carrier role of the media enables it to serve as an open channel of communication between political leaders and the public. Whereas public officials try to get the most favorable news coverage they can, the press today is less deferential to political leaders than in the past.
3. The watchdog role of the media encompasses the media's responsibility to protect the public from deceitful, careless, incompetent and corrupt officials. An inherent tension exists between the watchdog role and common-carrier role. The skepticism of the watchdog role emphasizes coverage of "bad news" which feeds negative images of politics and politicians.
4. The public representative role of the media puts it in the position of being a spokesperson for and advocate of the public. Journalists are not well suited for this role because the news media is not subject to the level of public accountability required of a public representative. Secondly, since politics is essentially the mobilization of bias and the press is more interested in presenting dramatic incidents, the press finds it difficult to formulate society's problems in a way that allows citizens to understand and act upon them.

Organizing the Public in the Media Age

1. The media creates a pseudo-community which does not enable citizens to act together effectively to solve problems.
2. The media can raise public consciousness about an issue and can communicate public opinion that has already been formed on an issue.