Professional Models in Journalism

This chapter presents two alternative models which are operative among contemporary working journalists—the "gatekeeper" and the "advocate." It analyses the professional issues associated with these models and their implications for the practice of journalism. Since World War I, journalists have come more and more to consider themselves as professionals and to search for an appropriate professional model. The gatekeeper orientation emphasized the search for objectivity and the sharp separation of reporting fact from disseminating opinion. While there is hardly a one-to-one linkage between political orientation and professional norms, the advocates appear to be concentrated more to the left of the political spectrum than the gatekeepers. The advocate-journalists believe that personal records of income taxes, social security and criminal behaviour should be kept confidential to insure individual privacy. Advocate-journalists have come to think of themselves as conforming to a conception of the legal profession, concerned to speak on behalf of their "client" groups by means of the mass media.

Engineering ethics · Journalism · Media studies · Political science · Public relations · Sociology · Engineering · Media Studies and Communication · Public Relations and Crisis Communication

• Journalismuskultur

  Open Access•Thomas Hanitzsch•Medien & Kommunikationswissenschaft•2007

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