Overshadowed voices in media reporting on truth-telling commissions

Bibliographic Data

ID6442008
AuthorsEli Skogerbø (0000-0001-6803-5021, University of Oslo, corresponding author), Kerry Mccallum (0000-0001-7567-2125, University of Canberra), T Dreher (0000-0003-2403-1007, UNSW Sydney)
Year2024
Volume47
Issue1
Pages96-112
Publication date2024-09-02
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueMedia Culture & Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0163-4437 • E-ISSN: 1460-3675
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/01634437241276125
OpenAlexW4402134060
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited35

Over the past decades, truth-telling commissions aimed at uncovering, confronting and providing justice for the past treatment of children have been established in many countries, including the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse (RCIRCSA 2013-2017) and the Norwegian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) (2018-2023). Journalism plays important roles both in triggering commissions of inquiry and in attracting public attention to their work and findings. This paper investigates media reporting on the RCIRCSA and the TRC. The Commissions were not similar in scale, scope or legal powers, however, they both generated spaces for public listening to stories about the consequences of past policies and present practices of child removal, abuse and racism that potentially could change the grand narratives of each nation. Our findings suggest that future commissions should pay particular attention to the structural power of news logics and mediation. We find, despite the widely different cases, consistent patterns of uneven and hierarchical media reporting and overshadowing of First Nations voices and aspirations

Media studies · Political science · Psychoanalysis · Sociology · Truth telling · Media Studies and Communication · Policy Transfer and Learning · Political Influence and Corporate Strategies · Psychology

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