Shifting foundations

Journalism and the power of the ‘common good

Bibliographic Data

ID7477323
AuthorsKarl He (0000-0003-3027-7492, Deakin University, corresponding author)
Year2016
Volume18
Issue7
Pages801-816
Publication date2016-02-02
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournalism (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1464-8849 • E-ISSN: 1741-3001
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/1464884915627149
OpenAlexW2400153194
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited43

This essay rethinks the relationship between news media and the universal notion of the ‘common good’ as a key foundational concept for journalism studies. It challenges dominant liberal democratic theories of the press linked to the idea of the ‘public good’ to offer a new way of conceptualizing news media’s relationship to civic life that incorporates power and legitimacy in the changing media world. In doing so, it argues current understandings of journalism’s relationship to the common good also require some re-alignment. The essay draws on Pierre Bourdieu to contend the common good can be understood as a global doxa – an unquestionable orthodoxy that operates as if it were objective truth – across wider social space. How this is carried out in practice depends on the specific context in which it is understood. It positions the common good in relation to news media’s symbolic power to construct reality and argues certain elites generate and reinforce their legitimacy by being perceived as central to negotiating understandings of the common good with links to culture, community and shared values

Common good · Context (archaeology · Democracy · Doxa · Epistemology · Journalism · Legitimacy · Media studies · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Relation (database · Sociology · Symbolic power · Media Studies and Communication · Social and Cultural Dynamics · Social Media and Politics · Law

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