Media Ethics 1999 Abstracts
Media Ethics Interest Group
An Intellectual History Of Mass Media Ethics • Clifford Christians and John Nerone, Illinois • Examining the case of the Cincinnati Enquirer’s reporting on Chiquita, we argue that media ethics is challenged to support media critique and political actions. We trace this impasse in media ethics historically, identifying a continuing reliance on utilitarianism and modernist rationalism. We conclude by looking to a dialog among Habermasism discourse ethics, communitarianism and feminism for scholars.
Ethics On Trial: Courts Scrutinize Plaintiff Journalists’ Roles in Defamation Cases • Constance K. Davis, Iowa • Two plaintiff journalists lost defamation cases in 1998. In both cases courts scrutinized the journalists’ ethics and found their actions had helped turn them into limited-purpose public figures. In one case, a photojournalist had taken his concerns about staged photographs in Time magazine to a computer discussion group. In another, a broadcast journalist got into the middle of the failed ATF raid at the Branch Davidian compound, helped move wounded agents and shared his information with other media.
To Council or Not To Council: Debunking Common Myths and Fears About The National News Council • L. Paul Husselbee, Lamar University • Three common assumptions seem to have emerged from speculation about the demise of the National News Council. These assumptions, coupled with journalists’ concerns about news councils in general, are frequently cited as reasons not to consider news councils as a viable mechanism of media accountability. This analysis of the complaints filed with the National News Council finds no evidence to support these assumptions. It suggests that journalists’ traditional “news council phobia” is just that-an irrational fear.
Press, Privacy and Presidential Proceedings: Moral Judgments and the Clinton-Lewinsky Affair • Jennifer L. Lambe, Christina L. Fiebich and Darcia Narvaez, Minnesota • This exploratory study examines the relationship between levels of moral judgment and various attitudes towards the Clinton-Lewinsky affair and subsequent impeachment proceedings. Trends suggest that individuals with higher levels of moral reasoning take a more systemic view of political controversies. Expectations about Presidential competence and character are found to be highly correlated with attitudes concerning the private lives of public officials. Both demographic characteristics and attitudinal variables are shown to be associated with the level of blame assigned to the news media in shaping the Clinton-Lewinsky situation.
Value System Changes Resulting from a Media Ethics Course: A Postmodern Perspective • Larry Z. Leslie, South Florida • This pre- and post-test study examined value system changes resulting from a media ethics course. Over three semesters, seventy-four students participated in the study. They were given Rokeach’s lists of terminal and instrumental values on the first day and again on the last day of class and asked to rank each value on the lists in terms of its importance to them. The study was designed to answer several questions about the degree to which formal instruction in ethics could be influential in students changing the relative importance of several values, particularly those deemed important and less important to contemporary, postmodern culture.
Conservation vs. Dynamism: Five Versions of a Code of Ethics-A Case Study of the Israel Broadcasting Authority • Yehiel Limor, Tel-Aviv University and Ines Gabel, The Open University • The Nakdi Document is the code of ethics and practice of the Israel Broadcasting Authority (‘BA). Since it was drawn up in 1972, the document was updated four times (in 1979, 1985, 1995 and 1998) and expanded fourfold. The significant changes during the years reflect the unique position of the ‘BA as a public broadcasting organization. The research analyses the changes and the political, religious, cultural and professional reasons and circumstances for these changes.
A Research Agenda for Establishing a Grounding for Journalistic Ethics • Dan Shaver, North Carolina-Chapel Hill • The author suggests a model derived from modified professional theory and a set of characteristics for a system of media ethics that may avoid some of the difficulties of traditional approaches. The model proposes the cultivation of a relationship of trust based on bargains between individual news organizations and the immediate public they serve. A six-phase research agenda for testing the basic assumptions and for developing and implementing the model is proposed.
Telling It Like It Is: Letters To The Editor Discuss Journalism Ethics in 10 American Magazines, 1962-1972-1982-1992 • Brian Thornton, Northern Illinois University • This research found that: Negative letters increased from 47% negative in 1962 to 93% negative in 1992; Letters about journalism declined 95 percent during the study period; Themes in the letters changed from ethical concerns about truth to the view that objectivity has been abandoned. These findings add a largely unexplored dimension to the topic of public opinion and press ethics while building on Hazel Dicken-Garcia’s research into letters in the 1800s.
Autonomy and Accountability: Reassessing the National News Council • Erik Ugland, Minnesota • This study examines complaints brought before the National News Council, which operated from 1973 to 1984. It seeks to answer the arguments and assumptions posed by opponents of the Council that the Council was biased against the news media and therefore intruded on their autonomy. It seeks evidence of bias by examining disparities in the success of media respondents versus public complainants and disparities in the voting patterns of individual members of the Council.
Rights, Wrongs and Responsibilities: The Nexus of Law and Ethics in the Newsroom • Paul S. Voakes, Indiana University • How do journalists sort out the tangle of legal rights and ethical responsibilities in their everyday news work? In a survey of 1,037 journalists and in-depth interviews with 22 others, this project found substantial evidence for three models of the relationship of law and ethics: A Separate Realms model, a Correspondence model and a new “Responsibility Model,” in which the law is considered in problematic situations but only as one of several considerations in what is essentially an ethical decision.
Print friendly
