Local news as political institution and the repercussions of ‘news deserts’: A qualitative study of seven UK local areas

IF 2.7 2区文学 Q1 COMMUNICATION

Journalism Pub Date : 2024-09-01 DOI:10.1177/14648849241272255

Steven Barclay, Steven Barnett, Martin Moore, Judith Townend

{"title":"Local news as political institution and the repercussions of ‘news deserts’: A qualitative study of seven UK local areas","authors":"Steven Barclay, Steven Barnett, Martin Moore, Judith Townend","doi":"10.1177/14648849241272255","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"A transformation in the political economy of local news provision has led to claims that an increasing number of local areas have become ‘news deserts’ – areas that are poorly served or not served at all by professional and dedicated news services (Abernathy, 2022). Such developments have raised widespread concerns about the future health of local democracy. One aspect of local news’ declining capacity that has received little attention to date is the impact on its role as political institution. This paper first examines the impact of changes on those most closely affected by the reduction or closure of UK local news media outlets – the consumers and sources of local news. Through empirical research in 2021-22, the authors explore Cook’s theory of the news media as political institution (2005), by examining local citizens’ experience of – and attitudes towards – their local news outlets, and the extent to which they believe these continue to perform an institutional role. Second, the paper seeks to explore the extent to which other information services – most notably social media and online communities - substitute for the institutional roles of local news outlets. The paper argues that the diminishing role of local news media as political institution has significant political and democratic implications which are not being addressed by policymakers, who are more concerned with the economic interests of corporate media owners than the broader democratic and societal interests of local communities.","PeriodicalId":51432,"journal":{"name":"Journalism","volume":"9 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7000,"publicationDate":"2024-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journalism","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14648849241272255","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"COMMUNICATION","Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Abstract

A transformation in the political economy of local news provision has led to claims that an increasing number of local areas have become ‘news deserts’ – areas that are poorly served or not served at all by professional and dedicated news services (Abernathy, 2022). Such developments have raised widespread concerns about the future health of local democracy. One aspect of local news’ declining capacity that has received little attention to date is the impact on its role as political institution. This paper first examines the impact of changes on those most closely affected by the reduction or closure of UK local news media outlets – the consumers and sources of local news. Through empirical research in 2021-22, the authors explore Cook’s theory of the news media as political institution (2005), by examining local citizens’ experience of – and attitudes towards – their local news outlets, and the extent to which they believe these continue to perform an institutional role. Second, the paper seeks to explore the extent to which other information services – most notably social media and online communities - substitute for the institutional roles of local news outlets. The paper argues that the diminishing role of local news media as political institution has significant political and democratic implications which are not being addressed by policymakers, who are more concerned with the economic interests of corporate media owners than the broader democratic and societal interests of local communities.

查看原文本刊更多论文

作为政治机构的地方新闻与 "新闻沙漠 "的影响：对英国七个地方的定性研究

地方新闻提供的政治经济转型导致越来越多的地方地区成为 "新闻沙漠"--专业和专注的新闻服务很差或根本没有服务的地区（Abernathy，2022 年）。这种情况引起了人们对地方民主未来健康发展的广泛担忧。迄今为止，地方新闻能力下降的一个方面很少受到关注，那就是其作为政治机构的作用所受到的影响。本文首先探讨了这些变化对受英国地方新闻媒体减少或关闭影响最大的群体--地方新闻的消费者和来源--的影响。通过 2021-22 年的实证研究，作者探讨了库克关于新闻媒体作为政治机构的理论（2005 年），研究了当地公民对当地新闻机构的体验和态度，以及他们认为这些机构在多大程度上继续发挥着机构作用。其次，本文试图探讨其他信息服务--尤其是社交媒体和网络社区--在多大程度上替代了地方新闻机构的制度作用。本文认为，地方新闻媒体作为政治机构的作用日益减弱，这对政治和民主产生了重大影响，而决策者却没有意识到这一点，他们更关心的是企业媒体所有者的经济利益，而不是地方社区更广泛的民主和社会利益。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

求助全文

约1分钟内获得全文求助全文

来源期刊

Journalism COMMUNICATION-

CiteScore

7.90

自引率

10.30%

发文量

123

期刊介绍： Journalism is a major international, peer-reviewed journal that provides a dedicated forum for articles from the growing community of academic researchers and critical practitioners with an interest in journalism. The journal is interdisciplinary and publishes both theoretical and empirical work and contributes to the social, economic, political, cultural and practical understanding of journalism. It includes contributions on current developments and historical changes within journalism.