You get a phone call. On the other end of the line is a person representing himself as a journalist. Albeit a journalist working for an interest organisation. How do you react?
The situation occurred recently in Brussels, when a part time staff member of the EU lobbywatch-NGO Corporate Europe Observatory CEO contacted Burson-Marsteller, presenting himself as a journalist working for CEO. Following the contact between CEO and Burson-Marsteller, the lobbyist organisation EPACA filed a complained with the European Commission about CEO’s behaviour, which was shortly after turned down. Se all the links below.
Now the interesting thing is, whether this is just a one-off situation, or whether it is a significant one pointing towards a new trend.
What I find striking is not so much the petty skirmish between Burson-Marsteller and CEO, but the comment of the key-figure at CEO, Olivier Hoedeman. In a press release Hoedeman states, that the CEO staff member is “a registered journalist who is employed part-time by CEO for investigative journalistic work”.
Being a journalist myself, I react with goose pimples. Each fibre resists the notion of “investigative journalistic work” pulling the cart of any one-sided interest. Be it as well-intentioned as the lobbywatchers of CEO are in their attempt to map the lobbying structures in the Brussels bubble.
Am I old-fashioned by insisting on journalistic independence?
I have seen quite some journalists, who give up their independence and work for an interest organisation. So far I have called that PR or communication jobs. I also know that journalists on a personal level often face identity questions when switching sides. At the end it is a personal choice that can be challenging and enriching and lead to great results. But is it journalism?
Now recent research about the future of journalism indicates that what happened with the CEO researcher may well have been a first sign of a new trend. The research has been done by the INSEAD business school near Paris, and looks at the future for funding what is called watchdog journalism.
The authors of the study Mark Hunter and Luk Van Wassenhove argue, that due to lack of money watchdog journalism must be expected more and more to be carried out on behalf of stakeholders. In other words on behalf of interest organisations. Such as COE or indeed Burson-Marsteller?
“Our belief is that investigative journalism will grow outside and in parallel with the (newsmedia) industry, and build a new public, before it is widely reintegrated into the industry’s standards as a central mission. (If we are wrong, and the news industry swiftly rebuilds its watchdog capacity, we will be delighted.),” the two authors write.
Indeed, there are problems with funding quality research journalism, which is one of the reasons why we are building new support structures like Journalismfund.eu, where classic editorial independence is safeguarded through a buffer between donors and recipients of working grants. Other non-profit journalism project also work with buffer-models to prevent interference and most importantly to build credibility.
The two researchers however foresee a shift in journalists’ ethics – in other words that’d then help on my goosepimples. They also foresee a shift in readers’ expectations. Instead of offering objectivity, the new interest-paid journalists will offer transparency about their aims.
A very interesting thought indeed.
Hunter and Van Wassenhove analyse the current crisis of many media, its value in terms of money, revenue and power. They observe a growth in stakeholder- and community media during the past years. And most importantly they observe a change in values: Rather than objectivity, transparency now has to sell the news. Stakeholder media target smaller audiences, they are very clear about their aims and they involve their audience by suggesting them to act. Actually there are quite a few examples mentioned, where non-profit journalism which does respect editorial independence from various views, has been rather successful. However the researcher-duo states, that few of these usually journalist-driven projects are really successful when it comes to making good revenue.
Analysing a series of examples – from French Le Canard Enchainé to Greenpeace’s research department – Hunter and Van Wassenhove give a list of suggestions on how the various experimenting groups of investigative journalists as well as how the stakeholder media can organise themselves in order to generate better revenues of their work.
Adopting the analysis of the two INSEAD researchers means to give up the highly debated notion of “objective journalism”. Or rather leaving the notion of attempted objectivity – as pure objectivity is a contradiction in terms whenever a reporter chooses one story rather than another.
The argument of Hunter and Van Wassenhove sounds plausible. It even ends with an optimistic foresight pointing towards a new wave of watchdog journalism. Encouraging.
Now let’s assume their prediction of a shift from attempted objectivity as a credibility tool for broad target groups towards transparency as a credibility and narrow target groups comes true. Transparency is indeed an essential tool for credibility, and there is room for improvement also under the current “attempted objectivity” set up. Readers can think for themselves. If they get all the information, they will be able to make their own analysis.
But let’s not pour the attempt of objectivity out with the bathing water. Just as competition in many cases can be a helpful tool, the striving for objectivity is a helpful, no, an essential tool for journalism. When striving for objectivity journalists are obliged to understand a case or a cause from several sides, not just in the way, they wish to. Thus they have to get themselves a complete picture. If this attempt is abandoned already in the research phase because the researcher neglects thoroughness because of his or her stakeholder background, the quality of the understanding and ultimately the quality of the research is at stake.
Hunter & van Wassenhove: Disruptive News Technologies – Stakeholder Media and the Future of Watchdog Journalism Business Models.
The CEO-EPACA case:
17. March 2010, EPACA complaint to the European Commission
23. March 2010, EUobserver article
29. March 2010, European Commission decision
30. March 2010, Corporate Europe Observatory
31. March 2010, EPACA comment on Commission decision
#1 by Anonymous on April 22, 2010 - 9:35 am
Just because someone is registered as a journalist doesn’t make one’s work journalistic by default.
For instance, I can be a registered journalist and do dentist work for a company. Doesn’t mean that I’m doing “investigative journalism” now does it?
In the case Brigitte is presenting, clearly we’re talking about a PR job.
#2 by Olivier Hoedeman on April 22, 2010 - 11:50 am
Dear Brigitte,
Your comment is written out of concern with the decreasing priority given to in depth investigative journalism in mainstream media, a concern that I very much share. I would however like to make a few comments to set the record straight and avoid that readers get the wrong impression about Corporate Europe Observatory.
You refer to the ill-founded complaint that EPACA, the coalition of large commercial lobby consultancies in Brussels, filed against CEO last month – a complaint that was quickly dismissed by the European Commission. On the basis of this case, it seems, you conclude that journalists working for NGOs don’t deliver on objectivity and quality of research and therefore cannot be described as journalists. I don’t think there’s any factual basis for drawing such conclusions. My colleague, the journalist that you refer to, approached Burson-Marsteller, one of the biggest lobbying consultancies in Brussels, with a very specific question about their lobbying activities on behalf of a government, information that is not available on the company’s website, nor anywhere else in the public domain. The report that has been prepared on the basis of these and many other research efforts is thoroughly researched and well-documented. In my opinion, throwing light on the highly opaque activities of lobbying consultancies in Brussels – including the little-known phenomenon of lobbying for governments – is not a “one-sided interest” but actually a matter of public interest. And a watchdog group employing a journalist part-time to shed light on the little secrets of lobbying in Brussels should really not be a reason for concern.
In CEO we are as worried as you are about the continuous decline in the priority that mainstream media give to investigative journalism. And there many additional problematic aspects to the reporting on EU issues, such as the tunnel vision caused by the strong focus on national angles, the dependency of some EU quarter media on sponsorship by industry lobby groups and the examples of Brussels-based correspondents of major newspapers going through the revolving door to become for profit lobbyists. In fact, these are the kind of things that give me goose pimples.
Olivier Hoedeman, Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO)