What are Media or Journalism Ethics?

Journalists should be ethical

All forms of journalism should be ethical. This is broadcast journalism.

 Right from the beginning, this blog has been talking of media ethics. While this may sound a common concept it is however worthwhile to discuss ethics at length. The following is a brief account of journalism ethics.

Accuracy, factuality and truthfulness

In its basic sense accuracy means that journalists should capture and present information precisely. This is based on one of the key elements of journalism, which is “its obligation is to tell the truth” (Kovach and Rosentiel, 2007). For a journalist to be accurate it means being factual and truthful. It emphasises that should the journalist get the information from hearsay, he or she should indicate as such otherwise the information would neither be factual or truthful. Franklin et al (2005: 6) state that “at this level, the term accuracy means, for example, that the names of those featured in the piece are spelt correctly, that quotes are reproduced in direct form, or in précis which preserves their meaning, and that events are clearly related”. The essence of it all is that any alteration of whether a name, time or date, venue and/or speech during the summarisation and reproduction of information (to which journalism is subject) (Welsh and Greenwood, 2003: 259-27 in Franklin et al, 2007) results in the prejudice of a concerned party. It is up to the journalist therefore to stand up to the challenge and uphold this principle.

Accountability and transparency

The other key elements of journalism, which form the foundation for this study, are that “journalists’ loyalty is to the citizen” and “the essence of journalism is a discipline of verification” (Kovach and Rosentiel, 2007: 5-10). This means that journalists are accountable to the citizens and they must verify all the information they receive in order to be transparent. According to Bertrand (2003 in Franklin et al, 2005: 5), accountability “describes the variety of means and methods – including press councils, ombudsmen, training in ethics, readership surveys” – which can be used by journalists to verify their information. It means journalists should own up their words once they make mistakes in the process of reporting. In Zimbabwe for instance, the Voluntary Media Council of Zimbabwe (VMCZ) is one body that handles complaints on behalf of journalists who subscribe to it. According to Kovach and Rosentiel (2003 in Franklin et al, 2005), this enhances journalists’ loyalty to the citizens whom they hold in trust (Schuddson, 1998 in McQuail, 2005: 181). Transparency entails allowing all concerned parties to speak on the issue at hand

Impartiality and independency in reporting

In journalism, the principles of impartiality and independence entail balanced reporting and being neutral. This means that all the parties concerned in a story or any piece of journalistic literature are given the platform to speak for themselves (Howard, 2009). Impartiality and independency are rooted on two journalism principles: “its practitioners must maintain an independence from those they cover” and “it must serve as an independent monitor of power” (Kovach and Rosentiel, 2007: 12-20). This means journalists are expected to be independent of their sources of information in order to achieve balance and neutrality. Balance envisages looking for persons of the same prominence for comments, treating them with the same prominence, allocating them the same time (if it is in broadcast) and looking for the same number of people so that they are all equally represented (Wilson, 1996; Harcup, 2004 in Franklin et al, 2007). Wilson (1996: 45 in Franklin et al, 2007: 23) argues that balance means “exploring issues in an uncommitted way so that viewers, listeners appreciate all the important arguments, including the height of support that they enjoy”. Howard (2009: 23) notes that “impartiality also means that the professional journalist is not an active leader in any political group or movement” – he is an independent observer and communicator. McQuail (2010) equates impartiality to equality. By this he means that “no special favour be given by the media to power holders and that access to media be given to contenders for office and, in general, to oppositional or deviant opinions, perspectives as well as established positions” (McQuail, 2010: 196). It also entails the absence of the journalist’s personal feelings in the piece of information. In a nutshell, equality, impartiality and balance all equate to fairness, independence and absence of bias in relaying second hand information to society.

Reference list

Chari, T. J. (2009), New Communication Technologies and Journalism Ethics in Zimbabwe: Practices and Malpractices African Edition, Vol 3 (2): 112-136, [Online] Available: http://www.ojcmt.net/articles/32/326.pdf [Accessed 23 November 2013].

Franklin, B. et al. (2005). Key concepts in Journalism Studies, London: Sage

Howard, R. (2009). Conflict Sensitive Journalism: Special Edition Zimbabwe, Copenhagen: International Media Support.

Kovach, B. and Rosentiel, T. (2007). The Elements of Journalsim: What Newspeople should know and the public should expect. Three Rivers Press, New York

McQuail, D. (2010). McQuail’s Mass Communication Theory. 6^th edition, London: Sage.

Christians, C. (n.d.). Ethical and Normative Perspectives: Chapter One. Available: http://www.sagepub.com/mcquail6/PDF/Chapter%201%20%20The%20SAGE%20Handbook%20of%20Media%20Studies.pdf [Accessed 22 January 2014]