One
measure of quality election reporting is impartiality. Impartial reporting is
closely related to accuracy. Accurate reporting is a precondition to
impartiality; however, it is not a sufficient alone. One-sided reporting that
conveys the position of a favoured party or candidate without reporting
alternative positions is biased election coverage. A news story that includes
different points of view is always going to be a stronger and more balanced
one.
It is
sometimes a challenge for media to establish balance within a particular story.
For example, a journalist may be assigned to a particular party campaign and
will not have opportunity to seek comment from other parties. In such cases,
editors are responsible to make sure that different party positions on the same
issue are reported. This is done by
compiling composite stories or by running parallel stories that portray the
different positions.
One
characteristic of impartial election coverage is separation of fact and
comment. In other words, if a journalist or editor expresses his or her own
opinion, it should be labelled as such. This applies even to campaign
journalism. A media outlet may endorse a candidate, party, or political
position however they impartial election coverage obliges coverage still be
accurate, even when such accuracy may undermine that endorsement. This ethical
obligation lies with individual journalists and editors, as well as with higher
management of a media outlet.
So is
it ethical for journalists and editors to voice opinions? Generally speaking,
credible newspapers – both print and online – will often have opinion sections
in which editors and others make statements of their views, often clearly in
favour of a particular party or candidate. According to an NDI media monitoring
manual, “[i]n many countries, there are a large number of private newspapers
and magazines that present a wide variety of political views. Political parties
may even print and distribute newspapers to present their views”[i]
none of which is fundamentally unethical so long as readers know the source of
the content and are provided with a range of options and perspectives. For
example, the highly respected international news magazine The Economist frequently endorses a particular candidate, for
example Barack Obama in the US in 2008 and Nicolas Sarkozy in France in 2012.
When
it comes to bias, expectations differ for public media (particularly public
radio and television stations) and print media. Public broadcast media is
usually expected to provide a wider range of views and less editorial content.
This is because public media are owned by the public, often have a large
national audience, and can be quite influential, particularly in contexts where
audiences have limited choices, including limited access to new media.
Finally,
an important measure of journalists’ impartiality is that they do not hold
prominent office in any political party or movement. Journalists are as
entitled as anyone else to political beliefs and loyalties, however any
work-related affiliation to politics will compromise a journalist's credibility
as an impartial chronicler of events.
It
goes without saying that the acceptance of bribes is neither responsible nor
impartial journalism. Yet this topic
warrants special attention due to the prevalence of bribery in electoral
processes and in journalism in general. While “cash for coverage” may be a
conventional form of bribery, other forms exist that do not involve exchanges
of money. These other manifestations of
bribery may be subtle, such as provision of transportation, resources, or
gifts.
Here are a few examples
of media bribery. These have been drawn directly from a report by the Center
for International Media Assistance (CIMA), Cash
for Coverage: Bribery of Journalists Around the World:
In South Africa, a journalist admitted in an affidavit that he
and several others had set up a media relations firm that received cash
payments for helping an African National Congress official in his struggles
with party rivals…he described receiving payments of 5,000-10,000 South African
Rand…He understood, he said, that he “could not write negative reports about
[the candidate] or his allies.”
[…] In Lebanon, “the practice
of ‘gifting’ journalists remains widespread… “Certain politicians have a budget
for bribes. Depending on your rank and the media you work for, it could be a
car or a laptop.” [ii]
It is poor practice for
journalists to accept any form of inducement in exchange for writing favourable
reports of politicians or prominent individuals. Just as equally, promising
negative or no coverage of opposing candidates is also unethical. Some of the
ways in which cash-strapped media organisations have tried to overcome the
problem of inducement are through: enforcing strict hiring and firing policies
that prohibit journalists from receiving bribes; providing ethics training for
all staff members; providing non-salary incentives to compensate poorly-paid
journalists (for example training programmes and other professional
development); advocacy for investment in, and donor funding of, media and media
development. In addition, press councils and media ombudsman can uphold a code
of ethics that contains measures for sanctioning journalists who accept
bribes. Furthermore, stakeholders are
beginning to increase advocacy for salary transparency within the media
sector. Overall, international advocacy
and recognition of the seriousness and pervasiveness of bribery of media has
increased substantially in recent years.
[i] Robert Noris, Media Monitoring to Promote Democratic
elections: an NDI handbook for citizen organizations, (Washington DC:
National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, 2002), 3
[ii] Bill Ristow, Cash for Coverage: Bribery of Journalists
Around the World, (Washington DC: National Endowment for Democracy, 2010),
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