News values: Ideas for an information age
By Jack Fuller
University of Chicago Press, 1996. 251 pp. $41 (hb)
Reviewed by Dot Tumney
This is probably where Mediawatch would like to spend more of its time if there wasn't so much tabloid crap requiring demolition. Jack Fuller is the president and publisher of the Chicago Tribune as well as being a lawyer and novelist. The role of broad coverage mass market newspapers is the focus.
The primary lack in the information age is the lack of coherence and knowledge acquisition. The collection of assorted isolated facts does not increase functional capacity except, perhaps, in Trivial Pursuit games.
Basically it is a discussion of the quality newspaper as a saleable product which people buy for its perspectives, differentiation between news and polemic and the overall picture, lost in the current addiction to the live cross and the sound bite.
Fuller feels that a free society (the USA in his argument) needs a comprehending citizenry to function properly. It does, of course, but I doubt his contention that a comprehending citizenry would be a massive asset to the present order. The incestuous relation between the powerful and those who report on them is, not surprisingly, diminishing press credibility and increasing cynicism about "the political process". The citizenry comprehend enough not to take the game seriously, and it's a major problem to bring them back into the fold.
Media discussion/criticism in this country hasn't got past twitterings about objectivity and neutrality either. I was interested by Fuller's dismissal of these as an absolute goal. He discusses instead a commitment to intellectual honesty in factual reporting.
In my opinion there is an awful long way to go, since "balanced" reporting currently means one Lib, one Lab, maybe one ind and only really applies to politics (parliamentary definition). "Neutrality" means agreeing with me — possibly with a few polite reservations; "bias" means agreeing with the other guy — possibly with a few polite reservations. "Objectivity" means not actually stating an opinion, rather than not selecting a slant for the item or avoiding censorship by omission.
Journalism students should definitely study Fuller's book so they might possibly remedy some of the defects of their calling and avoid the scrutiny of Littlemore.
Fuller's definition of a newspaper would not extend to Green Left — fortunately. Its purpose is not to give formal "equal time" to those who already have a voice or even to discuss all the ramifications of a subject. Its purpose is to help to change the world — a goal not at all popular with owners of big commercial newspapers.