Objectivity – epistemological, ethical and political

The first of these pillars of the modernist profession and practice is, then, the concept of objectivity. Objectivity has had and still has (Wien 2005, Muhlmann 2008) a strong impact on western journalists’ understanding of the journalistic practice and function in society. Though the term ‘objectivity’ may have been changed to the less positivist sounding terms ‘impartiality’ or ‘balanced’ reporting, it is still the legacy of the positivist sciences that sustains journalistic legitimacy (Wien 2005: 13, Anderson and

32 I will use freedom of expression and freedom of speech interchangeably.

Ward 2007: 46, Muhlmann 2008: 10). In these epistemological terms, the Danish scholar of source criticism in journalism, Charlotte Wien (2005), outlines the way in which the concept of objectivity is still present though disputed in journalistic teaching. Sketching a ‘Journalistic Theoretical Map’ (Wien 2005: 13), Wien shows that the twin birth of positivism and mainstream journalism in the late nineteenth century has developed through Scientific Journalism, Precision Journalism and lately Computer-Assisted Reporting, whereas it has been challenged by Public Journalism and New Journalism. The latter two question the primacy of journalistic objective reporting by situating the journalist amidst the society and the story, whereas the types of journalism supported by positivist assumptions extent a belief in the journalist’s objective ability to represent the world ‘as it is’ without affecting it. From the beginning, the aim of journalistic practice included unity of the readership – that is constructing a unified ‘us’. The increase in readership simultaneously brought about an editorial urge to unite this growing readership under the sign of the factual. The press ‘clung to the “facts” so that it could bring together readers who might well have different opinions on a subject, and hence reach a common denominator’ (Muhlmann 2008: 6). The US in the 1960s and 1980s provided journalism with New Journalism and Public Journalism, which may be seen as pockets of resistance to the dominating journalistic concept of objectivity by attempting to decentre the reader rather than unify them (Muhlmann 2008). I will return to this issue throughout this chapter and in chapter 3.

In this section, however, I want to confront the assumptions of modern journalism’s professionalism through a discussion of the underlying principles of the trade. I have chosen to discuss the two major principles of freedom of expression and of objectivity in order to show their abstract nature and the consequences inherent in their character.

Moreover, I want to show that taking these tenets of professional journalism at face value the singular journalist-subject risks displacing the responsibilities of response (Derrida 1992) which are crucially bound up with modern journalistic practice. That is, the ethical self-other relation available to journalistic practice is converted into an overarching moralistic consumption of the other through an appropriation of ‘us’ and

‘them’. What I am proposing instead is a less unifying journalistic practice built on experience, affects and sensibilities. Within the professional modern practice of journalism it is widely accepted that journalistic objectivity is an ideal that cannot be

reached. This is so because facts are sometimes hidden from the journalist or sometimes certain facts are edited away in order to tell a story in a captivating or more comprehensible manner, and so on. If it is agreed that objectivity is unreachable, each journalist-subject should at least strive towards objectivity and hence objectivity is reformulated into a moral concept. The positivist developments and debates within journalism lead to ‘objectivity’ being made synonymous with ‘fairness’ which in turn can be graded (Wien 2005: 9). That is, one can give a more or less fair report and thus be more or less objective. In Denmark one of the university-based facilities that provides training for journalists, the University of Southern Denmark, and which according to Wien makes use of the ideal of scientific, epistemological objectivity in its educational syllabus (Wien 2005: 12), recently developed a professional pledge of responsibility and accountability. This pledge or oath is in line with the Hippocratic Oath for medical doctors and it was developed in order to instil and secure quality and creativity in the journalistic practice and profession.³³ The oath states that the journalist ‘persistently and with an open mind will seek out and communicate the best obtainable version of the truth’.³⁴ The journalism which is produced will be

‘independent’, ‘fair’ and transparent in its methods, the oath proclaims. This is not far from the declaration made by Walter Williams (in 1908)³⁵, which the Centre for Journalism and its students at the University of Southern Denmark kept in mind while developing their own oath. Williams also speaks of ‘accuracy’ and ‘fairness’ and to

‘write only what [the journalist] holds in his heart to be true’. But whereas Williams begins his text by stating that he believes in ‘the profession of journalism’, the Danish students’ pledge emphasises the personal responsibility in their formulations and the fact that journalism is serving the public.³⁶ To the journalist students, then, objectivity is an ethical connection or contract between the journalist and the public provided through the practices of journalism – accuracy and truthfulness. The connection implicitly builds on a common denominator of what is fact and of who ‘we’ are, though this embeddedness goes unrecognised and unmentioned in the pledge described here.

33http://www.sdu.dk/Om_SDU/Institutter_centre/C_Journalistik/Nyt_journalistik/varm_luft_kold_tid.as px (accessed 29 July 2008).

34 The pledge of responsibility is written in Danish. All references to the text in this chapter are translated by me.

35 http://www.sdu.dk/Om_SDU/Institutter_centre/C_Journalistik/Nyt_journalistik/forste_lofte.aspx (accessed 29 July 2008)

36 ‘My journalism exists for the citizens’ (my translation).

Another side to the issue of ethical objectivity centres on the media institutions which employ journalists. By placing emphasis on media institutions’ politico-ethical economic structures in relation to issues of ownership or to the amount of state subsidies received for public service engagements (Anderson and Ward 2007: 45-6) the journalist-subject as an ethical relation is circumscribed and displaced. The displacement neglects to perceive journalistic practice as something which can be culturally, religiously, gendered or ethnically affected on the level of the singular journalist-subject. The journalist-subject is placed within a larger political structure of global capitalism and consumerism which leaves little or no room for journalistic subjectivity.³⁷ In other words, the ethical accountability of the journalist-subject is murky at best, or it is merged with the institution of journalistic practice either as it functions in a given society at large or as a particular and known media institution such as, for instance, Rupert Murdoch’s media group, the BBC or (in more abstract terms) as the Fourth Estate. The function of the idea of the Fourth Estate, Anderson and Ward (2007) remark, may both be understood as a journalistic ‘watchdog’

function, which guards the interest of the people, or it may be seen as a political power on its own, which then – again – begs the question of ethical and epistemological objectivity or bias. Epistemologically, however, the journalist-subject may be seen as failing if s/he writes something that turns out to be incorrect.³⁸ Accuracy in the journalistic production therefore matters (especially to the journalist) but more often than not objectivity in terms of ethical decisions and coverage of cases belongs to the journalist-subject’s employer and his or its politico-economic interests.

It is moreover impossible to discern who the journalist-subject is and to whom s/he is writing. The disembodiedness of the positivistic modern ethical and social contract provides a pretext for the singular journalist-subjects not to be accountable and take responsibility for the relations developed through the journalistic practice. The desire to disembody journalistic practice in order to unite a necessarily very diverse

37 I understand subjectivity to mean a subject which continuously constitutes relations of power. That is, an agency which allows the subject to be affected and embodied as part of his or her constitution. It is a process rather than a static identity formation. I will return to the issue of subjectivity later on in this chapter and throughout the dissertation. See also chapter 1.

38 ‘Correct’ or ‘false’ is not always the issue, though. Rather the issue is whether the receiver, the audience, has realised the editing power of journalism and therefore feels cheated. Such cases are rarely discussed in terms of ethics, but in terms of good or bad journalistic craftsmanship. This in turn connects to the training of journalists and the belief in the ethical validity of journalistic craftsmanship as discussed above. I will also come back to this in much more detail below.

readership or viewer/listener audience helps to construct the social imaginary as homogeneous and in dialectic relation to the other.

On the one hand, when examining the angle of students and practitioners of journalism, the function of journalistic objectivity neglects to acknowledge the always embeddedness of the journalist in the social imaginary. On the other hand, discussing journalism without the journalist-subject as a major factor misses the point of journalistic subjectivity. By use of the idea of journalistic cultural memory, I want to keep the relation between the social imaginary and journalistic practice in flux and not allow for a distinction separating the two interdependent and intermingling concepts.

Journalistic cultural memory is created by or always already embodied and embedded in journalistic subjectivity.