"Journalists are regularly exposed to online hate speech their profession. Because discrimination often harms targets and can prompt self-censorship in journalistic content, undermining journalism’s public duty, it is essential to understand factors explaining why journalists become victims of onl
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ine hate speech. Using Routine Activity Theory, an online survey of journalists in Germany (N*=*497) revealed that conceptions of their roles as interpreters or adversaries were associated with more frequently being targets of online hate speech. Moreover, women journalists and journalists with migration background were additionally targeted by respectively sexist and racist online hate speech. Participation in active content moderation, a presumed destructive motivation, and audiences’ weak trust in media also raised journalists’ likelihood of being targets of hate speech online. Newsroom support, however, was positively related to such victimization, possibly as a result of sharing past experiences." (Abstract)
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"Limited studies exist on the safety challenges that journalists face in reporting conflict related issues within their localities. This study extends literature in this direction by providing a model that explains the safety challenges that journalists faced in reporting the 2020 END SARS protests
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in Nigeria. The study is a survey of 470 journalists with questionnaire as the instrument for data collection. Results were analysed using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). It was found that legal limitations, lack of training on safety and absence of safety motivational measures constitute the safety challenges that journalists faced in reporting the ENDS SARS protests. This information could be beneficial for policy formulation and advocacy within the context of safety of journalists." (Abstract)
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"This chapter examines the intersection of journalist security and safety with the condition of happiness to proffer solutions at the individual and organizational levels, including vis a vis boundaries, mental models, and security champions, with the aim of contributing to journalistic happiness, s
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afety, and security." (Abstract)
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"While online harassment directed towards women journalists are under wide discussion, the mechanism of audience intervention in stopping online harassment is less explored. Integrating bystander invention, ambivalent sexism, and social identity theories, we propose and test an integrative framework
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of audience intervention in online harassment of women journalists. Results from an online experiment in Hong Kong showed that type of harassment, ideological similarity between the audience member and the harassed journalist, and the presence of other responsive bystanders could shape the appraisal of harassment incidents and willingness to intervene. The study advances the literature by clarifying the contextual nuances and challenges of audience intervention in online harassment of women journalists. It bears practical implications on how to defend women journalists so as to protect press freedom, cultivate journalist-audience relationship, and enhance an inclusive and egalitarian online space." (Abstract)
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"A large number of Bangladeshi women journalists are facing gender discrimination and sexual harassment in the workplace. This is one of the contributing factors in excluding women journalists’ voices from the public sphere. Drawing on the feminist approach of structure and agency theory, the stud
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y investigated the causes and consequences of workplace gender discrimination and sexual harassment. A mixed method of survey and in-depth interviewing were conducted, and the data were thematically analyzed. The findings outlined gender discrimination and harassment are evident in the media industries of Bangladesh, commonly maneuvered by both internal and external perpetrators. The situation causes frustration among women journalists. As a coping-up endeavor, they often remain silent due to their lack of trust in protection mechanisms e.g., sexual harassment prevention committee in workplace, and sometimes they withdraw from their responsibilities." (Abstract)
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"This article utilizes theoretical concepts of sensemaking and affective events theory to analyze and interpret what type of harassment events journalists experience from readers, viewers, and strangers, and their subsequent emotional responses. Findings indicated journalists experience three forms
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of harassment at work from those external to the newsroom, and that women not only receive more sexual harassment than men, but they experience more overall harassment, from viewers, readers, and strangers. When examining affective reactions, men say they experience emotions of anger when harassed. Women, however, noted emotions of anger when experiencing sexual harassment, and emotions of fear when experiencing incivility and disruptive harassment and personally attacking harassment." (Abstract)
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"Given rising hostility toward journalists in the United States, this monograph illuminates how journalists experience hostility from news sources. Drawing on 38 in-depth interviews with U.S. journalists, this project uses the theory of intersectionality to understand how journalists experienced hos
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tility and how they changed their journalistic routines in response. Participants described four forms of hostility from news sources: general distrust of the news media, boundary crossing, safety-violating hostility, and microaggressions. Boundary crossing was primarily used toward younger women, and microaggressions were used toward White women and men and women of color. Although safety-violating hostility occurred least often, it was the most intense form of hostility and was disproportionately experienced by women, whose gender, race, age, tenure, and even their geographical location worked against them to create hostile and unsafe situations. These findings should inform how news editors think about story assignments and reporters’ safety on the job so that editors empathize more with reporters and do away with more dangerous reporting scenarios, such as person-on-the-street interviews and door knocking. Finally, as many reporters were unprepared for the hostility they experienced, journalism instructors should focus on hostility as a reality journalists will likely face in the field." (Abstract)
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"Non-state media journalists in Ethiopia traditionally faced safety threats emanating from state-sponsored attacks and punitive legal frameworks. Recently, however, state hostility is being replaced by non-state actors’ aggression against journalists. By framing emerging threats of reporters’ sa
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fety in Ethiopia within normative vis-à-vis alternative debates of journalism practice in the context of transitional, unstable, pluralistic-partizan societies, this study examines the prevalence of non-state actors in remapping threats of journalistic impunity in Ethiopia. Key findings from interviews conducted with editors, reporters, and other practitioners indicate, while the government cannot be ruled out as a safety threat for journalists, there is an emerging consensus that identifies non-state actors such as vigilante groups, influential social media political personalities, and weaponized media as the most perceptible safety risks to journalism practice. Although threat levels vary depending on journalists’ regional affiliation or perceived ethnic identity/political worldview, domestic journalists face increased native othering that amounts to mobility restrictions and physical aggression compared to foreign correspondents." (Abstract)
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"This paper utilizes concepts from new institutionalism to help explain journalists’ and news organizations’ resistance to implementing security-related practices despite a deteriorating safety and security environment for journalists in the United States. Through 30 interviews with journalists,
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technologists, and media lawyers, I identify three main variables for the resistance to the development of newsroom security cultures, as well as a new social actor necessary for the development of security cultures in newsrooms: the “security champion.” The emergence of this new institutional entrepreneur highlights an intriguing tension. Although news organizations have engaged in slow adoption of the anonymous whistleblowing platform SecureDrop, they have not necessarily engaged in an institutionalization of security practices throughout the newsroom. The decoupling of these two factors represents attempts by news organizations to have institutional legitimacy while not changing core practices. In conjunction with this phenomenon, inspired individuals in newsrooms across the country are becoming ad hoc “security champions” in order to build security cultures from the ground up." (Abstract)
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"There is a quickly increasing body of studies and reports on harassment and intimidation of journalists around the world. These series of acts have a chilling effect on media freedom and journalists’ freedom of expression. The research literature on the topic has mostly focused on intimidation an
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d harassment of journalists – particularly sexual harassment of women journalists – or journalists’ experiences of online harassment, and the impact on press censorship. In this chapter, we contribute to the debate by exploring the nexus between the harassment of journalists and the protection mechanisms adopted by leading news media organisations, professional journalism associations and other institutions, and national governments. We then discuss the effects on democracy in the 18 countries participating in the 2021 Media for Democracy Monitor (MDM). Our findings indicate how legal support and protection mechanisms might enhance journalists’ capacity to realise the news media’s democratic role in practice." (Abstract)
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"Although journalism practice exposes media workers to different levels of occupational hazards, research on the coping strategies is limited. This study made an effort to extend literature in this direction by providing a model that explains the coping strategies of Nigerian journalists who covered
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the 2020 ENDSARS protests in Nigeria. The researchers surveyed a total of 470 journalists who were sampled through a respondent-driven chain referral sampling technique. It was found that journalists who covered the protests faced occupational hazards such as physical attacks, disgrace, threats, trauma, anxiety as well as fear. The coping strategies were found to include seeking social support, selective appearance, self-censorship as well as self-motivation. It was further found that perceived behavioural control significantly moderates the implementation of coping strategies. The researchers explored the implications of these results on theory, practice and scholarship." (Abstract)
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"The Zimbabwean state has in recent years stepped up its surveillance efforts on citizens, civil society and journalists who are viewed as the “enemies of the state”. This state surveillance has been argued to infringe on citizens’ right to privacy and access to information. We are mindful tha
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t the “Second Republic” or the “New Dispensation” government has invested heavily in surveillance to silence its critics, among them activists, opposition leaders and journalists. Based on this, the study critically examines the use of surveillance strategies by Zimbabwean journalists and assesses the challenges and opportunities. The study uses in-depth interviews with selected journalists from Zimpapers, Alpha Media Holdings and freelance journalists around the country. The data show that journalists in Zimbabwe use different surveillance strategies, while some are benefiting from state sources for surveillance. Journalists further indicated that they live in fear of the state, which tracks them down. As a result, however, journalists have resorted to various means of security, which include “hunting in packs” and deploying digital security strategies. Findings further demonstrate that newsrooms are poorly equipped with technology for surveillance." (Abstract)
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"In the midst of a public health crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic, journalists play an important role of sharing information of consequence with the public. As first responders to precarious events, they work in close proximity to the threat they are reporting on yet at the same time struggle with
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other personal and professional responsibilities which are strenuous on their mental health. This chapter qualitatively interrogated journalists in order to understand their experiences with mental health during COVID-19 and how they worked through personal and social acceptability, biases and stigma as well as diagnosis. Of importance as well was to understand how they disclose, if they disclose at all, mental health issues and the different copying mechanisms. Findings show that journalists have a textbook but not applicable understanding of mental health, declaring that they many of them have experienced mental disorders without knowing. The consequences of COVID-19 measures such as layoffs, increased workload, inconsiderate media houses, brutality from law enforcement agencies were key contributors to mental health stresses. Journalists with supportive families seemed to have coped better while some buried themselves in multiple jobs to circumvent the stress that comes with financial privation." (Abstract)
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"The online harassment of journalists is a phenomenon which has been on the rise in Europe over the last decade and it affects journalists' working lives. As an expression of mob censorship, online harassment raises questions about how media organisations react to online aggressions targeting their
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journalists, the consequences on the victims’ well-being and on the role of journalism in society. Yet, previous research has shown the lack of support mechanisms provided by journalists’ employers. In this article, we explore the hypothesis that the lack of organisational support towards targeted journalists is partly due to the challenges faced by media managers when trying to make sense of the phenomenon. This article offers a unique viewpoint on how 22 Belgian media managers from five media organisations struggle to define what online harassment is and how to respond to it. In turn, it shows that the vague understanding of what online harassment is seems to favour case-by-case organisational responses. Missing words and unstructured actions related to online harassment impede media managers from addressing online harassment as a collective issue in journalism and its consequences on the democratic debate." (Abstract)
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"As the journalism industry faces increasing risk and insecurity in the digital environment, there is still much to know about how journalists are reacting to and internalizing online harassment, and what the consequences are for their routines. Approaching the problem from a socio-technical perspec
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tive and using focus groups with Latin American journalists, this study identified the dimensions of social media violence against journalists, and the actors and coping strategies involved in responses to social media violence. This study shows that social media violence against journalists permeates all stages of news production stages. The study also identifies new and changing actors—such as the social media agent provocateur, who, working on behalf of governments and parties, stirs up mob censorship as part of orchestrated online harassment to try to dictate what news is told—, as well as actants, such as messaging apps that journalists use to create support networks. Implications for Latin American journalism are discussed." (Abstract)
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"This study looks at how online misogyny is impacting the work of women journalists in India. Journalists here are encouraged to have a social media presence and publicize stories online, but organizations do little to protect them from the relentless trolling and misogyny that characterizes the onl
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ine sphere in India today. Analyzing interviews with female journalists who actively covered the recent #MeTooIndia movement, this study found that when women reporters covered stories of sexual violence, their voices online were condemned, and they were subject to horrific sexual innuendo that implied violence. As journalists are forced to rethink the notion of public, how do they respond and cope with incivility online? They are expected to do stories that serve the public, but when a section of that public is extremely uncivil, how are journalists impacted and how does this affect their work? Journalists in India have developed a variety of strategies to deal with social media vitriol, but incivility online is an issue that organizations refuse to do much about. As the interviews show, social media platforms in India are more pulpits of hate than reasoned debate. This study looks at their implications on journalism from a gendered perspective in India." (Abstract)
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"Despite rising scholarly interest in online violence as an “occupational hazard” for journalists, we know little about the dynamics that shape the often-limited support given by media organizations to media workers affected by online violence. In this study, I explore how the working environmen
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t of journalists constrains opportunities for addressing gendered online violence. Through a total of 27 interviews with experts and media workers in the United Kingdom and India, I find that these structural barriers play out through three main dynamics: stratified access to support resources, workplace norms that punish reporting online violence as signs of “weakness,” and precarious conditions that leave journalists with little control over their work. Adverse press freedom conditions also appear to exacerbate the impact of these dynamics. Relating these findings to broader inequality regimes in the contemporary working world, I argue that online violence both reinforces and is reinforced by inequality regimes within media organizations. In the same way that organizations often fail to adequately address other forms of workplace harassment, structural barriers complicate newsroom responses to online violence." (Abstract)
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"Human rights, the rule of law and democracy are interlinked and mutually reinforcing. Within the framework of international human rights law, the right to freedom of expression particularly stands out, as it constitutes a pre-requisite for the fulfilment of other fundamental rights. In this regard,
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as ‘guardian of the rule of law’, the judiciary plays a particularly important role in guaranteeing the respect for the fundamental right to freedom of expression and its corollaries, access to information and the safety of journalists. To do so, however, judicial actors need to be well versed on freedom of expression challenges (both online and offline), and knowledgeable about the related international standards and regional jurisprudence. To share best practices and lessons learnt in this regard, this essay will be structured in two parts: first, it will discuss the crucial role of an independent judiciary in protecting the rights to freedom of expression and access to information, while falling under the obligation to act in full transparency itself. Second, it will present an in-depth analysis of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)’s Judges’ Initiative, presenting the concrete experience of a United Nations’ body engaging with its constituents. At the heart of this endeavor is the goal of enhancing the international human rights legal framework, by raising, in full cooperation with them, the knowledge an capacities of judicial actors from around the world on the need to protect and promote freedom of expression, access to information, and the safety of journalists to guarantee the respect for human rights, democracy, and the rule of law." (Abstract)
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"Este estudio, apoyado por la UNESCO, es el resultado de una investigación de nueve meses de RSF sobre la eficiencia, el impacto y los desafíos de estas políticas públicas a nivel regional, con un enfoque específico en asegurar la protección de periodistas y comunicadores. Los resultados refue
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rzan la idea de que los mecanismos de protección son una respuesta necesaria al entorno de violencia estructural contra periodistas y comunicadores en los países analizados. En mayor o menor grado, estas políticas públicas han mejorado la capacidad de los Estados para cumplir con su obligación de proteger a este sector de la población." (Presentación)
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"Academic studies and news stories alike have been documenting a quite devastating picture of the online trolling of journalists, especially women and minorities, around the world. The scale and the magnitude of trolling have attracted the attention of governments and international organizations, pa
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rticularly those considering it a threat to human rights. This chapter examines the dimensions and consequences of online trolling of journalists and suggest four lines of action to address the problem. Although journalists across news organizations and news beats are frequent targets of trolling, not all journalists are similarly vulnerable. Trolling is disproportionately directed at two clusters of journalists. Digital harassment is both a relatively new form of anti-press violence and censorship as well as the continuation of authoritarian forces determined to silence critical journalism and other forms of public expression." (Abstract)
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