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Media capture in Central and Eastern Europe: The corrosive impact on democracy and desecration of journalistic ethics

William Horsley

In: The Routledge Companion to Journalism Ethics

Lada Trifonova Price; Karen Sanders; Wendy N. Wyatt (eds.)

London; New York: Routledge (2021), 9 pp.

"This chapter examines the root causes, development, and corrosive effects of the progressive “capture” of influential media by populist governments and other vested interests in Central and Eastern Europe over the past 20 years. Many countries in the region have proved vulnerable to media captu ... more

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Trust in Institutions

Church, Communication and Culture, volume 5, issue 3 (2020), pp. 293-510

"Speaking of trust in the Catholic Church necessarily leads to talking about the management of the crisis of clerical sexual abuse by its leaders. The focus is on managing responsibility and information, with case studies by Paulina Guzik and Patrick O'Brien. The first deals with the case of Poland, ... emphasizing the need for accountability and suggesting five actions to regain trust. O'Brien offers a map of the management of abuses in the 197 dioceses of the United States, and points to transparency in communication and government as a key to regaining trust. As you will read in these pages, neither the communicator nor the communication serves to mask a negative reality. The institution must justify its existence only if it is a good for society, even if it makes mistakes. This question is approached from a theological point of view: Is it still possible to trust the Church? To answer this question, Marco Vanzini highlights the tensions that characterize and define the identity of the Church: such as her divine origin and her human composition, or the inner coexistence of holiness and sin, among others. On the other hand, Gabriel Magalhães, taking a cue from passages of sacred and universal literature, invites reflection on the contrast between human and divine justice, highlighting the excessive and almost ‘scandalous’ nature of divine mercy. Faced with the reality of a certain human solidarity in evil, he explores the need for collective guilt and forgiveness as a common horizon that allows trust to be recovered at the social level. It is precisely ‘the Church communicator’ on whom the article by Professors Gil and Gili puts the focus. His role as spokesman for an institution and bearer of a message gives him great responsibility. The credibility that he demands and needs, the authors maintain, depends to a great extent on his human and professional virtues. Creative fidelity, reliable transmission of an ideal and embodiment of the values he communicates are expected from him. Internal communication in organizations, with the transformation of the channels through which trust travels – more horizontal and collaborative than vertical and hierarchical (Botsman Citation2017) – represents a challenge for those who govern the organization. Receiving trust from the leadership in turn generates confidence in the workers. To put these ‘spirals of trust’ into action, Gara and La Porte analyze one of the most important moments in the relationship between an employee and an organization: recruitment. Trust, they say, must be considered one of the great strategic tools of the Human Resources department. In the legal field, Moreno and Díaz show with a case study the ‘legal defense of corporate reputation’, where law and communication work in a complementary way. In recent years, especially with the digital revolution, new fields of interaction have opened up with their own followers, as well as new spaces for vulnerability (e.g. privacy, personal data, copyright…). In this context of the Internet, the authors present the crisis of reputation of an NGO linked to the Church and show how law and communication are two strategic tools of the organizations destined to collaborate. Looking at trust management in the public sector is a necessary source of inspiration for an institution like the Church. María José Canel conducts the academic interview with Steven Van de Walle on trust in public administration. He deals with a wide range of topics: from the ways of measuring trust and its typologies, to the influence of emotions on the inspiration of trust. The interview offers some comparative considerations between some other institutions, such as NGOs, and the Church. It also includes a final reflection on the new scenario created by COVID-19, which is testing citizens’ trust in the state and the health system. In the public sphere, the management of vulnerability takes on a particular nuance in the case of high reliability organizations, entities that by their nature must avoid errors at all costs (Lekka Citation2011). Sanders takes the criteria of the HROs as her model to measure the trust that the British government has earned (or lost) with its public communication during the pandemic generated by the COVID-19, a situation that has tested the strength of social relations – especially trust toward public services – and that will merit another special issue of this journal." (Editorial: Contents of the special issue, pages 295-296) more

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The Global Journalist in the 21st Century

David H. Weaver, Lars Willnat (eds.)

New York; London: Routledge (2012), 584 pp.

"The Global Journalist in the 21st Century systematically assesses the demographics, education, socialization, professional attitudes and working conditions of journalists in various countries around the world. This book updates the original Global Journalist (1998) volume with new data, adding more ... more

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Journalism Education, Training and Employment

Bob Franklin, Donica Mensing (eds.)

New York; London: Routledge (2011), xii, 236 pp.

"During this period of rapid and significant change in journalistic practices, journalism educators are re-examining their own profession and contributing to the invention of new models and practices. This edited volume of studies by respected international scholars describes the diverse issues jour ... more

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Ethics and Journalism

Karen Sanders

London: Sage (2003), 196 pp.

"Ethics and Journalism provides a comprehensive overview of the main approaches to ethical enquiry in Western journalism. It examines the ethical dilemmas faced by journalists in all areas of the media and sets out ways of achieving ethical journalism. Ethics and Journalism explores such subjects as ... more