Journalism and the political powers

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.4185/RLCS-2014-1028

Keywords:

Journalism, political power, political communication, journalistic professionalism, journalistic independency

Abstract

Since its very beginnings, journalism has swung between the servile repetition of biased versions of events and its own distorted versions caused by its lack of knowledge of a hardly glimpsed reality. The powers that threaten the journalistic independence have in fact constantly increased their manipulative ability. Journalism originated as a „profession of slaves‟ during the Roman Empire, and many current indicators seem to resemble its origins: the large-scale strategic public relations, the rise of the „spin doctors‟, the shameless extortions that take place in the weakest democracies, and the populism of the social networks, among others. All these elements are being accompanied or promoted by the internal degradation and dismay of the journalistic institutions, which are unable to distance themselves from all these forces. Journalism should neither become an ally or a competitor of the powers that surround it; instead it should cleverly distance itself from these powers in order to be able to move among them without ceasing to perform the watchdog function that citizens still need from the professionals of journalism.

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Author Biography

José Luis Dader García, Complutense University of Madrid

José Luis Dader García holds a PhD degree in Information Sciences (Journalism, 1980). Professor of journalism specialised in political communication, journalistic professionalism and precision and data journalism, at the Department of journalism I of the School of Information Sciences of the Complutense University of Madrid. Its most recent line of research is the use of the Internet in political communication.

Accredited as researcher for 24 years by the National Agency for Quality Assessment and Accreditation of Spain and the Ministry of Education, and as lecturer for 30 years by the Complutense University. Coordinator (Director) of the PhD programme in Journalism of the School of Information Sciences of the Complutense University of Madrid.

He has given international seminars and participated in meetings of experts at universities and centres from Oxford (United Kingdom), Berkeley (California), Perugia (Italy), Le Havre (France), and many other cities from Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and other Latin American countries, as well as Spanish universities, associations and media companies. Permanent Professor in the MA programme in Political and Institutional Communication of the Ortega and Gasset-Marañón Foundation (Madrid), in the MA programme in advanced studies in Political Communication of the Complutense University, in the Professional MA programme of the ABC newspaper Madrid, and in the MA programme in Investigative and Data-driven Journalism of El Mundo newspaper and the Rey Juan Carlos University (Spain).

His central lines of research and teaching are: 1) political communication, cyber-politics and cyber-democracy; and 2) journalistic professionalism, criticism of conventional journalism and new journalistic movements.

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Published

2014-10-23

How to Cite

Dader García, José Luis. 2014. “Journalism and the political powers”. Revista Latina de Comunicación Social, no. 69 (October):637-60. https://doi.org/10.4185/RLCS-2014-1028.

Issue

Section

Miscellaneous