About this Research Topic

Background

This Research Topic seeks to explore the changing ethical parameters of journalistic practice and the latter's relationship with the concepts of press freedom, media accountability, and professionalization.

Submitted manuscripts should focus on the multifarious nature of press freedom within the newsroom and aspects of journalism practice in any type of media (print, electronic, online/digital, and new media).

Press freedom is one of the key concepts of, and prerequisites for, every healthy democracy (e.g., Schramm, 1964; De Smaele, 2006; Besley and Prat, 2006; Norris, 2006). However, from the USA (the ‘land of the free’) to Greece (the country that created the first democracy in 507 B.C.), Norway (which in recent years has ranked first in the international democracy index) and the Swiss cantons of Appenzell, Innerrhoden, and Glarus (which constitute a rare example of a pure form of direct democracy (Golay, 2005)), press freedom seems to remain a rather vague concept with blurred boundaries. This is so both as a normative concept (e.g., McQuail, 2000; Graber, 2017; Hallin, 2020) and as an empirical one (Freedom House, 2019; RSF, 2022). In addition, press freedom seems to remain quite ‘sensitive’ by nature, as it is constantly, either directly or indirectly, influenced by a series of factors/parameters which not only affect its dynamics but, above all, impact overall journalism practice (Maniou, 2022).

Documented research mainly focuses on political factors/parameters that center on the role of the government/state/authorities and the limitations they pose. This Research Topic focuses on assessing a series of economic, political, and social factors/parameters as well as internal characteristics of the media systems and their impact on the dynamics of journalism practice. Media ethics, accountability, and professionalization are the proposed theoretical ankles under which issues around press freedom within the newsrooms could be assessed and discussed. Manuscripts dealing with the following topics are especially welcome, but several others may be proposed:

• self-censorship and media ethics
• press freedom and journalism practices in times of uncertainty
• journalism, accountability, and new business models
• comparisons of journalism practices in different countries
• media ethics and journalism practice in different media systems
• journalism practices, professionalization, and ethics in times of uncertainty
• new forms of journalism, accountability, and ethics.

The guest editors are particularly interested in articles of the following types: Original Research, Conceptual Analysis, Empirical Study, and Hypothesis and Theory.

Keywords: press freedom, journalism practice, media accountability, professionalization, media ethics

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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