A lecture to LSE students about the so-called 'post truth' political media world we inhabit.

1. What’s wrong with political
journalism?
Prof Charlie Beckett
MC417
2016

2. What does journalism do for politics?
• Information
[facts, records, statistics, events,
policies]
• Deliberation
[debate, analysis, comment, opinion]
• Accountability
[investigation, audit, voice for
citizen, campaigns]

3. Politicians
News
Media
Public

4. Political reporting is now networked
Media
Politicians
Citizens

5. Networked political journalism is..
• Mainstream or digital native media
‘exploiting’ networks
• ‘Digital first’: Connected, continuous
• Includes public participation at some point:
source, interactivity, audience analysis,
dissemination
• Multi-source, multi-format, multi-platform
• Service, not product

6. Examples of networked political
journalism

7. Build your own coalition

8. What digital can for democracy
• More information
• Citizen voice and
participation
• Media accountability
• Direct communication
(disintermediation)
• Organisation &
campaigning

9. What digital can for democracy
• More information
• Citizen voice and
participation
• Media accountability
• Direct communication
(disintermediation)
• Organisation &
campaigning
• Over abundance of data
and voice
• Replicates hierarchies
• Homophily (filter
bubbles)
• Fragmentation and
polarisation
• Distraction, extremism,
clicktavism

10. #EdStone

15. Trust in media: relative to platform,
source, country

16. Real problem is lack of engagement,
attention & authenticity

18. Corbyn’s solution: bypass MSM

22. Labour’s ratings have declined under
Corbyn to record post-war low

23. Labour supporters don’t even back him for PM

25. blog.sysomos.com/
(2015)
• Orange = Corbyn critics
• Red = centre Left, neutral or supportive
• Purple = broad debate
• Blue = Corbynistas

26. Trump’s media by-pass

27. Trumpvision

29. Trump v Clinton
• HRC is significantly ahead in all mainstream
polling
• US tradition of anti-establishment voting
historically grounded
• But seems to confirm filter bubble works for
core (primaries), less so for open votes
(presidentials, general election) i.e. for power
not mobilisation

30. Journalists have lost control to
platforms

31. Platforms now increasingly shape
political information flows

32. Facebook’s new news policy
• “In the weeks ahead, we’re going to begin allowing
more items that people find newsworthy, significant, or
important to the public interest — even if they might
otherwise violate our standards. We will work with our
community and partners to explore exactly how to do
this, both through new tools and approaches to
enforcement. Our intent is to allow more images and
stories without posing safety risks or showing graphic
images to minors and others who do not want to see
them.”
• http://newsroom.fb.com/news/2016/10/input-from-community-and-
partners-on-our-community-standards/

33. Facebook fosters hyper-partisan false
news posts

34. False information feeds partisan
passion
• Articles with false news gain more traffic than
those that are factual
• 38% of right wing hyper partisan posts
contained significant false information
• 22% of left wing hyper partisan posts
contained significant false information
• https://www.buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/partisan-fb-pages-
analysis?utm_term=.fhewlD3Z8z#.qqXD3ZmWQq

35. Brexit: more evidence that MSM
journalism has lost relevance?

36. The Brexit media failure?
• False equivalence (esp BBC)
• Partisan press
• Lack of fact checking
• News media out of touch
• Failed to predict result
• But both sides lied

37. Post-truth?
• Is ‘Post truth’ actually simply the failure of
Establishment to recognise challenging views?
• Does politics and media deserve to be
trusted?
• What should mainstream news media do to
regain relevance?

38. Journalism and Democracy
Prof Charlie Beckett
MC422
2016