Ethics and Media Culture: Practices and Representations

Ethics and Media Culture straddles the practical and ethical issues of contention encountered by journalists. The book's various contributors cover a diversity of issues and viewpoints, attempting to broaden out the debates particularly in relation to Journalism Studies, Cultural Studies, Sociology of Culture and Communications, Philosophy and History.The debate concerning media ethics has intensified in recent years, fuelled mainly by the standards of journalist and media practices. The role of practitioners has taken centre-stage as concerns over what constitutes ethical, and therefore socially acceptable practice and behaviour, by the public, practitioners and intellectuals alike. The discursive relationship between the production and consumption of information is central to the debate regarding moral conduct, particularly in light of the commercialisation of the media. Considering that media institutions operate in a climate of intense competition, the value of information and its corresponding quality have begun to be critically assessed in terms of ethical understanding. A degree of open-endedness is maintained in discussions throughout this book, which is intended to engage the reader with the issues raised and determine their own conclusions.

Introduction; Chapter 1 Radical mass media criticism: elements of a history from Kraus to Bourdieu, John Theobald; Chapter 2 Trust in media practices: towards cultural development, David Berry; Chapter 3 Enframing/revealing: on the question of ethics and difference in technologies of mediation, Joost van Loon; Chapter 4 The ‘fourth estate’ and moral responsibilities, Andrew Edgar; Chapter 5 Reproducing consciousness: what is Indonesia?, Carol Davis, Nick Rayner; Chapter 6 The manufacture of news — fast moving consumer goods production, or public service?, Michael Bromley; Chapter 7 ‘If it bleeds, it leads’: ethical questions about popular journalism, Cynthia Carter, Stuart Allan; Chapter 8 New Labour, New Britain. Campaign politics and the ethics of spin, Stephen Hayward; Chapter 9 Parody, pastiche or purloining?, Sanda Miller; Chapter 10 ‘Shock’: the value of emotion, Jason Barker; Chapter 11 Cyber-ethics: regulation and privatisation, Walton Paul; Chapter 12 ‘Sweet sell of sexcess’: the production of young women's magazines and readerships in the 1990s, Anna Gough-Yates; Chapter 13 A social drama: media violence controversies and anti-violence campaign groups, Annette Hill; Chapter 14 Consuming interests in a culture of secrecy, Miranda Basner; Chapter 15 And the consequence was …, Mike Jempson; Chapter 16 A degree of uncertainty: aspects of the debate over the regulation of the Press in the UK since 1945, Tom O'Malley; Chapter 17 Codes and cultures, Philip Dring; Chapter 18 Media ethics at the sharp end, Bill Norris;

David Berry