Welcome to The Future of Journalism, a podcast from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford.
I'm Fredricka Cherubini. This is a special series, our podcast, and it's dedicated to digital news report Twenty Twenty.
Over six hour visit, we've dived into the findings of the report, the most comprehensive piece of research on news consumption around the world.
And the head of leadership development at the institute and for this podcast, I'm joined by the authors of the report.
For our last episode of the series, we're joined by Craig Robinson, research fellow at the Institute.
Craig will help us unpack what audiences think about the ideal of impartiality.
We'll talk about what people want from the news, whether it is impartial coverage or news, which takes more of a point of view.
Craig, welcome and thank you for being with us today. Thank you for having me. According to the BBC, defining partiality is easy.
It means reflecting all sides of arguments and not favouring any sides.
But we know that in practise that is much more difficult to implement and in some situation more than on this.
We've seen, for example, many newsrooms discussing internally what approach to take ahead of the 2020 U.S.
presidential election in case claims of a stolen election were made and lacked evidence.
And whether it was appropriate to argue, to argue against is for the next news report.
Craig, you look at this issue with a specific focus on four countries, Brazil, Germany, the U.K. and the U.S. What did you find out?
Well, put simply, there is strong evidence that people want news to be impartial.
That's the ideal people hold to. So we looked at this topic and both our survey in 46 markets.
And we also dive deeper into the topic with focus groups and interviews in four countries, Brazil, Germany, the UK and the US.
We picked those four markets because of their different media laws and regulations, audience profiles, journalism histories,
etc. And we found that across these countries that people hold strongly onto the ideal of impartial journalism.
So three quarters of people, for instance, say that when you're reporting on social and political issues,
that news outlets should reflect a range of different views and leave it up to people to decide for themselves.
So in general, few people want journalists to argue for particular points of view.
And the same goes for the idea of neutrality. The majority of people want news outlets to remain very neutral on every issue.
You've also asked people whether news outlets should give equal time to all sides when reporting on social and political issues,
even when reporting on issues where one side has a clearly weaker argument.
What do people say? So there's a there's quite an interesting story here in our survey that the
vast majority of people said news outlets should give equal time to all sides.
So few people said news outlets should give less time to sides with weaker arguments.
But there is more of a sense amongst younger people and those on the political left in particular,
that sometimes it might not be appropriate, it might be appropriate to limit the time given.
So our interviews get more into the nuances of this. Of course, it always depends what topic we're talking about.
So in general, people think equal time is a good idea. But for instance, amongst younger, younger people and those on the left in particular,
they say it's sometimes not a good idea to give equal time to antibacterials or climate change deniers, for example.
And that's especially if the weight of evidence, particularly the scientific evidence, is on one side.
If that's the case, then we can limit some alternative views.
But what's interesting to note is that people strongly express a discomfort with the idea of excluding these views entirely,
especially on political topics. So there's quite a hesitancy about that.
So people say that maybe you can give these views less time, but you shouldn't entirely shun these views.
These are views we need to talk about out in the open and deal with.
So when interviewing in Germany, for example, said these anti vaccination opinions exist, so we have to see them.
We shouldn't just sweep these things under the table and then suddenly be surprised the Antibalas is everywhere.
So let's talk about them, lay the evidence out and let people see actually what's going on.
They say it's a bad idea to hide these views away and let them fester underneath the surface.
And in the UK and US, there's a marketplace of ideas approach that people take.
People say bad arguments will be shown to be weaker against stronger ones.
So they say let those bad arguments condemn themselves out in the public sphere.
I mean, it's particularly older people that seem to more strongly hold on to these kinds of impartial views.
I think one of the most interesting insights in your chapter is related to the journalistic debate about false equivalence,
other any issues where it makes no sense for news outlets to be neutral.
Some people would mention topics like climate change or covid vaccines or racial injustice or domestic violence.
What do people think about this? Yeah, so this gets into those topical nuances that we don't quite capture with the survey questions.
People's views shift with the topic at hand.
So most people when I say, yeah, it doesn't make sense to be neutral about topics like racism or domestic violence.
These topics don't have another side to present or argue. So racism is bad, domestic violence is bad.
So let's say that journalists can say these things. These are moral and legal issues that people recognise that there's a line to draw on.
But when it gets into partisan politics, that's particularly when people want journalists to maintain their neutrality.
So it always comes back to politics at the end of the day.
So some people even said since climate change and cold vaccines have become political in a way,
especially in the United States, journalists need to present the evidence and stay neutral to stay objective.
If the evidence is on one side, that'll be shown. But journalists need to maintain an impartial approach.
Their. You mentioned that your analysis relies on survey data, but also on focus groups and in-depth interview with audience members,
and you quoted a couple of things, but generally, what have you learnt from those more nuanced conversations?
Yeah, so as I say, the nuanced conversations really get into the of different differences that we don't really get into with the survey.
So people's opinions obviously shift with what we're talking about.
People said, well, obviously, if a dam breaks and floods a valley, there is a single view of that.
That's what happened to the dam broke, the valley flooded.
But if we start to get into the hows and whys of things about value judgements, for example, then journalists need to take an impartial approach.
That's essentially about whether there are differences in views on a topic.
So when there are differences in points of view, people want journalists to remain as objective as possible.
There's a shift between these like very obvious, definitive things, like a car crash happened or a house burned down.
These are very obvious things that you can be straightforward about.
But then as we move into more value judgement, sides of things, how did that happen?
Why did that happen? That's when people want more of an impartial take on things when you need to present both sides or different sides of arguments.
So did it suggest people still care about the ideal of impartiality?
And yet we live in an increasingly polarised society,
polarised society where partisan voices make themselves heard in the public square and quite loudly in some cases.
How do you interpret the data in light of this?
What people say there's there's a place for both these partisan voices have their role and the public discussion, and so do impartial news providers.
These things have different functions, as people say when we talk to them.
So they admit that they're often drawn to these partisan voices, particularly divisive television personality is like Piers Morgan.
They say they're fun, they're interesting. They tell it like it is. It's entertainment.
It's insightful sometimes. But what people really want is a clear dividing line between that and the news.
People want that baseline of impartial, straightforward reporting, the just the facts.
And then if they want it, they can go off to see these opinions elsewhere where they expect to find them.
Like on these TV shows or podcasts, for example,
the dividing line is important and people sometimes feel like the line between reporting and partial reporting and opinion gets too blurred.
And they really do want that dividing line so they know what they're getting when they're getting it.
Finally, public service broadcaster, often at the centre of these debates about impartiality,
they are sometimes accused of being biased and sometimes accused of amplifying baseless of bigoted arguments.
How should they navigate these issues in light of what audiences say they want?
Well, I like one of our interviewees in the UK said she said, you know,
the BBC is renowned for being the steady source of the advice for them is to carry on what you're doing.
Don't go to the left and go to the right, said there in the middle and report on what is happening in the world.
Broadcasters in the UK obviously have this requirement for due impartiality and people want them to stick to that.
People want the BBC to strongly stick to this impartiality ideal because that's their role.
So don't sensationalise or add opinions, lay out the story and that the opinion stuff can be left to others.
As I said, there's plenty of that out there.
But the BBC's role, for example, with people say in the market is to be this reliable source of factual and impartial reporting.
They'll always attract criticism from both sides. Of course, that's kind of what happens when you're trying to play things straight down the middle.
But our data really shows how people really rely on a source like the BBC.
So it's important to stick to that impartial line in terms of amplifying the baseless or bigoted arguments out there.
That's a difficult tightrope to walk. That's where the Jew part of due impartiality comes in.
It doesn't mean giving full licence for certain views to be aired.
If all the facts point in one direction, for example, that's what can be said if it's science or something like that.
But there's a responsibility for them to lay out the facts, contextualise the views and show people what the story is,
at the end of the day, people really just want the right to decide for themselves, but they need all those facts in that context.
Craig, thank you very much for joining us,
this was really interesting and thank you to you for listening to the sixth and last episode of Digital News Report Twenty one podcast series.
Our guest today was Craig Robinson, research fellow at the Institute and one of the authors of the report.
You can catch up on previous episodes on our podcast channel, on Spotify or Apple podcast.
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You can find a full report online and digital news reports. Dot org slash twenty twenty one.
This was Fugitive Journalism, a podcast by the Reuters Institute of Roubini.
And we'll be back soon.