Abstract
In democracies, one of Public Service Media’s (PSM) main roles is to inform the public. In a digital news ecosystem, where commercial, citizen, and alternative news sources have multiplied, questions about the ability and need for PSM to fulfil this role are increasingly being raised. While the role of PSM can and should be scrutinized, a too-narrow a focus on an informed citizenry may obfuscate aspects, other than audience reach and objectivity, that are key to this information role, such as trust. Against this background, this article studies whether and to what extent citizens still trust the news and information services of their public broadcaster, asking if that trust is still high, whether there is a difference between groups in the population, and if trust is in line with reach. Based on a representative survey of news users in Flanders, the Dutch-speaking community of Belgium, the article studies the reach and trust scores of the brands of VRT, Flanders’ PSM, and compares them to those of its main competitors, with a specific focus on differences in terms of age, education levels, and political orientation. The results suggest that VRT struggles more than the main commercial players to reach young people and the lower-educated, but still leads when it comes to trust. The data show the continued importance of widening our assessment of PSM beyond market-focused indicators of reach.
Highlights
Public Service Media (PSM) can be defined as the provision of media services, across devices and platforms, that contributes to the democratic, cultural and social wellbeing of society
We studied whether and to what extent citizens still trust the news and information services of their public broadcaster, asking if that trust is still high, whether there is a difference between groups in the population, and if trust is in line with reach
Based on a representative survey among Flemish citizens, we find high levels of trust in the Flemish public broadcaster VRT, having that said, results are slightly different for young people and right-wing voters
Summary
Public Service Media (PSM) can be defined as the provision of media services, across devices and platforms, that contributes to the democratic, cultural and social wellbeing of society (see contributions in Lowe & Martin, 2013; Lowe, Van den Bulck, & Donders, 2018). The delivery of such services is entrusted to public broadcasters. PSM has a “responsibility for the health of the political process and the quality of public discourse generated with it” Four trends have hindered public broadcasters in their work to inform the citizenry. The online environment results in lower reach of public broadcasters’ news services and, with younger audiences, as well as encouraging the rapid consumption of news (Cola & Prario, 2012). The line between what is true and what is false seems to have become more blurred and public broadcasters are finding it difficult to position themselves in a ‘post-truth society’ (Gibson, 2018); even if that latter concept has been rightfully criticised by some (e.g., Fuller, 2018).
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