Abstract
This article explores to what extent public service news reporting in Sweden has undergone any significant changes during the last decade, when public service broadcasting became exposed to commercial competition. The analysis employs a historical approach that serves to uncover the trajectory of news reporting and journalism from the early days of regular television broadcasting in 1956 until the 1990s. The article aims to resolve some of the complexities and apparent contradictions of the ?popularization? of news in Swedish television, and the analysis addresses changes in news format and news organization as well as the specific aesthetics and discourse that characterize news as a cultural form. The argument advanced is that the empirical evidence lends very little support to the suggestion of a linear and continuous trend from a serious, informative coverage of society towards more lightweight journalism geared to maximize ratings. The long-term development of television news in Sweden can not be understood simply as a trend over time. A more apt way of describing the development is to conceive of it as characterized by three phases: (1) objectivism 1956?65, (2) critical scrutiny (1966?85), and (3) popularization (1986?the present). Each of these phases has been characterized by specific practices of news selection and modes of representation, connected to systems of journalistic ideals and norms.
Published Version
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