Liberal Journalism Research Articles

Spanish journalists in exile

The title of this paper refers to both the personality and work of two Spaniards, who, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, had to abandon their homeland fleeing from the absolutism of King Ferdinand VII (1784–1833). The exile of the Spanish liberal writers started in 1814 and was characterized by two major milestones: the first between 1814 and 1820, where Great Britain was the main destination; and a second wave which began in 1823 and ended in 1833, wherein France gained prominence as a reception centre. Although the journalistic activities that were both undertaken in Paris were less relevant than those carried out by other writers in London, the truth is that with their reading, we can better understand the study of this exile journalism and the subsequent liberal journalism that was developed in Spain when the conditions allowed it.

Образ итальянского государства в период первой Итало-эфиопской войны 1895-1896 гг. в российской журнальной периодической печати либерального толка

Introduction. The article deals with the problem of functioning and transformation of the image of the Italian state during the first Italo-Ethiopian war of 1895-1896 in the Russian liberal periodical press. Special attention is paid to the assessments of the battle of Adua on 1 March 1896 and its significance in changing the political stereotype in Russia about Italy. The relevance of the study is determined by the fact that before in the domestic historiography no attention was paid to historical-imagological studies about this historical period in Russian-Italian relations. Materials and methods. The authors relied on the materials of the journals ‘Russian Thought‘ and ‘Herald of Europe‘ as the most popular and authoritative liberal publications in the Russian Empire of the period under consideration. The methodological basis of the study is the methodology of historical imagology and, accordingly, its conceptual apparatus (image and stereotype). Results. Two periods in the development of the image of Italy during the First Italo-Ethiopian War of 1895-1896 are identified. The first period is fixed from January 1895 to March-April 1896. These boundaries are associated with the time when Prime Minister Francesco Crispi was in power in the country. The Italian state and its policy during this period, according to liberal journalists, was defined by the ‘mania of great power‘, which drove the already ruined population into even greater financial decline. The next chronological phase is associated with the premiership of Antonio Starabba de Rudini, which is recorded from March-April 1896 to 1 January 1897. In this period of time the former image of the Italian state and political stereotype ceases to function. Instead of it a new stereotype is gradually formed. Now the Italian state was presented much more moderately, ‘great caution in politics‘ and aspiration to maintain the status quo were emphasised. This assessment is already neutral-positive, though not so bright.

«Thick» Patriotic Journals in the USSR: Origins of Their Tradition, Circle, and Opponents

The paper examines the circle of “thick” Soviet conservative-patriotic journals, whose contributors tried to defend Russian national interests and values of the Russian history within the ideological framework of that time. These were, fi rst of all, Young Guard (Molodaya gvardiya), Moscow (Moskva) and Our Contemporary (Nash sovremennik). The terms “thick patriotic journals”, “journal contributors”, and “circle of journals” are considered almost synonymous, as the author is talking about a phenomenon that, although tied to specifi c respected editions, extends far beyond their pages. The main thesis of the paper is that patriotic journals of the second half of the Soviet period continued and developed two long-standing trends that may seem a bit contradictory, but in fact are combined quite harmoniously. The fi rst is the autonomous statist (yet not state-based) patriotism, which strives to bring good to Russia and the Russian people and for this purpose objects to the current government and criticizes it, wishing to bring it to reason, transform and improve, but not overthrow. The second is the justifi cation of the current government, whose merits are not obvious to many from the point of view of long-term national and state interests. The paper examines the discussion between patriotic and liberal journals and authors generated by the famous article Inevitability (Neizbezhnost’) by V. А. Chalmayev that was printed in the Young Guard journal, publications by M. P. Lobanov and S. N. Semanov, disputes by B. M. Sarnov and V. V. Kozhinov, and other issues that are important for understanding of the subject.

Arguments vs emotions: Argumentative models as a tool of ideological confrontation in the mass media

The article analyzes the texts covering the special military operation (SVO) of the Russian Federation on the territory of Ukraine in the modern media discourse. The question of language strategies and tactics used in media texts belonging to authors professing different ideological positions is considered. By means of linguistic-stylistic, functional-grammatical and comparative analyses, it is concluded that in the texts, on the one hand, pro-Russian-minded, and on the other — liberal-minded journalists and bloggers, different argumentation methods are chosen as language strategies. As a result of the study of texts devoted to the topic of SVO, the author of the article comes to the conclusion about the predominantly reasoned nature of the speech of pro-Russian authors and, conversely, about the predominantly evaluative and hypothetical, i. e., in general, the emotional type of speech in the texts of liberal-minded authors. It is argued that the main method of argumentation of “pro-Russian texts” is the factual method, whereas the main methods of argumentation in “liberal texts” are evaluative and hypothetical methods. Special attention is paid to the question of the place and role of argumentation in texts representing new knowledge. In this regard, the problem of logical and cognitive actions relevant to substantiating truth in scientific communication is considered. Based on a comparative analysis of the logic of argumentation in journalistic and scientific communication, a conclusion is made about the similarity of communicative and cognitive strategies of science and quality journalism. The description of argumentative actions representing the position of journalists and bloggers belonging to the liberal wing of the media sphere allows the author to speak about the low-quality nature of liberal journalism.

The Joy of Following: Network Fascism and the Micropolitics of the Social Media Image

This article deploys Spinoza’s ethic of joy alongside Deleuze and Guattari’s exposition of micropolitics to expose how fascist desires and affects bloom and circulate through digital communications ecosystems that generally promote a diffusion or decentralisation of power. Beyond the steady barrage of alt-right content conscientiously documented by liberal journalists and progressive watchdogs, a more persistent and widespread fascist impulse permeates the very forms of some of our most banal digitally mediated acts and encounters. Rather than a sole looming authoritarian figurehead, the network itself – particularly with the new image paradigms propelled by apps such as Instagram and TikTok – has become the rallying point for the circulation of fascistic affects, burnished through the art and ethos of following: of rules, routines, protocols, accounts. I contend that a joyful passion accompanies much of this everyday experience of keeping up with one’s feeds, engaging the platforms, participating in the spectacles. This is what Sontag, interrogating the appeal of the Third Reich, calls the ‘joy of followers’, a joy in fascist belonging, which is to suggest that fascist movements thrive not only on the circulation of negative affects like hatred and fear, but also on the profusion of pleasure and affiliation. Deleuze’s Spinoza, resolutely anti-fascist, helps us parse this situation as it plays out in the social media sphere. Spinoza offers a bipartite conceptualisation of joy that allows us to diagnose the pleasures particular to fascist belonging and network belonging alike as passive, partial and indirect. Ultimately, what we today share with historical fascisms is a ubiquitous aesthetic that merges art with life and bodies with information, and a corresponding ethos that cultivates conformism, barbarises critical thought and redirects joyful impulses into reactionary social forms. As fascistic power relations spread anew through digital cultures’ newly evolving modes of visuality, hapticity, vibration and expression, one can observe something of what Deleuze calls ‘sad joy’, a sort of joy rooted in conquest and domination. The aim of this article is to root out such sad joys, to appreciate their appeal, and ultimately to reject them in all their various forms.

Racism and journalism: The dangers of returning to the ‘safe-space’ of objectivity

Although a contested term in journalism research, the need for a critique of objectivity is increased by responses to the current “crisis of journalism,” which have united around the rediscovery of sacred journalistic ideals such as truth, facts, and autonomy. In particular, objectivity must be critiqued for its role in the persistence of racism in liberal democratic journalism, a persistence that runs across different funding models and organizational structures. Objectivity, as a contested and flexible political concept, has proven incapable of addressing systemic racism. I argue that objectivity needs to be understood as an inherently political concept, which is as much proscriptive as descriptive in the way it shapes the field of journalism and the profession’s relationship to political and social life. Rather than return to the safe ground of autonomy, truth and facts, professional, liberal journalism must recognize its foundations within racially unequal political and social structures.

The U.S. State Department's Opposition to Zionist Aspirations during the Early Cold War

Abstract In the latter half of the 1940s, senior U.S. national security officials opposed Zionist aspirations for an independent state and sought to keep the Truman administration from actively facilitating that effort. Even though President Harry Truman himself expressed strong public backing for the new state of Israel, the reality, as recognized at the time by Israel's leaders and by prominent U.S. liberal political leaders and journalists, was that the United States was less firm, less consistent, and less consequential in supporting the establishment of the state of Israel than were the Soviet Union and the Communist states of Eastern Europe, especially Czechoslovakia and Poland. The situation that existed in 1947--1948, with significant U.S. government opposition and Soviet-bloc support for Israel, is evident from declassified files of the U.S. State Department and public records of the United Nations (UN).

ОСМЫСЛЕНИЕ НАЦИОНАЛЬНОГО ОПЫТА ВЗАИМОДЕЙСТВИЯ С ВЕНГЕРСКИМИ ПОЛИТИЧЕСКИМИ ЭЛИТАМИ В СЕРБСКОЙ ЛИБЕРАЛЬНОЙ ПУБЛИЦИСТИКЕ (1861–1872)

Национальная самоорганизация сербов в Австрийской монархии с 1690 по 1867 гг. претерпела значительные изменения в ходе взаимодействия с венгерскими элитами (администрацией комитатов, католическим духовенством, депутатским корпусом Государственного собрания). На материале периодической печати, программных политических манифестов, источников личного происхождения и др. в статье показано, как затяжной сербо-мадьярский конфликт при вмешательстве в него австрийских властей сформировал «стратегию выживания в условиях полиэтничного государства и политическую культуру сербов, базировавшуюся на устойчивой антипатии к осуществляемой концепции развития в Венгерском королевстве единой политической нации. Также представлен новый взгляд на мобилизацию сербского сообщества в условиях принудительной интеграции, наиболее действенными средствами которой являлись популяризация травмирующего опыта взаимоотношений с титульным этносом и его стигматизация путем применения «языка вражды» в пропагандистской компании, развернутой сербскими либералами в 1866–1872 гг.The Serbs’ national self-organisation in the Habsburg monarchy from 1690 to 1867 underwent significant changes in the course of interaction with the Hungarian elites (county administrations, the Catholic clergy, deputies of the Diet). Periodicals, political writings, ego-documents and other sources demonstrate how the Serbian–Magyar conflict against the background of the Austrian authorities’ interference into the inter-ethnic relations resulted in the making of a “survival strategy” in the composite monarchy and crystallisation of a specific political culture of the Serbs, based on a stable antipathy to the triumph of the concept of “natio Hungarica”. The article presents a new look at mobilisation of the Serbian community in the context of forced integration, the most effective means of which were the popularisation of traumatic experience of relationships with the titular nation and its stigmatisation by using the “hate speech” in the propaganda campaign launched by Serbian liberals in 1866–1872.

Theodor Heuss „Zu Ernst Troeltschs Gedächtnis“. Eine Gedenkrede im „Demokratischen Klub Berlin“

Abstract On September 12, 1949, the liberal politician Theodor Heuss, party leader of the „Freie Demokratische Partei“ (FDP), was elected by the Bundesversammlung (Federal Convention) as the first Bundespräsident, i. e. head of state, of the newly founded Bundesrepublik Deutschland. As a young man Heuss had been a close friend and political ally of Friedrich Naumann, the protestant pastor and left wing liberal politician, supported by Ernst Troeltsch. Heuss then working as a political journalist for liberal newspapers and Naumann’s weekly journal Die Hilfe, was an admirer of Troeltsch, and since 1910 they often met in Heidelberg, at Villa Fallenstein, Ziegelhäuser Landstraße 17, where Max and Marianne Weber as well als the Troeltschs lived; Heuss frequently visited Max Weber’s Sunday jour fixe. When in 1915 Troeltsch became a professor at the Philosophical Faculty of Berlin University Heuss regularly kept in contact with him especially through Hans Delbrück’s „Mittwochabend“, a weekly gathering of liberal intellectuals, professors, politicians and journalists discussing political reforms and the ongoing war. Both Troeltsch and Heuss, 19 years younger, demanded the democratization of the Deutsches Reich, and after the end of the war and the revolution of 1918/19 they became members of the newly founded left wing liberal party „Deutsche Demokratische Partei“ (DDP). After Troeltsch’s sudden death on February 1st, 1923, Heuss wrote an obituary, and, together with his wife Elly Heuss-Knapp, attended the funeral service conducted by Adolf von Harnack. Heuss was a member of the „Demokratischer Klub Berlin“, founded in 1919 by liberal politicians, bankers and academics to regularly discuss the political situation of the new democratic state, the Weimar Republic. Unknown until now, seven weeks after Troeltsch’s death the „Demokratische Klub“ invited its members (the club only had male mebers!) to a memorial act for Troeltsch. On this occasion Heuss delivered a speech „Zu Ernst Troeltschs Gedächtnis“ („To the Memory of Ernst Troeltsch“) which is published here for the first time.

Concerning Patriots, Liberalas, Americanists and Protestants

The title of this paper refers to both the personality and work of the Spaniards who, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, had to abandon their homeland fleeing from the absolutism of King Ferdinand VII (1784–1833), and the inhabitants of the Spanish colonies in the New World, the forerunners of the struggles for independence in their respective countries. Both ended up settling in London, a city that served not only as a refuge but also as a place from which to disseminate their slogans in favour of freedom. Three areas are discussed: the publications of liberal Spanish exiles in London in the early nineteenth century, the interaction between Spanish and (Latin) American exiles and the role of women in this endeavour and in the cause of liberalism in general. The London press shaped this exile journalism and the subsequent liberal journalism in Spain when the extreme censorship from which these exiled journalists had fled was finally lifted. We believe that this global approach offers an original perspective from which to highlight the role of women, with a view to filling the traditional historiographical lacuna in this regard. To this end, we have employed recent relevant literature and primary sources.

Measuring differences in the Chinese press: A study of People’s Daily and Southern Metropolitan Daily

The development of the market has produced a differentiation inside the Chinese press between an ‘official’ press with traditional propaganda functions on behalf of the Communist Party and a ‘commercial’ press whose objective is to maximise revenue. Scholarly opinion has differed over whether marketization undermines Party control and whether new forms of journalism have arisen that lead to conflicts. These discussions have rested on little evidence as to the practises of Chinese journalism. This article presents empirical data on the extent of the differentiation, reporting on a content analysis of the national news in People’s Daily and Southern Metropolitan Daily. These titles are popularly believed to represent the polar opposites of official, orthodox journalism and commercial, liberal journalism. The evidence presented here demonstrates that while there are indeed significant differences in the journalism of the two titles, there remains a substantial overlap in their choice of subjects, their use of sources and the degree to which news is presented ‘objectively’. Southern Metropolitan Daily does display some ‘popular’ features and does contain more ‘watchdog’ journalism, but it shares with its official cousin an emphasis upon the party as the source for news.

«Польский вопрос» в русской либеральной публицистике 1860-1880-х гг.

«Польский вопрос» в русской либеральной публицистике 1860-1880-х гг.

With the Faltering Liberal Journalism Model; Is China Set to Lead Emmerging Powers in Shaping New Global Journalism?

Whereas the US President Donald Trump names American Media and their journalistic practices fake news and enemy of the people hence complement the long scholarly claims that the American Liberal Journalism is in crisis and unfriendly on social-economic development initiatives and to the global south, “China’s journalism model” which put particular emphasize on social-economic development with government intervention is now gaining grounds. While some scholars see the ‘Going Global’ of Chinese media a high time for the Chinese model to be globalized others reserve contentious. This article highlights the readiness of Chinese media and journalism practices in affecting local media and journalism practices across the World in reflecting to the U.S’s liberal journalism model. It reviews various scholarly suggested journalism models in China such as ‘positive reporting’, ‘developmental journalism’ and ‘Soviet-Communist model’ but argues that while these values are now exported globally, there is no clear and consistent model due to what articulate China’s domestic media and journalism environment is unpredictable depending on the political and economic circumstances and regulations are prone to party-state interventions. Through thoroughly reading various publications by researchers and scholars from both China and the Western perspectives, reading official documents and adhering to direct commentaries or directives from Chinese top officials and academicians on media and journalism practices; this article have concluded that due to political system dissimilarities among emerging global powers there should be a new approach of joining and mobilizing other developing countries and especially the emerging BRICS powers in developing a clear and consistent media and journalism model since majority of the world countries are already caught in a trap of liberal democracy and journalism regardless the impasse the model bleeds especially in social-economic development.

La stampa liberale di fronte allo squadrismo e al fascismo (1919-1922)

The essay examines the role of the press of Liberal orientation in front of the rise of Fascist squads. After the First World War the role of the newspaper is deemed crucial by politicians, publishers and journalists. The rising awareness of the importance of newspapers, within the context of a difficult post-war transition, contributed to the radicalisation of liberal newspapers. An anti-Socialist legacy, combined with Union busting, joined with the new nationalistic wave which was emphasised by military victory. The hostility against Socialism turned into a kind of showdown after the appearance of Fascist squads, to which the major Italian newspapers (Corriere della sera, Giornale d’Italia, La Tribuna) offered their support. They depicted the Fascist movement mainly as a phenomenon in continuity with the Liberal state and ideology, never as an external one. Its violent expressions were either not mentioned, or dis-torted, or even justified. While Fascist press showed off the cases of threats and violence, the Liberal one tended to conceal them, thereby favouring in silence a shift of opinion towards Fascism. Liberal journalists, then, observed middle-class public opinion becoming motionless or angry, in both cases ready to move towards Fascism. An autonomous fascistizzazione of Liberal press was, in fact, realized even before the march on Rome, in a process that involved also local newspapers.

Jornalismo Radical: Lições da Grécia

Centrado no caso da Grécia, este texto vem traçar os contornos de um novo paradigma do jornalismo radical. Argumentamos que este novo paradigma é radical em cinco sentidos: em termos de sua organização, em termos de identidade de seus produtores, em termos de suas orientações face ao establishment político e à sociedade, em termos dos seus conteúdos, e em termos de sua relação com leitores e públicos. Tomados em conjunto, estes sentidos mostram um novo papel radical para o jornalismo, concentrado na abordagem das necessidades atuais de uma sociedade em crise. O papel político do jornalismo foi há muito tempo integrado numa compreensão gramsciana da hegemonia e no papel dos intelectuais que agitam e persuadem. O surgimento de um novo jornalismo radical em contexto de crise significa uma relação mais fundamental e orgânica do jornalismo com a sociedade, que requer mais do que agitação de suporte. Os jornalistas radicais não procuram liderar, agitar ou relatar desligados da sociedade. Em vez disso, este jornalismo nascido da crise e operando como crítica pode ser visto como um jornalismo de praxis ou de fazer: por isso, a ênfase é mais na construção ou restauração de relações sociais, em vez de ielegitimar as existentes como no caso do jornalismo liberal . Isso mostra um novo caminho e um papel político para o jornalismo, no qual ele se torna parte integrante da sociedade e em que está firmemente orientado para as necessidades sociais.

デモクラシーが「公衆」を形成する : ジョン・デューイとリベラル・ジャーナリズムの時代(報告論文,フォーラム2 デモクラシーが「公衆」を形成する-ジョン・デューイとリベラル・ジャーナリズムの時代)

デモクラシーが「公衆」を形成する : ジョン・デューイとリベラル・ジャーナリズムの時代(報告論文,フォーラム2 デモクラシーが「公衆」を形成する-ジョン・デューイとリベラル・ジャーナリズムの時代)

Fighting Putin and the Kremlin’s grip in neo-authoritarian Russia: The experience of liberal journalists

Russia is one of the most dangerous countries for journalists, and the conflict with Ukraine and Russia’s involvement in Syria present even further challenges for the future of Russian journalism. In addition to the financial pressures, physical attacks, abductions and harassment, liberal journalists now face an increasing threat to the democratising role they see themselves as playing. President Vladimir Putin’s soaring popularity and the elaborate range of tactics used to suppress press freedom are forcing liberal media to rethink their mission(s) and identity(ies). This article presents empirical evidence on the range of tactics used by the Russian authorities as well as the coping strategies adopted by journalists. The study shows that some Russian media and journalists demonstrate a great degree of resilience in their efforts to expose wrongdoings and hold the powerful to account. The article questions the applicability of Western-centric normative media system theories because it shows that the breadth, depth and mechanisms of control in modern-day Russia are very different from the ones used during Soviet times, and yet, Russian media and society do not appear to be on a linear journey from authoritarianism to democracy. The article presents the findings of a semi-ethnographic study of some of Russia’s most influential liberal news outlets – Novaya Gazeta, Radio Echo of Moscow and Radio Free Europe/Liberty. The study was conducted in May 2014 in the midst of the conflict with Ukraine. It involved observations of editorial meetings, documentary analysis and interviews with editors, deputy editors and journalists.

Portraits of the Poor in Early Nineteenth-Century Radical Journalism

AbstractThis paper compares the social-exploration literature of radical, mostly Owenite and Chartist, and liberal journalism in the first half of the nineteenth century, though the focus is on the less known ‘portraits of the poor’ in radical papers. In the paper I argue that against the developing liberal practice of intricately mapping poverty and categorizing the poor, radical papers under-represented particular cases of poverty, using an obfuscating syntax to document the poor. In doing so, radicals differentiated themselves from their middle-class counterparts, primarily as a way to challenge the assumption that poverty was a function of individual error and to turn the public’s gaze onto the social causes of poverty. Highlighting the political dimensions of poverty and minimizing the language of ‘personal responsibility’, radicals demonstrated that the activist agenda concerned itself with the economic and social as much as with the political, even while offering political solutions to economic and...

The Meaning of Leaning

Based on the subset of a representative survey of journalists with an active role perception in Germany, this article shows that more liberal journalists within the subset have (a) a more active role conception than more conservative journalists, (b) they perceive stronger discrepancies between their active role and its fulfillment, and (c) they are, thus, less satisfied with audiences and editorial policy. The indirect effect of the political leaning of this subset of journalists on their satisfaction with audiences and editorial policy underlines the significance of intrinsic factors for subdimensions of job satisfaction in journalism.

News Media Landscape in a Fragile State: Professional Ethics Perceptions in a Post-Ba'athist Iraq

During the years of Ba'athist dictator Saddam Hussein, media personnel were under tight control and tortured or executed when they strayed from the government line. In the decade following the fall of the Ba'athist regime, thousands of Iraqi journalists were trained in liberal democratic professional norms, and hundreds of news outlets opened even as some of the old patronage practices and violence continued. This study utilized Shoemaker and Reese's hierarchy of influences model to examine factors influencing a proxy indicator for professional ethics, the value of conflict of interest avoidance among a purposive sample of Iraqi journalists (N = 588). We found that the news media routines and ideological levels, though not strong, had the greatest influences on this conflict of interest avoidance perception criterion indicator, the proxy for professional ethics. The findings suggest a tension between liberal democratic journalism training at the routines level and ideological aspects, in some cases, such as ethnic identity and political ideology. Strong influences on perceptions of conflict of interest avoidance were the type of media platform/Western journalism training, Arab ethnicity over Kurdish ethnicity, ideology of “democrat” over Kurdish nationalist or Islamist. No influence was apparent for Internet use frequency or state versus nonstate media.