The U.S. media landscape can be defined is a highly diverse, liberalised and mostly self-regulated system. Media outlets are predominantly privately owned, what, along with slack ownership laws, has led to a considerable scale of ownership concentration among broadcast, but not among print media. A strong system of legal protection based on the First Amendment guarantees freedom of expression and the press, though concerns are raised regarding a lack of uniform shield laws, libel laws being used as leverage against media outlets, and the governments war against whistle-blowers. Though media coverage is generally plural and diverse, partisanship and editorial slant are increasingly displayed by cable news channels like Fox News or MSNBC. American journalists mostly view themselves as watchdogs and enjoy extensive degrees of autonomy in their work. However, structural changes like financial or time pressure and the rising popularity of social media as an alternative news sources have decreased journalists’ autonomy and resources for investigative reporting in recent years. Lastly, the election of Donald Trump, who continues to threaten and villainise non-compliant media outlets, has deeply unsettled the U.S. media landscape.

The United States of America have a strong system of legal protection for media freedom and editorial independence, with its core guarantees being defined in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution of 1787: “Congress shall make no law (…) abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press” (Legal Information Institute, 2016). Despite media independence and freedom of expression being heavily protected and widely respected in most cases, the election of President Trump, who has repeatedly threatened and villainised liberal media outlets, has deeply unsettled the U.S. media landscape. He personally explained one day after his inauguration that he has “a running war with the media” (Stelter, 2017), and both Trump and his chief strategist Steve Bannon have called media the “opposition party” (Gambino, 2017). However, his statement at a rally in Texas in February 2016, in which he explicitly threatens the New York Times and the Washington Post, probably best describes his campaign against unfavourable media outlets: “The New York Times (…) is one of the most dishonest media outlets I’ve seen in my life. The worst, the worst, the absolute worst, they have an agenda that you wouldn’t believe, and they are run by incompetent people (…). And believe me, if I become President, oh do they have problems, they’re gonna have such problems” (Youtube, 2016). Though no immediate direct actions have been undertaken by Trump until the creation of this report (which was issued around two weeks after his inauguration), this statement still points out the difficult relationship of America’s new President with critical media outlets.

Besides, there are a number of other recent developments that cause concerns among media freedom advocates and have a potential to restrain journalists’ autonomy:
The regulation of media and media content via ministries in the U.S. is minimal, and there are no industrywide self-regulatory institutions (Freedom of the Press, 2016: 2). While there are no regulatory bodies for print or internet media, broadcasting media is regulated by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which is the “United States’ primary authority for communications law, regulation and technological innovation” (FCC, 2016a). With reference to the Communications Act from 1934, Congress required FCC to regulate broadcasting in “the public interest, convenience, or necessity” (Pritchard, 2007: 2), without, however, ever defining the phrase. Left to its own, the FCC identified three goals it believed would foster public interest in broadcasting: diversity, competition and localism. Its budget is controlled by the Congress, which also has considerable oversight authorities (ibid: 4-5). The FCC is directed by five commissioners appointed by the President (FCC, 2016a) and “responsible for managing and licensing the electromagnetic spectrum for commercial users and for non-commercial users” (FCC, 2016b). Furthermore, the FCC also reviews broadcasting content for compliance with federal law regarding obscenity, indecency, or nudity (Communications Act, 1934: 253). Its vague definitions of obscene content and the issuing of high fines led to increased criticism against the FCC evoking self-censorship among broadcasting journalists, and numerous calls to limit its authorities regarding the regulation of indecent content (McNeill, 2012).
Freedom House, though being a non-governmental organisation, is funded by the U.S. government and rates the U.S. press as “free” (Freedom of the Press, 2016: 1). Reporters without Borders rank the U.S. media system 41 in its annual World Press Freedom Index of 2016, eight ranks higher than in 2015 (Reporters without Borders, 2016).

The media market in the U.S. is highly diverse, liberal and moderately regulated, with no significant restrictions on production. Since the “media in the U.S. are overwhelmingly under private ownership” (Freedom of the Press, 2016: 4), distribution or funding of the media is primarily financed through a highly-developed advertising market. In total, there are six large media groups in the U.S., together controlling over 90 per cent of all audience shares: Comcast (formerly GE), News Corp, Disney, Viacom, Time Warner and CBS (Lutz, 2012).

The U.S. print market is highly diversified. Between 1984 and 2008, the top four national newspapers combined never exceeded 26 per cent of total market shares by circulation and the top four magazines never exceeded 17 per cent (Noam, 2009: 140, 161). The print market encompasses about 1.300 titles (Statista, 2014a), with the USA Today being the highest-circulating daily newspaper (2.301.917) (Cision, 2016). Like most print media all over the Western world, U.S. papers are suffering from a rising influence of online freelancing journalism, resulting in decreased circulation rates and, consequently, advertising revenues. Within the last 25 years, the total daily circulation declined from around 60 million in 1990 (Noam, 2009: 138) to 40.420.000 copies in 2014 (Statista, 2014b), which makes around 0.33 newspaper titles per household today (Statista, 2014c). This development evoked a financial burden, which forces newspapers to cut staff and turn to freelance journalists. What’s more, most newspapers can’t afford to assign as many reporters to statehouses as they used to. Since 2003, there has been a 35 per cent decline (around 160 reporters) in the number of reporters assigned to statehouses by newspapers. Besides, every seventh of the now 300 statehouse reporters assigned today is a college student (Pew Research Center, 2014).

In contrast to the print market, the U.S. broadcasting market is fairly concentrated, with the top four TV networks (Viacom, Comcast, News Corp & Disney) accounting for a 91.3 per cent share of total audience in 2007 (Noam, 2009: 89), and the top four radio networks accounting for 73.6 per cent shares of total revenue in 2006 (Noam, 2009: 85). In 2013, the number of local TV stations changing owners via mergers or acquisition reached nearly 300. Though this number declined to 101 in 2015, ownership concentration among broadcasting media is still an ongoing concern (Freedom of the Press, 2016: 5) One reason behind this considerable scale of concentration are the slack and generous broadcast ownership laws, which are based on the Administrative Procedure Act, implemented by the FCC, and reviewed every four years (Pritchard, 2007: 5):
Despite this ban on cross-ownership, however, “consolidation of [cross-] ownership has been spurred in recent years by a pattern in which media conglomerates spin off their newspaper units from their broadcast assets, and the separate companies then pursue mergers and acquisitions in their respective sectors” (Freedom of the Press: 2016: 5). For instance, in 2014, media companies E.W. Scripps and Journal Communications announced to merge and then spin off their combined newspapers, leaving one company focussing on TV stations and another focussing on newspapers. The main benefit of the merger would be that both future companies could pursue growth through acquisitions and bypass media cross-ownership rules, with one company purchasing TV stations and the other purchasing newspapers (De la Merced, 2014). The announced merger was completed in April 2015 (Micheli, 2015).

The internet penetration rate in the U.S. is 75 per cent (Freedom on the Net, 2016: 1).Within the last years, traditional media (broadcasting and especially print) have suffered financially from the rising popularity of online media outlets (specifically Google News or Social Media Networking Sites like Facebook or Twitter) as an alternate, primary news source. As a result, the U.S. media’s ability to hold authorities to account and to serve as a watchdog has suffered, since funding of investigative or foreign reporting had to be cut (Freedom of the Press, 2016: 4). In an interview, former executive director of non-profit organization Investigative Reporters & Editors Mark Horvit and his successor Doug Haddix both confirmed that while large media outlets like the New York Times or national broadcasters still have “pretty decent resources devoted to investigative journalism” (Mullin, 2016), in-depth research has severely suffered at local news companies. However, the extensive cuts in investigative departments have also lead to an increased corporation among investigative journalists in the U.S., for instance in the revision of the Panama Papers in April 2016 (ibid.). Furthermore, non-profit online outlets like First Look Media or ProPublica, sponsored by philanthropic foundations emerged, seeking to fill that vacuum of decreasing investigative journalism by providing explorative, in depth reporting (Freedom of the Press, 2016: 4).

Due to its liberal model, the viewpoints displayed in the U.S. media are highly diverse and plural. Self-censorship is rare among U.S. journalists and most media companies successfully strive to separate commentary and news and to avoid partisanship in their news reporting. However, there are some rising concerns about an increasing rate of news outlets being partisan, especially in covering political affairs (Prior, 2013: 101). Editorial slant towards a specific political direction is increasingly displayed among cable news channels like Fox News (conservative) or MSNBC (liberal) (Martin & Yurukoglu, 2014: 7). Furthermore, the “popularity of talk-radio shows, whose hosts are primarily conservative has also played an important role in media polarization” (Freedom of the Press, 2016: 3).

In addition to that, the increasing influence of fake news, non-factual and unsupported news content published by seemingly authentic online outlets and rapidly disseminated via social media, is posing a serious threat to factual journalism. While fake news are not a U.S. specific but a global problem, media advocates believe that they have in fact played a significant role in the 2016 presidential vote and the perception of its two candidates, with some even calling it “the scourge of the U.S. election” (Blackwell, 2016). One example was the fictional story of a Trump protester claiming he was paid 3.500 USD by Hillary Clinton’s election team to demonstrate against the republican candidate at one of his rallies. The made-up news was published by AbcNews.com.co, a privately run online outlet emulating AbcNews.com, whose creator Jimmy Rustling regularly uses his own name in his mock articles. Despite claims that the emergence of fake news will severely change journalism globally (ibid.), its verifiable influence on society and journalism remains yet to be surveyed.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were about 41.050 “reporters and correspondents” employed in the U.S. in 2015 (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2015). However, taking into account that a broad definition of journalists might also include vague job terms like “writers or editors”, one might assume that there were around 100.000 full time journalists nationally employed in 2015 (ibid.). Regarding aspects like journalists’ socio-demographics, their perceived job autonomy, their professionalization or their role perceptions, Weaver et al.’s long term study The American Journalist (conducted once per decade, initiated in 1982) might serve as a good reference. In their 2017 study, The American Journalist in the Digital Age, David H. Weaver and Lars Willnat provide many useful insights for assessing journalists’ autonomy in the U.S. However, since only the key findings of their 2013 study have been published so far, both researchers have been interviewed additionally to deliver personal assessments: Journalists’ perceived job autonomy in America has dropped severely within the last few decades. In 2002, 42.5 per cent of interviewees stated “they have almost complete freedom to decide aspects of story to stress” and 51.5 per cent said “they almost always can get a subject covered that they think should be covered” (Weaver et al., 2007: 76). However, while 60 per cent of journalists believed that they had “almost complete freedom in selecting stories” in 1971 and 40 per cent in 2002, only 33.6 per cent said so in 2013 (Willnat & Weaver, 2013: 13). In a personal interview, David H. Weaver describes that “much of this decline has to do with lack of time for reporting and the need to pay attention to news web sites and social media. Some of it may also be due to more pressure from audiences, who can now easily contact journalists by email or social media, and some may be from the business people in news organizations who are more concerned with audience size and attention.” Consequently, he believes that “U.S. journalists still have a great deal of freedom in writing their stories, but they don’t have as much time for original reporting as they used to.” Separately, Lars Willnat adds that “financial pressures are driving this decline in job autonomy. Editors are telling their colleagues what kind of stories might sell, audience data from news websites and social media feeds provide constant updates on which stories get read, and an audience that prefers entertainment rather than hard news, all put pressures on journalists to produce news that sells. These pressures reduce job autonomy – many journalists likely feel that they cannot cover the stories that they think should be covered.” Despite this perceived decline in job autonomy, American journalists are still generally satisfied with their work, with 71.6 per cent of women and 76.3 per cent of man stating they were “very” or “fairly satisfied”. However, the percentage of journalist being “very satisfied” has declined from 49.0 per cent in 1971 and 33.3 per cent in 2002 to only 23.3 per cent in 2013 (Willnat & Weaver, 2013: 12).

With regard to their self-perception, previous studies suggested that U.S. journalists subscribe to multiple roles depending on the type of reporting they do (David H. Weaver). However, they predominantly view themselves as a watchdog of the government, with three of four interviewees stating that “investigating government claims is extremely important”. This percentage has even increased from 66 per cent in 1982 to 78.2 per cent in 2013 (Willnat & Weaver, 2013: 14). Lars Willnat believes that this perception might even have intensified due to the ongoing aggressions of President Trump: “I would argue that the watchdog role just got a huge shot in the arm due to Trump’s attempts to go to war with the media.” Furthermore, 68.8 per cent of journalists believed that “analysing complex problems is extremely important” for their work, compared to 49 per cent in 1982. Taken together, “investigating government claims” and “analysing complex problems” have become the most important professional roles perceived by U.S. journalists in 2013 (ibid: 15). At the same time, the “information disseminator” role has decreased, with only 46.5 per cent stating that “getting information to public quickly is extremely important”, compared to 68.6 per cent supporting this role in 1992. According to Willnat & Weaver, “U.S. journalists might have recognized that their real strengths may lie in providing investigative reports and analyses rather than quick information, especially when competing with online media that can distribute news and information instantly” (ibid: 17). However, David H. Weaver personally stresses that “perceived roles are more a measure of what journalists think they should do than what they actually do, it seems.”

In contrast to self-perception, the people’s trust in mass media remains at a historic low, since “journalists generally don’t have a very good image among the US public” (Lars Willnat). Following a survey from opinion research institute Gallup from 2015, only 40 per cent of Americans say they have ”a great deal” or “a fair amount of trust and confidence in the mass media to report the news fully, accurately and fairly”, compared to 55 per cent in 1999 (Gallup, 2017). However, Lars Willnat believes that this “might change in the coming months (if they stand up to Trump and provide facts rather than some kind of alternate reality preferred by the US administration), but at the moment most people simply don’t trust the media – and by extension, journalists.” David H. Weaver shares this opinion: “The news media are held in fairly low esteem by the U.S. public, but journalists seem to be rated higher than the U.S. Congress and some other institutions. This also depends on level of education and political leaning of members of the public. Less educated, more conservative people generally have a lower opinion of the news media and journalists. This seems to be especially true of supporters of Donald Trump, at least the vocal ones.” This issue is supported by the Gallup survey, which suggests that only 32 per cent of Republicans trust the mass media, compared to 55 per cent of Democrats (Gallup, 2017).

Journalistic ethics are widely respected in the U.S., and only a minority of journalists believes that controversial reporting practices “may be justified”: “using personal documents (…) without permission” (24.9 per cent), “badgering unwilling informants” (37.7 per cent) or “claiming to be somebody else” (6.7 per cent). Following Willnat & Weaver, this trend toward a more gentle form of U.S. journalism might reflect the increasing commercial pressure on media outlets: “Investigative reporting is a costly endeavor and might scare away audiences that do not appreciate aggressive journalism” (2013: 19). However, a slight majority of 57.7 per cent stated that “using confidential business or government documents without authorization may [in fact] be justified” (ibid: 18). Lars Willnat states that “ethics in journalism has become a big value, we all talk about it, and I think people are increasingly looking for journalists with integrity. I could be wrong, but the flood of fake news and the constant barrage of ‘opinion’ journalism found on the Internet has tired many people who are now looking for real news.”

In total, there are 41 professional journalism associations in the U.S., providing journalistic codes of ethics and defending journalists’ autonomy (American Media Institute, 2016). Among the most important are: When asked about the influence of these journalist associations, the views of the two researchers differ: While Lars Willnat considers the role of organizations like SPJ “a public voice and a defender” of journalists and “crucial in the fight against the current attacks by the US administration”, David H. Weaver said, “I don’t think that journalism associations in the U.S. have much influence with journalists or politicians. For one thing, the membership of journalists in these associations is low, and U.S. journalists tend to be rather independent non-joiners of organizations. Some may have more influence than others, but there are many specialized journalism organizations that do not have much influence on politicians, the public or even journalists themselves.” However, since The American Journalist surveys have never asked about the journalists’ attitude towards their journalistic associations, it is hard to assess whether reporters actually have confidence in organizations like SPJ or RCFP (David H. Weaver & Lars Willnat).

Currently there are no active press councils in the U.S. safeguarding journalistic quality or issuing reproofs, making the FCC the only institution merely imposing bans on profane or obscene content (Accountable Journalism, 2017). According to Lars Willnat, “the US media believe in self-regulation – quintessential American attitude. Press councils would not work in this nation, not with the 1st Amendment having such a huge importance in this country.”

Lastly, despite Donald Trump repeatedly villainizing and threatening media outlets during his campaign, both researchers don’t see a profound impact of his election on the future autonomy of U.S. journalists: “The Trump administration is in a war with the media, but U.S. journalists are not easily intimidated. They are a wild bunch, it will take more than a few dim-witted clowns to make them lose their tenacity” (Lars Willnat). David H. Weaver adds that “some journalists may feel a bit intimidated by Trump and his supporters, but I think that most will not feel that they have less autonomy. I think the criticism of the Trump administration by most mainstream national news organizations will continue to be as, or more, critical than it has this past week unless Trump starts acting more reasonably.”

Interviewed experts (via E-Mail, January 2017)

References

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