After Leveson: how to rebuild trust and credibility in journalism

Here is the second part of a chapter by Professor Richard Sambrook in After Leveson.* The director of Cardiff University's centre for journalism answers questions he posed in yesterday's extract, asking whether it might be possible to build journalistic professionalism through formalising education and whether employers could be persuaded to support it...

Outside journalism, professionals typically undergo a postgraduate programme. On qualifying, they then have to obtain a formal licence to practice by passing a comprehensive exam designed to test their mastery of their subject.

Once they pass this test, they have to invest in a certain amount of continuing education to stay abreast of evolving knowledge. In some fields, licensed professionals must periodically pass further exams in order to re-certify their licenses.

Journalists don't face such challenges. Although increasing numbers now have university training, and those entering newspapers may sit the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) exams, there is no formal requirement for entry.

There is a growing need for consistent entry level training and also for training at mid-career and senior levels.

Society has an implicit contract with true professions — we grant them privileges because we trust them to self-govern. They are not always upheld, but they do establish a higher expectation than in a non-professional setting, and a higher degree of censure when those expectations are broken.

If journalism were to be seen as a profession, supported by a transparent approach to training and development and qualification, public expectations and the expectations of journalists themselves would rise. It might be the start of strengthening trust and improving morale.

For that to happen, the industry would need to agree, and abide by, a consistent standard for entry to the profession – accredited independently by the NCTJ or others – and invest in a recognised programme of continuous personal development for editorial staff.

Currently there is little incentive for them to do so and, culturally, little recognition of the need or advantages of doing so.

How the US moved on from yellow journalism

There is a parallel with the "professionalisation" of American journalism a century ago. In the 1920s there was a long and heated debate about press standards and purposes – following the sensational yellow journalism of the press wars between Pulitzer and Hearst.

As Michael Schudson has suggested, this debate led to a conscious decision on the part of American journalists to move towards a set of professional standards, a move also made in response to the rapid growth of PR.

In the US, they developed the first ethical codes of practice and the concept of objectivity as a core journalistic value took hold. It was a view that did not cross the Atlantic.

Britain aspired to the amateur literary journalistic tradition, but also – in broadcasting at least – adopted the objective/impartial ideal.

Through most of the last century this professional approach to newspaper journalism in the US has produced high quality, ethically sound, reporting. Critics would say it has also been less innovative or creative than British journalism and has not protected US journalism from some of its own scandals.

In addition, the digital age has undermined the value of such professional norms as objectivity which, in the US more than the UK, is now widely discredited as an impossible and therefore unhelpful standard to which to aspire.

Establishing professional norms in the US worked in the middle of the last century at a time when owners wanted to restore trust and build media empires based on scarcity of resource and distribution.

In an era of digital plenty, and economic challenge, it is less clear that the same approach is relevant anymore. However, this shouldn't be confused with a lack of relevance of any professional standard.

If the norms of objectivity and impartiality are breaking down, what is to distinguish the professional journalist from anyone with access to social media or a blog? In an era when we are engulfed in information – much of it of poor quality, uncertain provenance or just wrong – there should be a premium on professional assessment, analysis and presentation of information of public interest.

Ethical codes can help to set standards

Trust in a professional approach requires transparency about standards, methods and motivations – and a culture which prizes accuracy and a positive relationship with the public rather than the cynical exploitation of them as revealed in the Leveson inquiry.

There is of course a great deal of outstanding high quality journalism delivered every day by British newspapers. In many ways, we are lucky to have the range and quality that we enjoy given the economic circumstances. But in its approach to training and development, and the culture it nurtures, the industry is overly attached to the past.

Lord Justice Leveson talks more about culture than about training or development in his report – while making clear that they are closely linked. He says no code of practice can turn an unethical organisation into an ethical one. However such codes can help ethical organisations to set standards.

Culture is the core issue. As any manager will testify cultural change, even when recognised as needed, is hugely difficult to implement.

In a curious and little commented upon digression, considering the tools a new regulatory system might use to change culture, Sir Brian Leveson turned to a former government lawyer, Donald Macrae.

In paragraphs that could have come out of a business school handbook, he offered a four-part analysis of bringing about cultural and behaviour change across the industry based on four principles: enable, encourage, engage and exemplify.

What is striking about this passage on cultural change is the extent to which Leveson believes those outside the industry are key to ensuring an environment that will stimulate and support a different media culture. The relationship between the media and society is of course crucial.

Transparency is the crucial ethical factor

If there is a lucrative market in unethical journalism, it will continue. If the public really want a more accountable media, they have to continue to demand it. At the heart of this relationship, as Leveson noted, sits transparency:

"Transparency... could work in two ways. It can take the form of transparency of action (eg, requiring all stories to run under the byline of a real person; requiring transparency on the sources of quotes, requiring transparency on the method by which any story has been obtained).

It can also take the form of transparency of compliance (eg, requiring visible corrections, publishing accuracy league tables, publishing data on compliance with regulatory standards)."

He also recommended the six principles of transparency offered by Baroness Onora O'Neill:

(a) openness about payments from others; (b) openness about payments to others; (c) openness about the interests (financial or otherwise) of owners, editors, programme- makers and journalists; (d) openness about errors; (e) openness about (most) sources, with an adequately drawn test of the public interest to allow sources to be kept secret; (f) openness about comments from members of the public.

Ethics and transparency are about the media's relationship with the public. Adopting a framework of transparency of this kind – within whatever regulatory model emerges from the current political debate – would be a first step in strengthening that relationship, providing a basic level of accountability and rebuilding trust.

It would also be a first step towards a more professional footing for journalism that could be built upon without infringing independence or freedom of the press.

It doesn't require statute to implement – merely a shift in perspective about newspapers' responsibilities towards the public and a recognition by employers about their responsibility towards a well-trained staff.

After Leveson? The future for British journalism, edited by John Mair, is published by Abramis. Available at a special Media Guardian price of £15 from richard@arimapublishing.co.uk

Tomorrow: Bernard Clark thinks Lord Justice Leveson was looking backward at a disappearing problem rather than forward at the burgeoning of information terrorism