New Civic Journalism Research

Civic journalism

initiatives in four cities around the country were widely and

positively recognized in their communities and prompted

increased civic activity, according to one of the first

academic studies of projects supported by the Pew Center for

Civic Journalism.

Newsroom buy-in,

however, tended to be either top heavy or lukewarm in the

news organizations studied.

"As we

anticipated, the findings were not all positive," said

Ed Fouhy, executive director of the Pew Center. "Perhaps

the most vexing to me was that the four projects were more

warmly received in the communities than in most of the

newsrooms that produced them. Citizen responses to civic

journalism in their communities were consistently

enthusiastic. Newsroom responses were frequently ambivalent

or even negative."

The research was

commissioned in January 1996 by The Pew Charitable Trusts.

"We sought an independent assessment of what kinds of

impact civic journalism was having and we are tremendously

encouraged by the findings," said Rebecca Rimel,

president of The Trusts.

The evaluators

studied four projects selected to demonstrate how civic

journalism worked in a variety of settings: large complex

communities (San Francisco); mid-sized cities (Charlotte and

Madison); and smaller towns (Binghamton, N.Y.)

This allowed the

researchers to compare such older, developed sites as

Charlotte and Madison with new ones, such as Binghamton, and

projects that are primarily oriented toward public

deliberation, such as Madison and San Francisco, with those

that seek to engage citizens in a community problem, such as

Charlotte and Binghamton.

In each case

study, the researchers looked at five areas: Who has

been affected in the communities? How have they been

affected? What has been the content of the projects?

How have the news collection, selection, reporting and

communication processes been affected? And what is the

impact of using media partners?

"It’s the

first comprehensive look at civic journalism across sites and

provides a terrific foundation for further understanding the

role and impact of civic journalism," said Tamar Datan,

the Venture Fund officer at The Pew Trusts, which funds the

Pew Center for Civic Journalism. Among the key findings:

The percent of

people aware of the projects and the impact of these efforts

on civic attitudes indicated that the projects had achieved

excellent "reach."

Citizens who were

aware of the projects said the initiatives made them think

more about politics, gave them a better idea about important

community problems, made them want to be more involved in the

community, and made them feel more strongly they should vote.

Projects that

focused on a specific community issue over a period of time

were more effective in mobilizing both public deliberation

and civic engagement than projects that episodically

addressed a range of general issues.

The active civic

core in all the communities were most aware of and most

motivated by the civic journalism efforts, and, once

mobilized, gave the efforts strong ripple effects throughout

the communities.

Minority

communities where targeted–in Charlotte and San

Francisco–responded strongly and well.

Although the

civic journalism reporting became repetitive to those in the

newsroom, citizens interviewed had a strong appetite for more

such reporting.

Civic journalism

efforts studied appeared to work better in simpler media

environments but are still effective in more complex cities.

The effects of

the initiatives within newsrooms were less significant than

in the communities at large.

The Pew Trusts

plan to publish the results for formal release in

mid-February after additional data are collected, according

to Don Kellerman, director of communications.

The research

comes as the Pew Center begins its fourth year as an

incubator of innovative civic journalism efforts. With the

recent selection of 13 new projects, the Pew Center, to date,

has helped to support 47 efforts around the country.

Undertaking the

research were Prof. Esther Thorson, Associate Dean of the

University of Missouri School of Journalism and Director of

the Center for Advanced Social Research; Prof. Steve Chaffee,

of Stanford University; and Prof. Lewis Friedland, of the

School of Journalism and Mass Communication and the Mass

Communications Research Center of the University of

Wisconsin.

In each

community, the researchers interviewed key journalists,

central community figures, and citizens in neighborhoods

particularly affected by the efforts. Phone surveys followed.

On the whole, the

researchers found that the civic journalism efforts were

succeeding in benefiting the communities served and the

overall democratic process. Most people surveyed who were

aware of the four projects said the efforts helped them

become more knowledgeable and concerned about their

communities and gave them a stronger sense of their civic

responsibilities.

The researchers

also reported being "impressed" by the reach of the

projects. In each community studied, recognition of the

effort by local leaders and residents was excellent–higher

than the researchers had anticipated, even in San Francisco,

a particularly competitive media environment.

The researchers

also said they were impressed by what the projects had

accomplished in their communities–again, more than they had

expected. They found that the projects opened options in the

community and gave both leaders and citizens a greater sense

of possibilities for solving local problems.

In Charlotte, in

particular, the researchers said they were struck by how

deeply the crime project "had penetrated into the

corners of community life and how it had diminished barriers

between people of different races and classes."

Within newsrooms,

the projects were viewed in various ways depending on

underlying labor-management relations, and whether there was

early acceptance by respected reporters and editors.

In all but one

case the initiatives were poorly introduced into the

newsrooms, the researchers said, and were widely perceived as

"management gimmicks."

Yet, the

researchers found paradoxically that the uneven newsroom

commitment didn’t necessarily hurt the projects in the

community.

"One of the

most important effects of the projects were that they got

reporters back out onto the street talking and listening to

citizens," Friedland said. "It’s something

newspapers and TV stations always say they do, but frequently

don’t."

Moreover, the

researchers noted, the journalists viewed citizens not as

devices for telling larger stories–a habit of contemporary

journalists–but as sources who knew better than the experts

what was important to them in their own lives and in this

democracy.

"One could

argue," the researchers concluded, "that these

projects represented a return to good reporting in the

classic sense."