Preventive journalism
The intention of preventive journalism is to make society and politics aware of urgent social problems early on, in a prospective sense. It sees itself as a kind of social early warning system.
Definition and demarcation to other genres
The American journalist Michael O'Neill, who was editor of the New York Daily News from 1972 to 1985 and later President of the American Society of Newspaper Editors, provides a definition of the term preventive journalism : "Preventive journalism is a journalistic discipline that reports on urgent social problems at an early stage and on solutions proposed for these problems. It complements traditional investigative journalism and recognizes that journalism can alert government and society to problems before they become crises. "
Preventive journalism evolved from investigative journalism . The two genres can be distinguished from one another as follows: "If the investigative journalist deals with those children who have long since fallen into the well, the preventive colleague has the task of identifying the well hole in advance and ensuring that it is as close as possible sealed before a child can even fall in. "
According to this, preventive journalism - beyond investigative journalism - also has overlaps with solution-oriented journalism. The media scientist Christoph Fasel also sees similarities with utility journalism . Even the positive journalism has similar intentions as of preventive journalism.
Other / dissemination
In a speech in 1996, the former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan emphasized the necessity of preventive journalism for a functioning community - without, however, specifying the details of such a form of journalism. A good example of preventive journalism can be seen in a three-part report on Washington DC public schools by Dan Keating and V. Dion Haynes. In addition to a description of the problem, the contributions also provided specific suggestions for improvement in a solution-oriented sense.
Individual evidence
- ↑ See: wikipedia.org/wiki/Preventive_journalism.
- ↑ Christoph Fasel: Preventive Journalism, in: Deutscher Fachjournalisten-Verband (Ed.): Journalistische Genres, UVK-Verlag, Konstanz 2016, p. 74.
- ↑ Fasel 2016, p. 75.
- ↑ See scienceblog.com/community/older/archives/L/1996/B/un961953.html.
- ↑ See the description in: poynter.org/uncategorized/83256/preventive-journalism- its-roots-and-its-targets /.