Communitarian Journalism

One of the sharpest recent debates over media ethics has centered around what has been variously called public or civic or communitarian journalism. This special issue examines some of the underlying concerns of communitarian journalism including the relationships between individual and community and the connecting role of journalism; negative vs. positive freedoms; constitutional vs. marketplace mandates; universal vs. situational/professional values; individual vs. corporate vs. democratic loyalties; commitment and compassion vs. detachment and professional "distance;" and "talking to" vs. "talking with." Authors of these essays include some of the best-known practitioners and critics of contemporary journalism. They wrote these papers as part of a 2-year lecture series funded by the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation and hosted by the University of South Florida, St. Petersburg.