The Environmental Beat
Inside the Struggle to Legitimize the Environment as News
Will be published approx. on 2. July 2026
Book
Hardback
344 pages
978-0-8262-2358-6 (ISBN)
Description
Environmental degradation has been part of American life for centuries, and yet environmental journalism as a specialized reporting beat has only existed since the 1960s. In the ensuing decades, the environment has fallen in and out of favor as a priority for news organizations. Moreover, journalists who pursue environmental stories have long been dogged by a reputation that they are activists, a charge that delegitimizes their labor and further undermines the potential for news organizations to commit to reporting on environmental issues.
In The Environmental Beat: Inside the Struggle to Legitimize the Environment as News, Suzannah Evans Comfort examines the circumstances under which news organizations chose to invest in environmental journalism since the early 20th century, demonstrating that a combination of external social factors and internal newsroom dynamics must occur for the environment to appear as a newsworthy topic. Comfort also examines actors on the margins of journalistic legitimacy, such as newspaper outdoor columnists who wrote on the sports pages, and environmental advocacy presses that provided a far more consistent source of environmental news making than their peers in the newsroom. These low-status actors in the journalistic field embraced advocacy and rejected both-siderism in their reporting on issues of the environment. Their consistency and longevity, even as more traditionally produced news attention waxed and waned, may provide an explanation for the perception of environmental news making as fundamentally activist.
The Environmental Beat will be of interest to working journalists as well as scholars of journalism.
In The Environmental Beat: Inside the Struggle to Legitimize the Environment as News, Suzannah Evans Comfort examines the circumstances under which news organizations chose to invest in environmental journalism since the early 20th century, demonstrating that a combination of external social factors and internal newsroom dynamics must occur for the environment to appear as a newsworthy topic. Comfort also examines actors on the margins of journalistic legitimacy, such as newspaper outdoor columnists who wrote on the sports pages, and environmental advocacy presses that provided a far more consistent source of environmental news making than their peers in the newsroom. These low-status actors in the journalistic field embraced advocacy and rejected both-siderism in their reporting on issues of the environment. Their consistency and longevity, even as more traditionally produced news attention waxed and waned, may provide an explanation for the perception of environmental news making as fundamentally activist.
The Environmental Beat will be of interest to working journalists as well as scholars of journalism.
Reviews / Votes
"Written in lively, accessible prose, The Environmental Beat makes a compelling case not only for why environmental journalism matters, but how it can reconnect us to one another and to the world we share. Suzannah Comfort's historical account of the challenges faced by writers and newsrooms to produce essential stories about environmental problems offers valuable lessons for scholars and journalists at a time of institutional transformation. Illuminating the vital role of reporting on issues from conservation to climate change, The Environmental Beat provides insights for a new generation of environmental journalists to forge a sustainable, ethical future." -Melissa Aronczyk, Rutgers University, co-author of A Strategic Nature: Public Relations and the Politics of American Environmentalism "Dr. Suzannah Evans Comfort offers a compelling historical analysis of the emergence and evolution of the environmental beat in U.S. news media. Her work illuminates the political, economic, and organizational challenges that continue to shape environmental journalism, while offering valuable insight into where the field may be headed. This book is an essential resource for aspiring environmental journalists and for anyone seeking to better understand how news about the environment is produced." -Bruno Takahashi, Michigan State University "Utilizing the tools of historical sociology, Suzannah Evans Comfort offers the first sweeping view of the development of environmental journalism over two centuries. The Environmental Beat sings with insight into the entanglements of journalism and advocacy, sport and culture, and news and business. Suzannah Evans Comfort has written a necessary book that helps environmental journalists understand their labor and struggles, and our moment, in the arc of historical time. She provides scholars with a groundbreaking look into the many forces that shape what is legitimate journalism and ultimately matters of public concern. This book could not be more urgent. As wildfires light night skies, oceans rise with the melting of glaciers, and hurricanes rage hundreds of miles from the ocean, The Environmental Beat shows how professional standards push environmental journalists to the margins, away from the urgency of the moment." -Daniel Kreiss, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, author of Prototype Politics: Technology-Intensive Campaigning and the Data of Democracy "As environmental reporting moved from the fringes of the media to a central place in many newsrooms, it encountered increasing levels of resistance and misinformation, along with declining support in a precarious media landscape. Journalists hoping to take the environmental beat into the future are well advised to acquaint themselves with its long history, the old challenges it continues to confront even as it faces myriad new pressures. With astute analysis of the news industry, a thorough study of the history of the environmental beat, and engagement with scores of working environmental journalists, Suzannah Comfort has provided an invaluable guide to how the environmental journalism ecosystem developed, what helped it grow, and how the most important beat on the planet can not only chart a course into the future but possibly improve it." -Michael Kodas, Senior Editor, Inside Climate News, author of Megafire: The Race to Extinguish a Deadly Epidemic of Flame "The Environmental Beat gives one of the most important and often under-examined areas of journalism its due. Suzannah Evans Comfort brings sharp perspective and critique as she examines the history, challenges, and future of environmental journalism- one of the most complex beats in the newsroom. This is essential reading for working or aspiring environmental journalists and journalism scholars."-Sadie Babits, Senior Supervising Climate Editor, NPR, author of Hot Takes: Every Journalist's Guide to Covering Climate ChangeMore details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Missouri
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
College/higher education
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 36 mm
Weight
739 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-8262-2358-6 (9780826223586)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Suzannah Evans Comfort is an associate professor in the Media School at Indiana University. A lifelong environmentalist, her interest in environmental journalism arose as a young reporter who noticed that environmental issues were rarely a priority for editors, despite their relevance to the community. She is the co-author of The Perfect Protein: The Fish Lover's Guide to Saving the Oceans and Feeding the World, with Andy Sharpless, and co-editor of The Handbook of International Trends in Environmental Communication. She lives in Bloomington, Indiana, with her husband, two dogs, and a cat.