Page 287 - Comparing Political Communication Theories, Cases, and Challenge

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Political News Journalists

world of British newspapers is different from the air of neutrality that
pervadesBritishbroadcasting.Swedenisanothercountrywherethenews
cultures of print and broadcast journalists are measurably different.
In the three other countries – the United States, Germany, and Italy –
the differences in the mean scores of the print and broadcast journalists
are so small as to be insignificant. Journalists in these countries work
through different mediums, but they have a shared conception of news.
In other words, they have a common journalistic culture.
It is important to keep in mind, of course, that these cross-national
differences describe news systems that also have much in common, in-
cluding their primary task: the gathering and dissemination of the latest
information about current events. It is probably fair to say that Western
news systems are more alike than different, although their differences
are important and consequential.

LESSONS LEARNED
The power inherent in a comparative design is evident in these examples.
The chronic problem of a single-country study is that of a weak context
in which to assess the results. They are much richer in a comparative
study because it provides bases for comparison and thus for judging
the significance of a particular tendency or relationship. For example,
when partisanship in the news is examined simultaneously through the
lens of five countries, additional leverage is gained beyond even what five
separatestudiescouldprovide.Weunderstandtheimpactofpartisanship
more fully by being able to examine it across news systems that differ in
their media and political structures. We also understand each separate
case better because of the ability to see it through precisely the same lens
as the other cases. For example, as Case 2 illustrated, we have a much
clearer picture of the professional culture of U.S. journalism through
comparison with those of four other countries.
A comparative survey, however, places unusual demands on the re-
searcher. Not only must the survey instrument be a precise one – which
is always the case – but it must also be exact in terms of its applicability
to each case. Anyone undertaking such a survey should not underes-
timate the time and effort required to ensure that questions asked of
journalists in separate countries are identical in their meaning. If this
goal is not accomplished, the researcher is at the mercy of measurement
error. Are observed differences real ones or are they methodological
artifacts? The survey researcher gets some protection from the fact that,

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