Political Rumors: Why We Accept Misinformation and How to Fight It
Adam Berinsky, an MIT political scientist, tackles the challenge of political rumors – the factually incorrect claims, such as Obama’s birth abroad, that come to be widely believed. He explores why such rumors persist, who believes them, and how to combat them, using original survey and experimental data. He identifies conspiratorial thinking and strong partisan loyalties as key factors in the dissemination of such claims while suggesting remedial efforts should target not only diehard believers but also those who might be tempted to accept them. Emphasizing public vulnerability to misinformation, Berinsky calls for attention to both the message and the messenger, advocating for credible sources to debunk falsehoods.
News Hole: The Demise of Local Journalism and Political Engagement
The decline of local newspapers is a familiar story. Hundreds of them have shut down, with the loss of thousands of jobs. But News Hole shows that the problem is more than one of locked doors and laid off workers – when a local paper goes, so does the community’s civic health. Lower turnout in local elections, less responsive local officials, less civic engagement, wider polarization, less social trust, weaker community ties, less awareness of what’s going on a City Hall, the school board, and the county commission – in short, when a newspaper goes out of business, the community stops acting like a community. Danny Hayes, Professor of Political Science at George Washington University, and Jennifer L. Lawless, Leone Reaves and George W. Spicer Professor of Politics and Professor of Public Policy at the University of Virginia, aided by dozens of student research assistants, analyzed fifteen years of reporting in more than 200 local newspapers, while also studying election returns, opinion surveys, and other indicators to track community engagement to show that without solid journalism, democracy itself is at risk.
Power Play: How utilities paid a consulting group that infiltrated local news media, attacked clean energy foes and intimidated public officials
A months-long investigation by NPR’s David Folkenflik and Floodlight’s Mario Ariza and Miranda Green uncovered just how far two major power companies went to try to make sure their political foes didn’t dampen their profits or hold them accountable. The reporting, building off of an earlier Floodlight investigation with the Orlando Sentinel, found that Alabama Power and Florida Power & Light paid consulting company Matrix LLC millions over a decade, resulting in undisclosed payments to news outlets that cast the utilities in a positive light and were critical of those who questioned their power. A freelance ABC News producer was also hired to misleadingly represent herself and confront politicians over controversies relevant to Matrix clients. These revelations were followed by leadership changes at both power companies, internal investigations into their work with Matrix, as well as broad calls for transparency and reform. ABC News also severed ties with the freelance journalist. The story offers a rare window into the way power companies and consultants manipulate the democratic system, and the pressure local regulators and lawmakers confront if they seek to hold those corporations accountable, and what happens when local news erodes.
Democracy’s Detectives: The Economics of Investigative Journalism
Hamilton chronicles a record of investigative journalism’s real-world impact, showing how a single dollar invested in a story can generate hundreds of dollars in social benefits.
Political Journalism in Comparative Perspective
Based on interviews with journalists, a systematic content analysis of political news, and panel survey data in different countries, this book tests how different systems and media-politics relations condition the contents of political news.
Lincoln and the Power of the Press: The War for Public Opinion
Holzer shows us an activist Lincoln through journalists who covered him from his start through to the night of his assassination—when one reporter ran to the box where Lincoln was shot and emerged to write the story covered with blood. In a wholly original way, Holzer shows us politicized newspaper editors battling for power, and a masterly president using the press to speak directly to the people and shape the nation.
The Invention of News: How the World Came to Know about Itself
Andrew Pettegree investigates who controlled the news and who reported it; the use of news as a tool of political protest and religious reform; issues of privacy and titillation; the persistent need for news to be current and journalists trustworthy; and people’s changed sense of themselves as they experienced newly opened windows on the world. By the close of the eighteenth century, Pettegree concludes, transmission of news had become so efficient and widespread that European citizens—now aware of wars, revolutions, crime, disasters, scandals, and other events—were poised to emerge as actors in the great events unfolding around them.
Media Commercialization and Authoritarian Rule in China
Daniela Stockmann argues that the consequences of media marketization depend on the institutional design of the state.
How Partisan Media Polarize America
Drawing on experiments and survey data, Matthew Levendusky shows that Americans who watch partisan programming do become more certain of their beliefs and less willing to weigh the merits of opposing views or to compromise. And while only a small segment of the American population watches partisan media programs, those who do tend to be more politically engaged, and their effects on national politics are therefore far-reaching.
Changing Minds or Changing Channels? Partisan News in an Age of Choice
Overturning much of the conventional wisdom, Changing Minds or Changing Channels? demonstrate that the strong effects of media exposure found in past research are simply not applicable in today’s more saturated media landscape.
