Anthony Cawley

SHARING THE PAIN OR SHOULDERING THE BURDEN

This article draws on the concept of framing to analyse Irish print-media coverage of the public and private sectors in the first two years of Irelands economic crisis, 2008–2010. It examines the underlying framing contest among institutional sources (Government, Opposition, trade unions, employers’ groups, and financial services) to win favourable coverage for their sectional interests and ideological arguments about the size, role and obligations of the State. The research is based on a content and cluster analysis of a substantial sample of articles from quality and mid-market Irish daily and Sunday newspapers. The article offers concluding comments on the explanatory robustness of the dominant news-model in Ireland in the face of a process on the scale of the economic crisis.

‘I’d be proud to spend the sacred foreign aid budget on our poor pensioners’: Representations of macro aid resourcing in the Irish, UK and US print-media during the economic crisis, 2008–2011

The news-media has been identified as an influence on donor nations’ overseas aid allocations, acting as a site where decisions are justified to ‘domestic constituencies’ and through which resistance is mobilised. Mediated pressures on aid allocations amplified between 2008 and 2011 in three donor countries experiencing domestic economic difficulties: Ireland, the UK and the US. This study suggests that each country’s print-media positioned the macro resourcing of aid primarily as an inward concern, neglected recipient country needs, and made weak connections to international policy frameworks to benchmark, contextualise and rationalise aid allocations. The research suggests that the explanatory limitations of the countries’ news-models in communicating the processes and rationales underpinning macro aid resourcing may be a factor in sustaining a knowledge and legitimacy deficit among domestic publics for international aid agreements.

Johnston Press and the crisis in Ireland’s local newspaper industry, 2005–2014

Reflecting international trends, Ireland’s local newspaper industry has suffered steep circulation and advertising revenue falls since the late-2000s and has struggled to reshape traditional business models for the digital era. In harsh trading conditions, local titles are operating on reduced editorial resources and are weakened in their capacity to fulfil their traditional watchdog and informed-citizenry functions. Perhaps, no company better encapsulates the industry’s recent difficulties than UK media group Johnston Press. In 2005, it paid more than €200m to acquire 14 local titles in Ireland, but 9 years later sold them for just €8.5m. The article draws on this case study to consider wider issues related to the corporatisation of local news provision, the sustainability of local news industries in small media markets such as Ireland’s and the increasing disconnect between local journalism’s commodity value and its public good value.

Big Data Challenges

This book brings together an impressive range of academic and intelligence professional perspectives to interrogate the social, ethical and security upheavals in a world increasingly driven by data. Written in a clear and accessible style, it offers fresh insights to the deep reaching implications of Big Data for communication, privacy and organisational decision-making. It seeks to demystify developments around Big Data before evaluating their current and likely future implications for areas as diverse as corporate innovation, law enforcement, data science, journalism, and food security. The contributors call for a rethinking of the legal, ethical and philosophical frameworks that inform the responsibilities and behaviours of state, corporate, institutional and individual actors in a more networked, data-centric society. In doing so, the book addresses the real world risks, opportunities and potentialities of Big Data.

From AAA to Junk: Credit rating agencies as news sources in the Irish print-media during the economic crisis, 2008–2013

Credit rating agencies, through close relationships with (elite) news-media, hold a strong position in the specialist mediated discourse of contemporary financial capitalism that circulates narrowly among governmental, regulatory and corporate actors. Additionally, by issuing ratings on countries’ creditworthiness, the agencies hold the discursive power to affect, positively or negatively, the economic well-being of states and their citizens. Such was the case during Irelands economic crisis, 2008–2013, when the worlds three main rating agencies—Moodys, Fitch, and Standard and Poors—progressively downgraded the countrys sovereign rating. This study, through the lens of the watchdog and informed-citizenry functions of the Irish print-media, examines how the agencies were positioned in Irish news-discourse during this period. It evaluates the print-medias routine level of critical reflection on the agencies’ role in global financial markets and their actual or potential influence on Irelands economic condition. Further, it interrogates the degree to which news coverage of rating actions was constructed within a closed network of elite institutional discourse (financial, political and regulatory). The study suggests that, even in the midst of a national and global financial crisis, the Irish print-media tended to reproduce the perceived legitimacy, authority and relevance of the rating agencies as elite institutional actors, and unproblematically accept the structures, mechanisms and values of the wider “market” system.

Is There a Press Release on That? The Challenges and Opportunities of Big Data for News Media

This chapter reflects on the growing importance of data to journalism. It highlights the fact that data journalists are developing innovative forms of news storytelling which not only engage audiences in novel ways, but also offer greater transparency to the editorial production process. It argues, however, that data journalism finds itself caught in a long-standing tension in news industries between the dual demands on news to serve the public good (maintaining an informed citizenry and acting as a watchdog on power) and succeed as a for-profit informational commodity. The chapter suggests that, so far, data journalism aligns more comfortably with the public good objectives of news than with its commercial imperatives, which may be a factor limiting its wider practice in news organisations.

Introduction to Big Data Challenges

This chapter introduces the rationale for the book. It explains why Big Data is one of the most prominent challenges of our time, with far-reaching implications for society and security. It sets out why the tension, and interaction, between innovation and ethics is at the forefront of the various challenges of Big Data. It clarifies the division of the book into Part I, ‘Between Mathematics and Philosophy’, and Part II on ‘Implications for Security’. Each chapter is also briefly introduced to the reader.

A Song for Ireland? Policy Discourse and Wealth Generation in the Music Industry in the Context of Digital Upheavals and Economic Crisis

Drawing on a recent Irish-based study, this chapter examines how major players in the music business have restructured themselves in the context of an evolving digital environment, but also a period of global economic crisis. Rogers and Cawley are particularly attentive to the role played by the intellectual property rights (IPR) regime in shaping the music sector’s recent development, particularly through copyright, trademarks and new and evolving forms of music ‘brand partnerships’. Their findings not only challenge received opinion on the fortunes of the music industry in digital times, but crucially they highlight growing contradictions between IPR policies pursued by successive Irish governments and the wealth return of core music industry players to the Irish economy.