ABSTRACT

This study examines the connection between newsroom policies, division of labor and journalists’ willingness to engage in investigative reporting. Based on extensive qualitative research carried out at three different Swiss media organizations, it suggests that policies meant to foster investigative journalism may actually have counterproductive effects and increase competition in the workplace, both over material resources, such as time, and symbolic resources, for example legitimacy and status. From newsrooms with loosely integrated structures to very separate autonomous units, observed policies fail to integrate investigative journalism into the general beat system in an inclusive way, thereby creating divisions between those who benefit from it (insiders) and the others (outsiders). This, in turn, may impact journalists’ investigative commitment and undermine the legitimacy of investigative reporting in all the newsroom. The study’s findings highlight the ways in which investigative journalism challenges the traditional division of journalistic labor and point to a growing need to consider investigation both as a practice and as a cornerstone of journalistic identities when formulating investigative management policies.

摘要

本研究考察了新闻编辑室政策、分工和记者参与调查报道的意愿之间的联系。基于在三个不同的瑞士媒体组织进行的广泛的定性研究，它表明旨在促进调查性新闻的政策实际上可能会产生适得其反的效果并增加工作场所的竞争，例如时间等物质资源和象征性资源，例如合法性和地位。从具有松散集成结构的新闻编辑室到非常独立的自治单位，观察到的政策未能以包容的方式将调查性新闻整合到一般的节拍系统中，从而在从中受益的人（内部人员）和其他人（外部人员）之间产生分歧。这反过来，可能会影响记者的调查承诺并破坏所有新闻编辑室调查报道的合法性。该研究的发现突出了调查性新闻挑战传统新闻分工的方式，并指出在制定调查性管理政策时，越来越需要将调查视为一种实践和新闻身份的基石。