Klaus Meier

This volume explores innovations in journalism: the goals and expectations associated with them, promoting and hindering framework conditions, and their social and industrial impact. Drawing on an international research project conducted in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Spain, and the United Kingdom, the book takes a complex approach, considering media policy preconditions and the social impact of journalistic innovation from a comparative perspective. The key findings are examined and presented on different levels: theoretical, methodological, and – as the focus – empirical. Having identified the most relevant innovations in each of the five countries, a total of 100 case studies are examined to explore the influence of these innovations on the quality of journalism and its normative role in democratic societies and to analyze which preconditions support or inhibit the development and implementation of the innovations in news organizations. The interdependencies between journalistic innovations and their media policy preconditions are compared in a system-analytical way – concluding with the lessons that can be learned from the macrolevel (policies) and the mesolevel (organizations). This insightful and truly international volume will interest professionals, scholars and students of journalism, media and communication studies, media industry studies, and related fields. The Open Access version of this book, available at https://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Journalism is undergoing profound transformations, and innovations in journalism play a key role in this process. The increasing use of data and artificial intelligence, the search for new business models, alternative audience-engagement strategies, and the impact of social media are all shaping the current news ecosystem, forcing journalism to continuously adapt to new phenomena. Thus, innovation becomes a crucial element for journalism to adjust and to (re-)invent itself in the light of ongoing changes.

This chapter aims to advance the theory of innovation in journalism. Based on the results of our three-year international research project, JoIn-DemoS, we specify the concepts of change, transformation, and innovation and outline their links and relationships. The findings show how individual innovations affect journalism at any or all of the micro-, meso-, and macrolevels and how these levels are linked to one another, e.g., through journalistic culture. Furthermore, the innovations selected for our study can strengthen those quality factors that make journalism so special and distinct from other communication forms. The democratic value of innovations in journalism lies in their occasional enhancement of the advantages offered by digital media, but mostly, they aim to reduce the threats to democracy posed by the digital media universe. Innovations bring depth and variety instead of accelerating the rapid speed of news, and they emphasize original reporting instead of pushing the often-criticized churnalism that only rehashes prepackaged material.

Scholars and practitioners observe the growing relevance of journalism innovation research. This chapter reviews and structures research on innovation in journalism and builds a theoretical framework that forms the basis for the international research project Journalism Innovations in Democratic Societies (JoIn-DemoS). Building on the corpus of literature, this chapter identifies gaps in the research and develops a definition of innovations in journalism. While the literature provides clear evidence for an unambiguous definition of innovation in journalism, this study needed to develop a distinction between the concepts of change and transformation, which are important backgrounds to innovation. The underlying basis is a normative understanding of journalism in democratic societies, which defines media systems and journalistic culture as framing preconditions for innovations in journalism.

This chapter presents the central research questions and the complex methodological design of the JoIn-DemoS project. A total of three empirical studies were conducted in each country. The first concerned identifying the 20 most important innovations in journalism in the period from 2010 to 2020 in Austria, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. The second examined in greater depth each of the identified most important innovations in country-specific case studies. Both the first and second studies used qualitative, guided interviews to elicit data. The third involved a quantitative online survey among employees of media companies that have a formative role in the respective areas of innovation. This methodology led us to the findings presented in other chapters in this book, especially the presentation of the individual innovation areas.

Where does innovation in journalism come from, how is it implemented, and what factors drive or hinder its development? Scholars have explored these questions from different perspectives for over two decades. Our research holistically considers the broader factors that influence the development of journalistic innovation at the macro, meso, and micro levels, and whether it is internally or externally driven. In a three-year international research project, we have unpacked innovation with this multidimensional approach, looking at the most important innovations in journalism in Austria, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, and the UK. Our study focuses on the mutual interplay between journalists, media organizations, and society. We investigated 100 case studies with 137 guided interviews with senior managers or project leaders. The results show that the focus of supporting and obstructive factors is internal and on the meso level and that many parallels exist between media systems. Internal factors are the intrinsic motivation of individuals, which need the support of open-minded management, allowing a culture of experimentation without economic pressure and assembling interdisciplinary teams. Across countries and independent of the respective media system, three external key drivers of innovation in journalism can be identified: technology, societal change, and change in the digital media universe. The study confirms once again as if through a magnifying glass that journalism is primarily a public service, especially for those innovations that strengthen the role of journalism in a democratic society.

Este monográfico aborda ocho trabajos sobre temáticas complementarias entre sí que exploran aspectos relevantes de las transformaciones que está experimentando el ecosistema mediático habida cuenta de que, aunque afronta una considerable crisis de credibilidad y sostenibilidad, el periodismo sigue desempeñando un papel capital para garantizar valores básicos en las sociedades democráticas. En este sentido, la actividad periodística es un ámbito fértil para el desarrollo de la innovación ligada a la difusión de soluciones originales para afrontar las necesidades de las empresas informativas con nuevos productos, procesos, prácticas profesionales o soluciones tecnológicas que les permitan generar ventajas competitivas con las que contribuir a su sostenibilidad y a la mejora del servicio que ofrecen a los usuarios. A este respecto, conviene tener en cuenta que la innovación periodística no sólo abarca los aspectos relacionados con el producto y la tecnología, sino también con la calidad de las informaciones y su influencia social y ética, ya que las innovaciones inciden en las organizaciones, en los sistemas mediáticos y en los comportamientos en la sociedad. Con este horizonte, nuestro deseo es que el presente monográfico estimule la producción de futuros estudios que continúen ampliando este campo de investigación.

Research on journalism innovation has become increasingly relevant for science and practice. The literature shows a great variety of innovations in a wide range of media fields. However, the question of what the most important innovations in different media systems are has not been addressed. This article attempts to fill this research gap by providing a theoretical framework that deals with the function of journalism in society as well as with the multifaceted meaning of innovation in a time of constant media change. We identify and analyze the most important journalistic innovations in Austria, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom in the last decade. Interviews with 100 experts reveal diverse innovation efforts. From a total of around 1000 mentions, 50 different types of innovations could be identified; from them, 34 made it into the selection of the 20 most relevant innovations in the countries. Different innovations were found to be of varying importance for journalism development in each country. However, some innovations were ranked high everywhere including data journalism, collaborative and investigative networks, audience participation, journalism in social media and the establishment of paywalls. Further comparative analysis of the media policy frameworks, journalism cultures and contexts for the contribution of journalism to democracy is required.