A Matter of Organisational Silence: Media Managers Struggling to Make Sense of the Online Harassment of Journalists as a Collective Issue in Journalism

Malcorps, Sylvain; Libert, Manon; Le Cam, Florence

doi:10.1080/21670811.2022.2140301

Article (Scientific journals)

A Matter of Organisational Silence: Media Managers Struggling to Make Sense of the Online Harassment of Journalists as a Collective Issue in Journalism

Malcorps, Sylvain; Libert, Manon; Le Cam, Florence

2022 • In Digital Journalism, p. 1-18

Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi

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https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12907/43779

DOI
10.1080/21670811.2022.2140301

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Keywords :

journalisme; Cyberharcèlement; Online harassment; media organisations; organisations médiatiques; mob censorship; risk management

Abstract :

[en] The online harassment of journalists is a phenomenon which has been on the rise in Europe over the last decade and it affects journalists’ working lives. As an expression of mob censorship, online harassment raises questions about how media organisations react to online aggressions targeting their journalists, the consequences on the victims’ well-being and on the role of journalism in society. Yet, previous research has shown the lack of support mechanisms provided by journalists’ employers. In this article, we explore the hypothesis that the lack of organisational support towards targeted journalists is partly due to the challenges faced by media managers when trying to make sense of the phenomenon. This article offers a unique viewpoint on how 22 Belgian media managers from five media organisations struggle to define what online harassment is and how to respond to it. In turn, it shows that the vague understanding of what online harassment is seems to favour case-by-case organisational responses. Missing words and unstructured actions related to online harassment impede media managers from addressing online harassment as a collective issue in journalism and its consequences on the democratic debate.

Disciplines :

Arts & humanities: Multidisciplinary, general & others

Author, co-author :

Malcorps, Sylvain ; Sylvain Malcorps, Département des Sciences de l'Information et de la Communication, Université libre de Bruxelles, ReSIC-LaPIJ, Brussels, Belgium

Libert, Manon ; Université de Mons - UMONS

Le Cam, Florence; Florence Le Cam, Département des Sciences de l'Information et de la Communication, Université libre de Bruxelles, ReSIC-LaPIJ, Brussels, Belgium

Language :

English

Title :

A Matter of Organisational Silence: Media Managers Struggling to Make Sense of the Online Harassment of Journalists as a Collective Issue in Journalism

Publication date :

23 November 2022

Journal title :

Digital Journalism

ISSN :

2167-0811

eISSN :

2167-082X

Publisher :

Informa UK Limited

Pages :

1-18

Peer reviewed :

Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi

Development Goals :

3. Good health and well-being

Additional URL :

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/21670811.2022.2140301

Research unit :

H950 - Info-Com
H950 - Info-Com

Research institute :

Soci&Ter

Funders :

Wallonia-Brussels Federation and the AJP

Available on ORBi UMONS :

since 23 November 2022

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