Audience Expectations of Media Accountability in the Netherlands

Abstract

Citizens in the Netherlands demand that news media are transparent and responsive to audiences. But above all, the population expects journalism to adopt a more professional manner of self-regulation in order to strengthen news quality. These are the main findings from a large-scale representative survey—the first of its kind—on audience perceptions of news media accountability. Additional results show that citizens are interested in news, but not in the workings of journalism. Only a minority wants to be actively involved in journalism and its accountability mechanisms. This explains why the audience supports a professional liability model of news media accountability rather than a model based on social dialogue.

KEYWORDS:

• audience
• ethics
• journalism
• media accountability
• professionalization
• The Netherlands

Notes

1. Of course, the professional autonomy of journalists has always been limited by organizational, commercial and source constraints (e.g., Brownlee and Beam 2012). Here, however, we focus on the role of the audience as an “external agent” (McQuail 2010, 209).