Watch A Social Conscience Of Society

Ethics and journalism are indispensable, since the practice of journalism is centred on a set of essentially ethical concepts such as freedom, democracy, truth, objectivity, honesty, privacy, responsibility and obligation. Journalistic self-regulation is the prominent theme of journalism ethics whose purpose is to provide a conceptual framework for thinking about what it means to be a profession from the moral point of view.Based on journalistic professionalism, the thesis tries to analyze and dwell on the development of the Anglo-American journalistic self-regulation, and its theoretical and institutional backgrounds, arriving at the conclusion that journalistic self-regulation, with fusion of professional ideals, ethical norms and their discourse practice, is the internal driving force of the development of journalistic profession. It is a new exploration as well as new research orientation, the shift of which means the shift of research ideas and directions. The five chapters illustrate the main ideas of my research.Chapter One starts from the institutional concept of a profession-professionalism, with a brief introduction of professionalism. It then draws into the result of institutional ethics, analyses the inner logic of journalistic professionalism, institutional ethics and journalistic self-regulation. The conclusion is that journalistic self-regulation is the necessary requirement of professionalization in journalism. The end of the chapter points out the features and definition of journalistic self-regulation.Chapter Two traces the development of professionalization in journalism: from the partisan press to the commercial-professional press. It attempts to outline the evolvement of the self-regulation ideals and mechanisms of a professional journalism, to find the thread of thoughts and essence of the professional self-regulation. Meanwhile, the chapter describes the symbolic picture of Anglo-American journalism by representing the conceptual framework of journalistic self-regulation.Chapter Three focuses on the institutional and theoretical backgrounds of journalistic self-regulation. The logic it follows is that the normal operation of journalistic self-regulation, as a self-regulation ideal and mechanism, needs the proper institutional basis-freedom of the press This system guarantees to free the professional autonomy from the intervention of the government and the restriction of the owners, hence the journalistic professionals can realize the self-discipline following the professionalism and ethical norms. As to the question of whether journalistic self-regulation, as a discourse practice, has a theoretical background and ideational support, the chapter analyses the several phases of the establishment of the theory of journalistic self-regulation, then pays more attention to the relationship of social responsibility theory andjournalistic self-regulation. Putting journalistic self-regulation on a broader level, it reveals the relationship between the journalism ethics and the Anglo-American moral philosophy and social values and explains the theoretical origins of journalistic self-regulation.Chapter Four studies the professional norms and mechanism of journalistic self-regulation. It starts with the nature, function and aim of journalistic self-regulation, and a brief introduction and analysis to Anglo-American self-regulation norms. The practice of journalistic self-regulation relies on the understanding of professionals and voluntary actions, which is the result of inner ethical pressure of human beings, and reinforcement by peers and public opinion as well Since media have turned into a big business, it relies not only on the individual conscience, but also on the supervision and criticism of the institutions of journalistic self-regulation. This chapter also explores the features and functions of the mechanism of journalistic self-regulation in Great Britain.Chapter Five makes the research on the effect and new orientation of journalistic self-regulation, making the arg...