Democratized Access to Journalism: the model of City Bureau
An interview with Bettina Chang
Bettina Chang, the co-founder of City Bureau — a civic journalism lab based in Chicago- talks to Find Out Why about the future of journalism, the value of civic journalism, the debate around the financial models of news business and the need for a democratized access to journalism so that meaningful civic engagement and equitable news production can be truly achieved.
What is the mission of City Bureau?
Our mission is to bring communities together to create more equitable, and responsive journalism.
What was the need you identified?
Journalism is a very elitist industry and it is not representative of the people who are most directly affected by the issues covered in the newsrooms. In topics such as housing, policing, immigration policy, environment, etc. the burdens fall mostly on people of color, low-income, and other marginalized groups. These communities have very little agency over the narrative that comes out in the news.
You have recently talked at TEDx about the future of journalism. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs plays an important role in your analysis. What is the central idea of this approach?
I was using Maslow’s framework to explain the kind of journalism we need to focus on. If there are people, who are going hungry I am asking: is it considerate for us journalists and producers to be investing so much money in the promotion of luxury goods at style magazines for example? Journalism is an important part of democracy, hence our editorial choices should be prioritized accordingly. First, we have to get our house in order and think about how do we make editorial decisions. Then we have to be courageous and willing enough to get people’s input and change our traditional ways.
If there are individuals who are spreading rumors or spreading misinformation, how do you combat that?
A lot of the work that we do at City Bureau focuses on how to build trust and in equipping people to be able to determine the difference between misinformation and real information. Traditional media outlets often argue against users who produce online content that is considered “news”. At the same time however they do not explain why would somebody trust an established news organization if they do not understand how this organization makes choices about its coverage. Those are choices that are made every day in newsrooms that editors never explained to people. As a casual observer, who does not know anything about how those decisions are made, one would hesitate to trust the traditional news. That is why misinformation has strength and power. It is because there are these elite traditional news that do not explain why they deserve to be trusted. Explaining the work and the choices in journalism makes the relationship with the people that we are serving better. It also protects the audience from future misinformation.
In the age of social media, where everyone can produce content, the question remains: why journalism is still important?
The fact that the technology around journalism has become accessible to all, does not mean that the skills or the resources around journalism are available too. Even if there is a community organizer who is trying to draw attention to pollution in her neighborhood and she gets on social media and becomes really popular writing about that work- she still might not be able to interview the mayor; she still might not be able to get a response from the public Information officer to get the data that she needs. Those are the journalistic skills that we in City Bureau share with people.
How does City Bureau train civic journalists?
We have two training programs. The first one is the paid 10 week training program, designed specifically for people who want to be journalists. We make it really clear that the requirement for recruitment is a demonstrated commitment to care about storytelling, reporting, telling the truth and finding ways to bring light to issues. In order to make sure that our process is fair and possible, we really put an emphasis on local knowledge: if you’re from the neighborhoods that we work in, this really matters just as much as someone who has a Master’s degree in journalism in our recruitment process for that program.
In addition, we created “Documenters”, a program which is a way for someone to have a free training and then get paid for single assignments (for example to cover a local government meeting). We found that this program really exposes so many at the civic process. It gets people more excited about what is happening it in their civic life, and whether they are being a journalist or being an activist or an educator or running for office, or none of the above they can still get involved.
Why City Bureau is a nonprofit?
I think there are several reasons for that with the main being that people can donate and an amount is deducted from their taxes. However I would love to see how one could do what we are doing in a different business form. There are more people now thinking about why it is important to support local news. Again talking about how to create a discerning news consumer who can tell the difference between misinformation and real information you need to be able to have the general public understand that just because a news organization is nonprofit does not mean that they are not unbiased. Being a nonprofit is one of the solutions to sustain the news business and I think it is going to introduce an interesting level of discourse around how news is funded anywhere. For instance in Canada they are trying to provide tax credits for anyone who buys a news subscription, and thus encourage the subscription model. But what qualifies as a news subscription? Does Netflix count? if you are watching mostly documentaries, for example? Because of the diversification of ways that people are trying to pay for news now a lot of new complications will appear in the future of news business that are really interesting to watch.
Where do you see City Bureau the next five years?
In a beautiful, ideal, perfect world City Bureau would barely even need to exist. Our aim is to have enough influence on the local media system in Chicago to be able to say that every news organization is diverse and inclusive. Realistically speaking, it is a huge change to ask for. A huge amount of our effort goes into building a pipeline of journalists who are able to represent all corners of the city and to be able to deeply understand and be able to report and reflect narratives properly.
I would love if more journalism organizations and also more community organizations understood that journalism is a tool, it is not necessarily a profession. It is not necessarily an institution that needs to be achieved. It could be something that you do every day, and I think that would be to me a really great sign that we made an impact for anyone.
A final note?
Now that the technology is available, all it takes is the human will and the desire to democratize access to journalism. We are no longer living in a world where there is only one printing press in town, so there is no reason for us on the production side to act like that.
Let’s make sure that everyone has the access to the knowledge and the skills that they need to use them responsibly and in a way that really uplifts the voices of marginalized groups.
