Organizing Independence: Negotiations Between Journalism and Management in News Organizations

This revealing book goes behind the scenes of normative principles of media independence to investigate how that independence is actually practiced and realized in everyday working life. Taking an ethnographically rich journey through European news organizations, Elena Raviola exposes the diverse and complex ways in which the ideal of independence is upheld, and at the same time inevitably betrayed, in the organizational life of media companies.

Elena Raviola presents a distinct organizational analysis of media independence throughout the book, offering a close study of three news organizations in Europe – the largest Italian financial newspaper Il Sole-24 Ore, the largest Swedish regional newspaper company Stampen and the French pioneer online-only news website Rue89. In each of them, the implications of digitalization on their practices of independence is explored and analyzed. The book ultimately sheds light on how digital technologies are practically reshaping democratic principles such as media independence, while being embedded in the existing organizational and professional structures of democratic societies.

Organizing Independence will enrich the reader's understanding of media independence in practice, beyond the normative principles, and so will be a key reference point for researchers in management and organization studies, media studies and anyone interested in the future of media.

Elena Raviola, Torsten and Wanja Söderberg Professor in Design Management, Academy of Art and Design and Director of Business and Design Lab, University of Gothenburg, Sweden