THE RECIPROCITY OF JOURNALISMS SOCIAL CONTRACT The political-philosophical foundations of journalistic ideology

Helle Sjvaag

This article traces the political-philosophical background of journalisms social contract metaphor. The social contract of the press finds its professional ideal in the intersection between republican and liberal philosophies originating with the classical philosophies of Rousseau, Locke and Hobbes. From these origins, the mechanism of contractual reciprocity is appropriated to the relationship between journalism and its audiences to expose hidden ideological traits within the profession. The concepts of rights and obligations found within a contractarian perspective thus offer a new way of conceptualising the role of journalism in democracy and the function of journalistic ideology. The press social contract ideology entails a professional world-view that establishes journalism as a separate contractual partner with a mission to sustain the democratic order as it is expressed in the original political-philosophical social contract. This theoretical investigation of the ideological link between the two contractual metaphors reveals how journalism functions according to the contractual reciprocity principle, particularly with regard to its expectations of balanced rights and obligations within the democratic order. KEYWORDS journalism; professional ideology; reciprocity; social contract theory

Introduction
The journalistic social contract*the metaphor used to describe the democratic mission of the press*finds its legitimacy claim in the political-philosophical tradition in which it originates. By tracing the social contract metaphor through its origins in the political-philosophical traditions of liberalism and republicanism, the concept of rights and obligations within a contractual relationship provides explanation and justification for the role of the press1 in democracy. The social contract metaphor also explains the necessity of journalistic ideology in maintaining the function of the press within this system. The centrality of the social contract metaphor to the moral and legal standing of the press in liberal democracies should entice us to investigate its ideological usefulness to journalism. Within journalisms contractarian world-view, journalism entails a contractual partner in its own right, not just a communicator between the public and the state. This perspective provides an entry point to theorise about the distribution of rights and responsibilities within the journalistic social contract.

Journalism Studies, Vol. 11, No 6, 2010, 874888

ISSN 1461-670X print/1469-9699 online 2010 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/14616701003644044

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Social Contract Theory in Journalism Research

The social contract remains largely unexplored by media and communication scholars. Journalism researchers sometimes mention it in conjunction with the democratic mission of the press (e.g. Entman, 2005, p. 62), while political communication and media ethics refer either normatively or critically to the contract in reference to some notion of journalistic responsibility (e.g. Kieran, 2000, p. 156; McQuail, 2003, p. 7). Overall, most points of departures that address the social contract of the press concern journalisms democratic role in providing citizens with the information they need to make informed decisions when electing governments and participating in the public debate between elections (Schudson, 2008, p. 15; Siebert et al., 1956, pp. 25). The press is predominantly seen here as serving the public by facilitating democratic debate and deliberation. For the most part then, the concept frequently referred to in contractual terms revolves around journalistic responsibility to the public or the citizenry, by way of a loyalty to citizens that entails an implied covenant with the public (Kovach and Rosenstiel, 2001, pp. 512). Specific discussions of a journalistic social contract are scarce, but the relevant researchers who address the concept directly include media ethicist Matthew Kieran, Norwegian press historian Odd Raaum, Swedish media researcher Jesper Stro mba ck, Denis McQuail, Herbert Altschull and Deni Elliott. Kieran ties professional ethics and standards to an implicit contract*establishing contractual principles to be based on some agreement between the citizenry and the journalistic institution of what constitutes good journalism (Kieran, 1997, pp. 269). Raaum references contractual aspects in discussions of journalistic professionalism, public legitimacy and professional ideology (1999, p. 9), observing that the contract entails a mission that, at the highest level of abstraction, remains an oppositional force to the three formal branches of state power (Raaum, 1999, p. 66). Stro mba ck makes a specific reference to the social contract as journalisms obligation to provide citizens with the information they need in order to be free and self-governing, [and] the government with the information it needs in order to make decisions in the common interest sensitive to public sentiments (2005, p. 332), predominantly through its watchdog function. In McQuails treatment of media accountability, a contractual relationship between the media and society is referred to as the selfimposed and non-binding responsibilities on the part of the press*promises found in editorial mission statements or implicitly in the composition or content of the media (2003, p. 203). Deni Elliott describes media obligations to society as promises by way of moral contracts that ensures journalism provides accurate material of interest and importance (1986, p. 39). Furthermore, Altschulls account of the philosophical ideas behind American journalism usefully addresses how liberal-democratic ideals have shaped journalistic ideology, among them the Hobbesian social contract (1990, pp. 438). However, although the social contract as metaphorical concept in journalism is implicit in much journalism research, it has yet to be explored in theoretical detail in relation to its political-philosophical origins.

Journalism and Models of Democracy

The theoretical investigation undertaken in this article aims to do so on a highly general level. The premise for this endeavour is that the discourse surrounding the journalistic social contract is founded on social contract theory within political philosophy. To express it somewhat crudely, as there is a direct semantic relationship here, there

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should also be a theoretical and ideological link between the political social contract and the social contract of the press, seeing as journalism in fact surrounds itself with this type of borrowed discourse. The question is why this is so, and what this entails for how we conceptualise journalism. Most theories that address the role of journalism in democracy understand the function of the press differently according to various models of democracy. Systematisations of this kind are helpful but can vary to such a degree that to attempt to appropriate journalistic social contract ideology into such classifications is beyond the scope of this article. Nevertheless, a brief reference to how the media within democratic systems have been classified provides insight into how the ideals embedded in the liberal and republican traditions are understood within media studies. Generally, media models are broadly divided into geographical regions or according to systems of rule (Hallin and Mancini, 2004; Siebert et al., 1956); designated to historical periods (Curran and Seaton, 1991; McQuail, 2003), or theoretically systemised according to the role of the media in democratic processes (Ferree et al., 2002; Stro mba ck, 2005). All classifications divide either implicitly or explicitly between liberal and republican traditions. C. Edwin Baker distinguishes between elitist theories, liberal pluralist theories and republican theories of media and democracy. Liberalism sees democracy as the aggregation of individual interest, while republicanism emphasises participation, collective ideals and public goals (Baker, 2002, p. 126). Alternative ethical and normative conceptions of media-democratic systems include deliberate democratic theory and communitarianism. These theories are critical of the medias function in democracy and suggest remedies to improve democratic participation. Ju rgen Habermas, for instance, criticises liberal media systems and proposes that the mass media ought to understand themselves as the mandatory of an enlightened public whose willingness to learn and capacity for criticism they at once presuppose, demand, and reinforce (1996, p. 378). Habermas theory of communicative action is republican-inspired, however not to the same extent as communitarianism, which recommends an ethical media model for news reporting that is grounded in community, aiming for civic transformation, and operating by the principle of mutuality (Christians et al., 1993, p. 15). McQuail maintains that the social responsibility theory that began with the Hutchins Commission (see below) retains a growing influence in the development of media systems in most democracies in the world, at least in Northern Europe (McQuail, 2003, pp. 545; Siebert et al., 1956, p. 5). Hallin and Mancini* lately criticised for collapsing highly differentiated national systems into categories that are too broad (e.g. Thorbjrnsrud, 2009)*propose on the other hand that Western media systems are converging towards the liberal model, particularly in areas of political parallelism and journalistic professionalism (Hallin and Mancini, 2004, pp. 294301). Whatever strand of media-democratic framework dominates theoretical and practical trends in modern democracies today, the evident entanglement of liberal and republican philosophies into journalistic social contract principles provides an entry point to theorise about the function of journalistic ideology.

Mixed Liberal-Republican Systems

The term social contract suggests a common agreement with far-reaching jurisdiction. What lies in the metaphoric concept of contract is that two or more partners have freely entered into an agreement that serves a common goal between them, where that goal is attained by the fulfilment of duties that are ensured by the reciprocity of rights

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and obligations. In political-philosophical terms, the social contract is an agreement between the state and the citizenry. Rights and obligations in statepublic relations are regulated through governmental systems such as parliamentarism, republicanism or constitutional monarchy, through checks and balances established by the three branches of government, and based on the sovereignty principle and the rule of law. The concept of contractual rights and obligations was established by the sovereignty principle of the philosophical tradition of republicanism, as well as freedom of speech and the right to property principles coming from the political philosophy of liberalism. Republican principles are largely positive rights*or rights to*such as right to representation, right to due process, and right to state education. Liberal principles are largely negative rights* or freedom from*such as freedom from regulation of markets, freedom from restrictions on expression, and freedom from restrictions on religious belief. Rights and obligations regulate the contractual relationships through these negative and positive rights. Questions regarding media regulation and normative journalistic standards within liberal democracies can be rationalised as a negotiation between the negatively defined liberal freedoms and the positively defined republican regulations (Hallin and Mancini, 2004, pp. 1011). Indeed it is this very tension between positive and negative liberties which underlies much of the historical and normative research on the press, but whose origin is seldom expressed as derived from the political-philosophy of social contractarianism. The social contract metaphor reveals the press as an integral part of democratic theory and launches a broader understanding of press ideology in which the development of the Fourth Estate is bound to the frictions between liberal ideals and the morality of the state (Siebert et al., 1956, pp. 5, 40, 51). Particularly within liberal media systems exemplified by the United States, regulation challenges to the liberal paradigm are argued with great care towards republican ideals, such as by the Hutchins Commission in their 1947 report on A Free and Responsible Press. The Commission states that,
[T]he insistence of the citizens need has increased. He is dependent on the quality, proportion, and extent of his news supply, not only for his personal access to the world of event, thought, and feeling, but also for the materials of his duties as a citizen and judge of public affairs. The soundness of his argument affects the working of the state and even the peace of the world, involving the survival of the state as a free community. Under these circumstances it becomes an imperative question whether the performance of the press can any longer be left to the unregulated initiative of the few who manage it. (Leigh, 1947, p. 17)

The Hutchins Commission expresses concern over the concentration of media ownership in the United States immediately after the Second World War. It places the greatest moral burden of upholding a vibrant press on journalism itself, but also holds the citizenry responsible and accountable for the state of democracy. Media regulation here is negatively defined, to the extent that government is only to regulate to curtail any tendencies to monopoly and consequently the reduction of active voices in the public sphere. The Commission argues defensively and conditionally in favour of government regulation. Such a mixed liberal-republican argument is echoed in many liberal democracies, but from the opposite vantage point. As such, the statemedia systems within liberal-democratic countries are decidedly mixed liberal-republican systems (Hallin and Mancini, 2004). We might credit this mix to the shared political-philosophical origins of the state*i.e. the social contract so common to liberal democracies.

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The Origins of the Social Contract of the Press

The division of political-philosophical theory into liberal and republican traditions has significance for the ideals on which the press rests. The two strands together make up the press social contract ideal. Liberal principles, on which press freedom rests, simultaneously provide the press with authority and justification for this legitimacy. The social contract of the press, and journalisms mission in democracy, derives its legitimation from republican common good principles, while this legitimacy in turn rests on the justifications of liberalism*i.e. the tenets of the freedom of speech. Pressstate relations are predominantly administered by legal aspects that regulate the exchange of rights and obligations between these two contractual partners. Regulations to ensure plurality and access are positively defined and republican-inspired measures to improve democracy, while laws enforced to ensure the freedom of expression and publication are negatively defined and liberal-inspired to uphold individual freedoms. Journalisms relationship to the public is legally regulated to the extent that access to the media is based on negative rights principles. Primarily, however, the presspublic relationship is administered by moral regulations that urge audiences to trust news institutions*such as ethical codes of conduct and professional ideology. If we look at the reciprocity of contractual obligations from the vantage point of how the media came to occupy its ideological space within the democratic order, the how of this question finds its dominion in the intersection between liberal-democratic theories and the moral or republican philosophies of citizenship. Republican and liberaldemocratic theories intersect in the social contract theories that developed during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The central texts within this development are Thomas Hobbes Leviathan (1651); John Lockes Letter on Toleration (1689); Jean-Jacques Rousseaus The Social Contact (1762); and John Stuart Mills On Liberty (1860). Social contract theories originate in philosophical arguments about freedom, property, religion, and law. These theories attempt to refute mans loss of freedom in the transition from state of nature to civil union; to defend systems of rule; to argue in favour of moral and lawful behaviour; to defend civil obedience; to argue in favour of the democratic order; and to defend property rights.2 The free press arguments that came out of the liberalism of John Milton and John Stuart Mill were originally constructed in favour of religious freedom and the ultimate obtainment of truth (Mill, 1991 [1860]; Milton, 1999 [1644]). Hereto the press is seen as essential in its facility as medium for bringing all opinions to light for the benefit of strengthening the truth, and for allowing no possibility of truth to remain hidden or obscured by restriction. The early defenders of the freedom of speech helped form the conceptual understanding of representative government and active citizenship*involving the public, through the press, in the system of checks and balances of the modern political constitution. According to John Keane then, A free press was considered a critical ingredient of politics, understood as a precarious balance between rulers and those who are ruled (Keane, 1991, pp. 267). As such, it was the democratic duty of the citizenry to exercise vigilance in keeping the rulers from abusing their powers (Keane, 1991, p. 27). In the defence of freedom of speech lies the liberal notion of negative freedom. Herein we find the dual concepts rights and obligations that bind societys members to the social contract. Given the centrality of freedom of expression to the legitimacy of both democracy and the press, the liberal view offers support for a theory of reciprocal contractual obligations for the press and the citizenry. Hobbes establishes that the social

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contract entails the mutual transferring of Right (Hobbes, 1968 [1651], pp. 1923)* which in turn entails duties. When rights and obligations within society are seen as directed by morals, republican ideas of how to attain the kind of society we want add a further dimension to the metaphor. Rousseaus (1998 [1792]) notion of a social contract is built on social responsibility and co-operation for the good of society, in essence asking that we set aside individual interests for the benefit of the best outcome for all. As best outcome refers to the quality of democracy and civil and individual life, both the liberal and the republican tradition offer support for a consideration of rights and obligations in the relationship between journalism and the citizenry. Liberalism argues the inherent reciprocity of the contractual relationship from the vantage point of negative rights, while republicanism argues the reciprocity inherent in rights and obligations from the vantage point of positive rights. The press has a powerful position in a society founded on liberal-democratic ideals. Here, the press has been designated, in social contract terms, as the Fourth Estate of government. The political system that grew out of the political philosophy of Edmund Burke and Baron de Montesquieu is one of checks and balances*in which the judicial, the legislative, and the executive estates of constituted society oversee each other. The legitimacy of this division of power rests with the sovereignty of the citizenry, which in republican terms forms a common will based on the desire for a good and just society; and*in liberal terms*attains truth through the open contest of opinions in the free marketplace of ideas. As the press and democracy largely developed simultaneously, the task of forming such a truth or common will was designated to communicators of the written word, i.e. the press. Immanuel Kant offers such an argument. According to him, the legitimacy of the ruler rests with the people, and the safeguard of the system depends on the freedom of the pen. Kant writes that,
Thus the citizen must, with the approval of the ruler, be entitled to make public his opinion on whatever of the rulers measures seem to him to constitute an injustice against the commonwealth . . . Thus freedom of the pen is the only safeguard of the rights of the people, although it must not transcend the bonds of respect and devotion towards the existing constitution, which should itself create a liberal attitude of mind among the subjects. To try to deny the citizen this freedom does not only mean, as Hobbes maintains, that the subject can claim no rights against the supreme ruler. It also means withholding from the ruler all knowledge of those matters which, if he knew about them, he would himself rectify. (1990 [1793], p. 135, italics in the original)

Kant here expresses the ideal that freedom of the pen is essential for the maintenance of civil society. The idea that publicity and public rationality would strengthen democracy began with this notion of communication (e.g. Holmes, 1990, p. 29). Eighteenth-century publicist activities likely involved novelists and publishers rather than what we today conceive of as journalism. Nevertheless, Kant defends the publicist ideals behind journalism as vital components in the fulfilment of the contract itself. The role of the press is to expose those errors in legislation which infringe upon the citizens freedoms. Within the social contract, the press is thus a safeguard*that which ensures that the contract functions as it ideally should. A benevolent social contract functions only if the contractual partners live up to their contractual obligations. For the institution of the press this entails bringing to light for the executive estate the unintended consequences of legislation. For the executive it means rectifying errors brought to light by the press.

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This constitutes the reciprocity of contractual relations between the citizenry and the state, and*as the press functions as the communicator of the citizenry*contractual relations between the press and the state. Whereas Kant expresses the role of the press in the social contract, the exact designation of the press to this role is established by Thomas Carlyle in his definition of the press as the Fourth Estate of society. This link is significant because contractarian thinkers often outline the social contract structure by referring to the three estates of government. Carlyles addition of a Fourth Estate places the press firmly within the political structure* as intermediary between citizen and state, and as watchdog of the fulfilments of contractual obligations on the part of the three estates of government. Carlyle (1841) says that,
Burke said there were Three Estates in Parliament; but, in the Reporters Gallery yonder, there sat a Fourth Estate more important far than they all . . . Printing, which comes necessarily out of Writing, I say often, is equivalent to Democracy: invent Writing, Democracy is inevitable . . . Whoever can speak, speaking now to the whole nation, becomes a power, a branch of government, with inalienable weight in law-making, in all acts of authority. It matters not what rank he has, what revenues or garnitures. The requisite thing is, that he have a tongue which others will listen to; this and nothing more is requisite. The nation is governed by all that has tongue in the nation: Democracy is virtually there.

In order to ensure that the democratic order is sustained, the social contract is ultimately upheld by the citizens obligation to speak up against legislative errors, misuse of power and social, moral and legal unfairness. Citizens need a medium in order that such complaints and corrections be heard and amplified. Ultimately, societies become so complex that citizens need journalists to fulfil this contractual obligation on their behalf. The essence of these ideals promoted by Kant and Carlyle are of such universal nature that they have become commonplace. Not only do these concepts enter democratic legislation and legal frameworks through the efforts of the early rulers of the state, but the framework of a social contact understanding of the place and function of journalism in democracy is also embedded in the foundations of the modern press by well-read editors of early metropolitan newspapers. And, as illustrated by the Hutchins Commission, Kants account of the necessary balance of reciprocal rights and obligations within the social contract was as amply reflected in 1947, as it is today.

Rights and Obligations Within the Social Contract

Embedded in the social contract notion of journalism and the press are also the moral principles which warrant the legitimacy of the metaphor in the first place*those which ensure the public that the press can be trusted with such a position of power and responsibility. Thus, it also includes the ethical rules and responsibilities of the press stipulated in the ethical guidelines of journalism and editors (e.g. McQuail, 2003, p. 298). It further includes the professional practices and ideals with which the ethical standards and the democratic and communicative goals are upheld, such as journalisms methodological objectivity ideal. Together these ideals make up the metaphor of the social contract of the press*a metaphor on which the press as institution and journalism

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as profession is greatly dependent, and from which they gain privilege, power, and responsibility in democratic societies. The idea that the news media, which according to the contract has obligations towards the citizenry, should also have some measure of tacit rights with respect to its audience is a largely overlooked aspect of journalisms social contract. The question here is not whether or not journalism in actual fact has rights of this kind that they can reasonably claim. The point is rather to investigate theoretically whether the journalistic social contract metaphor includes a reciprocal understanding of the contract that is hidden by professional ideology. The political social contract embodies a balanced reciprocal relationship between the state and citizenry. As the premise of this investigation is that the journalistic social contract is directly founded on classic contractarian principles, we should look for the presence of this reciprocal balance also within journalistic ideology. Carolyn Marvin and Philip Meyer emphasise the fact that journalism works in conjunction with other institutions as well as with audiences in maintaining civic responsibility. They claim that, To expect journalists to assume the sole responsibility for producing and managing the information environment is democratically unworkable (Marvin and Meyer, 2005, p. 409). In effect, they say, this means citizens need to function as quality control of the press work (Marvin and Meyer, 2005). Robert Picard shares this approach as he claims audiences must consider their media use in light of the demands of democratic participation (2005, p. 347). Kovach and Rosenstiel also address this issue of audience responsibility, to the extent that audiences are responsible for judging journalistic work on the basis of whether it contributes to their ability to take an informed part in shaping their society (2001, p. 192). Likewise, Stro mba ck maintains that most media-democracy models expect citizens to respect the democratic process and to have some knowledge about society and politics (2005, p. 339). McQuail argues similarly when he notes that democratic political processes require an informed electorate, a wellformed and stable public opinion, and a readiness on the part of citizens to participate actively (2003, p. 6). Hence the government expects co-operation from media as well as citizens. Hereunder, the function of the audience is to exert pressure on larger issues in matters of public welfare (McQuail, 2003, p. 47). The question of the distribution of rights and obligations relating to communication within the social contract thus primarily focuses on the obligation of citizens as good and critical media consumers. As shown above, Kant holds that the citizenry has an obligation to uphold the social contract by raising its voice against injustice. The implied meaning here is that citizens should react politically based on information provided by journalism when this is democratically warranted. Kieran points out that the Lockean contractual theory makes this argument in that citizens must be made aware of the nature, workings and characters of those in government so they are in a position to exercise their will as citizens and judge those to whom power is entrusted on their behalf (2000, p. 156). Contractual philosophers thus place a democratic obligation on citizens to act on this information that contemporary media theorists negate in their primary focus on critical reception. Looking at news media from a market perspective*as liberal philosophies tend to do*this theoretical deficit is not surprising. If news is seen strictly as business, its obligation is simply to give audiences more of what they want*which could consequently mean giving them less of what they need. However, according to the social contract ideal, the news media should itself be interested in maintaining a system in which

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it continues to enjoy its rights as the Fourth Estate. In a reciprocal communication situation, equal rights are ensured, says the philosopher Onora ONeill, through an obligation-based theory of good that focuses on the rationality of the individual to obtain good results (1990, pp. 1579). In the same manner as the above-quoted media researchers, ONeill emphasises obligations as fundamental to ensure the protection of the rights of communicating parties. When the social contract of the press is researched within this moral-philosophical framework, the term often used is simply the press social contract obligations (e.g. ONeill, 1990, p. 167). The focus is therefore on the obligations of the press, and the rights of citizens. However, in the perspective of the journalistic social contract, obligations cannot be designated as more fundamental than rights. It is precisely because of the reciprocal premise of the social contract that individuals accept their obligations in order to retain rights. As the original contractual motivation for renouncing the state of nature is right from harm, the two must be seen as morally equal. In liberal democratic theory as well as in journalistic ethical codes of conduct, the press is ascribed both rights and obligations towards the public. Within the same framework, however, the public is ascribed only rights. Citizens rights are the same as the basic press rights*right to information, right to speak, and right to print. Liberal rights do not discriminate between communicators in the public sphere, but treat both news media and audiences as communicating agents. In the social contract division of political estates, however, the citizenry has a place of its own in relation to the media and to the rulers. The citizenry is the public, and the public sphere is where communication takes place*a system in which the media and the citizenry both participate to uphold and improve society. As citizens are as much part of this system as journalism and politics, they too are formed by the rights and obligations of the political fabric of society. Citizens have rights to information, but they also have obligations as to how they react to this information. The system functions optimally only if all contractual partners claim their rights as well as fulfil their obligations. Seen from a journalistic contractual perspective then, citizens cannot remain the only category which retain rights without also having obligations.

Professional Ideology and the Reciprocity of the Social Contract

Because the tenets of the social contract between news media and the citizenry require journalists to report the contractual breaches made by the contractual partners, the news media is full of reports of social and political neglect, criminal activity, the abuse of power, and judicial oversight. The media do this through their gatekeeping and agendasetting functions. Moreover, the professions ethical guidelines and ideals*which constitute the tenets by which social contract obligations are upheld*stipulate that this obligation be carried out truthfully, uncorrupted and without subjective judgement. Citizens are in turn obliged to react to this information by issuing sanctions that according to the contract can be imposed on such contractual breaches. Should the media fail to deliver on their obligation, journalists are in breach of the social contract. Following this premise then, should citizens fail to react to reports in the press, the citizenry is itself breaching its obligations within the contract. Normally, the news media need only report breaches to the original social contract objectively and with a suitable amount of coverage before the case moves to the general public sphere. Breaches in the contract between the citizenry and the state

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typically involve crimes punishable under the law and moral and ethical misconduct* issues sometimes exposed by investigative journalism. The public then forms a public opinion*often through the media*as to the suitable punishment for the contractual breach in question. Investigative journalism, say James Ettema and Theodore Glasser*the flagship of the journalistic endeavour*functions in such a way. [J]ournalists report empirically verifiable violations of established standards while the public evaluates and perhaps responds to those violations (Ettema and Glasser, 1998, p. 8). Social morality, they maintain, forms the basis for journalism and is established by the citizenry and the press in conjunction (Ettema and Glasser, 1998, p. 82). Journalism participates in the establishment and maintenance of this moral order by exposing transgressions. However, should the news medias opinion of the severity of the transgression differ from that of public opinion, journalists can usually conceal such judgement by continuing to report according to the professional journalistic rules that constitute the terms of the contract, simply by increasing the amount of coverage devoted to such breaches. When reporting reaches critical mass, the news media can induce sanctions though amassing a seemingly strong public opinion. This is often the case when chairmen or ministers have to resign their posts, or people or agencies must issue public apologies for wrongful or immoral behaviour. The mechanism described here*sometimes referred to as the watchdog function of the press*constitutes the potential power of journalism and the news media within the larger media logic. Seen from a contractual perspective, should the news media fail to live up to their contractual obligations, the state and public can issue sanctions. The state can revoke licences and public funding, or introduce new legislation, and citizens can render a news provider illegitimate or invalid as agenda setter*effectively through getting their news elsewhere. Should the public fail to live up to its obligations, journalism can in turn sanction its audience*something that, granted, does not happen very often. Instances of such attempted sanctions, however, reveal a paradox in the journalistic ideology that exposes the frailty of the profession and the subsequent importance of the social contract metaphor in concealing and suppressing this weakness. When journalists attempt to sanction the public, they can do so by vacating the premises on which their contractual obligations are upheld. One way to do this is to increase coverage, as argued above. Another way is for journalism to vacate its responsibilities. Thus, journalism may depart from the ideal of objectivity, and actively tell the public how to react to the contractual breaches reported in the press. One example of such a situation was the emergence of a subjective journalistic method called the journalism of attachment, during the reporting of the Bosnian War (19921995). Some journalists here reacted to what they perceived as the unwillingness of the international community to become involved in the Bosnian war, primarily by embracing a subjective style of reporting (Bell, 1996, pp. 28, 135). In an attempt to procure the publics attention, it has been argued that the Sarajevo correspondents who embraced this subjectivity cast all the blame for the war on the Bosnian Serbs and called for intervention from the UN and NATO3 (Hume, 2000, p. 76). This could be explained from a contractual perspective as an attempt at sanctioning contractual breaches by audiences as they failed to amass the necessary political pressure to induce governments to intervene in the war on behalf of what the reporters saw as the unjust suffering of the Bosnian civilian population (Sjvaag, 2005).

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Within the boundaries of the social contract of the press lies the assumption that journalists and the citizenry communicate on the same basic moral terms. This is necessarily so because journalists need such a socially common moral framework in order to shed light on the ills of society and thus fulfil its contractual obligations (Ettema and Glasser, 1998, pp. 701). Because this is a discourse that is based on rights and obligations within the social contract, journalists expect*in return for their contractual professionalism*that their work engender public response. In the contractarian reciprocity of rights and obligations between journalists and the public, journalism exchanges a ritualistic objectivity for influence (e.g. Belsey, 1998, p. 10). It would seem that in return for the obligation of professionalism, journalism demands the rights to audience response, i.e. that the public reacts politically to reports in the press. The subjectivity of the journalism of attachment emerged only when the objective method failed to produce the results it normally would have been able to provoke in accordance with the tenets of the contract. However, this professional heresy remains concealed when the contract between journalism and civil society works optimally and the objective method is able to incur social reaction. Although the journalistic objectivity ideal states that journalists merely report without having an interest in the effects of their work, the reciprocity of rights and obligations sustaining the social contract suggests that this image of journalism is disingenuous. The contractual agreement entails that journalism should affect political action in the citizenry when action is called for. However, the professional ideal ensures that their social engagement remains masked as objectivity. This is possible because professional ideology is able to successfully maintain the social contract, which in turn sustains the Fourth Estate as a possible catalyst for social change. Therefore, journalists expect the public to trust their role as watchdog. When this does not happen*when the public disregards its reporters*the rules of the social contract of the press no longer function according to the principles of reciprocity. Here, journalists find themselves in a situation where audiences no longer fulfil their contractual obligations, thus creating a situation in which sanctions to contractual breaches are warranted. As Ettema and Glasser observe, investigative journalism encourages the community to affirm transgressions through reaction, or to affirm that it is not through indifference. Stories met with indifference may disappear from the news agenda, however, they note, That such stories sometimes are told again is evidence of a moral persistence, even moral courage, in journalism that should command public respect (Ettema and Glasser, 1998, p. 82). This description of a moral persistence supports the existence of the reciprocity principle in journalism ideology. The reason why this expectation of rights in relation to audiences usually remains hidden is the paradox that ensues from such exposure: by encouraging audiences to fulfil their contractual obligations, journalists are in breach of their own. Journalists in a liberal democratic system lack the social authority awarded to the classic professions. Because journalism lacks the monopoly on expertise that other professions have, journalists compensate for this lack of professional exclusivity through its professional ideology (Raaum, 1999, p. 9). The paradox inherent in this situation is one which serves to exacerbate the importance of journalistic ideology. The simultaneous strength and weakness of the journalistic profession is precisely its lack of classical professional status. Because of the liberal foundation on which rests the freedom of the press, journalism is based on the universal appropriation of negative rights*essentially rights from restrictions on its professional activities. This principle maintains the freedom of

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the pen as a vital component of the social contract upon which democracy rests. The negative rights which uphold the interests of the press as institution, nevertheless do little to strengthen the legitimacy of a profession which generally enjoys little public regard. Thus, in journalisms struggle to attain independence and credibility in an environment fraught with competition, the continued maintenance of the professional ideal is essential (Raaum, 1999, pp. 347). Based on this premise, the journalistic sanction towards an audience not fulfilling its contractual obligations is a highly contradictory and paradoxical move. Such a strategy could, on the one hand, be seen by the press itself as necessary to entice the public to fulfil its social contract obligations, but should, on the other hand, be avoided in order to maintain journalistic legitimacy. If we look at the social contract as an agreement between three parties*the state, the people and the press*we uncover the common justification for awarding the press obligations without rights in its relationship with the citizenry. Within this exchange, the legitimacy of the journalistic profession ultimately rests on its fulfilment of its social contract obligations towards the citizenry more so than on its obligations to the state. Conversely, the legitimacy of the people rests more on its fulfilment of its social contract obligations to the state than to the press. In the obligations of the people towards upholding the social contract, the press is seen merely as an intermediary between the citizenry and the state (Curran, 2005, p. 121). Should we, however, consider contractual tenets as rights and obligations towards the democratic order in its own right, this imbalance in the power relations between the three parties is dissolved. This explains why journalistic sanctions against the audience are scarce or invisible, without negating the existence of this reciprocity within the ideological field. Citizens have obligations towards the press insofar as the press embodies an essential democratic conduit. Whereas journalism sociology and democratic theory see the media as an intermediary between the two primary contractual partners, i.e. the state and the public, this analysis suggests that the press ideologically conceives of itself as a separate partner within the social contract. This world-view explains why the social contract metaphor is so pervasive within journalistic ideology. Without the implicit reciprocity of the social contract of the press, journalism would not have the moral encouragement to tacitly expect that audiences respond politically to news content. And without the underlying presence of this expectation*which classic contractarian theory grants the press*neither the journalistic nor the political social contract would function according to the contractual agreements.

The Usefulness of the Social Contract Metaphor

In contractarian terms, the duty of the journalist is to abide by the rules of professionalism and the obligations of the social contract. But the fulfilment of this duty is in turn dependent on the other contractual partners, i.e. the public and the state, also meeting their obligations under the same contract. The problem of duty appears when reciprocity fails. This is not equal to saying that readers get the newspapers they deserve. Social contract theory does more than explain the mechanisms behind good or bad journalism. The rights and obligations perspective offers a vantage point from which the exchange of obligations*or duties*for rights adds valuable insight to considerations of how journalism ideology is maintained within the profession. The weakness of the journalistic profession provides only one argument for the continued relevance of the social contract as metaphor for journalisms legitimacy as

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the Fourth Estate of democracy. Designating journalisms role in society as a social contract also provides a substantial justification for the power of the press, in theoretical as well as moral and practical terms. A political-philosophical consideration of the social contract of the press can, in addition to more practical and institutional frameworks of understanding, also serve as a productive vantage point for researching the dynamics of media markets, changes in media landscapes, and competition between media outlets. As such, we should consider that ideology*as here described*is more than a journalistic mythos. Rather, it is a vital and natural part of the democratic fabric which helps sustain not only the press and the journalistic profession but in turn also the citizenry and the state. For it is through this mythology that journalism can fulfil its obligations. The final suggestion is thus that this understanding of the social contract of the press*and its philosophical, political and ideological components*should contribute our understanding of the role of journalism within liberal democracies.

NOTES
1. 2. 3. The press*here dened as the journalistic enterprise in broad terms, and to the news business regardless of publication platform. See Boucher and Kelly (1994, pp. 310), Keane (1991, pp. 1117), Lessnoff (1990, pp. 213) and Street (2001, p. 254). Reporters who called for outside help include The Guardians Maggie OKane and Ed Vulliamy; Newsdays Roy Gutman; Martin Bell and Allan Little of the BBC; and CNNs Christiane Amanpour (Carruthers, 2000, pp. 2402; Hammond, 2002, pp. 12).

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Helle Sjvaag, Department of Information Science and Media Studies, The University of Bergen, PO Box 7802, 5020 Bergen, Norway. E-mail: helle.sjovaag@infomedia.uib.no

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