Journalism and Digital Media; the role of Journalism regarding Fakenews, Post-Truth, and Democracy.

Abstract

The concepts of Fake news and the Post-truth are widely debated topics in academia and in the media since the U.S. presidential election of Trump, and the Brexit election. Since the emergence of the internet, traditional media outlets declined in popularity, while digital media platforms increased in popularity. Being much more susceptible to dis- and mis-information campaigns, the governments of constitutional liberal democracies and the journalistic sector are in doubt whether and how to respond to the diminishing trust of fundamental institutions and the increased fragmentation within society.

As a topic that touches upon fundamental institutions in society - like Freedom of Expression, our liberal-democratic constitution, journalistic objectivity, and truth - this paper tries to identify and structure the most relevant ethical aspects of the debate to analyze them. The central issue that will be addressed is what the role of the journalistic sector is in the current digital media landscape. Essential for solving this issue, the question of what the moral duties of digital media platforms are in a liberal constitutional democracy will be treated. The argument of this thesis is that the struggle of liberal democracies to regulate digital media in the name of saving democracy can also be seen from the perspective of a political discursive struggle for power. In this view, regulation by the government is not legitimate. This legitimacy problem lays in the political philosophical grounding of liberalism where our constitutions are based upon. However, regulation is ethically acceptable if it is from the perspective of safeguarding the institution of Journalism from the ill effects of the digital capitalistic landscape.