Making News

This absolutely essential book combines meticulous, original research from leading authorities with a finely tuned editorial sensibility to reinforce the centrality to journalism of the political economy. * Martin Conboy, Professor of Journalism History and Co-Director of the Centre for the Study of Journalism and History, University of Sheffield *
Making News provides a necessary and much needed historical perspective on the development of news journalism in the US and the UK since 1688.Covering two countries and three centuries in a tightly edited volume, the contributors convincingly show how economic, political, and normative institutional arrangements are at least as important as media technologies in shaping the production and dissemination of news, confronting hyperbolic techno-jargon (whether Victorian or contemporary) with sober historical analysis. * Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, Director of Research, Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford and Editor-in-Chief, International Journal of Press/Politics *
Making News offers a startling multi-century tour from the birth of newspapers to the rise of the Internet. There are surprises on almost every page. The value of this rigorous, crisply written book is enhanced because the authors dont just record the history of news. They place the enfolding chronology in historical context, making their narrative come alive, gently instructing readers on not just what happened but why. * Ken Auletta, author and media critic for The New Yorker magazine *
Do not mistake this book for yet another sentimental look at the history of a dying medium. From the eighteenth century to the present, this rich transatlantic collection challenges us to turn away from the dazzle of new media technologies and to explore the political and economic institutions that have always shaped the news. Rigorously researched and analytically acute, the essays gathered here serve as thoughtful, probing guides not only to the journalism of the past, but to the forces that will shape the news media of the future. * Fred Turner, Professor of Communication at Stanford University *
This book breaks new ground by focusing on the economic, technological, and public policy influences that shaped British and American journalism over three centuries. It is full of new insights and new information that will require the history of journalism to be reinterpreted. * James Curran, Professor of Communications, Goldsmiths, University of London *
A meticulous, thought-provoking, and accessible work which offers an original and engaging insight for anyone interested in the history of Anglo-American journalism and its business, economic, and technological developments. * English Historical Review *
The work's underlying thesis, played out across the volume's eight chapters, is that the free-market approach favored by contemporary Internet-focused journalistsas well as by many of today's media business savantswill ultimately prove incapable of producing the kind of reliable, high-quality reporting serious news organizations were expected to deliver prior to the technological revolution of the late-twentieth-century arrival of the Internet. At its core, the central argument of this book is persuasive, all the more so because earlier revolutions in the business of news are explored deeply for the purpose of comparison, contrast, and agency. * David Abrahamson and Callie Leone, Business History Review *
Overall, this collection offers interesting interpretations of how political and economic institutions jointly altered the number and nature of players in the newspaper field.This collection will be a useful introduction to this vital and vibrant industry for scholars of organizations and the economy who are analyzing its recent past and its future. * Heather A. Haveman, Administrative Science Quarterly *
The book belongs in graduate colloquia in journalism history. It would be especially beneficial for graduate students to force them to think outside the traditional mass communications box. * Owen V. Johnson, American Journalism *
In its geographic and chronological breadth, there is simply nothing else like Making News. Few works have managed to walk the tightrope of journalism historythat is, simultaneously accounting for the news's place in deliberative democracy and its place in the structures of modern capitalismwith such skill. In fact, many of the authors most adept at doing so in the past are represented here. As such, Making News will be of great service not only to scholars in specialized fields such as media history and journalism studies, but to historians broadly interested in the complex interplay of economic institutions and democratic society. * Richard K. Popp, Economic History Review *
Media history, business history and journalism studies scholars alike will enjoy these themed essays and their authors perspectives on where our journalism-driven political economy comes from, and where it may be going. * Will Mari, Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly *