Editorial journalism and human development: an analysis of editorial contents of mainstream pakistani newspapers

Abstract

Abstract Context: Despite being a nuclear power, Pakistan does not have satisfactory human development indicators. The 2019 United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Human Development Index (HDI) ranking places it at 154 out of 189 countries, the lowest in the region after Afghanistan. Despite carrying strong potential to influence (1) public agenda; (2) internal news agenda; (3) external news media agenda; and (4) political or policy agenda, newspaper editorials have barely been studied before to advocate human development issues to eventually impact public policymaking process. Purpose: This dissertation examines editorial journalism coverage of human development issues versus other issues in the mainstream Pakistani newspapers for two different time periods i.e., from 1st July 2015 to 30th June 2016; and from 19th August 2018 to 18th August 2019. The aims of study include 1) to investigate editorial agenda-setting priorities 2) to explore the change in editorial agenda with the change in policy agenda on human development issues; 3) to examine inter-media agenda differences between Urdu and English language newspapers on human development issues; 4) to explore correlation between editorial and readers’ priorities of human development issues; and 5) to discuss the factors/influences behind the inadequate space given to them. Methods: The hierarchy of influences model suggested by Shoemaker and Reese (2014), underpins this study because it allows to examine the factors/influences behind editorial coverage of different types of issues in Pakistan.The quantitative content analysis method is used to measure and compare the frequency of sample content in five major categories coupled with qualitative elite in-depth interviews with veteran journalists/academics/PR professionals to explain the factors that influence the editorial content. Editorial contents of six mainstream Urdu and English newspapers are selected for applying content analysis method, whereas 20 interview participants are probed to understand various influences behind Pakistani editorial journalism. Findings: The data from quantitative content analysis reveal that at the cost of consuming precious editorial space to advocate voiceless factions’ miseries and to eventually improve country’s HDI value, editorial contents are dominated by the discourse produced by the mighty communication bureaucracies of powerful national and international establishments. For instance, non-human development issues’ based policies of the state and political actors; and conflicts with India and Afghanistan with warmongering spirit are given considerably larger coverage. Apart from giving due coverage to human development issues when such issues came on the policy agenda, editorialists also paid attention to highlight the issues of common people. Additionally, inter-media agenda differences on human development issues were detected between Urdu and English language newspapers, which can otherwise negatively impact the normative role of consensus building by the mass media. Finally, readers’ reaction to editorial content through Facebook Likes and online readers comments indicates a clear difference between editorialists and readers’ priorities. In-depth interviews inform this study that Pakistani editorialists have to face a variety of influences at individual-level, routine-level, organization-level, extra-media level and ideological level. Study Implications: The communication aspects of development programmes should actively feed newspaper editorial boards regarding current global development agendas to ensure sufficient coverage of their advocacy. It is imperative to make the UNESCO-led syllabus Teaching Journalism for Sustainable Development an integral part of the country’s journalism curriculum. ‘Civic advocacy’ groups can play a dynamic role in helping to plug gaps by 1) perusing scientific studies on human development related issues from the academic community; 2) communicating their findings to the media outlets particularly to the advocate- journalists; 3) organizing reporting and editorial staff training workshops on how to use such findings to effectively influence developmental policymaking process; 4) sharing with journalism academic community to ensure necessary amendments in relevant journalism course contents for future journalists, and, above all, 5) persuading editors to provide enough room for human development issues.