JOUR90027 Chap.1 News Values and the Idea of a Global Crisis
News Values and the Idea of a Global Crisis
The first week asks two linked questions: what makes the news, and what makes a crisis? It starts with a front-page exercise in which four train crashes compete for one lead story, showing how proximity, magnitude, elite people, celebrity and surprise shape editorial judgement.
It then sets out the news-value lists of Galtung and Ruge and of Harcup and O'Neill, including the 2016 additions of shareability and audio-visuals, and Hall's argument that news values are ideological. Finally it introduces Simon Cottle, whose book gives the subject its name and whose thesis, that the media help define what counts as a crisis, runs through every later week and the media report's marking criteria.
The chapter ends by asking what journalism is for and which outlets count as reputable branded sources, the question you must settle before collecting stories for Assignment 1.
What this chapter covers
- 01
The front-page exercise: ranking four train crashes for one audience
- 02
Galtung and Ruge's twelve categories and Harcup and O'Neill's ten
- 03
The 2016 revision: exclusivity, conflict, drama, audio-visuals and shareability
- 04
Hall and the propaganda model: are news values ideological?
- 05
Cottle: claims-making, power and who defines a disaster
- 06
What journalism is for, and choosing reputable branded sources
Worked example · free
Ranking crisis stories with news values
- 1Identify the dominant value for each story: magnitude for the fire, proximity for the derailment, celebrity for the storm.
- 1Explain how a local audience changes the weights, so proximity and relevance can outrank a larger distant toll.
- 1State a ranking and defend the first choice against the strongest alternative.
- 1Add Hall's caution that these values are not neutral and favour some perspectives over others.
Key terms
- Proximity
- Proximity is the news value of closeness, geographic or cultural, between an event and the audience, which can outweigh a larger toll far away.
- Shareability
- Shareability is the news value Harcup and O'Neill added in 2016 for stories likely to generate sharing and comments on social media.
- Power elite
- The power elite is the news value attached to stories about powerful individuals, organisations, institutions or corporations.
- Disaster threshold
- A disaster threshold is the implicit judgement, which Cottle says someone must make, about how much harm turns an event into a disaster.
News Values and the Idea of a Global Crisis FAQ
Why does the subject start with news values?
Because every later topic depends on them. The front-page exercise shows that coverage is a set of judgements about audiences, and the media report asks you to compare how two national presses made those judgements about one crisis.
What did Harcup and O'Neill change in 2016?
Their revised list kept values such as the power elite, celebrity, surprise and magnitude, and added exclusivity, conflict, drama, audio-visuals and shareability, reflecting newsrooms that now watch how stories travel on social media.
What is Cottle's thesis of global crisis?
Cottle argues that crises are not self-defining. Who defines an event as a disaster, when, how and with what consequences is a question of claims-making and power, and the news media help constitute the crisis as well as communicate it.
Are news values neutral?
The Week 1 lecture says no, citing Hall's argument that they belong to an ideologically constructed way of seeing that naturalises elite perspectives, a view later echoed by Herman and Chomsky's propaganda model.
Which news sources count as reputable for this subject?
The lecture lists outlets such as the BBC, ABC, DW, CBC, France 24, Al Jazeera, the New York Times and the Guardian and asks what they share. For the media report you must use branded, daily, mainstream publications, not aggregators, influencer selections or agency copy.
Assessment move
Before the Week 1 seminar, read Harcup and O'Neill and Cottle's opening chapter, then pick three stories from that day's paper and label each with two news values. Keep the list: it becomes your first evidence when you choose a crisis for the presentation.
When you write about Cottle, quote his question about who defines a disaster and answer it for your own case, because the media report criteria reward understanding of his thesis, not a summary of it. Finish the week by writing one sentence on why your chosen crisis is global in Cottle's sense; you will need that sentence for the presentation and the report introduction.
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