The Virtuous Journalist

Product Description This book combines the insights of a seasoned journalist with those of an expert on philsophical ethics to provide a penetrating and comprehensive guide to the ethics of news reporting. It is essential reading for anyone interested in the role the press plays in influencing social, economic, and political choices in modern society. Drawing on a wealth of real-life cases, The Virtuous Journalist melds for the first time a conceptual analysis of the critical moral problems in journalism with a solid understanding of the constraints and possibilities faced by the print and electronic media. The authors are not First Amendment absolutists but believe nonetheless that, in a democracy, the media should be subjected to minimal legal restraint. They also argue that freedom from legal restraint requires increased moral responsibility. Among the specific topics treated in the book are notions of morality and fairness, journalistic competence, standards of objectivity and accuracy, avoiding bias, avoiding harm, notions of public service, and maintaining public trust. Specific cases discussed include the controversy surrounding the CBS documentary "The Uncounted Enemy" and recent reporting on the AIDS epidemic. From Library Journal This book, by a journalist and a philosopher, serves as an impressive guide to where philosophy can improve media criticism and where the field is better left to practising journalists. Better than any recent book, it defines terms in a manner both philosophically precise and journalistically practical. The authors' "Reasonable Reader Standard" for judging journalistic competence is startlingly simple in conception and surprisingly subtle and flexible in application. And where they discuss what readers and viewers should expectas in their trenchant review of CBS's "Uncounted Enemy" documentaryphilosophy and journalism seem made for each other. But where they view the field from the reporter's side rather than the audience's, they more or less repeat standard warnings. For informed lay readers and specialists. Daniel Levinson, English & History Depts., Thayer Acad., Braintree, Mass. Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. About the Author About the Authors: Stephen Klaidman is a Senior Research Fellow at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Georgetown University, and has been a journalist for the International Herald Tribune, The Washington Post, and The New York Times. Tom L. Beauchamp is Professor of Philosophy and Senior Research Scholar at the Kennedy Institute and author or co-author of such books as Principles of Biomedical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, and Hume and the Problem of Causation.
ASIN: 0195042050
VSKU: 56JTFY003RL3_ns
Condition: Very Good