Journalism's appeal to the public is in decline and the causes and remedies for this are debated in society and academia. One dimension that has garnered attention is that of journalistic norms and how they are performed; it has been proposed that a journalism based on a different, more transparent, normative base can better connect with citizens, compared with the current prevailing norm of journalistic objectivity. However, the opinions of citizens themselves have been remarkably absent and, in order to inform the debate, this study inductively investigates how citizens view and relate to the notion of good journalism. Drawing upon a theoretical framework of Bourdieu's concept of doxa, journalistic role performance, and social contract theory, this study is based on the results of 13 focus groups. The findings suggest that the respondents’ views about good journalism are quite in accordance with the traditional norms of the journalistic field; however, there is more emphasis on stylistic and linguistic qualities. Few calls are made for transparency. The results suggest that a remedy to the decreasing trust in news may not lay in the changing of norms, but rather in how already established norms and values of the journalistic field are performed.

One of the main debates within journalism research during the last decade has been the role of citizens as contributors or, conversely, as threats to the practice of journalism. While participation has been explored from many different theoretical, empirical, and methodological perspectives, one perspective remains noticeably underexplored – the perspective of the citizens themselves. Using social contract theory as a backdrop, this study draws on a representative survey (N = 2091) and focus groups (N = 82) in Sweden. The results show that although citizens do not bring up participation as an important element of journalism, they become more skeptical the more participation affects journalism. Furthermore, they expect journalists to moderate citizen contributions according to established journalistic standards. From the perspective of social contract theory, participation in journalism appears to be more of a problem than a benefit to citizens.

Transparency has emerged as an ethical principle in contemporary journalism and is contended to improve accountability and credibility by journalists and scholars alike. However, to date, few attempts have been made to record the public’s views on transparency. This study enriches current knowledge by using data from an experiment, survey and focus groups in Sweden collected between 2013 and 2015. Overall, the results suggest that the respondents are not particularly moved by transparency in any form; it does not produce much effect in the experiments and is not brought up in the focus groups. While that is the key finding of this study, it should also be noted that various forms of user participation are evaluated negatively, while providing hyperlinks, explaining news selection and framing, and correcting errors are viewed positively. Implications for journalism practice and research are discussed.

The accelerating news cycle means there is a risk that errors become more common, but digital media also allow for correcting errors continuously and being transparent about this. In this study, we investigate Swedish citizens’ attitudes toward errors and corrections. The results demonstrate that citizens have strong expectations that news media publish correct information and they have little tolerance for errors. People’s background and media use do not affect attitudes toward errors and corrections to any large extent, but media trust explains a small fraction of the results—It is only those who already trust the media that appreciate corrections.

This article examines how journalists perceive workplace autonomy in five European countries, based on an email survey (N = 2238) conducted in the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Sweden and Estonia. The article argues that the workplace level functions as a link between the macro level of external pressures and the micro level of perceived influences on news work. Using principal component analysis we explore the dimensionality of workplace autonomy based on a set of 20 survey questions. Regression analysis is then used on the dimensions found in order to determine what affects perception of autonomy in the different dimensions. The most salient explanatory variables are found on the country and organisational levels, whereas the variables age, experience, gender, managerial role and medium have no or limited effects. The results show the organisational and country levels being integrated and that national journalistic culture is the most salient factor explaining perception of autonomy.

The accelerating news cycle means there is a risk that errors become more common but digital media also allows for correcting errors continuously and being transparent about this. In this study we investigate Swedish citizens’ attitudes towards errors and corrections. The results demonstrate that citizens have strong expectations that news media publish correct information and they have little tolerance for errors. People’s background and media use does not affect attitudes towards errors and corrections to any large extent but media trust explains a small fraction of the results – it is only those who already trust the media that appreciate corrections.

Hyperlinks are considered vital to both the Web and to digital journalism. This study utilizes alongitudinal content analysis of hyperlinking practices in Swedish online news from 2007 to2013 to see how hyperlinking evolves over time. It also compares if and to what extentpublishing tradition shapes journalistic practice. The findings primarily show that the overallimpact of hyperlinks remains largely unchanged over time but that internal links, while stillbeing most common, decrease in relative importance while external links increase. Thegeneral conclusion is that hyperlinks, so far, are not an important aspect of onlinejournalism practice.

A contemporary debate in media studies concerns participation and empowerment, and to whatextent digital media shift power to the citizens. This study assesses the long-term viability of participatoryjournalism using Swedish content and user data. Inclusion of comments and blog-linkson news sites increased from 2007 to 2010, and decreased rather dramatically from 2011 onward.Posting user comments or writing blogs have never been activities that have appealed to a majorityof the Swedes. Participatory journalism seems to have decreasing value to producers and little appealto users. A shift in how power is distributed in the public sphere is absent. This is not primarily aproblem of reluctant producers but, more importantly, a lack of interest from users.