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Broady, R (2022) NUJ Reporting Poverty Campaign: introducing a trade union challenge to journalistic representations of the unemployed and the working poor. Journal of Class and Culture, 1 (2). ISSN 26341123
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Abstract
The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) has reporting poverty guidelines for its 25k+ members to use alongside its Code of Conduct. These were introduced following a campaign from trade union activists and are now available to media workers in the industry including, among others, staff at the BBC, the tabloid and broadsheet press. These guidelines were created to challenge the demonising and stereotyping of the working poor and people in receipt of benefits found in British journalism. In this paper they are contextualised, within the ideology of austerity, a British media dominated by the middle and upper class, and the resulting demonising of the poor during economic crises. This article posits that the campaigning work can provide a theoretical and practical challenge to encourage and enable workers to join forces in rejecting the scapegoating of low paid, unemployed and under employed workers as seen in the media. In so doing, it considers that, while the guidelines may have limited influence in some sections of the media, they are nonetheless a significant tool, and position of solidarity, in challenging the depoliticising individualising apparent in reporting poverty, the ‘skivers versus strivers’ discourse, and in providing a critique of the journalistic use of sources. This paper, written by a contributor to those guidelines and leader of the NUJ campaign, serves as an introduction to this unique British trade union approach, informed and led by collaboration with people who have experienced of poverty.
| Item Type: | Article |
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| Uncontrolled Keywords: | poverty, NUJ, journalism, representation, discourse, media, welfare |
| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General) H Social Sciences > HT Communities. Classes. Races |
| Divisions: | Humanities & Social Science |
| Publisher: | Intellect |
| SWORD Depositor: | A Symplectic |
| Date Deposited: | 07 May 2024 13:27 |
| Last Modified: | 07 May 2024 13:27 |
| DOI or ID number: | 10.1386/jclc_00013_1 |
| URI: | https://researchonline.ljmu.ac.uk/id/eprint/23188 |
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