The journalism industry has been associated with stereotypes of the type of people employed within the industry and where they have come from socially. For those who have come from a lower socioeconomic background, there can be challenges in accessing the industry. Reporter Aaron Stokes speaks to Georgia Coan to investigate what the industry is like today for those in lower socioeconomic positions.
The National Council of Training Journalists (NCTJ) released a report that explores the level of diversity within the journalism industry. This report highlighted the overall decline in the number of journalists in the industry. In 2022, it was estimated that there were 101,500 journalists, compared to 2021 which saw 108,000 journalists. This is a decline of 6,500 people.
These figures also do not consider the recent cuts experienced across the journalism industry.
Georgia's speciality within the industry is producing audio. For the interview, she joined me from a studio to talk about the socioeconomic diversity issues in the journalism industry.
Georgia says: “Maybe I am not necessarily concerned in the sense that people are turning away from journalism, because in content creation a lot of the skills are similar to those that you need to be a journalist.”
Instead, Georgia’s concerns lie with people who are from underrepresented backgrounds turning away from journalism because they feel like it is not for them, or they feel they do not fit into the industry.
Explaining what impact, the current job cuts the journalism is facing can have on people trying to enter the industry from a lower socioeconomic background, Georgia says: “[It’s] a real frustration because it means that potentially the industry will start to lose all the progression that it made.
“Journalism could go back to an industry that is dominated by people who have some kind of financial backing.
“A lot of fixed-term contracts are very short, it’s very difficult for people [from lower socioeconomic backgrounds]. They don’t have the financial stability to be able to take that chance.
“That means automatically they will turn away from the industry because they feel as though it’s not for them.
“Potentially it could become elitist again, [because] there’s just not that same level of security.”
Another highlight figure is the number of younger journalists has declined. The most recent data suggests that only five percent of journalists are under 25 years old. As it stands, the current trend of journalists getting younger has been reversed.
With the decline in the number of young journalists, it can pose the risk of the quality of the journalism that is produced as well as missing key audiences because the newsrooms will not have the level of diversity that reflects their audiences according to Georgia.
When looking at the social class of current journalists it has revealed progress for those that have come from the lowest social group. There has been a 12 percent increase in the number of journalists in this category. Initially, this is a good change however according to the report “we need to wait to see whether this is a sustained change over time.”
Georgia says: “The wait-and-watch mentality for socioeconomic diversity, as well as other forms of diversity, is not helpful.
“Nearly half of all Brits consider themselves working class, yet only a 12 percent increase in journalists from this demographic.
“It’s not acceptable that the majority of our industry is still not representative of our country as a whole.
However, once someone from the industry has been able to finally be able to enter the industry, there are still challenges that they can face when trying to fit in with their peers.
Speaking about her experience in the industry, Georgia says: “You [can] feel very out of place.”
Alongside this, when it came to organising meetings with a previous employer for a group that represented staff from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, Georgia would have to push for the meetings to be arranged, and because a lot of the people who make decisions around diversity did not understand the audiences and people.
“You need to create an inclusive culture within an organisation and newsrooms.
“When you take people from those backgrounds and bring them in [to the industry] but don’t listen to their voices or opinions, it’s just performative.”
Previously, NCTJ reports were released towards the end of May. As a result, there are just a couple of weeks to see how the journalism industry has changed over 12 months.
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