A Lost Decade: Policymakers Fiddled as Newsrooms Burned

• Published date: 01 May 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00027162231211424
• Author: Sewell Chan
• Date: 01 May 2023
• Subject Matter: Part I: Policy

62 ANNALS, AAPSS, 707, May 2023

DOI: 10.1177/00027162231211424

A Lost Decade:

Policymakers

Fiddled as

Newsrooms

Burned

By

SEWELL CHAN

1211424ANN THE ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMYA LOST DECADE

research-article2023

Journalists can be averse to media policy, but the stakes

today are too high for practitioners to sit these debates

out. The years that followed the 2011 Federal

Communications Commission (FCC) Report were a

lost decade in media policy, in which policymakers

dithered as an information apocalypse loomed. It is

essential to acknowledge that the media ecosystem

has always been affected by public policy and to

broaden our vision of how policymakers can help

local news survive and innovate. I argue for urgent,

renewed investments from government, philanthropy,

and consumers to create a new media ecosystem in

which all kinds of news media—public, nonprofit,

and commercial—can be revived and can thrive.

Keywords: media policy; nonprofit news; journalists;

local news

The July 2011 report of the Federal

Communications Commission (FCC)

Working Group on Information Needs of

Communities (Waldman and Working Group

on Information Needs of Communities 2011) is

best read not as a blueprint for media policy in

the 21st century but as a snapshot at one point

in time, before American society and politics

were convulsed by misinformation and hyper-

polarization. Its ambitions were limited, but so

too were the political possibilities for reform of

media policy.

It was released during a consequential year

for American democracy and for the press.

Empowered by the right-wing Tea Party,

Republicans regained control of the U.S. House

in January. On the left, Occupy Wall Street, a

movement assailing wealth and income ine-

quality, began in September. In November,

BuzzFeed News was born.

Correspondence: sewell.chan@texastribune.org

Sewell Chan is the editor in chief of The Texas Tribune,

a nonprofit, nonpartisan, digital-first news organiza-

tion founded in 2009. He was previously an editor at

the Los Angeles Times and The New York Times.