From Trustee Journalism to Embedded Journalism: The News Embargo Break of Pope Francis’ Laudato si’

Marica Spalletta () and Lorenzo Ugolini ()
Additional contact information
Marica Spalletta: Link Campus University
Lorenzo Ugolini: Sapienza University, Rome

Revista Romana de Jurnalism si Comunicare - Romanian Journal of Journalism and Communication, 2016, issue 4, 16-25

Abstract: Covering religious news requires careful attention, because it blends the issues related to the Institution (the Pope and his documents) with topics related to people’s faith and values. Therefore, Vatican journalists (“Vaticanists”) are forced to respect strict rules, as for example the news embargo. The paper aims to aims to understand in which way the practice of embargo in Vatican journalism is consistent with a trustee model whose “principal” is represented by citizens. In order to do so, the paper focuses on a recent and very significant case of religious news embargo break: the publication of a draft of the Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato si’, three days before the established official presentation. From a methodological point of view, we carried out a qualitative media content analysis on Italian newspapers, and qualitative interviews to key informants, selected among Italian journalists. The researches show that Vatican journalism can be considered as an embedded journalism, concerning the critical ethical values nonetheless appear to be reversed. It appears to be a trustee journalism when its principals are represented by believers, but probably not when they consist of citizens.

Keywords: Religious news; embedded journalism; news embargo; professional ethics; trustee journalism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Y8 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://jurnalism-comunicare.eu/rrjc/free_download_en.php?id_articol=164 (application/pdf)
Access reserved to active subscribers. Subscription information available at: http://jurnalism-comunicare.eu/rrjc/subscribe_en.php

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:foj:journl:y:2016:i:4:p:16-25

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
Editura Ars Docendi, Sos. Panduri 94, sector 5, Bucuresti, Romania – for print copies
http://www.jurnalism-comunicare.eu/rrjc/

Access Statistics for this article

Revista Romana de Jurnalism si Comunicare - Romanian Journal of Journalism and Communication is currently edited by Raluca Radu

More articles in Revista Romana de Jurnalism si Comunicare - Romanian Journal of Journalism and Communication from University of Bucharest, Faculty of Journalism and Communication Studies – Universitatea din Bucuresti, Facultatea de Jurnalism si Stiintele Comunicarii Bdul Iuliu Maniu 1-3, Corp A, etajul 6, sector 6, Bucuresti, cod 061071, Romania.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Raluca Radu ().