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Ian Sinclair newspapers may prove highly influential in defining news and setting the local agenda for their readership’. Speaking about the role of regional newspapers in 2012, the President of the Newspaper Society (Newspaper Society 2012b) noted that ‘no other medium can replicate the role of local media, in print and online, in scrutinising those in authority, supporting local businesses and communities and campaigning with and on behalf of readers’. Professor Franklin (National ‘An establishment Assembly of Wales 2009) also believes regional newspapers have an important role to play, newspaper’: noting they have been: The politics of the the archivists and chroniclers of their local Eastern Daily Press and regional communities, recording various rites of passage (births, marriages and deaths) of members of the communities, as well as This paper analyses the political stance of the the activities of the judicial and political Norwich-based Eastern Daily Press. It uses Nick elites and institutions, manifest in court Davies’s notion of ‘churnalism’ and Herman reports and coverage of the proceedings of and Chomsky’s Propaganda Model to explain, parish councils and parliaments. in particular, its editorial positions on the mon- archy and British foreign policy. Moreover, the The flagship newspaper in Norwich and Norfolk evidence presented suggests that the EDP’s is the Eastern Daily Press (EDP). Launched in ownership and, to a lesser extent, its reliance 1870, the EDP grew out of the Norfolk News, on advertising are key reasons for its political which began publishing in 1845. According to stances. Interviews with journalists, politicians the official history (Clarke 2000) of the Eastern and a prominent academic support the over- Counties Newspapers Group (the company that all argument. The paper concludes: ‘Archant’s used to own the EDP) the Norfolk News was set monopoly in the region has a worrying influ- up by a small group of rebel businessmen who ence on dissent.’ were incensed by the refusal of the Norwich Mercury, then the dominant newspaper in Keywords: Eastern Daily Press, churnalism, Propaganda Model, monarchy, British foreign the city, to report the protests of those who policy opposed a tax levied by the church. The men – John and Jonathan Copeman, Jeremiah ‘Chroniclers of their communities’: Colman and Jacob Henry Tillett – hoped their The importance of the regional press new newspaper ‘would shake a complacent Regional newspapers are often dismissed and Establishment to its very core’ (Clarke 2000: 7). ridiculed for being parochial, amateurish and By 2013 the EDP’s daily circulation was 47,231, insignificant. Yet we ignore the regional press with the paper claiming to be ‘the best-selling at our peril. In 2012, there were 1,100 regional regional morning daily newspaper’ in England newspapers in the UK and 1,600 associated (Linford 2013). websites (Yorkshire Times 2013). According to the Newspaper Society, 61 per cent of British Several of the people I interviewed for this adults read a regional newspaper, compared paper agreed that the EDP does much of what with 53 per cent who read a national newspaper. the President of the Newspaper Society and Moreover, the regional press has what is known Professor Franklin list. Pete Kelley, the current as ‘a high solus readership’ – 23 per cent of Letters Editor, argues the EDP helps to create people who read a regional newspaper do ‘a sense of local identity’ as it gets ‘a bit closer not read a national newspaper (Newspaper to the community’ than the national press. A Society 2012a). Local newspapers remain the recent example of this community spirit and most trusted source of news (Ponsford 2011). reporting was the EDP’s in-depth coverage According to Bob Franklin (2004: 155), Professor of the December 2013 storm surge. A senior of Journalism Studies at Cardiff University, this Norfolk-based political figure told me: ‘It is high level of market penetration and trust, vital to have a local press scrutinising council combined with local monopolies, means ‘local decisions, the local economy, government 30 Copyright 2014-3. Ethical Space: The International Journal of Communication Ethics. All rights reserved. Vol 11, No 3 2014 PAPERS decisions that affect the county, etc. The EDP sad truth’. Kelley confirmed that over the last plays a valuable role in some of these regards.’1 30 years reporters’ jobs had become ‘more John Greenaway, Emeritus Professor of Politics pressurised’ but he also noted that the EDP’s at the University of East Anglia, notes the management was aware of the dangers that EDP has ‘excellent Norwich City Football Club Davies wrote about. ‘The last three times that reporting and analysis’ and ‘good coverage of we’ve had redundancies over the last seven a range of rural affairs and village green type years which have involved editorial staff, issues’. they’ve protected reporting staff on news reporting,’ he said. ‘We’d always like to see Explaining newspaper content: Nick Davies’s more reporters. We do have to use re-written churnalism vs. Edward Herman and Noam press releases, obviously. We always have done.’ Chomsky’s Propaganda Model In 2008 investigative journalist Nick Davies While Davies’s Flat earth news received rave published Flat earth news: An award-winning reviews and extensive coverage in the very reporter exposes falsehood, distortion and newspapers he was criticising, there is another PAPERS propaganda in the global media. Its central critique of the mainstream media which is argument is Davies’s concept of ‘churnalism’, rarely mentioned in the press – Edward Herman whereby the increasingly concentrated and Noam Chomsky’s Propaganda Model. corporate ownership of the national and Introduced in the 1988 book Manufacturing regional press has led to profit maximisation consent: The political economy of the mass at all costs. With newspapers cutting costs by media, the Propaganda Model is an attempt cutting staff, the journalists who remain at to understand why, in the authors’ opinion, the paper are expected to do more work in the American mass media ‘serve to mobilise less time. This has created a more pressurised support for the special interests that dominate working environment with less time for fact- the state and private activity’ (Herman and checking and for getting out of the office to Chomsky 1994: xi). Applying an analysis of pursue a story and build up contacts. Unable to market forces, Herman and Chomsky argue leave their desks, the stressed-out reporters are five filters systematically shape the news prey for PR firms, regurgitating press releases agenda: the concentrated corporate ownership and wire copy with minimal, if any, editing. of the media; advertising as a primary source According to Davies (2008: 13), these commercial of income; the reliance on government and pressures have ideological consequences with business sources; ‘flak’ received by the media; journalists tending ‘to produce a consensus and the dominant ideology (in 1988 this was account of the world which repeatedly reflects ‘anti-communism’). the interests of the rich and powerful’. The Propaganda Model is disliked by many Chris Fisher, the EDP’s former Political Editor, journalists – including Davies. Jonathan confirmed the EDP had undergone what Davies Cook (Media Lens 2009), a former Guardian has written about: journalist, suggests one reason for this hostility: Over the past 30 years or so, much has A possible reason why a journalist like changed… [the EDP’s owners and managers] Davies appears incapable of considering became locked into a vicious circle – along the arguments for the Propaganda Model, with virtually all of the rest of the regional let alone rebutting it, was explained by press – of making cuts as circulation dipped Chomsky during an interview in 1996 with and thereby giving readers less reason for another senior British journalist, Andrew buying the paper … I think the EDP is now Marr, then of the Independent newspaper a pale shadow of what it was. So much of its and today of the BBC. Marr and other journalism is ‘soft’ and unchallenging, and senior journalists, said Chomsky, had risen that is no reflection on the journalists. They to their present positions precisely because tend these days to be glued to computer their work did not challenge the corporate screens, under relentless pressure to get interests they served. A discomfited Marr pages into the content management system maintained that he had never self-censored as quickly as possible by producing stories and that there were lots of ‘disputatious’ from press releases without many questions people in journalism. Chomsky replied: asked. ‘If you believed something different, you wouldn’t be sitting where you’re sitting.’ Ken Hurst, a former Business Editor at the EDP, agrees that Davies’s thesis is ‘without doubt, a PAPERS Copyright 2013 3. Ethical Space: The International Journal of Communication Ethics. All rights reserved. Vol 11, No 3 2014 31 Ian Sinclair Davies surely had the Propaganda Model in The next day’s editorial (Eastern Daily Press mind when he referred in Flat earth news 2011c) continued in the same vein: to ‘conspiracy theories’ about the media propagated by ‘outsiders’. For Davies (2008: 16) … the absolute imperative is to regain the the primary purpose of the corporations that street, and the general public wants firm own the media today ‘is not propaganda. Their action not Guardianista theorising. A Sun primary purpose simply and uncontroversially poll out today records 90 per cent support is to make money’. Regarding ownership for the use of water-cannon, 82 per cent and advertising, Davies (2008: 22) explains: for curfews and even 33 per cent for the ‘Journalists with whom I’ve discussed this agree use of live ammunition. In other words, that if you could quantify it, you could attribute Mr Cameron, the public has had enough only 5 to 10 per cent of the problem to the total of pandering to the rights of the lawless, impact of these two forms of interference.’ This worse-than-useless, few.

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