Consumer Affairs, a US-based consumer news and advocacy site says that the $500,000 grant from Ford Foundation to Washington Post, one of the most reputed global newspapers, is no different from buying influence by paying an individual journalist

Bribing reporters is seen as a worldwide practise as it reporters pay the rent and enables politicians and companies to generate favourable stories about themselves. But that would never happen in the United States. You just give the money to the publisher and let it trickle down to the reporters.

The Ford Foundation one-year grant of $500,000 to The Washington Post, one of the most reputed global newspapers, is supposed to be used to “expand the paper’s government-accountability reporting”.

Earlier in May this year, the Ford Foundation gave $1 million to the Los Angeles Times, saying it wanted to experiment with “new approaches to preserve and advance high-quality journalism.” The money is supposed to be used to report on the Vietnamese, Korean and other immigrant communities in Southern California.

Underwriting
This is basically the PBS model of journalism: ‘underwrite’ the production of stories or documentaries that fit your worldview. It’s not as crass as a company looking for a favourable story but it’s not all that dissimilar either.

If one looks closely there are plenty of examples of slightly creepy transactions in the world of underwritten content. To take an example drawn from personal experience, a professional association of architects underwrites a documentary about ‘green’ building practices. You can bet the resulting program makes architects look good.

One could, and no doubt will, argue that if green buildings are good. But would the show have been produced quite that way—or at all—had it not been for the architects’ cheque books?

None of this is new to the Ford Foundation, which for years has lavished money on ‘public’ broadcasting, thus ensuring that what the Ford Foundation thinks is important gets airtime.

In fairness to Ford, anyone can apply for a grant to support just about anything. “Our grant making focuses on reducing poverty and injustice; promoting democratic values; and advancing human knowledge, creativity and achievement,” the foundation’s website explains.

Ford says it makes about 1,400 grants a year. Last year, it distributed $422 million worldwide.

Bang for the buck
The Columbia Journalism Review, which calls itself as a watchdog of the watchdogs, recognizes that Ford is buying influence: “The Ford Foundation has recognized that if what it wants is public-service journalism with a broad reach, a big daily still gives it the most bang for the buck,” the editors of cjr.org wrote in an editorial.

There’s nothing wrong with giving away money. The question, in the case of newspapers owned by large, for-profit corporations is whether it’s quite right to accept money to influence news coverage.

After all, consumers buy the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times because they trust their editors to select the most important news stories to cover each day and to ensure that those stories are covered fairly and accurately. They don’t expect a third party’s cheque book to be a factor in the editors’ decisions.

Journalists used to, and perhaps still do, take great pride in turning down bottles of expensive wine, assorted bling and the occasional junket to nowhere. Taking money to cover a particular topic isn’t all that much different, some would say, especially if it is not disclosed.

Will readers know which stories are being funded by the Ford Foundation? Mediamen hound everyone else about transparency but they’re not always its greatest practitioners.

This may sound like nitpicking but it’s a slippery slope the Post and Times are beginning to slide down. Oddly, none of this seems to be a matter of even the slightest debate in journalism circles. Purists would say that journalists should cover stories without regard to whether those stories produce ratings, circulation or money. But maybe the purists have all taken jobs somewhere else.

(Courtesy: ConsumerAffairs.com/ James R Hood)

Read the original article here: http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2012/08/news-for-sale-washington-post-gets-500000-grant.html