When Walkley Award winner Paul Chadwick stated in 2003 that "ignorance" is the biggest legal challenge facing professional communicators he wasn't wrong. (Chadwick 2003, in Briet 2007, p.xvii)
As our industry changes and information streams to us at the click of a mouse button the lines have been blurred. The continuing evolving nature of the industry means less time, tighter deadlines, and fewer resources. All of which equal more ignorance about our legal and ethical responsibilities.
Citizen journalism has risen, some reliable, some not. Our information is now more a commodity than it has ever been. Journalists rush to publish, to be the first, to break an exclusive. And for that our information suffers. It has created an environment of competitive information capitalism.
The loss of 'rounds' within the newsroom also sees less time to become familiar with legal perimeters and ethical guidelines. So, where to from here?
I think part of the answer lies in the journalists role as an ethical professional. We are not lawyers, but pushing the legal limits is something contemporary journalists seem to be well acquainted with.
By producing ethical journalistic content, journalists should be able to remove any legal 'ignorance', commonsense tells you that printing the address details of an accused criminal is illegal, and why is it commonsense? Because our ethics build our commonsense.
Thus, legal and ethical concepts in journalism, in my eyes, are mutually exclusive. Law offers a framework for human action and even though ethical responsibilities go beyond our legal obligations, ethical choices must always be justified according to a set of standards in consideration of the law.
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