Looking beyond Flawed Journalism

Press coverage of the run-up to the Iraq war and of the war itself has sparked a debate on how good or how bad the coverage has been in terms of journalistic virtues of truth telling, independent reporting, skepticism and challenging of official accounts, giving different sides of the story, and showing sensitivity and understanding. An analysis of the coverage in five major newspapers from the United States, United Kingdom, Pakistan, and India suggests that quite apart from the question whether good professional practices of journalism were followed, deeper influences were at work, among them national interests and concerns, the nature of elite opinion and debate over the war, and cultural and social practices. By and large, the American war frame, with its emphasis on the overall military strategy, dominated the American and the British newspapers but with distinct nuances reflecting a broad agreement on the war in the United States and divided opinion in Britain. On the other hand, there was a greater coverage of the Iraqi viewpoint and of civilian deaths in the Pakistani and the Indian newspapers.