CFP: Toward Flourishing: The Ethical Nexus of Journalism and Politics

We invite abstracts for chapters in an edited volume entitled “Toward Flourishing: The Ethical Nexus of Journalism and Politics.” The proposal will be submitted to high-caliber academic presses.

The volume will focus on philosophical approaches to theory at the nexus of journalism, ethics and politics. The aim is to make a space for seeing things differently so theory can better inform the practice of journalism — particularly its political function — in the context of systematic disinformation, news avoidance, and political polarization in contemporary democracies.

Partly motivated by growing interest in new approaches to virtue ethics, this project is grounded in a broadly Aristotelian philosophical framework understood in contemporary terms and authors. From this perspective, we understand journalism to be a practice whose moral excellence consists of helping individuals and communities to know well in their roles as citizens and polities. Politics, in this framework, goes beyond political parties and procedural fairness. Rather, it is conceived as a kind of practical knowledge that we can act on jointly to achieve the common goods we all need to flourish in our families, practices, organizations, communities, schools and other institutions.

We seek to reframe and reinterpret journalism ethics theory as it relates to a politics of common goods. This perspective focuses on concrete, existing roles, relationships and activities, rather than on ideal types. Therefore, we welcome normative analyses of journalism as it is, or has been practiced, in a variety of places, times and cultures in respect to politics and common goods.

In an Aristotelian framework, concepts in journalism ethics are “thick concepts” that are intelligible within specific social, political and historical contexts. This means that we need to recover the meaning of some concepts in relation to their referents, or – where referents have changed or emerged – we may need to create new concepts. The standard for rethinking moral concepts, in neo-Aristotelian thought, is flourishing. Therefore, we are interested in proposals for historicizing and interrogating basic concepts in journalism ethics — for example, “truth,” “freedom” and “public” – with an eye on flourishing in the context of today’s socio-political ethos for journalism. Alternative theoretical approaches are welcome as long as they engage with broader themes in neo-Aristotelian thought (see examples below).

We are also interested in proposals addressing adjacent topics, such as: communication technologies, media systems, political cultures, sociology of knowledge, political philosophy, philosophy of language, and democratic processes. However, to be accepted, proposals must make strong theoretical contributions that are relevant to improving and strengthening journalistic practice as it relates to a politics of common goods.

We seek proposals from scholars from diverse geographic, political, cultural and disciplinary orientations. Comparative works are encouraged.

Possible topics for proposals include, but are not limited, to:

Socio-political ethos of journalism

● Analyses of specific socio-political contexts that support or hinder the flourishing of journalism as a practice in respect to its political function (with a proposal for either strengthening or repairing the ethos as applicable). Contextual factors include political cultures, media systems, professionalism, economic arrangements, newsroom socialization, and media consumption patterns. In other words, does journalism have the contexts it needs to flourish as a practice? If it does not, how can the context be improved to promote flourishing?

The practice of journalism

● Works that look at the variety of ways in which journalism itself promotes or hinders flourishing in different historical eras, cultures and media systems (with a proposal for either strengthening or repairing the practice as applicable). In other words, do we have the journalism we need to jointly pursue a politics of common goods?

Conceptual reset

●  Systematic works to interrogate, clarify, and critique existing concepts in journalism ethics using flourishing as the standard.

●  Systematic works to repair, expand, recover, appropriate or invent journalism ethics concepts using flourishing as the standard.

●  Critiques and refinements of neo-Aristotelian approaches to ethics and politics as they apply to journalism.

●  Non-Aristotelian theoretical works that engage with key Aristotelian themes, such as flourishing, virtue, traditions, exemplars, common goods, practical reasoning, public deliberation, and human or social development.This volume builds on a recent workshop on the same topic, hosted by The Public Communication Department of the Universidad de Navarra and the Western Michigan University Center for the Study of Ethics in Society in Pamplona, Spain. Participation in the workshop is not required for submission to the volume.To be considered, email submissions to both [email protected] and [email protected] consisting of:

● An extended abstract of 750-1,200 words summarizing a theoretical argument related to the concerns of this volume. Abstracts should include a clear and concise title; specify a theoretical framework in alignment with, or in conversation with, a neo-Aristotelian framework; state the framework’s relevance to a politics of common goods; offer specific proposals for strengthening or repairing journalistic practice and/or its ethos; and provide references (not included in the word count).

• A shorter abstract of approximately 250 words for the book proposal (no references).
• A biosketch of approximately 100 words for the book proposal.
• A CV (as a link or attachment).

• Submission deadline: November 15, 2024
  Notification date: December 16, 2024
  
  
• For more information, contact Sandra L. Borden, director of the Center for the Study of Ethics in Society, Western Michigan University [email protected] Mónica Codina, director of the Department of Public Communication, Universidad de Navarra [email protected]