By Yusufu Senessie
The media which is known as the fourth estate, for decades now, have immensely contributed to nations’ development. The trends of the press in the information ecosystem have been acknowledged both its implicit capacity for advocacy, and the explicit ability to frame political issues. The traditional or mainstream media surge enough confidence in the general populace as trusted body to provide balanced coverage on both national and local issues. The radio station, television station and the print media are long ago held accountable as trustees of information. For this singular reason, the mandate of the media is not just limited in facilitating and monitoring the responsibilities of the legislative, the executive and the judiciary as the main-stream organs of government, but also cover report on every national interest.
As it is often said that the media provide window to the world. The media serve as eyes and ears to the public in bringing balanced coverage at every doorstep that would have been seemly impossible to access. In the view of Bansal and Martin (2015), the job of journalists is to hold up an accurate mirror to society. Journalists have enough knowledge as to tell the costumes which societies are adorned with, and even further foretell the next change of dress that would likely be wore by societies to match the trend of the unfolding events in the future. In a nutshell, journalists are fortunetellers with the deeper sense to tell the problems and progresses of a society.
The capacity of the media to advocate explicitly is by influencing public opinions and promoting social change through various channels. These among others are:
Raising Awareness: Media can highlight issues that may not receive adequate attention, educating the public on important topics. Also, shaping narratives: Through storytelling and framing, media can influence how issues are perceived, encouraging particular viewpoints. Another channel is through by mobilizing action: Advocacy campaigns often use by media to galvanize support, encouraging audiences to participate in activism or advocacy efforts. Furthermore, providing a Platform: Media offers a space for marginalized voices to be heard, facilitating dialogue and promoting social justice. Finally, through accountability: Investigative journalism can hold powerful entities accountable, exposing corruption or injustices and prompting public response.
Overall, media serves as a critical tool for advocacy by amplifying messages and fostering community engagement.
Society has more trust in the mainstream media because of the level of confidence the press has created in the minds of its viewers by giving objective, fair and balanced report. The problems in our societies today are very too much complex to manage with the added emergency of the new media and the internet which also have created serious concern in the minds of news men and news women with regards to information disorder or pollution. Since the media institution is resilient in handling matters that occurred on the spur of the moment, the media have entertained the concept of solution journalism. This new concept goes beyond traditional reporting. Solutions Journalism is “rigorous and compelling reporting on responses to social problems” (Solutions Journalism Network 2017) and it is reporting done with the highest of journalistic standards (Bansal and Martin, 2015). Solution-oriented reporting pushes journalists to think about the social responsibility of the press and questions whether they consider society’s best interest in their daily thought processes and habits (Lough and McIntyre, 2018). The strongest solutions journalism stories use the rigor of investigative reporting to explore systemic, underlying reasons for social ills and then critically examine efforts to address them (Wenzel, Gerson and Moreno (n.d)). The media have served as antibiotics in vaccinating miss information and disinformation created by the new media in the information ecosystem.
The implicit rolls of the media in covering political issues are in themselves very phenomenon. The traditional media operate with the codes or cannons that regulate their operation, and in turn maintain peace and unity of the nation. They work hard to see how audience should perceive political issues or event in a good light. To achieve this aim, there are mechanisms they solely rely on to effect that.
Firstly, the media has the autonomy to set the agenda of the day. The postulation put forward by agenda theory is that ” media will not tell you what to think, but media will certainly tell you what to think about.” The real sense of argument put forward by this theory is that it is not the business of the media to tell you which program to listen to. They can achieve this through a salient transfer. media implicitly tell the public what issues are important. This doesn’t directly tell people what to think, but it influences what they think about. For instance, if a particular political scandal is highlighted constantly, it can shift public focus towards that issue.
Second, selection of sources with deep experiences to discuss critical trending issues that relate to electoral process: The media often draws upon specific experts, political analysts, or sources, who can shape the narrative around an issue. The selection of these voices implicitly endorses certain viewpoints or political ideologies, affecting how issues are understood by the public. Again, the implicit roll of the media in covering political issue is through priming: Through repeated exposure to specific themes or issues, the media primes audiences to make particular judgments. For instance, frequent coverage of economic issues can prime voters to focus on economic performance when making political decisions.
The relevance of media in our lives is Continuously improving on a daily basis therefore, society has turned it as beacon of hope in receiving accurate reports in the information ecosystem.