Journalism and the Islamic Worldview

Muchtar, Nurhaya; Hamada, Basyouni Ibrahim; Hanitzsch, Thomas ; Galal, Ashraf; Ullah, Masduki; Ullah, Mohammad Sahid (2017): Journalism and the Islamic Worldview. Journalistic roles in Muslim-majority countries. In: Journalism Studies, Vol. 18, No. 5: pp. 555-575

Abstract

This paper looks at the extent to which journalistic culture in Muslim-majority countries is shaped by a distinctive Islamic worldview. We identified four principles of an Islamic perspective to journalism: truth and truth-telling (siddiq and haqq), pedagogy (tabligh), seeking the best for the public interest (maslahah), and moderation (wasatiyyah). A survey of working journalists in Africa (Egypt, Sierra Leone, and Sudan), Asia (Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia, Oman, Qatar, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates), and Europe (Albania and Kosovo) found manifestations of these roles in the investigated countries. The results point to the strong importance of an interventionist approach to journalism—as embodied in the maslahah principle—in most societies. Overall, however, journalists’ roles in Muslim-majority countries are not so much shaped by a distinctively Islamic worldview as they were by the political, economic, and socio-cultural contexts.

• Item Type: Journal article
• Keywords: Islam; Islamic culture; Islamic view of journalistic roles; Muslim-majority countries; universal journalistic roles; Worlds of Journalism Study
• Faculties: Social Sciences > Communication
• Subjects: 000 Computer science, information and general works > 070 News media, journalism and publishing; 300 Social sciences > 300 Social sciences, sociology and anthropology
• ISSN: 1469-9699
• Annotation: Special Issue: Comparing Journalistic Cultures
• Language: English