Author ORCID Identifier

https://orcid.org/0009-0001-1263-8082

Semester

Spring

Date of Graduation

2023

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MS

College

Reed College of Media

Department

Not Listed

Committee Chair

Stephen J. Urbanski

Committee Member

Patrick Ferrucci

Committee Member

Mary Kay McFarland

Committee Member

Joseph Jones

Abstract

This study seeks to understand the pressure from both advertisers and the Bangladesh government on the local mass media between March 2020 and December 2021 concurrent with the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, this study aims to explore whether the local mass media compromised more with advertisers amid the COVID recession to earn advertising-based revenue and whether the Bangladesh government mounted more pressure on the press during the period as well as to analyze the influence of the aforementioned factors on newsrooms. To guide this work, this study employs the Market Theory of News Production (McManus, 1994), the Authoritarian Theory of Mass Communication (Siebert et al.,1956), and the Social Responsibility Theory of the Press (Peterson, 1956) for collecting and analyzing data. Twenty Bangladeshi media owners, editors, and journalists have been interviewed in this qualitative study to obtain answers to three research questions based on aforesaid theories. Their in-depth interviews have been thematically analyzed using deductive approaches guided by theories and inductive approaches guided by emergent responses as well. The findings reveal that the local media had a 50% decline in advertising revenue and a 70% fall in circulation revenue, which forced them to undertake cost-cutting measures like firing journalists and suspending their salaries for months. The Bangladeshi mass media also compromised more with the advertisers to sell advertisements amid the COVID recession for their survival. Another major challenge that the local media faced was pressure from the government. The critics were arrested, harassed, and intimidated. These two negative forces had corresponding adverse impacts on the newsrooms. As a result, the press could not perform as per its potential to grow public awareness amid the COVID pandemic and as a watchdog of the government’s coronavirus mitigation programs.

Embargo Reason

Publication Pending

Comments

The author was a professional journalist in Bangladesh with over 17 years of experience. He worked with two national dailies as a reporter. He decided to quit journalism during the pandemic out of job burnout and decided to pursue higher studies in journalism in the United States.

Download

Share

COinS