Central European Journal of Communication, Special Issue 2023

Deadline: January 31, 2023

Editors: Greta Gober, Michał Głowacki, Anna Jupowicz-Ginalska, University of Warsaw, Poland 

The “Central European Journal of Communication” and the Norway-grants funded „Diversity Management as Innovation in Journalism” research project (2021-2023) invite scholars from a broad range of disciplines to submit extended abstracts for a special issue under the theme of: “Reinventing Media Diversity: Change Management for Social Innovation”, focusing on the political, social, and cultural implications of enhancing diversity in the media.

Accompanying the call, we welcome interested scholars and media managers to a research conference with the same theme “Reinventing Media Diversity: Change Management for Social Innovation”. Conference is organized by Faculty of Journalism, Information and Book Studies, University of Warsaw (June 22-23, 2023). 

For more information visit: www.managingnewsroomdiversity.com

Our Timeline:

Deadline for extended abstracts (max. 500 words): January 31, 2023

Invitation to submit a full paper: February 15, 2023 

Full paper submission: May 31, 2023 

Peer review and copyediting: Summer/Autumn 2023  

Publication: October/November 2023

Our Topic and Goals:

We are living at a historical moment of disruption and radical transformation. The urgency of climate change, the globalization crisis, the increasing sense of distributive injustice, the impoverished political leadership, the rise of the “global Right ”, the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia’s war on Ukraine are all points of disruption where radical change starts. Unequal power relations in participation processes that are increasingly mediated become especially pertinent in times of crisis and war.

Disruption and radical transformation similarly affect contemporary media systems, bringing attention to these transformations’ consequences for democracy and the quality of public debates. On the one hand, many discussions and research on crises facing media and journalism narrowly focus on technological disruptions and economic declines. On the other hand, there is a growing realization that the root causes of media and journalism in crises are more profound; with the focus shifting to epistemological blind spots, gaps, and exclusions. This shift is reflected in the recent renewal of media organizations’ interest in diversity and inclusion management. Reports from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (approximately since 2019) regularly list ‘diversity’ amongst the industry’s biggest challenges. ‘Diversity’ (amongst journalists, management, and programming) is a solution to restoring the audience’s trust, improving the quality of journalism, and even ‘saving liberal democracies (e.g.,  Toff et al. 2022, English, 2021). 

Meanwhile, if ‘diversity’ has become a buzzword or even a fashion, the relationship between media and participation remains vaguely defined and largely underdeveloped in mainstream media and journalism research and education (see Tandoc Jr et al. 2020 addressing this problem). We argue that critical contributions feminist, postcolonial, queer, and anti-racist theories have made in advancing our understanding of the relationship between media and participation can help deepen and expend understanding of the challenges and opportunities media and journalism face in such turbulent times (e.g., Callison & Young 2020, Douglas 2022, Thomas et al. 2019). Reinvention of media diversity, both as a field of study and practice, is thus needed urgently.

The Special Issue 2023 of the “Central European Journal of Communication” aims to shed a critical and innovative light at the complexity of political, social, and cultural implications of enhancing diversity in the media and daily media practices. We suggest looking at conditions, possibilities, and constraints for mediated participation and the role diversity management and inclusion can play in reshaping newsroom cultures, journalistic practices, and organizational processes. We also aim  for a reinvention in theorizing diversity; for instance, concerning organizational and human-based resistance to unequal power relations and organizational adaptation and change (Gober and Głowacki, 2022). Bearing in mind the complexity of reinventing media diversity theorizing we invite papers, media scholarly and industry interventions on change management and social innovation considering:

1) The Value of Media Diversity (theory vs potential impact on society),

2) Diversity and Inclusive Management (rituals, artifacts, organizational culture, and so on),

3) Societal and cultural contexts (including motivation, standpoint, positionality, and pride).   

Our Processes:

We invite extended abstract (max. 500 words), highlighting the novelty of the research, data, goals, and methodologies by January 31, 2023 (the abstract shall be sent to: g.gober@uw.edu.pl).

Authors invited to submit full manuscripts (7,000–9,000 words) will be notified by February 15, 2023. The full papers shall be submitted by May 31, 2023, in accordance with the editorial standards and practices of the “Central European Journal of Communication”: www.cejc.ptks.pl.

About Us:

The “Central European Journal of Communication” adheres to a rigorous double-blind reviewing policy and articles are published Open Access with no processing charges for authors. The journal offers professional copyediting and instant access to Open Journal Systems. We welcome theoretical and empirical research from various disciplinary approaches, including methods and concepts, book reviews, conference reports, and interviews with scholars and media practitioners (policymakers, media managers, journalists). CEJC is indexed in several scientific databases, including SCOPUS, Web of Science Master Journal List, Emerging Citation Index and Central and Eastern European Online Library. 

Contact 

Questions about the “Diversity management as innovation in journalism” project, the special issue, and related June conference can be addressed to Greta Gober (g.gober@uw.edu.pl), Michał Głowacki (michal.glowacki@uw.edu.pl) and Anna Jupowicz-Ginalska (a.ginalska@uw.edu.pl). 

References:

Callison, C., Young, M. L. (2020). Reckoning: Journalism's Limits and Possibilities. online edn: Oxford University Press https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190067076.001.0001 

Douglas, O. (2022). “The media diversity and inclusion paradox: Experiences of black and brown journalists in mainstream British news institutions”. Journalism, 23(10), 2096–2113. https://doi-org.ezp.sub.su.se/10.1177/1464884921100177

Gober, G., and Głowacki, M. (2022). “Polyphony and Voice Plurality in Managing Newsroom Diversity”. Paper delivered at the conference of the European Media Management Association, Munich, June.

 Graff, A., Kapur, R., Walters, S.D. (2019). „Introduction. Gender and the Rise of the Global Right”. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 44(31): 541-560.

Tandoc Jr, E., Hess, K., Eldridge II., S., Westlund, O. (2020). “Diversifying Diversity in Digital Journalism Studies: Reflexive Research, Reviewing and Publishing”, Digital Journalism, 8:3, 301-309, DOI: 10.1080/21670811.2020.1738949

Thomas, T., Kruse, M., Stehling, M. (eds.) (2019). Media and participation in post-migrant societies. Lanhem, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield International.