Taking the Journey
By
Davis Merritt
Davis 'Buzz' Merritt, a former editor and senior vice president of the Wichita Eagle, is the author of Knightfall and Public Journalism & Public Life: Why Telling the News is Not Enough.
The idea of public journalism emerged from the thinking of an array of people. From Daniel Yankelovich came a compelling analysis of how people come to judgment on public issues. From Robert Putnam, convincing evidence of the need for civic reawakening. From Frances Moore Lappé and Paul Martin Du Bois, a detailed job of reporting upon the bare beginnings of such an awakening. And from the Harwood Group, two reports on in-depth conversations with citizens about their lives.
Those are important mileposts along the intellectual journey toward public journalism, but not the only ones. Here's where you can learn more about the civic and journalistic needs to which public journalism responds:
About citizens, politics and public life:
E.J. Dionne, "Why Americans Hate Politics"
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991)
Daniel Yankelovich, "Coming to Public Judgment:
Making Democracy Work in a Complex World"
(Syracuse University Press, 1991)
Robert Putnam, "Bowling Alone: America's Declining
Social Capital," Journal of Democracy, January 1995; and
"The Prosperous Community: Social Capital and Public Life,"
The American Prospect, Spring 1993
David Mathews, "Politics for People: Finding a
Responsible Public Voice"
(University of Illinois Press, 1994)
The Harwood Group, "Citizens and Politics: The View
from Main Street" (Dayton: Kettering Foundation, 1991) and
"Meaningful Chaos: How People Form Relationships to
Public Concerns" (Dayton: Kettering Foundation, 1993)
Frances Moore Lappé and Paul Martin Du Bois,
"The Quickening of America"
(San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1994)
About journalism:
David Broder, "A New Assignment for the Press," Press Enterprise Lecture No. 26
(Riverside, California: The Press Enterprise, 1991)
E.J. Dionne, "No News is Good News: Why Americans
Hate the Press," chapter 8 in "They Only Look Dead"
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996)
James W. Carey, "The Press, Public Opinion and
Public Discourse" in "Public Opinion and the Communication of
Consent," Theodore L. Glasser and Charles T. Salmon, editors,
(New York: Guilford Press, 1995)
Christopher Lasch, "The Lost Art of Argument," chapter 9 of
"The Revolt of the Elites"
(New York: Norton, 1995)
Thomas Patterson, "Out of Order"
(New York: Knopf, 1993)
W.R. Neuman, Marion R. Just & Ann N. Crigler, "Common
Knowledge: News and the Construction of Political Meaning"
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992) ###
| 
