The state of the news media in Iceland: -in the beginning of the 21 century

Media around the world are presently undergoing dramatic changes that originate in political, economic and technological development. The challenges confronting news providers have multiplied in the 21st century. This has raised concerns because the news media and journalism are assumed to be indispensable parts of democracies, providing the information and deliberation people need to function in democratic societies.
The aim of this dissertation is to contribute to a more comprehensive knowledge and understanding of the state of the news media in Iceland in times of great changes. The dissertation empirically examines and analysis various aspects of the state of the news media in the first years of the 21st century in four scholarly articles. The first paper maps key developments in the Icelandic media system and documents the media’s financial situation, ownership, relations between the news media and outside stakeholders, trust in the media and the state of the journalism profession. The second paper examines commercialization in news content in Iceland’s two national daily newspapers and the most-read online news sites over the past decade. In the third paper, gender representation and portrayal in news content in all major national news outlets in Iceland are detailed and compared to other Nordic countries. The fourth paper maps and analyses news consumption across platforms and outlets.

Matching the broad perspective of the research project, this dissertation uses a complementary, mixed method research design that draws on different methodologies. The data consist of content analysis, secondary data and data from an online survey.
The dissertation draws on the theoretical framework of Hallin and Mancini’s theory of the three models of media and politics. The findings suggest that the Icelandic media system is a mixed case in Hallin and Mancini’s classification. It is in many significant ways different from the media systems in the other Nordic countries, that constitute the core of the Democratic Corporatist model. The Icelandic media system is characterized by a combination of high levels of political parallelism and commercialization and a less developed and weaker journalistic profession than are in the other Nordic countries. A legacy of clientelism that has its roots in Iceland’s political history of democratization before bureaucracy and a political culture marked by confrontation still impacts the media system. The findings also indicate that an emphasis on soft news has increased in the Icelandic press at the expense of political coverage, particularly in online news. The study of gender representation in the news confirms the findings of many studies that have consistently shown that women are underrepresented in the news. The news consumption findings suggest that Iceland fits well with the description of the Democratic Corporatist countries, with their culture of equal and heavy news consumption. Icelanders use many news sources, both offline and online. Online sites are the most used, followed by TV news and social media. The study also demonstrates that traditional media, irrespective of platform, still provides most of the news Icelanders consume regularly. This points to fact that the news media still has an important role to play in a democratic society.