Avoiding Conflict of Interest

Avoiding Conflict of Interest 

Meghan McManamon
mm434215@ohio.edu

Conflict of interest in journalism is when a person's best interest is not in those of the organization they work for, a story source they are covering or a partnership. In the long run, it all comes back to loyalty. If you let your emotions, materialistic things or social growth get in the way of your professional decisions then that damages your validity as a journalist.

 Image by Melissa Lin. © The Balance 2018

Avoiding Bribes

A journalist must knowingly avoid situations where they benefit themselves and are disloyal to others. For example, let's say you are covering a court case where person X is blatantly in the wrong and causing harm to those in the community. Your organization's code of ethics clearly states that you must always report the truth and be transparent to your audience. You stayed true to this until you were approached one day by someone on person X's defense team, offering you $10,000 to keep quiet about the verdict. The most ethical thing for you to do as a journalist in this situation is to avoid this completely. Taking the money is not only damaging your reputation as a journalist but also harming those in the community that have the right to know what is going on.

Personal Relationships 

According to the RTDNA guideline that they use to avoid situations like this, reporting with personal relationships involved are also to be avoided as a journalist. If a close friend or family member is on one side of the story, whether you know it or not, there is going to be a bias involved. You want to protect the reputation of someone you love and it is at the organization's best interest that you are not involved at all. This same guideline explains how unprofessional relationships or romances between journalists and their sources can also cause an audience member to react with suspicion.

Politics 

One of the hardest conflicts of interest's in the workplace has to do with politics. In today's political world, it can be very hard to be 100 percent unbiased in your writing. Though difficult, it should be a goal to stay as unbiased and equal as you possibly can. Another conflict of interest that can occur when reporting on politics is that of a family member or close friend running for office. According to SPJ political involvement article, they state, "The simplest answer is “No.” Don’t do it. Don’t get involved. Don’t contribute money, don’t work in a campaign, don’t lobby, and especially, don’t run for office yourself." This also means that yard signs, bumper stickers, and campaign buttons should not be used by any journalist.

Journalism is a profession strongly protected by the First Amendment and although it seems ironic that a code of ethics page is not allowing you to preach what you believe in, your organization is trying to save you from conflict. As a dedicated journalist, you have to put your work above anything else whether that be a bribe for a big chunk of money, an emotional connection or strong political interest.