Ethics of investigative journalism as the "fourth estate"

Discuss whether investigative journalism contributes to the notion of the press as the Fourth Estate and whether the methods used in such journalism are ethically acceptable.

Investigative Journalism (IJ), as defined by De Burgh (2008), is the profession with the purpose “to discover the truth and to identify lapses from it… it is not limited as to target”. Waisbord (2001) stresses that this purpose is not preceded by an exclusive methodology to IJ compared to its counterparts in its field, as journalism as a whole is concerned with inquiry, analysis and investigation. Rather, this profession is distinguished because it should be solely concerned with uncovering and reporting information regarding publicly relevant abuses by individuals and organisations. It is the field of journalism, he says, that deals, or should deal, exclusively in the public interest. As such, notions of the “fourth estate”, the role “of critical scrutiny over the powerful… the watchdog role” (McNair, 2008, pg. 239), have become synonymous with IJ (Konieczna, 2018). The extent to which IJ maintains this synonymy and if the means in which it does so are ethically acceptable will be discussed in this essay.

Investigative journalism, in its growing form in the mid-19th century, has long since been nurtured by liberal enlightenment beliefs around the relationship between governance and its citizenry (De Burgh, 2008). The Lockian ethic of a “social contract” to preserve the legal obligation a government owes to its citizens for their liberties was of particular importance following the 1688 Glorious Revolution (Britannica, 2025). Of key importance in this contract was the right to liberty and property, both of which intertwined with the other, that the government owed protection in return for the consent of its citizens to be governed (Russell, 1944). The result of this contract was the burgeoning demand of the public to become knowledgeable about governance and political and social matters. This saw the birth of the Victorian Free Press, as a new, unofficial “estate” for citizens to hold the government to account for failure to fulfil these obligations. In many ways, their existence was owed to the contract. Without the right to private property enshrined by governance, these newspapers would not have been able to act as an external regulator of the happenings of the British government. These groups of independent newspapers utilised this freedom to investigate matters regarding the welfare of British citizens. From concerns over the Crimean War (King, 2007) or commentary on class in the Morning Chronicle’s “Labour and the Poor” series (Herdman, 2022), investigative journalism upon its genesis was always a symptom, arbitrator and in virtue of the social contract. The role as an arbitrator of the contract eventually grew the free press as the fourth estate of government.

The means in which the press, as the fourth estate, functions as a theoretical aid to democracy as its arbitrator is rather different from its official estate counterparts. Whilst it is regulated by the other branches, the press is primarily regulated and theoretically held accountable by its market (Nerone, 1995). From this liberal framework, it is presumed that the competitive, self-interested nature of actors within its market will offer services that are of importance to the public and benefit society as a whole (p. 134). This would mean that success in the market for IJ and the press as a whole would be reliant on their ability to perform the fourth estate role. Indeed, there are prominent examples of this hypothesis being proven. The most prominent being the overseas 1972 Watergate scandal, when Washington Post IJs uncovered President Nixon’s espionage campaign against the Democrats, leading him to resign (Weaver, 1974). Subsequently, they were celebrated for spearheading the investigation and holding a president to account; made into heroes by the public for the amount of time, skill and resources it took to uncover the scandal (Feldstein, 2014).

However, the market-driven nature of the press as a whole has also caused detrimental consequences for IJ. Financial dependence of news outlets has shifted away from public interest stories to circulation and ad revenue, especially during the 20th century (Hampton, 2011). Focus on advertisement revenue, firstly, has deterred more radical reporting perspectives, as advertisers are less likely to support those which may be financially perilous (Curran & Seaton, 2018). This extends to IJ in particular, as Elliott and Ozar (2010) state simply: journalists must incur harm to incur social change. Be it reputational or financial, the nature of investigative reporting in its most distilled role as a watchdog is to criticise and oppose wrongdoing. This, when it has its maximum effect, results in job losses, compensation or even a presidential resignation like the Watergate scandal had. Advertisers are indifferent to public interest but vehemently opposed to public controversy and, consequently, financial loss. This is part of the reason why investigative journalism can be considered to have become estranged from the fourth estate role.

The second contributor to this notion is the current ownership of news outlets. The rise in operating costs for news outlets to circulate has led news ownership to be shifted into the hands of the wealthy. This is evidenced by figures like Rupert Murdoch owning 40% of British newspaper circulation by 2011 (Watson & Hickman, 2012). Since the proposal of IJ as a proponent of the fourth estate ethic implies its ability to function as an impartial witness of sorts, obvious discrepancies arise when the public interest clashes with commercial interests.

Mainstream media has often been credited with an “agenda-setting” function by academics such as McCombs & Shaw (1972). The ability to set the public agenda – to direct public concern to topics and therefore away from others – is a tool that the media can be accused of employing to prevent harm to the commercial interests of news owners, even if investigation of these matters would be crucial to the public agenda. Conboy (2017) indicates an example of this with his criticism of financial journalists’ failures to expose the risks of a financial crash in the build-up to the global economic recession in 2008. The media, he says, had become “too close to comment critically for the simple reason that they have become incorporated into an undemocratic power elite” (p. 1272). The ownership of news institutions that IJs are subject to seems to have maligned the profession from its “watchdog” role to instead become a lapdog for the private agenda of the wealthy. Therefore, an active choice has been made to defund investigative reporting, as oftentimes this private agenda is in opposition to the public agenda.

This agenda-setting function, in service to the public rather than private benefit, is delegated to IJ to act as a locator and interpreter of matters that are in the public interest. Research into the reception of investigative journalism shows audiences prioritise information that includes alerts of urgent threats to their day-to-day life. This also includes stories that can shed attention on secondary issues that should nevertheless be of public concern (Costera Meijer & Bijlevel, 2016). As representatives of the public conscience, they are expected to employ role-defined ethics that give them more ethical leeway in order to alert the public of these threats or matters of concern (Philips & Tapsall, 2002). Certain behaviours that are unacceptable for normal citizens become acceptable for IJ on the basis of their perceived utility in acquiring information of the public interest. Such a privilege is recognized in English law as well as internal IJ ethics. The Sunday Times, despite being found liable for libel after publishing their investigation of Irish Prime Minister Albert Reynolds, were only expected to pay a penny in damages. “The press discharges vital functions as a bloodhound as well as a watchdog”, said Lord Nicholls in his reasoning for the ruling (De Burgh, 2008, pg. 117).

Albeit, these ethical privileges given to IJ and the press as a whole to act as a bloodhound for public discourse seem to have been compromised by the commercial agenda. Smolla (1998, pg. 1098) says simply, “The dividing line between public and private life has evaporated,” in reference to the paparazzi’s encroachment into celebrities' private lives in the name of investigative journalism. The ethical privileges IJ enjoys as a means to act for the public interest, seems to often be used to justify intrusion into personal lives for the interest of the public. The Leveson inquiry is emblematic of the conflation between the two. “Circulation defines the public interest… I was simply serving their need,” says shunned former editor Paul McMullan (The Guardian, 2011). McMullan perceives circulation and consumption as a metric for what passes as public interest to justify the phone hackings of MPs. This attitude fails to account for the differences between consumer desires and citizens’ needs. The dogmatic commitment to identifying the two as one leads IJs such as McMullan into ethically unacceptable practice. A figure in a powerful institution; ideally, they would otherwise criticise if they were truly acting as the fourth estate.

These challenges and failures are not to diminish investigative journalism’s existing contributions to the fourth estate role. Rather, it is to point to how its practice is assailed, paradoxically, by the privatisation of its institution. IJ, with the fruits of their labour, have grown from merely an arbitrator of the social contract. Instead, they are considered an unofficial arm of government as the fourth estate. Yet, as one would expect the other branches to have a responsibility to serve the public, IJ is existent within a market that permits it to ignore this responsibility. Belonging in a market dictated by self interest, therefore, makes the fourth estate role incidental to commercial gain. At one time, the privatisation of IJ and the press was a boon to act as an external check of the government. Now, it is a hindrance to its mature form as a vital democratic mechanism.

Word count: 1608

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