In Search of Lost Credibility: Reflections on the Reconfigurations of Journalistic Praxis in the Age of Mediatisation

This paper reflects on the reconfiguration processes that have reshaped journalistic praxis in newsrooms, particularly in response to the growing competition from new social actors who produce, circulate, and consume news on social media platforms within the context of a mediatised society. These transformations present significant theoretical, epistemological, ethical, and professional challenges for journalism researchers as they intersect with issues such as the fight against disinformation, the concepts of truth and post-truth, discursive symbolic power struggles, and the evolving dynamics of journalistic production and the circulation of information in the digital public sphere. To guide our reflections and explore the strategies journalism must adopt in today’s media ecosystem to preserve its authority, credibility, and role as a public truthteller, we contextualise the historical evolution of newsroom news production processes and perspectives on the influence of mediatisation. This is complemented by insights from interviews with journalists working at leading Brazilian print and online newspapers, examining the physical and cultural changes in newsroom routines over the past few decades.