Conceptualizing the development of professional journalism: A scoping review

In a constantly shifting context, where journalism is changing in response to evolving dynamics from politicians, the public, and big tech, it is crucial to understand the concepts that characterize the journalism profession. By understanding what journalism is and is not, and who is, or is not a journalist, journalists can reevaluate their added value in a changing society. This paper aims to identify key pressures that have been reshaping the journalism profession and to explore how the underlying core concepts that describe it are interconnected. It presents the results of a scoping literature review in journalism and media studies, focusing on academic literature that conceptualizes professional journalism. Our analysis shows, firstly, that a substantial body of literature refers to journalism as a collective entity; journalism at an institutional and an organizational level. Little attention has been paid to the journalist as an individual. Secondly, professional journalism is affected by both external developments, including technological, societal, and economic changes, as well as internal debates within the field. Building upon these two findings of our extensive scoping review, we propose a conceptual model that includes five factors influencing the core concepts of professional journalism: two related to journalism as a collective entity and three related to the individual journalist. Based on this model and our description of how the core concepts of professional journalism are interconnected, we propose a research agenda for further studying the professionalization of journalism.