Putting focus on issues voters care most about helps media earn trust of readers and strengthens democracy, Citizens Agenda proponents argue

With partisanship rising and trust in media organizations falling, there is a movement among some journalists to turn election coverage away from politicians and toward voters by focusing on the issues voters say they want their elected officials to address.

One approach created by a prominent journalism professor and a community engagement consulting firm is called "The Citizens Agenda."

"It's a way of putting the public in power to be able to drive what information they get from politicians as they compete for the public's vote," said Jennifer Brandel, the co-founder of Hearken, the company that created the program along with New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen.

The Citizens Agenda starts by asking: "What do you want the candidates to be talking about as they compete for your vote?"

That's a departure from traditional election coverage, sometimes called horse race journalism, that focuses on candidates' differences, political polls and insider information about tactics candidates are using to win the election — often focusing less on how candidates will govern.

More:What should the candidates be talking about as they compete for your vote in Wisconsin this summer? Tell us.

That type of coverage can leave communities with knowledge and information gaps, which can undermine democracy and trust in the media.

Together, Hearken and Rosen teamed up in 2019 to create a step-by-step guide to address what they had already been separately advocating for and teaching journalists: how to refine the election reporting model to be more engaging and functional. 

"And people were on board with (the Citizens Agenda)," Brandel said. "Journalists said their process is currently broken to some degree and they needed to shift their newsrooms to be more engaged."

Over the next four months, the Ideas Lab at the USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin along with the LaFollette School of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Wisconsin Public Radio are using the Citizens Agenda model to learn more about what the state's residents think headed into the mid-term elections.

The Wisconsin Main Street Agenda survey project will report on what we're learning from residents and aims to invite a group of them to have deeper discussions about the issues, including at in-person events this fall. 

Building public trust in media by changing focus 

Americans' overall trust in media is at one of the lowest points in decades, according to a Gallup poll, and even lower among voters who identify themselves as Independents and Republicans.

The Citizens Agenda style of election reporting attempts to gain back some of that trust by making voters the focus of the reporting. 

Brandel said no matter how diverse a newsroom is, it can never fully represent all the interests of its community. By asking the public to get involved, community members are able to direct their concerns to the politicians and, in turn, get more inclusive media coverage.

"It shows newsrooms are working on behalf of the public and don't have their own agenda," she said.

A University of Wisconsin-Madison and Hearken study on the newsrooms who participated in the Citizens Agenda training for the 2020 election found 84% said it helped build trust between their newsrooms and community.

"Engagement practices are the way to fix the increasing gap in media trust," said Sue Robinson, an assistant professor of  journalism and mass communications at UW-Madison, who helped write the study.

In an increasingly polarized information stream, Robinson said journalists have to reach out to audiences and be more transparent in their reporting.

She said the more transparent and engaging the reporting process, the more trust is built between journalists and audiences.

By actively asking the public to participate in the coverage, the Citizens Agenda works to build this trust.

"The Citizens Agenda is an opportunity for newsrooms to articulate their values, state why they are doing something differently and what their goals are," Brandel said.

Rosen said this approach to election reporting is slowly gathering momentum as newsrooms across the country have created their own version of public-powered election coverage, including: 

►The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, which used a "Peoples Agenda" to see what residents wanted mayoral candidates to focus on last spring and then used what was learned to help shape mayoral forums with community partners.

►Oregon Capital Chronicle, where readers were invited to "Let's Talk" sessions to discuss what they wanted gubernatorial candidates to address as they competed for votes.

►Virginia Public Media, which launched the People's Agenda Election Survey to get insight from readers on how to cover Virginia's elections.

What does engaging the community mean in the real world?

Audience engagement is interacting with a newsroom's readers, viewers or listeners through online or print questionnaires and public events designed to garner feedback.

Community engagement goes broader and deeper into the community, interviewing people at local events, talking with nonprofits and support groups, and setting up engagement events at community spaces like local libraries. 

Brandel said community engagement is done best by reaching a wide demographic range.

"Journalists need to be really thoughtful about collecting questions from people that represent the breadth of the diversity, socioeconomic classes and language groups in their community," she said.

If enough of a community is surveyed, Rosen said journalists are able to spot trends and learn what is most important to the voters.

Once journalists gather a sense of what voters want of their politicians, journalists then can act as a point of connection between voters and candidates. 

Leaving behind horse race journalism

Rosen argues horse race journalism is prevalent because it's doesn't require much knowledge to create quick content for newsrooms, which is especially beneficial to smaller newsrooms that have been ravaged by job cuts.

A 2021 report from the Pew Research Center found U.S. newsroom employment has fallen 26% since 2008, a loss of about 30,000 jobs in five industries that produce news: newspaper, radio, broadcast television, cable and “other information services” including digital news publishers. 

Brandel argues that this type of coverage isn't useful to voters and can actually be harmful. 

Horse race journalism creates more polarization by focusing more on the competition and differences between the candidates. It can give unusual candidates an unfair amount of coverage and overlook independent or third-party hopefuls.

"(Horse race journalism) just takes a snapshot of how candidates are doing in the polls and doesn't help people understand how folks competing for their votes will govern," Brandel said.

A more useful strategy includes lists of the top issues voters say they are concerned about and includes information on how each candidate addresses those issues, according to Rosen.

Robinson, who studies journalism communication strategies on public affairs, said the public tends to write off media coverage of issues that have become highly polarized. But when election coverage is relevant to their community and useful, the public becomes more engaged, and that helps democracy. 

"When news is more relevant to people, then their civic engagement increases and their voting increases," she said.

Sophia Voight can be reached at svoight@postcrescent.com or 920-993-7102. Follow her on Twitter @sophia_voight.