JOURNALISM: CITY AND COUNTRY

Murdoch’s News

Political Bias in The Australian Newspaper’s Coverage of the 2013 Federal Election

Monash University, 2013

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Monash University

Table of Contents

ABSTRACT .............................................................................................................................. 6

INTRODUCTION (Research Topic: scope and rationale) .................................................... 6-7

REVIEW OF LITERATURE ............................................................................................. 7-9

RESEARCH METHOD AND FIELDWORK PROCEEDINGS .................................................. 9-10

Quantitative content analysis.................................................................................................. 10

Qualitative analysis (Semi-structured interviews) ............................................................. 10-11

Ethical considerations ............................................................................................................. 11

RESEARCH FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ........................................................................... 11

Political bias in election coverage ...................................................................................... 11-12

Political bias by editors ............................................................................................................ 13

Preference for elite sources ...................................................................................................... 14

CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................. 14-15

Future research ......................................................................................................................... 15

REFERENCES ................................................................................................................. 16-17

APPENDIX 1 (Table 1 and Coding) ................................................................................. 18-21

APPENDIC 2 (Semi-structured interview questions) ....................................................... 22-23

ABSTRACT

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During the 2013 Australian federal election, there was speculation of a political bias

i Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporatio ewspapers. Murdoch has a perso al

reputation as a conservative, and publically supported the coalition throughout the

ca paig . This article exa i es a weeks worth of fro t page headli es i Murdoch’s

leading national broadsheet, The Australian newspaper, in the week leading up to,

and 2 days after, the 2013 Australian Federal Election. It builds on the study by

Daniel Maguire, published in 2007, which examines Newspaper Coverage of the

2006 Queensland state election. It also builds on David McKnight and Brian

McNair’s ‘The empire goes to war: News Corporation and Iraq’, published in

the 2012, which examines editorial content across News Corp news media in

the six months leading up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. By using in-depth

interviews as well as content analysis and observation, this article attempts to fill

research deficits of these two studies, to either prove or disprove the notion that

Rupert Murdoch’s The Australian newspaper showed political bias in the lead up the

2013 federal election.

INTRODUCTION (Research problem and significance)

Australia has the highest concentration of media ownership in the Western

world (Harding-Smith, R, 2011). Of these media owners, Rupert Murdoch’s media

conglomerate News Corporation has the largest influence, selling around 59 per cent

of all daily newspapers nationally (Goldsmith 2013, para 6). This monopoly on

ownership is concerning, as it puts the potential influence of public opinions and

government in very few, powerful hands (Hinders, B 2004, cited in Harding-Smith, R

2001). These powerful conglomerate owners have the ability to form the political

agenda, in particular through broadsheet newspapers, which have greatest deal of

influence on the power elites of our society (Cunningham, S 2000, p22).

The Australian newspaper was launched by Murdoch in 1964 and has a wealthy

and powerful audience (The Australian Media Kit). With a Monday to Friday

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circulation of only around 164,000 copies, The Australian’s appeal for Murdoch may

not be the revenue it brings in, but its power to influence society’s elite

In the lead up to the 2013 federal election, speculation was cast over Murdoch’s

editorial influence over his News Corporation newspapers. Having a personal

reputation as a conservative, and publically supporting the coalition during the 2013

campaign (Woodhead, B 2013), Murdoch was thought to be harbouring a vendetta

against Kevin Rudd’s Australian Labor Party. On August 3, with an election looming,

The Australian newspaper ran four negative front-page headlines about the Rudd

Government in one day (Sheehan 2013).

In light of this, I have chosen to analyse Murdoch’s most influential national

newspaper, in order to determine whether or not his political views may have affected

coverage of the 2013 federal election. By conducting my research, I hope to either

prove or disprove the notion that Rupert Murdoch used his editorial influence over

The Australian newspaper, to push his own political and personal agenda during the

2013 federal election campaign. Few studies have looked onto the Australian

newspaper in this way, and none have used a combination of both qualitative and

quantitative research methodologies, which I will be using in my research. By

assessing and evaluating journalism practice through the eyes of a journalist, I will be

better able to understand the journalist’s place in society, and the news media

environment of today.

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

As part of my research, I have built on two studies that concern both newspaper

election coverage in Australia, and Murdoch’s editorial influence over News

Corporation media. Research deficits were addressed by using mixed methods of both

content analysis and interview in my own research.

The first study is an analysis of the newspaper coverage of the 2006 Queensland

state election by Daniel Maguire, published in the 2007 Australian Journalism Review

(Maguire, M 2007). The other is by David McKnight and Brian McNair titled ‘The

empire goes to war: News Corporation and Iraq’, which addresses Murdoch’s

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editorial influence in the lead up to the Iraqi invasion in 2003 (McKnight, D &

McNair, B 2012).

Maguire’s study compares election coverage from two News Corp dailies The

Gold Coast Bulletin and The Courier Mail, looking at the way a metropolitan

publication and a regional daily differed in their coverage of the election campaign,

and for political bias in that coverage. Starting from the first full day of campaigning

to Election Day, Maguire uses coding of ‘favourable’, ‘unfavourable’ and ‘neutral’ to

establish whether or not an article showed any party bias. The amount of coverage

given to each political party in both of the dailies was also analysed.

Maguire’s content analysis found that both newspapers gave the Labor

Government more news coverage than other coalition parties. The study also found

election stories in both newspapers to be ‘overwhelmingly neutral in tone’ (Maguire,

D 2007), while editorials were predominantly unfavourable towards the major parties.

The metropolitan Courier Mail had more election news stories and editorial that The

Gold Coast Bulletin – a result that Maguire expected to find.

Like Maguire, my research assesses the newspaper coverage of a political

election, however it focuses on one publication on a federal level. Unlike Maguire,

my study looks for evidence of a political bias in the front-page news headlines over a

seven-day period, instead of a more extensive word-by-word analysis of each article.

The second study that I have chosen to build on, McKnight and McNair’s ‘The

empire goes to war: News Corporation and Iraq’, was published in the Australian

Journalism Review in 2012. The pair examines editorial content across News Corp’s

news media in the six months leading up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. McKnight

and McNair compare published arguments for the invasion across the UK, the US and

Australian press, looking at the degree of editorial conformity (or otherwise), and for

evidence of biased coverage. They tested the notion that Murdoch’s relatively clear

support of an invasion of Iraq was pushed by the news media that he controlled

through his News Corp ownership. I chose to adopt this theme, looking at Murdoch’s

editorial influence on news publications within his conglomerate in my own research.

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McKnight and McNair found that while editorials in News Corporation

newspapers all reflected Murdoch’s views in strongly supported the war, and that

News Corporation outlets were generally pro-war, there was not a clear uniformity of

opinion throughout the three countries. In regards to Australian press, research

showed that The Australian and the Herald Sun had a roughly equal number of

articles representing those for and against the invasion. However, The Australian’s

op-ed pages published a larger number of pro-war articles than anti-war articles.

Across the three countries, a strong connection was found between the views of

Rupert Murdoch and those broadly expressed by his news media, and that it can be

attributed to his ownership.

I have chosen to build on this study, which suggests that Murdoch’s ownership

over news media could result in biased editorial content that reflects his own political

stance. Unlike McKnight and McNair, I have used interviews with employees at The

Australian newspaper, in order to explore the realities of working within a Murdoch

conglomerate, testing the theory that his employees feel pressure to adhere to a

particular party line to fit with their employers political stance. I conducted my

research on a much smaller scale, only addressing one publication from one country,

but have similarly assessed the connection between Rupert Murdoch’s political views

and the news content produced by News Corp media.

RESEARCH METHOD AND FIELDWORK PROCEEDINGS:

For my research, I have used a mixture of both quantitative and qualitative

analysis in order to fill the research deficits in Maguire and McKnight and McNair’s

studies. By using both content analysis and interviews, I am able to give more depth

to my research and prevent a reliance on one type of analysis at the exclusion of

another.

The use of qualitative methodologies allows social norms and opinions to be

taken into account. However, quantitative analysis alone can be weak, as it may result

in research that is lacking in quantitative evidence (Lutters, G & Ackerman, S 1996).

By combining a content analysis of The Australian Newspapers, and then discussing

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these findings with the subjects of this analysis, I was able to get the best result for

my research.

Quantitative Content Analysis

To begin my research, I collected seven days worth of The Australian

newspapers, starting from Monday September 2, up to Monday September 9. This

provided me with election coverage material form the week leading up to the election,

held on Saturday September 7, and two days after. As The Australian prints one

weekend addition as opposed to a Saturday and Sunday edition, including the Monday

September 9 newspaper in my analysis allowed me to assess post election coverage as

well.

After my content had been collected, I began subjectively analysing front-page

headlines regarding the election or politics on each day. My content analysis was

arranged in a table, which used detailed coding to determined the genre of the article,

the angle I had perceived it had taken, the number of elite and non-elite sources used

and the position of the author at The Australian.

I was able to use this analysis to discuss the ‘problem of bias’ in a meaningful

way (Kolmer, C 2008, p. 117). My findings also provided a platform for which my

qualitative analysis could be built. While many in the journalistic field object to the

‘bean-counting’ involved in content analysis, claiming it leads to a ‘misunderstanding

of their creative work’, and that the reliability of coding is limited (Kolmer, C 2008,

p. 120), by ‘monitoring the media’ in this way, we can better understand the impact of

media on society (Kolmer, C 2008 p. 117).

Qualitative (Semi-structured Interviews)

To build on my content analysis, I conducted semi-structured interviews with

political reporter Paul Maley and Queensland bureau chief Andrew Fraser from The

Australian Newspaper. Interviews were conducted via email and telephone and gave

depth to my content analysis by offering inside and personal opinion on my findings.

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I used interviews that were ‘planned and structured’ but which retained the

flexibility to adapt to the individual interview’ (Bowd, K 2004, p. 117-118). This

included a variety of questions concerning the key focus of my study in order to get a

general view on my research topic, as well as presenting some of my findings for

possible explanation.

Ethical Considerations

When interviewing journalists who are ‘accustom to being in control of the

questioning and direction of an interview’ (Bowd, K 2004, p. 118), subjects may be

uncooperative in answering questions, using their experience in the field to either

control the interview or to avoid answering certain questions. Acknowledgement must

be given therefore, that this could have ‘limit the amount of meaningful data’ that

could have been collected (Bowd, K 2004, p. 119). Wanting to impress those in my

desired field may have also resulted in easier questioning of subjects, so as not to

offend potential future employers or co-workers.

RESEARCH FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

Two main themes arose from my quantitative and qualitative analysis. One of

these themes being Political Bias, with headlines favouring The Liberal Party over

The Australian Labor Party (ALP), and another, the tendency to use significantly

more elite sources than non-elite sources in political pieces.

Political Bias in Election Coverage

Content analysis fount that in the week leading up to the 2013 federal election,

and two days after, the majority of headlines were perceived as having an anti Kevin

Rudd or Labor Party angle (Table 1). Of the 31 articles analysed, 12 showed a

negative angle towards the ALP, with eight of the 31 showing a Positive Angle

towards The Liberal Party. Only two headlines had a positive angle towards the ALP,

and showed a negative angle towards the Liberal Party. Of the 31 headlines, eight

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were neither biased towards the ALP or The Liberal Party. This could support the

theory that Murdoch’s want for a Liberal Government win in the election, influenced

the way The Australian newspaper covered political news at this time.

These results differ from Maguire’s analysis of the 2006 Queensland state

election, which found no evidence of bias in the newspapers' news stories, with the

tone of the coverage being overwhelmingly neutral. McKnight and McNair also found

that The Australian newspaper had a roughly equal number of articles representing

those for and against the invasion, but that there was ‘generally pro-war’ coverage

across international News Corporation media, which reflected Rupert Murdoch’s

political and personal stance.

While Queensland bureau chief Andrew Fraser says that a perceived bias

could have simply been reflective of a government that was losing popularity in the

lead up to the election, others see it as ‘part of a broad conspiracy’.

‘There gets to be an awful lot of conspiracy theories…that Rupert

Murdoch came to town and told them to take this line and we all

jump into the ditch, but it doesn’t work like that.’

From this analysis, we can determine that there is evidence of biased coverage

of the 2013 federal election by The Australian newspaper, which reflects the political

and personal views of News Corporation owner Rupert Murdoch. However, this

perceived bias could have been put down to journalists reflecting the views of a

community that was losing faith in the current government, and not necessarily due to

Rupert Murdoch’s direct influence.

Political Bias by Editors

Majority of headlines of articles written by editors, including political and

national affairs editors, showed either a positive sway towards The Liberal Party, or a

negative sway towards the ALP. Of the 21 headlines analysed, seven showed a

negative angle towards the ALP, seven showed a positive angle towards The Liberal

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Party, with only one showing a positive angle towards the ALP and one with a

negative angle towards The Liberal Party. Of all of the article headlines written by

editors, five showed no particular political angle. This may show that editors are more

likely to push a political agenda than staff writers, and that there may be more

inclination for them to reflect the political views of their boss Rupert Murdoch.

While political reporter Paul Maley says he has never felt pressure to adhere to

political views of editors of owners, Fraser acknowledges that editors may decide to

cover certain events in a particular way.

‘You will often get in discussions with the editors about looking at it

something in a particular way, but it’s never as crass as support The

Liberal party over The Labor party…you don’t get anything at all like

that.’

From these findings, we can determine that the majority of editorial headlines,

written by the editor at large, political editors and national affairs editors, showed

evidence of a political bias against the ALP and towards The Liberal Party. While

McKnight and McNair did not find political bias in The Australian’s coverage of the

Iraq War, the op-ed pages did publish a larger number of pro-war articles than anti-

war, suggesting as my own analysis did, that editors may be more likely to make

biased decisions in their roles, in order to conform to Rupert Murdoch’s personal and

political views. This may be more subtle however, than making a clear editorial

decision to be biased, or in some cases may not exist at all. Like McKnight and

McNair, Maguire found no evidence of political bias, but did not analyse articles

written by editors separately from other articles.

Preference for Elite Sources

A significant majority of articles analysed used elite sources in positions of

power in society, over non-elite sources with no links to positions of power. Of the

131 sources used throughout the week’s worth of election coverage, only 15 of these

were from non-elite individuals. While Fraser does not feel this is a cause for alarm,

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he admits to being more inclined not to send reporters to too many public events or

press conferences, as he is ‘a great believer in talking to as many people as possible’,

saying it is ‘a lot better way to go’. Political journalist Paul Maley however, says a

reliance on elite sources neither surprises, nor troubles him.

‘If by elite sources we mean government departments, ministers,

police spokesman etc. their over-representation makes sense. They

are legitimate sources of information. Also people in positions of

power are more likely to make decisions or take actions that impact

on our lives. For that reason I suspect they are more likely to feature

prominently in media coverage.’

Neither Maguire nor McKnight and McNair analysed the number of elite and

non-elite sources used, which is a deficit in both of their studies. A preference for elite

sources over non-elite sources may result in news that is lacking in public perspective,

pushing the views of the power elites in society and forming the political agenda

(Cunningham, S 2000).

This data would suggest that The Australian newspaper has a clear preference

for using elite sources when covering political issues. For some working in the news

industry however, this reliance on elite sources is not an area for concern, as they are

thought to be a more legitimate and authoritative source.

CONCLUSION

Quantitative content analysis of political themed headlines in Rupert

Murdoch’s The Australian newspaper during the 2013 federal election show a

political bias against the ALP. Qualitative analysis in the form of interviews however,

suggests that there is no direct pressure on News Corporation employees to adhere to

any particular political views. Data also shows that editors are more likely than staff

writers to show political bias in their reporting, which reflects the views of their

conglomerate owner. Journalists and editors overall have a strong tendency to use

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elite sources over those who are non-elite, but some do not see this as concerning, as

they see elite sources as more legitimate sources of information.

Future Research

While qualitative analysis in the form if interviews shows that employees are

not pressured directly by Rupert Murdoch to push his political view, further research

into a more subtle or subconscious tendency to adhere to this view may be an area for

future research. With more time and resources, an analysis of entire editorial content,

as opposed to looking solely at front-page headlines, could give more thorough

results. Future research may benefit from interviewing an editor or political editor as

well as a staff writer or political reporter, to gain more insight into the topic.

REFERENCES

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Bowd, Kathryn 2004, ‘Interviewing the Interviewer’, Australian Journalism

Review, Vol. 26, pp. 115-123

Cunningham, S 2000, ‘Whither Media Influence’, Media International

Australia Incorporating Culture and Policy, Vol. 95, pp. 19-26.

Goldsmith, B 2013, ‘Fact Check: does Murdoch own 70% of newspapers in

Australia?’, The Conversation, 8 August,

https://theconversation.com/factcheck-does-murdoch-own-70-of-newspapers-

in-australia-16812

Harding-Smith, R (United Nations Development Programme) 2011, ‘Media

Ownership and Regulation in Australia’, viewed October 29, 2013,

http://cpd.org.au/wp-

content/uploads/2011/11/Centre_for_Policy_Development_Issue_Brief.pdf

Kolmer, C 2008, Global Journalism Research, Blackwell Publishing, pp. 117-

128

Lutters, G & Ackerman, S 1996, ‘An Introduction to the Chicago School of

Sociology’, Interval Research Proprietary, pp. 1-12.

Maguire, D. 2007, ‘ Newspaper coverage of the 2006 Queensland state

election’: Australian Journalism Review, vol. 23. No. 2, p. 109-122.

McKnight, D and McNair, B. 2012, ‘The empire goes to war: News

Corperation and Iraq’: The Australian Journalism Review, vol.34, no.2 p. 7-

17.

Sheehan, P 2013, ‘Murdoch sends trusted generalCol-Pot to bring down Rudd

over NBN’, The Age, 4 August, viewed 4 August 2013,

http://www.theage.com.au/comment/murdoch-sends-trusted-general-col-pot-

to-bring-down-rudd-over-nbn-20130803-2r6fk.html

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The Australian media kit, News Corporation,

http://www.newscorpaustralia.com/brand/australian

Woodhead, B 2013, Rupert Murdoch tweets Rudd ‘convincing nobody’, The

Financial Review, 20 August, viewed 23 August 2013,

http://www.afr.com/p/national/rupert_murdoch_tweets_rudd_convincing_JPty

Mlum4L2GtG9hIYzrfM

APPENDIX 1: Qualitative Content Analysis

Table 1: Analysis of The Australian Newspaper front-page headlines

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Day (Front

page) Genre Angle Elite Sources

Non elite

Sources

Story

type Author

2-Sep O NA 3 0 SF SW Sid

Maher

2 Sept P

NAALP

0 0 N E Dennis

Shanahan PAL

2 Sept O NAALP 3 0 E E Paul Kelly

2 Sept O NAALP 3 0 SF BC Jamie

Walker

3-Sep P NAALP 1 0 SF E Dennis

Shanahan

3-Sep O NA 2 2 SF

E Bernard

Lane & SW

Sid Maher

3-Sep NBN PAL 2 2 SF SW Peter

Griffith

3-Sep R PAALP 3 3 SF

SW Paul

Maley &

Lauren

Wilson

4-Sep O NA 8 0 F

E Ewin

Hannan &

John

Ferguson

4-Sep CC PAALP 11 0 F E David

Crowe & SW

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Joe Kelly

4-Sep O NA 6 0 F

SW Jared

Owens & F

Ean Higgins

4-Sep CC NAALP 3 0 O E Dennis

Shanahan

5-Sep P NAALP 7 0 F F Troy

Bramston

5-Sep B PAL 6 0 F E David

Crowe

5-Sep O PAL 3 0 E

E Paul Kelly

& Dennis

Shanahan

5-Sep O PAL 4 1 F

E John

Ferguson &

SW Brad

Norington

6-Sep B NA 7 0 F E David

Crowe

6-Sep NBN NAALP 1 1 SF SW Mitchell

Bingemann

6-Sep O NAALP 2 0 F E David

Crowe

6-Sep P NAALP 6 1 F

SW Sid

Maher & E

Dennis

Shanahan

17

6-Sep O NAL 3 0 N

E & BC

Patricia

Karvelas

7-Sep

(Election

Day)

O NAALP 3 0 F

SW Brad

Norington &

F Troy

Bramston

7-Sep

(Election

Day)

P PAL 0 0 SF E Dennis

Shanahan

7-Sep

(Election

Day)

P NA 5 1 SF F Troy

Bramston

7-Sep

(Election

Day)

O NA 2 0 E

E Dennis

Shanahan &

E Paul Kelly

7-Sep

(Election

Day)

B NA 1 0 E

E Dennis

Shanahan & E

Paul Kelly

9-Sep O PAL 4 0 F

E David

Cowe & SW

Sid Maher

9-Sep

O PAL 7 0 F

E Dennis

Shanahan & E

Paul Kelly

9-Sep O NAALP 8

F

F Troy

Bramston

9-Sep O NAALP 1 0 E E Paul Kelly

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Coding:

Genre: climate change-CC; refugees- R; budget- B; National Broadband Network-NBN; Polls-P;

Other-O

Angle: Positive angle ALP- PAALP; Positive angle Liberal PAL; Negative Angle ALP- NAALP; Negative

Angle Liberal- NAL; Neutral Angle-NA.

Sources: Elite sources- ES ; Non-elite Sources- NES ; Elite & Non elite Sources- ENES

Story type: News- N (100-500 words); Sub-Feature –SB (500-800words; Feature- F (1000 or

more); Opinion- O; Editorial- E.

Author: Editor (Incl. Deputy, Political, National Affairs)- E; Staff writer- SW; Freelancer- F; Bureau

Chief- BC: Deputy Editor- DE

Elite sources: Individuals or organisations who are in positions of power in society

Non- elite sources: Individuals who, when cited in the news, are not linked to positions of power.

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APPENDIX 2: List of semi-structured interviewees questions for:

Andrew Fraser – Queensland Bureau Chief, The Australian Newspaper

Paul Maley – Political Reporter, The Australian Newspaper

1. Tell me about your background. How did you get to the position at The

Australian? How long have you been there for?

2. Have you always wanted to work in political reporting?

3. What is your role at The Australian?

4. What are the values of The Australian? What does the publication aim to do?

5. Would you say that objective and unbiased reporting is something that The

Australian values and strives to uphold?

6. A content analysis of The Australian newspaper’s coverage of this year’s

federal election shows that of 31 article headlines, 12 could be perceived as

having a negative angle towards the Rudd/Labor government, while only one

showed a negative sway towards the Liberal Party. What reasoning could be

given for this?

7. Could it simply be reflective of a government that was losing popularity in the

lead up to the election?

8. Do newspapers have a role to play in campaigning against those things that are

of concern to the public, as well as informing the people?

9. The Finkelstein Inquiry last year stated that ‘there is nothing wrong with

newspapers having an opinion and advocating a position, even mounting a

campaign. Those are the natural and generally expected functions of

newspapers’. To what extent to you agree or disagree with this statement?

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10. Have you ever felt a pressure to adhere to the political views of media owners

when working for a large media conglomerate?

11. Analysis also showed that elite sources, those in positions of power, were used

more than seven times more than non-elite sources.

12. Have you ever had your work edited in a way that you felt showed a political

bias?

13. Do you think that public journalism should strive to be more representative of

ordinary members of the public, or is this not a cause for concern?

14. Anything you would like to add?