Court news in the post-national security law Hong Kong: Examining the significance and journalistic roles, production, and contents of protests-/ politics-related court news = 後國安法時代的香港法庭新聞: 探討與示威和政治有關的法庭新聞的意義、新聞專業角色、新聞製作以及內容
Project title
Court news in the post-national security law Hong Kong: Examining the significance and journalistic roles, production, and contents of protests-/ politics-related court news = 後國安法時代的香港法庭新聞: 探討與示威和政治有關的法庭新聞的意義、新聞專業角色、新聞製作以及內容
Principal Investigator
Department
Grant Awarding Body
Research Grants Council
Grant Type
Faculty Development Scheme
Project Code
UGC/FDS15/H02/23
Amount awarded
HK$845,983
Funding Year
2023-2024
Duration of the Project
24 months
Status
On-going
Abstract
Throughout the world, the mainstream news media have tended to attach more importance to political news than court news. However, in recent years, Hong Kong (“HK”) has witnessed a very different scenario, where court news has increasingly become an important news genre. In 2019, Hong Kong experienced arguably the most tumultuous political crisis in the contemporary era. The anti-extradition bill amendment movement (“Anti-ELAB Movement”) has resulted in a large amount of court trials, with numerous political figures and protesters being sent to the courts to defend their alleged illegal activities during the period of social unrest. According to the Hong Kong Police’s figures, up until May 2022, more than 10,200 people were arrested among which 2,850 people were charged (Mok, 2022). After the street protests and the political conflicts in political institutions (such as the legislature) had subsided following the end of the movement and the promulgation of the national security law (“NSL”) in 2020, legal conflicts have persisted in the courtrooms between prosecutors, defendants, and judges. Over the past three years, HK media have closely and relentlessly monitored all these court trials, elevating the salience of court news in both media and public agendas (Tang, 2022). It is perhaps for the first time in recent decades that HK citizens are being exposed to legal information on such a large scale.
The growing prominence of court news related to protests and politics deserves more scholarly attention. This study aims to examine the conceived significance and journalistic roles, the production practices, and the content of the associated news reports. For the conceived significance and journalistic roles, it is imperative to find out why HK journalists have paid so much attention to court news related to protests and politics against the city’s democratic backsliding in the post-NSL era. As HK journalists have long held a liberal conception of the press, believing in the monitorial and adversarial roles of the media in providing checks and balances on the authorities, including the judiciary, it is also important to examine whether they would still uphold these types of professional roles when covering court news.
For production practices, this study will identify the political and other non-political factors that may affect the production of court news related to protests and politics. Politically, in face of growing concerns over the decline of press freedom, it is important to examine whether the growing political and legal pressures in the post-NSL era have affected the production of the concerned court news. Organizationally, we will pay attention to the relationship between the media and the court and examine whether and how it may also affect the room for newsgathering practices for court news. Technologically, with the digital transformation of the news landscape, there has been a rise in online alternative media and social media influencers specializing in court news in recent years. We will examine how they make use of digital platforms to produce alternative court news. At the individual level, the mainstream and alternative court news journalists may also differ in their conceived significance and journalistic roles in covering court news. In order to map out the new ecology of court news production in the post-NSL era, the differences in the production practices as well as the contents between the mainstream and alternative media necessitate investigation. Finally, with regard to contents, this study will examine what sorts of court information have been communicated to the public. We will analyze their content features, including their news values (e.g., deviance, conflicts, and importance), framing, and enacted professional roles.
To address the above conceptual issues, we will mainly conduct qualitative in-depth interviews with the court news journalists and a quantitative content analysis of the court news.
As HK has witnessed paradigmatic changes in the legal system, the political field, and the news landscape in the post-NSL era, a study of court news would provide a unique theoretical window to re-examine and reflect upon their changing relationships in the new political and legal context of HK. To the best of our knowledge, this study will be the first of its kind in HK, which will fill the long-standing theoretical void of court news research locally.
The growing prominence of court news related to protests and politics deserves more scholarly attention. This study aims to examine the conceived significance and journalistic roles, the production practices, and the content of the associated news reports. For the conceived significance and journalistic roles, it is imperative to find out why HK journalists have paid so much attention to court news related to protests and politics against the city’s democratic backsliding in the post-NSL era. As HK journalists have long held a liberal conception of the press, believing in the monitorial and adversarial roles of the media in providing checks and balances on the authorities, including the judiciary, it is also important to examine whether they would still uphold these types of professional roles when covering court news.
For production practices, this study will identify the political and other non-political factors that may affect the production of court news related to protests and politics. Politically, in face of growing concerns over the decline of press freedom, it is important to examine whether the growing political and legal pressures in the post-NSL era have affected the production of the concerned court news. Organizationally, we will pay attention to the relationship between the media and the court and examine whether and how it may also affect the room for newsgathering practices for court news. Technologically, with the digital transformation of the news landscape, there has been a rise in online alternative media and social media influencers specializing in court news in recent years. We will examine how they make use of digital platforms to produce alternative court news. At the individual level, the mainstream and alternative court news journalists may also differ in their conceived significance and journalistic roles in covering court news. In order to map out the new ecology of court news production in the post-NSL era, the differences in the production practices as well as the contents between the mainstream and alternative media necessitate investigation. Finally, with regard to contents, this study will examine what sorts of court information have been communicated to the public. We will analyze their content features, including their news values (e.g., deviance, conflicts, and importance), framing, and enacted professional roles.
To address the above conceptual issues, we will mainly conduct qualitative in-depth interviews with the court news journalists and a quantitative content analysis of the court news.
As HK has witnessed paradigmatic changes in the legal system, the political field, and the news landscape in the post-NSL era, a study of court news would provide a unique theoretical window to re-examine and reflect upon their changing relationships in the new political and legal context of HK. To the best of our knowledge, this study will be the first of its kind in HK, which will fill the long-standing theoretical void of court news research locally.